The Dragon Republic

by R. F. Kuang

  Rage and grief were so different. Rage gave her the power to burn down countries. Grief only exhausted her.

  “And if you went back to the temple?” Kitay pressed. “If you went back and summoned the Phoenix?”

  “I’m not going back to that temple,” Rin said immediately. She didn’t know what it was, but Kitay’s enthusiasm was making her uncomfortable—he was looking at her with the sort of intense curiosity that she had only ever seen in Shiro and Petra.

  “But if you had to? If we only had one option, if everything would be lost if you didn’t do it?”

  “We’re not putting that on the table.”

  “I’m not saying you have to. I’m saying we have to know if it’s even an option. I’m saying you have to at least try.”

  “You want me to practice a genocidal event,” she said slowly. “Just to be clear.”

  “Start small,” he suggested. “Then get bigger. See how far you can go without the temple.”

  “That’ll destroy everything in sight.”

  “We haven’t seen signs of human life all day. If anyone lived here, they’re long gone. This is empty land.”

  “What about wildlife?”

  Kitay rolled his eyes. “You and I both know that wildlife is the least of your concerns. Stop hedging, Rin. Do it.”

  She nodded, put her palms out, and closed her eyes.

  Flame wrapped her like a warm blanket. It felt good. It felt too good. She was burning without guilt or consequence. She was unrestrained power. She could feel herself tipping back into that state of ecstasy, could have lost herself in the dreamy oblivion of the wildfire that surged higher, faster, brighter, if she hadn’t heard a high-pitched keening that wasn’t coming from her.

  She looked down. Kitay lay curled in a fetal position on the raft, hands clutching his mouth, trying to suppress his screams.

  She reined the fire back in with difficulty.

  Kitay made a choking noise and buried his head in his hands.

  She dropped to her knees beside him. “Kitay—”

  “I’m fine,” he gasped. “Fine.”

  She tried to put her hands on him, but he pushed her away with a violence that shocked her.

  “Just let me breathe.” He shook his head. “It’s all right, Rin. I’m not hurt. It’s just—it’s all in my head.”

  She could have slapped him. “You’re supposed to tell me when it’s too much.”

  “It wasn’t too much.” He sat up straight. “Try that again.”

  “What?”

  “I couldn’t get a good look at your blast radius just then,” he said. “Try it again.”

  “Absolutely not,” she snapped. “I don’t care that you’ve got a death wish. I can’t keep doing this to you.”

  “Then go right up to the edge,” he insisted. “The point right before it hurts too much. Let’s figure out what the limit is.”

  “That’s insane.”

  “It’s better than finding out on a battlefield. Please, Rin, we won’t get a better chance to do this.”

  “What is wrong with you?” she demanded. “Why does this matter so much?”

  “Because I need to know the full extent of what you can do,” Kitay said. “Because if I’m strategizing for Arlong’s defense then I need to know where to put you, and why. Because if I went through all of this for you, then the very least you can do is show me what maximum power looks like. If we’ve turned you back into a weapon, then you’re going to be a damn good one. And stop panicking over me, Rin. I’m fine until I say I’m not.”

  So she called the flame again and again, pushing the limits every time, until the shores burned pitch-black around them. She kept going even while Kitay screamed because he’d ordered her not to stop unless he said so explicitly. She kept going until his eyes rolled back into his head and he went limp on the raft. And even then, when he revived seconds later, the first thing he said to her was: “Fifty yards.”

  When at last they reached the Red Cliffs, Rin saw with immense relief that the flag of the Republic still flew over Arlong.

  So Vaisra was safe, and Daji was still a distant threat.

  Their next challenge was to get back into the city without getting shot. Arlong, expecting a Militia assault, had hunkered down behind its defenses. The massive gates to the harbor past the Red Cliffs were locked. Crossbows were lined up against every flat surface overlooking the channel. Rin and Kitay could hardly march up to the city doors—any sudden, unexpected movement would get them stuck full of arrows. They discovered this when they saw a wild monkey wander too close to the walls and startle a line of trigger-happy archers.

  They were so exhausted that they found this ridiculously funny. A month’s worth of travel and their biggest concern was friendly fire.

  Finally they decided to get some sentries’ attention in the least threatening way possible. They hurled rocks at the sides of the cliff and waited while pinging noises echoed around the channel until at last a line of soldiers emerged on the cliffside, crossbows pointed down.

  Rin and Kitay immediately put their hands up.

  “Don’t shoot, please,” Kitay called.

  The sentry captain leaned over the cliff wall. “What the hell do you think you’re doing?”

  “We’re Republican soldiers back from Boyang,” Kitay called, gesturing to their uniforms.

  “Uniforms are cheap on corpses,” said the captain.

  Kitay pointed to Rin. “Not uniforms that fit her.”

  The captain looked unconvinced. “Back away or I’ll shoot.”

  “I wouldn’t,” Rin called. “Or Vaisra will be asking why you’ve killed his Speerly.”

  The sentries hooted with laughter.

  “Good one,” said the captain.

  Rin blinked. Did they not recognize her? Did they not know who she was?

  “Maybe he’s new,” Kitay said.

  “Can I hurt him?” she muttered.

  “Just a little.”

  She tilted her head back and opened her mouth. Breathing fire was harder than shooting it from her hands because it gave her less directional control, but she liked the dramatic effect. A stream of fire shot into the air and unfurled itself into the shape of a dragon that hung for a moment in front of the awed soldiers, undulating grandly, before rushing the captain.

  He was never in any real danger. Rin extinguished the flames as soon as they made contact. But he still screamed and fell backward as if he were being charged by a bear. When at last he resurfaced over the cliff wall, his face had turned bright pink, and smoke drifted up from his singed eyebrows.

  “I should shoot you just for that,” he said.

  “Why don’t you just tell Vaisra that the Speerly’s back,” Rin said. “And bring us something to eat.”

  Word of their return seemed to have spread instantly to the entire harbor. A massive crowd of soldiers and civilians alike surrounded them the moment they passed through the gates. Everyone had questions, and they shouted them from every direction so loudly that Rin could barely make out a word.

  The questions she did understand were about soldiers still missing from Boyang. The people wanted to know if any others were still alive. If they were on their way back. Rin didn’t have the heart to answer.

  “Who dragged you out of hell?” Venka elbowed her way through the soldiers. She seized Rin by the arms, looked her up and down, and then wrinkled her pert nose. “You smell.”

  “Nice to see you, too,” Rin said.

  “No, really, it’s rank. It’s like you’ve taken a knife blade to my nose.”

  “Well, we haven’t seen properly clean water in over a month, so—”

  “So what’s the story?” Venka interrupted. “Did you break out of prison? Take out an entire battalion? Swim the whole length back down the Murui?”

  “We drank horse piss and got high,” said Kitay.

  “Come again?” Venka asked.

  Rin was about to explain when she caught sight of Nezha
pushing his way to the front of the crowd.

  “Hello,” she said.

  He stopped just before her and stared, blinking rapidly as if he didn’t know what he was looking at. His arms hung awkwardly at his sides, slightly uplifted, like he wasn’t sure what to do with them.

  “Can I?” he asked.

  She stretched her arms toward him. He pulled her in against him so hard that she stiffened on instinct. Then she relaxed, because Nezha was so warm, so solid, and hugging him was such a wonderful feeling that she just wanted to bury her face into his uniform and stand there for a very long time.

  “I can’t believe it,” Nezha murmured into her ear. “We thought for sure . . .”

  She pressed her forehead against his chest. “Me too.”

  Her tears were falling thick and fast. The embrace had already stretched on much longer than it should have, and finally Nezha let her go, but he didn’t take his arms off her shoulders.

  Finally he spoke. “Where is Jinzha?”

  “What do you mean?” Rin asked. “He didn’t return with you?”

  Nezha just shook his head, eyes wide, before he was pushed aside by two massive bodies.

  “Rin!”

  Before she could speak, Suni wrapped her in a tight hug, lifting her a good foot off the ground, and she had to pound frantically at his shoulder before he released her.

  “All right.” Ramsa reached up and frantically patted Suni’s shoulder. “You’re going to crush her.”

  “Sorry,” Suni said, abashed. “We just thought . . .”

  Rin couldn’t help but grin even as she felt her ribs for bruises. “Yeah. Good to see you, too.”

  Baji grabbed her hand, pulled her in, and pounded her on the shoulder. “We knew you weren’t dead. You’re too spiteful to go that easy.”

  “How did you get back?” Rin asked.

  “Feylen didn’t just wreck our ships, he whipped up a storm that wrecked everything in the lake,” Baji said. “He was aiming for the big ships, though; somehow a few of the skimmers held together. About a quarter of us managed to get out of the maelstrom. I’ve no idea how we paddled back out to the river alive, but here we are.”

  Rin had an idea of how that had happened.

  Ramsa’s eyes flickered between her and Kitay. “Where are the twins?”

  “That’s a long story,” Rin said.

  “Not dead?” Baji asked.

  “I . . . ah, it’s complicated. Chaghan isn’t. But Qara—” She paused, searching for the right words to say next, just as she saw a tall figure approaching from just over Baji’s shoulder.

  “Later,” she said quietly.

  Baji turned his head, saw who she was looking at, and immediately stepped aside. A hush fell over the soldiers, who parted ranks to let the Dragon Warlord through.

  “You’ve returned,” said Vaisra. He looked neither pleased nor displeased but somewhat impatient, as if he’d simply been expecting her.

  Rin instinctively ducked her head. “Yes, sir.”

  “Good.” Vaisra gestured toward the palace. “Go clean yourself up. I’ll be in my office.”

  “Tell me everything that happened at Boyang,” Vaisra said.

  “Haven’t they already told you?” Rin sat down opposite him. She smelled better than she had in weeks. She’d cut her oily, lice-ridden hair; scrubbed herself in cold water; and traded in her stained, pungent clothes for a fresh uniform.

  A part of her had been hoping for a warmer welcome—a smile, a hand on her shoulder, at least some indication that Vaisra was glad she was back—but all he gave her was solemn expectation.

  “I want your account,” he said.

  Rin considered pinning the blame on Jinzha’s tactical decisions, but there was no point in antagonizing Vaisra by rubbing salt into an open wound. Besides, nothing Jinzha had done could have prevented what had happened once the battle began. He might as well have been fighting the ocean itself.

  “The Empress has another shaman in her employ. His name is Feylen. He channels the Wind God. He used to be in the Cike, until that went sideways. He wrecked your fleet. Took him minutes.”

  “What do you mean, he used to be in the Cike?” Vaisra asked.

  “He was put down,” Rin said. “I mean, he went mad. A lot of shamans do. Altan let him back out of the Chuluu Korikh by accident—”

  “By accident?”

  “On purpose, but he was stupid to do it. And now I suppose Daji’s found a way to lure him onto her side.”

  “How did she do that?” Vaisra demanded. “Money? Power? Can he be bought?”

  “I don’t think he cares about any of that. He’s . . .” Rin paused, trying to figure out how to explain it to Vaisra. “He doesn’t want what humans want. The god has . . . like with me, with the Phoenix—”

  “He’s lost his mind,” Vaisra supplied.

  She nodded. “I think Feylen needs to fulfill the god’s fundamental nature. The Phoenix needs to consume. But the Wind God needs chaos. Daji’s found some way to bend that to her will, but you won’t be able to tempt him with anything humans might want.”

  “I see.” Vaisra was silent for a moment. “And my son?”

  Rin hesitated. Had they not told him about Jinzha? “Sir?”

  “They didn’t bring back a body,” Vaisra said.

  His mask cracked then. For the briefest moment, he looked like a father.

  So he did know. He just wouldn’t admit to himself that if Jinzha hadn’t made his way back to Arlong with the rest of the fleet, then he was probably dead.

  “I didn’t see what happened to him,” Rin said. “I’m sorry.”

  “There’s no point speculating, then,” Vaisra said coolly. His mask reassembled itself. “Let’s move on. I assume you’ll want to rejoin the infantry?”

  “Not the infantry.” Rin took a deep breath. “I want command of the Cike again. I want a seat at the strategy table. I want direct say in anything you want the Cike to do.”

  “And why’s that?” Vaisra asked.

  Because Chaghan can’t be right about my being your dog. “Because I deserve it. I broke the Seal. I’ve gotten the fire back.”

  Vaisra raised an eyebrow. “Show me.”

  She turned an open palm toward the ceiling and summoned a fist-sized ball of fire. She made it run up and down the length of her arm, made it twist around her in the air before calling it back into her fingers. Even after a month of practice, she was still amazed at how easy it was, how delightfully natural it felt to control the flame the way she controlled her fingers. She let it take shapes—a rat, a rooster, an undulating orange dragon—and then she closed her fingers over her palm.

  “Very nice,” Vaisra said approvingly. The mask was gone now; he was finally smiling. She felt a warm rush of encouragement.

  “So. Command?”

  He waved a hand. “You’re reinstated. I’ll let the generals know. How did you manage this?”

  “That’s a long story.” She paused, wondering where to start. “We, ah, ran into some Ketreyids.”

  He frowned. “Hinterlanders?”

  “Don’t call them that. They’re Ketreyids.” She gave him a quick account of what the Ketreyids had done, told him about the Sorqan Sira and the Trifecta.

  She omitted the part about the anchor bond. Vaisra didn’t need to know.

  “Then what happened?” Vaisra asked. “Where are they?”

  “They’re gone. And the Sorqan Sira’s dead.”

  “What?”

  She told him about Augus. She knew Vaisra would be surprised, but she hadn’t expected his reaction. The color drained from his face. His entire body tensed.

  “Who else knows?” he demanded.

  “Just Kitay. And a couple of Ketreyids, but they’re not telling anyone.”

  “Tell no one this happened,” he said quietly. “Not even my son. If the Hesperians find out, our lives are forfeit.”

  “It was their fault to begin with,” she muttered.

  �
��Shut up.” He slammed a hand on the table. She flinched back, startled.

  “How could you be so stupid?” he demanded. “You should have brought them back safe, that would have ingratiated us to General Tarcquet—”

  “Tarcquet made it back?” she interrupted.

  “Yes, and many of the Gray Company are with him. They escaped south in one of the skimmers. They are deeply unhappy with our naval capabilities and are this close to pulling out of the continent, which is a thought I assume never crossed your mind when you decided to murder one of them.”

  “Are you joking? They were trying to kill us—”

  “So you should have incapacitated him or fled. The Gray Company is untouchable. You couldn’t have picked a worse Hesperian to kill.”

  “This isn’t my fault,” Rin insisted. “He’d gone mad, he was waving an arquebus around—”

  “Listen to me,” Vaisra said. “You are walking a very fine line right now. The Hesperians are not just upset, they are terrified. They thought you a curiosity before. Then they saw what happened at Boyang. Now they are convinced that each and every one of you is a mindless agent of Chaos who could bring about the end of the world. They’re going to hunt down every shaman in this empire and put them in cages if they can. The only reason why they haven’t touched you is because you volunteered, and they know you’ll cooperate. Do you understand now?”

  Fear struck Rin. “Then Suni and Baji—”

  “—are safe,” Vaisra said. “The Hesperians don’t know about them. And they’d better not find out, because then Tarcquet will know we’ve lied to him. Your job is to keep your head down, to cooperate, and to draw the least possible attention to yourself. You have a reprieve for now. Sister Petra has agreed to postpone your meetings until, one way or another, this war has concluded. So behave yourself. Do not give them further reason for irritation. Otherwise we are all lost.”

  Then Rin understood.

  Vaisra wasn’t angry at her. This wasn’t about her at all. No, Vaisra was frustrated. He’d been frustrated for months, playing an impossible game with the Hesperians where they kept changing the rules.

  She dared to ask. “They’re never bringing their ships, are they?”