The Poppy War (The Poppy War Trilogy #1)
The Poppy War: Part 1 – Chapter 8

Sinegard Academy gave students four days off from studies to celebrate the Summer Festival. The next term would begin as soon as they returned.

Most students took this as a chance to visit their families. But Rin didn’t have time to travel all the way back to Tikany, nor did she want to. She had planned on spending the break at the Academy, until Kitay invited her to stay at his estate.

“Unless you don’t want to,” Kitay said nervously. “I mean, if you already have plans—”

“I have no plans,” Rin said. “I’d love to.”

She packed for her excursion into the city the next morning. This took mere seconds—she had very few personal belongings. She carefully folded two sets of school tunics into her old travel satchel, and hoped Kitay would not replace it rude if she wore her uniform during the festival. She had no other clothing; she’d gotten rid of her old southerner’s tunics the first chance she got.

“I’ll get a rickshaw,” Rin offered as she met Kitay at the school gates.

Kitay looked puzzled. “Why do we need a rickshaw?”

Rin frowned. “Then how are we getting there?”

Kitay opened his mouth to reply just as a massive horse-drawn carriage pulled up by the gates. The driver, a portly man in robes of rich gold and burgundy, hopped off the coachman’s seat and bowed deeply in Kitay’s direction. “Master Chen.”

He blinked at Rin, as if trying to decide whether to bow to her as well, and then managed a perfunctory head dip.

“Thanks, Merchi.” Kitay handed their bags to the servant and helped Rin into the carriage.

“Comfortable?”

“Very.”

From their vantage point in the carriage, they could see almost all the city nested in the valley below: the spiraling pagodas of the administrative district rising through a faint blanket of mist, white houses built into the valley slopes with curved tiled roofs, and the winding stone walls of the alleyways leading downtown.

From the shaded interior of the carriage, Rin felt insulated from the dirty city streets. She felt clean. For the first time since she had arrived in Sinegard, she felt as if she belonged here. She leaned against the side and enjoyed the warm summer breeze against her face. She had not rested like this in a long time.

“We will discuss what happened to you in detail when you return,” Jiang had told her. “But your mind has just suffered a very particular trauma. The best thing you can do for yourself now is rest. Let the experience germinate. Let your mind heal.”

Kitay, tactfully, did not ask her what had happened. Rin was grateful for it.

Merchi drove them at a brisk pace down the mountain pass. They continued on the main city road for an hour and then turned left onto the isolated road that led into the Jade District.

When Rin had arrived in Sinegard a year ago, she and Tutor Feyrik had traveled through the working-class district, where the inns were cheap and gambling houses stood around every corner. Her daily trips to see the Widow Maung had led her through the loudest, dirtiest, and smelliest parts of the city. What she’d seen of Sinegard so far was no different from Tikany—it was just noisier and more cramped.

Now, riding in the Chen family’s carriage, she saw how splendid Sinegard could be. The roads of the Jade District were freshly paved, and glistened like they had been scrubbed clean that very morning. Rin saw no wooden shacks, no evident dumping grounds for chamber pots. She saw no grumpy housewives steaming breads and dumplings on outdoor grills, too poor to afford indoor stoves. She saw no beggars.

She found the stillness unsettling. Tikany was always bustling with activity—drifters collecting trash to repackage and sell; old men sitting on stoops outside, smoking or playing mahjong; little children wearing jumpers that exposed their butt cheeks, wandering around the streets followed by squatting grandparents ready to catch them when they toppled over.

She saw none of that here. The Jade District was composed of pristine barriers and walled-off gardens. Aside from their carriage, the roads were empty.

Merchi stopped the carriage before the gates of a massive compound. They swung ponderously open, revealing four long rectangular buildings arranged in a square, enclosing an enormous garden pavilion. Several dogs rushed them at the entrance, tiny white things whose paws were as immaculately clean as the tiled path they walked on.

Kitay gave a shout, climbed out of the carriage, and knelt down. His dogs leaped on him, tails wagging with delirious delight.

“This one’s the Dragon Emperor.” He tickled a dog under its chin. “They’re all named after the great rulers.”

“Which one’s the Red Emperor?” Rin asked.

“The one that’s going to pee on your foot if you don’t move.”

The estate’s housekeeper was a short, plump woman with freckled, leathery skin named Lan. She spoke with a friendly, girlish voice that was at odds with her wrinkled face. Her Sinegardian accent was so strong that even after several months’ practice with the heavily accented Widow Maung, Rin still could only barely decipher it.

“What do you want to eat? I’ll cook you anything you want. I know the culinary styles of all twelve provinces. Except the Monkey Province. Too spicy. It’s not good for you. I also don’t do stinky tofu. My only constraint is what’s on the market, but I can get just about anything at the import store. Any favorite recipes? Lobster? Or water chestnuts? You name it, I’ll cook it.”

Rin, who was accustomed to eating the uninspired slop of the Academy canteen, was at a loss for a response. How was she to explain she simply didn’t have the repertoire of meals that Lan demanded? Back in Tikany, the Fangs were fond of a dish named “whatever,” which was quite literally made of whatever scraps were left at the shop—usually fried eggs and glass noodles.

“I want Seven Treasure Soup,” Kitay intervened, leaving Rin to wonder what on earth that was. “And Lion’s Head.”

Rin blinked. “What?”

Kitay looked amused. “Oh, you’ll see.”

“You could act less like a dazed peasant, you know,” Kitay said as Lan laid out a spread of quail, quail eggs, shark fin soup served in turtle’s shell, and pig’s intestines before them. “It’s just food.”

But “just food” was rice porridge. Maybe some vegetables. A piece of fish, pork, or chicken whenever they could get it.

Nothing on the table was “just” anything.

Seven Treasure Soup turned out to be a deliciously sweet congee-based concoction of red dates, honeyed chestnuts, lotus seeds, and four other ingredients that Rin could not identify. Lion’s Head, she discovered with some relief, was not actually a lion’s head, but rather a ball of meat mixed with flour and boiled amid strips of white tofu.

“Kitay, I am a dazed peasant.” Rin tried fruitlessly to pick up a quail egg with her chopsticks. Finally she gave up and used her fingers. “You eat like this? All the time?”

Kitay blushed. “You get used to it. I had a hard time our first week at school. The Academy canteen was awful.”

It was hard not to feel jealous of Kitay. His private washroom was bigger than the cramped bedroom Rin had shared with Kesegi. His estate’s library rivaled the stacks at Sinegard. Everything Kitay owned was replaceable; if he got mud on his shoes, he threw them away. If his shirt ripped, he got a new one—a newly made shirt, tailored to his precise height and girth.

Kitay had spent his childhood in luxurious comfort, with nothing better to do than study for the Keju. For him, testing into Sinegard had been a pleasant surprise; a confirmation of something he’d always known was his destiny.

“Where’s your father?” Rin asked. Kitay’s father was the defense minister to the Empress herself. She was privately relieved she wouldn’t have to converse with him yet—the thought itself was terrifying—but she couldn’t help feeling curious about the man. Would he be an older version of Kitay—wiry-haired, just as brilliant, and exponentially more powerful?

Kitay made a face. “Defense meetings. You wouldn’t know it, but the whole city is on high security alert. The entire City Guard will be on duty all this week. We don’t need another Opera incident.”

“I thought the Red Junk Opera was dead,” said Rin.

“Mostly dead. You can’t kill a movement. Somewhere out there, some religious lunatics are intent on killing the Empress.” Kitay speared a chunk of tofu. “Father’s going to be at the palace until the parade is over. He’s directly responsible for the Empress’s safety. If anything goes wrong, Father’s head is on the line.”

“Isn’t he worried?”

“Not really. He’s done this for decades; he’ll be all right. Besides, the Empress is a martial artist herself; she’s hardly an easy target.” Kitay launched into a series of anecdotes his father had told him about serving in the palace, about hilarious encounters with the Empress and the Twelve Warlords, about court gossip and provincial politics.

Rin listened in amazement. What was it like to grow up knowing that your father served at the right hand of the Empress? What a difference an accident of birth made. In another world she might have grown up at an estate like this, with all of her desires within reach. In another world, she might have been born into power.

Rin spent the night in a massive suite she had all to herself. She hadn’t slept so long or so well since she came to Sinegard. It was as if her body had shut down after weeks of abuse. She awoke feeling better and clearer-minded than she had in months.

After a lackadaisical breakfast of sweet congee and spiced goose eggs, Kitay and Rin wandered downtown to the marketplace.

Rin hadn’t set foot downtown since arriving to Sinegard with Tutor Feyrik a year prior. The Widow Maung lived on the other side of the city, and her strict academic schedule had left her with no time to explore Sinegard on her own.

She had thought the market was overwhelming last year. Now, at peak activity during the Summer Festival, it seemed like the city had exploded. Pop-up vendor carts were parked everywhere, crammed into the alleyways so tightly that shoppers had to navigate the market in a cramped, single-file line. But the sights. Oh, the sights. Rin saw rows upon rows of pearl necklaces and jade bracelets. Stands of smooth egg-sized rocks that displayed characters, sometimes entire poems, only if you dipped them in water. Stations where calligraphy masters wrote names on giant, lovely fans, wielding their black ink brushes with the care and bravado of swordsmen.

“What do these do?” Rin stopped in front of a rack bearing tiny wooden statues of fat little boys. The boys’ tunics were yanked down, exposing their penises. She couldn’t believe anything this obscene was on sale.

“Oh, those are my favorite,” Kitay said.

By way of explanation, the vendor picked up a teapot and poured water over the statues. The clay darkened as the statues turned wet. Water began spurting out of the penises like sprays of urine.

Rin laughed. “How much are these?”

“Four silvers for one. I’ll give you two for seven.”

Rin blanched. All she had was a single string of imperial silvers and a handful of copper coins left over from the money Tutor Feyrik had helped her exchange. She had never had to spend money at the Academy, and hadn’t considered how expensive things might be in Sinegard when she wasn’t living on the Academy’s coin.

“Do you want it?” Kitay asked.

Rin waved her hands wildly. “No, I’m good, I can’t really . . .”

Understanding dawned on Kitay’s face. “My gift.” He handed a string of silvers to the merchant. “One urinating statue for my easily entertained friend.”

Rin blushed. “Kitay, I can’t.”

“It costs nothing.”

“It costs a lot to me,” she said.

Kitay placed the statue in her hand. “If you say one more thing about money, I’m leaving you to get lost.”

The market was so massive that Rin was reluctant to stray too far from the entrance; if she became lost in those winding pathways, how would she ever replace her way out? But Kitay navigated the market with the ease of a seasoned connoisseur, pointing out which shops he liked and which he didn’t.

Kitay’s Sinegard was full of wonders, completely accessible, and crammed with things that belonged to him. Kitay’s Sinegard wasn’t terrifying, because Kitay had money. If he tripped, half the shop owners on the street would help him up, hoping for a handsome tip. If his pocket were cut, he’d go home and get another purse. Kitay could afford to be victimized by the city because he had room to fail.

Rin couldn’t. She had to remind herself that, despite Kitay’s absurd generosity, none of this was hers. Her only ticket into this city was through the Academy, and she’d have to work hard to keep it.

At night the marketplace lit up with lanterns, one for each vendor. Together the lanterns looked like a horde of fireflies, casting unnatural shadows on everything their light touched.

“Have you ever seen shadow puppetry?” Kitay stopped in front of a large canvas tent. A line of children stood at the entrance doling out copper shells for entrance. “I mean, it’s for little kids, but . . .”

“Great Tortoise.” Rin’s eyes widened. In Tikany, they told stories about shadow puppetry. She fished the change out of her pocket. “I got this.”

The tent was packed with rows of children. Kitay and Rin filed into the back, trying to pretend they weren’t at least five years older than the rest of the audience. At the front, a massive silk screen hung from the top of the tent, illuminated from behind with soft yellow light.

“I tell you now about the rebirth of this nation.”

The puppeteer spoke from a box beside the screen, so that even his silhouette was invisible. His voice filled the cramped tent, deep and smooth and resonant. “This is the tale of the salvation and reunion of Nikan. This is the story of the Trifecta, the three warriors of legend.”

The light behind the screen dimmed and then flared a bright scarlet hue.

“The Warrior.” The first shadow appeared on the screen: the silhouette of a man with a massive sword almost as tall as he was. He was heavily armored, with spiked pads protruding out from his shoulders. The plume on his helmet furled into the air above him.

“The Vipress.” The slender form of a woman appeared next to the Warrior. Her head tilted coquettishly to one side; her left arm bent as if she wielded something behind her back. A fan, perhaps. Or a dagger.

“And the Gatekeeper.” The Gatekeeper was the thinnest of the three, a stooped figure wrapped in robes. By his side crawled a large tortoise.

The scarlet hue of the screen faded away to a soft yellow that pulsed slowly like a heartbeat. The shadows of the Trifecta grew larger and then disappeared. A silhouette of a mountainous land appeared in their place. And the puppeteer began his story in earnest.

“Sixty-five years ago, in the wake of the First Poppy War, the people of Nikan suffered under the weight of their Federation oppressors. Nikan lay sick, feverish under the clouds of the poppy drug.” Translucent ribbons drifted up from the profile of the countryside, giving the illusion of smoke. “The people starved. Mothers sold their infants for a pound of meat, for a bolt of cloth. Fathers killed their children rather than watch them suffer. Yes, that’s right. Children just like you!

“The Nikara thought the gods had abandoned them, for how else could the barbarians from the east have wreaked such destruction upon them?”

The screen turned the same sickly yellow pallor as the cheeks of poppy addicts. A line of Nikara peasants knelt with their heads bent to the floor, as if weeping.

“The people found no protection in the Warlords. The rulers of the Twelve Provinces, once powerful, were now weak and disorganized. Preoccupied with ancient grudges, they wasted time and soldiers fighting against each other rather than uniting to drive out the invaders from Mugen. They squandered gold on drink and women. They breathed the poppy drug like air. They taxed their provinces at exorbitant rates, and gave nothing back. Even when the Federation destroyed their villages and raped their women, the Warlords did nothing. They could do nothing.

“The people prayed for heroes. They prayed for twenty years. And finally, the gods sent them.”

A silhouette of three children, hand in hand, appeared on the lower left corner of the screen. The child in the center stood taller than the rest. The one on his right had long, flowing hair. The third child, standing a little removed from the other two, had his profile turned away toward the end of the screen, as if he was looking at something the other two could not see.

“The gods did not send these heroes from the skies. Rather they chose three children—war orphans, peasants whose parents had been killed in village raids. They were born of the humblest origins. But they were meant to walk with the gods.”

The child in the center strode purposefully to the middle of the screen. The other two followed him at a distance, like he was their leader. The limbs of the shadows moved so smoothly there might have been little men in costume behind the screen, not puppets made of paper and string. Rin marveled at the technique involved, even as she was further absorbed into the story.

“When their village burned, the three children formed a pact to seek revenge against the Federation and liberate their country from the invaders, so that no more children would suffer as they had.

“They trained for many years with the monks of the Wudang temple. By the time they matured, their martial arts skills were prodigious, and they rivaled in skill fully grown men who had been training for decades. At the end of their apprenticeship, they journeyed to the top of the highest peak in all of the land: Mount Tianshan.”

A massive mountain came into view. It took up almost the entire screen; the shadows of the three heroes were minuscule beside it. But as they walked toward the mountain, the peak grew smaller and smaller, flatter and flatter, until the heroes stood on flat ground at the very top.

“There are seven thousand steps that lead up to the peak of Mount Tianshan. And at the very top, far up so high that the strongest eagle could not circle the peak, lies a temple. From that temple, the three heroes walked into the heavens and entered the Pantheon, the home of the gods.”

The three heroes now approached a gate similar to those that guarded the entrance to the Academy. The doors were twice the heroes’ height, decorated with intricately curling patterns of butterflies and tigers, and guarded by a great tortoise that bowed its head low as it let them pass.

“The first hero, strongest among his companions, was summoned by the Dragon Lord. The hero stood a head taller than his friends. His back was broad, his arms like tree trunks. He had been deemed by the gods to be the leader of the three.

“‘If I am to command the armies of Nikan, I must have a great blade,’ he said, and knelt at the feet of the Dragon Lord. The Dragon Lord bade him stand, and bestowed upon him a massive sword. Thus he became the Warrior.”

The Warrior’s figure swung the huge sword in a great arc above his head and brought it smashing downward. Sparks of red and gold light emitted from the ground where the sword struck.

“The second hero was a girl among the two men. She walked past the Dragon Lord, the Tiger Lord, and the Lion Lord, for they were gods of war and therefore gods of men. She said: ‘I am a woman, and women need different weapons than men. The woman’s place is not in the thick of battle. The woman’s battlefield is in deception and seduction.’ And she knelt before the plinth of the Snail Goddess Nüwa. The Goddess Nüwa was pleased by her words, and made the second hero as deadly as a serpent, as bewitching as the most hypnotic of snakes. Thus was born the Vipress.”

A great serpent slithered out from under the Vipress’s dress and undulated about her body, coiling upward to rest on her shoulders. The audience applauded the graceful trick of puppetry.

“The third hero was the humblest among his peers. Weak and sickly, he had never been able to train to the extent of his two friends. But he was loyal and unswerving in his devotion to the gods. He did not beg a favor from any deity in the Pantheon, for he knew he was not worthy. Instead he knelt before the humble tortoise who had let them in.

“‘I ask only for the strength to protect my friends and the courage to protect my country,’ he said. The tortoise replied, ‘You will be given this and more. Take the chain of keys from around my neck. From this day forth you are the Gatekeeper. You have the means to unlock the menagerie of the gods, inside which are kept beasts of every kind, both creatures of beauty and monsters vanquished by heroes long past. You will command them as you see fit.’”

The Gatekeeper’s shadow raised his robed hands slowly, and from his back unfurled many shadows of different shapes and sizes. Dragons. Demons. Beasts. They enveloped the Gatekeeper like a shroud of darkness.

“When they came back down the mountain, the monks who had once trained them realized the three had surpassed in skill even the oldest master at the temple. Word spread, and martial artists across the land bowed down to the prodigious skill of the three heroes. The Trifecta’s reputation grew. Now that their names were known in all of the Twelve Provinces, the Trifecta sent out word to each of the Warlords to invite them to a great banquet at the base of Mount Tianshan.”

Twelve figures, each representing a different province, appeared on the screen. Each wore a helmet with a plume shaped like the province he hailed from: Rooster, Ox, Hare, Monkey, and on and on.

“The Warlords, who were full of pride, were each furious that the other eleven had been invited. Each had thought that he alone had been summoned by the Trifecta. Plotting was what the Warlords did best, and immediately they set about planning to get revenge on the Trifecta.”

The screen beamed an eerie, misty purple. The shadows of the Warlords dipped their heads toward one another over their bowls as if conducting nefarious negotiations.

“But halfway through their meal, they found they could not move. The Vipress had poisoned their drinks with a numbing agent, and the Warlords had drunk many bowls of the sorghum wine. As they lay incapacitated in their seats, the Warrior stood on the table before them. He announced: ‘Today I declare myself the Emperor of Nikan. If you oppose me, I will cut you down and your lands will become mine. But if you pledge to serve me as an ally, to fight as a general under my banner, I will reward you with status and power. Never again will you fight to defend your borders from another Warlord. Never again will you struggle for domination. All will be equal under me, and I will be the greatest leader this kingdom has seen since the Red Emperor.’”

The shadow of the Warrior raised his sword to the sky. Lightning erupted from the sword point, a symbol of a blessing from the heavens themselves.

“When the Warlords regained control of their limbs, each and every one of them agreed to serve the new Dragon Emperor. And so Nikan was united without the shedding of a single drop of blood. For the first time in centuries, the Warlords fought under the same banner, rallying to the Trifecta. And for the first time in recent history, Nikan presented a united front against the Federation invaders. At long last, we drove out the oppressors. And the Empire, again, became free.”

The mountainous silhouette of the country returned again, only this time the land was filled with spiraling pagodas, with temples and many villages. It was a country freed from invaders. It was a country blessed by the gods.

“Today we celebrate the unity of the Twelve Provinces,” said the puppeteer. “We celebrate the Trifecta. And we pay homage to the gods who have gifted them.”

The children burst into applause.

Kitay was frowning when they exited the tent. “I never realized how horrible that story was,” he said quietly. “When you’re little, you think the Trifecta were being so clever, but really this is just a story of poison and coercion. Nikara politics as usual.”

“I don’t know anything about Nikara politics,” said Rin.

“I do.” Kitay made a face. “Father’s told me everything that happens at the palace. It’s just the same as the puppeteer said. The Warlords are always at each other’s throats, vying for the Empress’s attention. It’s pathetic.”

“What do you mean?”

Kitay looked anxious. “You know how the Warlords were so busy fighting each other that they let Mugen wreck the country during the Poppy Wars? Father’s convinced that’s happening again. Remember what Yim said the first day of class? He was right. Mugen isn’t just sitting quietly on that island. My father thinks it’s only a matter of time before they attack again, and he’s worried the Warlords aren’t taking the threat seriously enough.”

The Empire’s fragmentation seemed to be a concern of every master at the Academy. Although the Militia was technically under the Empress’s control, its twelve divisions drew soldiers largely from their home provinces and lay under the direct command of the provincial Warlords. And provincial relations had never been good—Rin had not realized how deep-seated northern contempt for the south was until she arrived in Sinegard.

But Rin didn’t want to talk about politics. This break was the first time in a long time that she was able to let herself relax, and she didn’t want to dwell on matters like some impending war that she could do nothing to stop. She was still dazed by the visual spectacle of the shadow puppetry, and she wished Kitay would leave the serious matters be.

“I liked the part about the Pantheon,” she said after a while.

“Of course you did. It’s the only part that’s pure fiction.”

“Is it, though?” Rin asked. “Who’s to say the Trifecta weren’t shamans?”

“The Trifecta were martial artists. Politicians. Immensely talented soldiers, sure, but the part about shamanism is just exaggeration,” said Kitay. “The Nikara love embellishing war stories, you know that.”

“But where did the stories come from?” Rin persisted. “The Trifecta’s powers are terribly specific for a kid’s tale. If their powers were only myth, then how come that myth is always the same? We heard about the Trifecta all the way in Tikany. Across the provinces, the story has never changed. They’re always the Gatekeeper, the Warrior, and the Vipress.”

Kitay shrugged. “Some poet got creative, and those characters caught on. It’s not that hard to believe. More credible than the existence of shamans, anyhow.”

“But there have been shamans before,” said Rin. “Back before the Red Emperor conquered Nikan.”

“There’s no conclusive proof. There are just anecdotes.”

“The Red Emperor’s scribes kept track of foreign imports down to the last banana cluster,” Rin objected. “They were hardly likely to exaggerate about their enemies.”

Kitay looked skeptical. “Sure, but none of that means the Trifecta were actually shamans. The Dragon Emperor’s dead, and no one’s seen or heard of the Gatekeeper since the Second Poppy War.”

“Maybe he’s just in hiding. Maybe he’s still out there, waiting for the next invasion. Or—maybe—what if the Cike are shamans?” The idea had just occurred to Rin. “That’s why we don’t know anything about them. Maybe they’re the only shamans left—”

“The Cike are just killers,” Kitay scoffed. “They stab, kill, and poison. They don’t call down gods.”

“As far as you know,” Rin said.

“You’re really hung up on this idea of shamans, aren’t you?” Kitay asked. “It’s just a kid’s story, Rin.”

“The Red Emperor’s scribes wouldn’t have kept extensive documentation of a kid’s story.”

Kitay sighed. “Is that why you pledged Lore? You think you can become a shaman? You think you can summon gods?”

“I don’t believe in gods,” said Rin. “But I believe in power. And I believe the shamans had some source of power that the rest of us don’t know how to access, and I believe it’s still possible to learn.”

Kitay shook his head. “I’ll tell you what shamans are. At some point in time some martial artists were really powerful, and the more battles they won, the more stories spread. They probably encouraged those stories, too, thinking it’d scare their enemies. I wouldn’t be surprised if the Empress made up those stories about the Trifecta being shamans herself. It’d certainly help her hold on power. She needs it now, more than ever. The Warlords are getting restless—I bet we’re barely years from a coup. But if she’s really the Vipress, then how come she hasn’t just summoned giant snakes to subdue the Warlords to her will?”

Rin couldn’t think of a glaring counterargument to this theory, so she conceded with silence. Debating with Kitay became pointless after a while. He was so convinced of his own rationality, of his encyclopedic knowledge of most things, that he had difficulty conceiving of gaps in his understanding.

“I notice the puppeteer glossed over how we actually won the Second Poppy War,” Rin said after a while. “You know. Speer. Butchery. Thousands dead in a single night.”

“Well, it was a kid’s story after all,” said Kitay. “And genocide is a little depressing.”

Rin and Kitay spent the next two days lazing around, indulging in every act of sloth they hadn’t been able to at the Academy. They played chess. They lounged in the garden, stared idly at the clouds, and gossiped about their classmates.

“Niang’s pretty cute,” Kitay said. “So is Venka.”

“Venka’s been obsessed with Nezha since we got there,” Rin said. “Even I could see that.”

Kitay waggled his eyebrows. “One might say you’ve been obsessed with Nezha.”

“Don’t be disgusting.”

“You are. You’re always asking me about him.”

“Because I’m curious,” Rin said. “Sunzi says to know your enemy.”

“Fuck Sunzi. You just think he’s pretty.”

Rin tossed the chessboard at his head.

At Kitay’s insistence, Lan cooked them spicy peppercorn hot pot, and delicious though it was, Rin had the singular experience of weeping while eating. She spent most of the next day squatting over the toilet with a burning rectum.

“You think this is how the Speerlies felt?” Kitay asked. “What if burning diarrhea is the price of lifelong devotion to the Phoenix?”

“The Phoenix is a vengeful god,” Rin groaned.

They sampled all the wines in Kitay’s father’s liquor closet and got wonderfully, dizzyingly drunk.

“Nezha and I spent most of our childhood raiding this closet. Try this one.” Kitay passed her a small ceramic bottle. “White sorghum wine. Fifty percent alcohol.”

Rin swallowed hard. It slid down her throat with a marvelous burn.

“This is liquid fire,” she said. “This is the sun in a bottle. This is the drink of a Speerly.”

Kitay snickered.

“You wanna know how they brew this?” he asked. “The secret ingredient is urine.”

She spat the wine out.

Kitay laughed. “They just use alkaline powder now. But the tale goes that a disgruntled official pissed all over one of the Red Emperor’s distilleries. Probably the best accidental discovery of the Red Emperor’s era.”

Rin rolled over onto her stomach to look sideways at him. “Why aren’t you at Yuelu Mountain? You should be a scholar. A sage. You know so much about everything.”

Kitay could expound for hours on any given subject, and yet showed little interest in their studies. He had breezed through the Trials because his eidetic memory made studying unnecessary, but he had surrendered to Nezha the moment the Tournament took a dangerous turn. Kitay was brilliant, but he didn’t belong at Sinegard.

“I wanted to,” Kitay admitted. “But I’m my father’s only son. And my father’s the defense minister. So what choice do I have?”

She fiddled with the bottle. “You’re an only child, then?”

Kitay shook his head. “Older sister. Kinata. She’s at Yuelu now—studying geomancy, or something like that.”

“Geomancy?”

“The artful placement of buildings and things.” Kitay waved his hands in the air. “It’s all aesthetics. Supposedly it’s important, if your greatest aspiration is to marry someone important.”

“You haven’t read every book about it?”

“I only read about the interesting things.” Kitay rolled over onto his stomach. “You? Any siblings?”

“None,” she said. Then she frowned. “Yes, actually. I don’t know why I said that. I have a brother—well, foster brother. Kesegi. He’s ten. Was. He’s eleven now, I guess.”

“Do you miss him?”

Rin hugged her knees to her chest. She didn’t like the way her stomach suddenly felt. “No. I mean—I don’t know. He was so little when I left. I used to take care of him. I guess I’m glad that I don’t have to do that anymore.”

Kitay raised an eyebrow. “Have you written to him?”

“No.” She hesitated. “I don’t know why. I guess I assumed the Fangs didn’t want to hear from me. Or maybe that he’d be better off if he just forgot about me.”

She had wanted to at least write Tutor Feyrik in the beginning, but things had been so awful at the Academy that she couldn’t bear to tell him about it. Then, as time passed, and as her schoolwork became more exhausting, it had become so painful to think about home that she’d just stopped.

“You didn’t like it at home, huh?” Kitay asked.

“I don’t like thinking about it,” she mumbled.

She never wanted to think about Tikany. She wanted to pretend that she’d never lived there—no, that it had never existed. Because if she could just erase her past, then she could write herself into whoever she wanted to be in the present. Student. Scholar. Soldier. Anything except who she used to be.

The Summer Festival culminated in a parade in Sinegard’s city center.

Rin arrived at the grounds with the members of the House of Chen—Kitay’s father and willowy mother, his two uncles and their wives, and his older sister. Rin had forgotten how important Kitay’s father actually was until she saw the entire clan decked out in their house colors of burgundy and gold.

Kitay suddenly grabbed Rin’s elbow. “Don’t look to your left. Pretend like you’re talking to me.”

“But I am talking to you.” Rin immediately looked to her left.

And saw Nezha, standing in a crowd of people wearing gowns of silver and cerulean. A massive dragon was embroidered across the back of his robe, the emblem of the House of Yin.

“Oh.” She jerked her head away. “Can we go stand over there?”

“Yes, let’s.”

Once they were safely ensconced behind Kitay’s rotund second uncle, Rin peered out to gawk at the members of the House of Yin. She found herself staring at two older versions of Nezha, one male and one female. Both were well into their twenties and unfairly attractive. Nezha’s entire family, in fact, looked like they belonged on wall paintings—they appeared more like idealized versions of humans than actual people.

“Nezha’s father isn’t there,” said Kitay. “That’s interesting.”

“Why?”

“He’s the Dragon Warlord,” said Kitay. “One of the Twelve.”

“Maybe he’s sick,” said Rin. “Maybe he hates parades as much as you do.”

“I’m here, though, aren’t I?” Kitay fussed with his sleeves. “You don’t just miss the Summer Parade. It’s a display of unity of all the Twelve Provinces. One year my father broke his leg the day before and he still made it, doped up on sedatives the entire time. If the head of the House of Yin hasn’t come, that means something.”

“Maybe he’s embarrassed,” Rin said. “Furious that his son lost the Tournament. He’s too ashamed to show his face.”

Kitay cracked a smile.

A bugle sounded through the thin morning air, followed by a servant shouting for all members of the procession to fall into order.

Kitay turned to Rin. “So, I don’t know if you can . . .”

“No, it’s fine,” she said. Of course she wouldn’t be riding with the House of Chen. Rin was not in Kitay’s family; she had no business being in the procession. She spared him the embarrassment of bringing it up. “I’ll watch you from the marketplace.”

After a good deal of squeezing and elbowing, Rin escaped the crowd and found a spot on top of a fruit stand where she could get a good view of the parade without being crushed to death in the horde of Sinegardians who had gathered downtown. As long as the thatched straw roof did not suddenly cave in, the fruit stand owner need never know.

The parade began with an homage to the Heavenly Menagerie, the roster of mythical creatures that were held by legend to exist in the era of the Red Emperor. Giant dragons and lions snaked through the crowd, undulating up and down on poles controlled by dancers hidden within. Firecrackers popped in rhythm as they moved, like coordinated bursts of thunder. Next came a massive scarlet effigy on tall poles that had been set carefully aflame: the Vermilion Phoenix of the South.

Rin watched the Phoenix curiously. According to her history books, this was the god whom the Speerlies had venerated above all others. In fact, Speer had never worshipped the massive pantheon of gods that the Nikara did. The Speerlies had only ever worshipped their Phoenix.

The creature following the Phoenix resembled nothing Rin had ever seen before. It bore the head of a lion, antlers like a deer’s, and the body of a four-legged creature; a tiger, perhaps, but its feet ended in hooves. It wove quietly through the parade; its puppeteers beat no drums, sang no chants, rang no bells to announce its coming.

Rin puzzled over the creature until she matched it with a description she had heard in stories told in Tikany. It was a kirin, the noblest of earthly beasts. Kirins walked the lands of Nikan only when a great leader had passed away, and then only in times of great peril.

Then the procession turned to the illustrious houses, and Rin quickly lost interest. Aside from seeing Kitay’s moping face, there was nothing fun about watching palanquin after palanquin of important people dressed in their house colors.

The sun shone at full force overhead. Sweat dripped down Rin’s temples. She wished she had something to drink. She shielded her face with her sleeve, waiting for the parade to end so she could replace Kitay.

Then the crowd around her began screaming, and Rin realized with a start that borne on a palanquin of golden silk, surrounded by a platoon of both musicians and bodyguards, the Empress had arrived.

The Empress was flawed in many ways.

Her face was not perfectly symmetrical. Her eyebrows were finely arched, one slightly above the other, which gave her an expression of constant disdain. Even her mouth was uneven; one side of her mouth curved higher than the other.

And yet she was without question the most beautiful woman Rin had ever seen.

It was not enough to describe her hair, which was darker than the night and glossier than butterfly wings. Or her skin, which was paler and smoother than any Sinegardian could have wished for. Or her lips, which were the color of blood, as if she had just been sucking at a cherry. All of these things could have applied to normal women in the abstract, might even have been remarkable on their own. But on the Empress they were simple inevitabilities, casual truths.

Venka would have paled in comparison.

Youth, Rin thought, was an amplification of beauty. It was a filter; it could mask what one was lacking, enhance even the most average features. But beauty without youth was dangerous. The Empress’s beauty did not require the soft fullness of young lips, the rosy red of young cheeks, the tenderness of young skin. This beauty cut deep, like a sharpened crystal. This beauty was immortal.

Afterward, Rin could not have described what the Empress had been wearing. She could not recall whether or not the Empress spoke, or if the Empress waved in her direction. She could not remember anything the Empress did at all.

She would only remember those eyes, deep pools of black, eyes that made her feel as if she were suffocating, just like Master Jiang’s did, but if this was drowning then Rin didn’t want air, didn’t need it so long as she could keep gazing into those glittering obsidian wells.

She couldn’t look away. She couldn’t even imagine looking away.

As the Empress’s palanquin moved out of sight, Rin felt an odd pang in her heart.

She would have torn apart kingdoms for this woman. She would have followed her to the gates of hell and back. This was her ruler. This was whom she was meant to serve.