The Burning God (The Poppy War #3) - R.F. Kuang Page 0,74

after a pause. “It’s impossible to find.”

“Only for those who don’t know where they’re going,” Daji said. “But I have been there many times.”

“And who are you?” Souji asked. The question didn’t sound like a challenge. He sounded confused, rather, like a man who had just awoken from a deep slumber to find himself in unfamiliar forest. Souji was groping through the mist, trying desperately to catch hold of clarity.

Daji gave a low chuckle. “Only an old woman who has seen a fair bit of the world.”

“But you don’t . . .” Souji trailed off. His question dissipated into nothing. Rin wished she could see his face.

“The Young Marshal will want to see her first,” said the first of Nezha’s envoys, the one who had put his boot on Rin’s neck. “He’ll want to know that she—”

“Your Young Marshal will be content with your report,” Daji said smoothly. “You are his loyal lieutenants. He’ll trust your word. Wait any longer and you risk that she wakes.”

“But we were tasked to—”

“Yin Nezha is weak and ailing,” Daji said. “He cannot face the Speerly right now. What do you think he will do if she strikes? She will burn him in his bed, and you will be known as the men who brought this monster to his lair. Would you murder your own general?”

“But he said she’d lost the fire,” said the soldier.

“And you trust this man?” Daji pressed. “You’ll wager the Young Marshal’s life on the words of a guerrilla commander?”

“No,” the soldier murmured. “But we—”

“Don’t think,” Daji whispered. Her voice was like gossamer silk. “Why think? Don’t trouble yourself with such thoughts. It’s much easier to obey, remember? You only have to do as I say, and you’ll be at peace.”

Another meek silence descended over the room.

“Good,” Daji cooed. “Good boys.”

Rin couldn’t see Daji’s eyes, not from this angle, but even she felt drowsy, lured into the soft, comforting undulations of Daji’s voice.

Daji bent over Rin and smoothed the hair away from her face. Her fingers lingered over Rin’s exposed neck. “Now, you’ll want to sedate her for the trip.”

The trip.

This wasn’t all just a ploy, then. They really were taking her to the Chuluu Korikh. The stone prison, the hell inside the mountain, the place where shamans who had gone mad were taken to be locked in stone, trapped forever, unable to call their gods and unable to die.

Gods, no. Not there.

Rin had been to the Chuluu Korikh once. The very thought of returning made her feel as if she were drowning.

She tried to lift her head. Tried to say something, to do anything. But Daji’s whispers washed over her thoughts like a cool, cleansing stream.

“Don’t think.” Rin barely heard distinct words anymore, just music, just tinkling notes that soothed her mind like a lullaby.

“Give up, darling. Trust me, this is easier. This is so much easier.”

Part II

Chapter 11

“Before humans lived on this earth, the god of water and the god of fire quarreled and split the sky apart,” Riga said. “All that shiny blue ceramic cracked and fell to Earth, and the Earth in its greenery was exposed to the darkness like yolk inside a shattered egg. That’s a nice image, isn’t it?”

Daji moved cautiously toward him, fingers outstretched as if she were approaching a wild animal. She didn’t know what to expect from him. Nothing Riga did was predictable anymore; these days she couldn’t tell from second to second whether he was about to kiss her or hit her.

She would have been less surprised if he were shouting, slamming things and people against the walls because things had gone wrong, had been going wrong for weeks.

But Riga was reading. Everything they had built over the past few years, every rock of their castle, was falling apart around them, and he was standing by the window with a book of children’s myths, flipping idly through its pages, fucking reading out loud like he thought she needed a bedtime story.

She kept her voice low so as not to startle him. “Riga, what’s happening out there?”

He ignored her question. “You know, I think I’ve figured out where you get all that self-righteousness.” He flipped the book around to show her the painted illustrations. “Nüwa mends the sky. You’ve heard this myth, haven’t you? The men wreck the world, and the woman has to piece it back together. The goddess Nüwa patched up that rift they’d made in the sky, rock by rock, and the world was right again.”

Daji stared at