The Dragon Republic (The Poppy War #2) - R. F. Kuang Page 0,217

“And all you have done is hand your country over to be ruled by the blue-eyed devils.”

A murmur of unease swept through the soldiers.

Vaisra’s eyes roved the crowd and fell on Rin. He beckoned to her with one finger.

“Come here,” he said.

She glanced around her, hoping he was pointing to someone else.

“Go,” Kitay muttered.

“What does he want with me?”

“What do you think?”

She blanched. “I’m not doing this.”

He gave her a gentle nudge. “It’s best if you don’t think too much about it.”

She shuffled forward, leaning heavily on her cane. She could still only barely walk. The worst was the pain in her lower back, because it wasn’t localized. The node seemed connected to every muscle in her body—every time she took a step or moved her arms, she felt like she’d been stabbed.

The soldiers parted to clear her a path to the platform. She ascended with slow, shaking steps. Every step pulled painfully at the stitches in her lower back.

Finally she stopped before the Snake Warlord. He met her gaze with tired eyes. Even now, even when he was completely at her mercy, he still looked like he pitied her.

“A puppet to the end,” Tsolin whispered, so softly that only she could hear. “When are you going to learn?”

“I’m not a puppet,” she said.

He shook his head. “I thought you might be the smart one. But you let him take everything he needed from you and just rolled over like a whore.”

She would have responded, but Vaisra spoke over her.

“Do it,” he said coldly.

She didn’t have to ask what he meant. She knew what he wanted from her. Right now, unless she wanted to arouse suspicion, she needed to be Vaisra’s obedient weapon of the Republic.

She placed her right palm on Tsolin’s chest, just over his heart, and pushed. Her curled fingers seared with flames so hot her nails went straight into his flesh as if she were clawing at soft tofu.

Tsolin twitched and jerked but kept his mouth shut. She paused, marveling at how long he managed not to scream.

“You’re brave,” she said.

“You’re going to die,” he gasped. “You fool.”

Her fingers closed around something that she thought might be his heart. She squeezed. Tsolin’s head dropped. Over his slumped shoulder, she saw Vaisra nod and smile.

Rin wanted to get out of Arlong immediately after that. But Kitay argued, and she reluctantly agreed, that they wouldn’t make it a mile out of the channel. She still couldn’t walk properly, much less run. Her open wounds required daily checkups in the infirmary that neither of them had the medical knowledge to conduct on their own.

They also didn’t have an escape plan. They’d heard only silence from Moag. If they left now, they’d have to travel on foot unless they could steal a riverboat, and Arlong’s dock security was too good for them to manage that.

They had no choice other than to wait, at least until Rin had healed up enough to hold her own in a fight.

Everything hung in a tense equilibrium. Rin received no word from Vaisra or the Hesperians. Sister Petra hadn’t summoned her for an examination in months. Rin and Kitay made no overt moves to escape. Vaisra didn’t have any reason to suspect her allegiances had shifted, so she was operating on a fairly loose leash. That gave her time to figure out her next move. She was a mouse inching closer to a trap. It would spring when she moved to escape, but only then.

A week after Tsolin’s execution, the palace servants delivered a heavy, silk-wrapped package to her room. When she unwrapped it she found a ceremonial dress with instructions to put it on and appear on the dais in an hour.

Rin still couldn’t lift her hands all the way over her head, so she enlisted Venka’s assistance.

“What the fuck do I do with this?” Rin held up a loose rectangle of cloth.

“Calm down. It’s a shawl, you drape it just under your shoulders.” Venka took the cloth from Rin and wrapped it loosely over Rin’s upper arms. “Like so. So that it flows like water, see?”

Rin was getting too hot and frustrated to care how well her clothes flowed. She snatched up another loose rectangle that looked identical to her shawl. “Then what about this?”

Venka blinked at her as if she were an idiot. “You tie that around your waist.”

The biggest injustice, Rin thought, was that despite her injuries, they were still forcing her to walk in the victory parade. Vaisra had insisted it