The Dragon Republic (The Poppy War #2) - R. F. Kuang Page 0,38

he said. “She sat there in the sky and watched the monkeys drowning over her. What does that say about her?”

That made her laugh. For a moment they both looked up at the moon. It was half-full, hiding behind a wispy dark cloud. Rin could imagine she was a woman, coy and devious, waiting to entice foolish men to their deaths.

She placed her hand over Suni’s. His hand was massive, rougher than wood bark, mottled with calluses. Her mind spun with a thousand unanswered questions.

Who made you like this?

And, more importantly, Do you regret it?

“You don’t have to suffer alone, you know.” Suni gave her one of his rare, slow smiles. “You’re not the only one.”

She would have smiled back, but then a wave of sickness hit her gut and she jerked her head down. Vomit splattered the deck.

Suni rubbed circles on her back while she spat blood-speckled phlegm on the planks. When she was done, he smoothed her vomit-covered hair out of her eyes as she sucked in air in great, racking sobs.

“You’re so strong,” he said. “Whatever you’re seeing, whatever you’re feeling, it’s not as strong as you are.”

But she didn’t want to be strong. Because if she were strong then she would be sober, and if she were sober she would have to consider the consequences of her actions. Then she’d have to look into the chasm. Then the Federation of Mugen would stop being an amorphous blur, and her victims would stop being meaningless numbers. Then she would recognize one death, what it meant, and then another, and then another and another and—

And if she wanted to recognize it, then she would have to be something, feel something other than anger, but she was afraid that if she stopped being angry then she might shatter.

She started to cry.

Suni smoothed the hair back from her forehead. “Just breathe,” he murmured. “Breathe for me. Can you do that? Breathe five times.”

One. Two. Three.

He continued to rub her back. “You just have to make it through the next five seconds. Then the next five. Then on and on.”

Four. Five.

And then another five. And those five, oddly enough, were just the littlest bit more bearable than the last.

“There you go,” Suni said after maybe a dozen counts to five. His voice was so low it was hardly a whisper. “There, look, you’ve done it.”

She breathed, and counted, and wondered how Suni knew exactly what to say.

She wondered if he had done this before with Altan.

“She’ll be all right,” Suni said.

Rin looked up to see who he was talking to, and saw Vaisra standing in the shadows.

It couldn’t have taken him long to respond to the soldiers’ calls. Had he been there the entire time, watching without speaking?

“I heard you came out to get some air,” he said.

She wiped vomit off her cheek with the back of her hand. Vaisra’s gaze flickered to her stained clothing and back to her face. She couldn’t read his expression.

“I’ll be okay,” she whispered.

“Will you?”

“I’ll take care of her,” Suni said.

A brief pause. Vaisra gave Suni a curt nod.

After another moment Suni helped her up and walked her back to her cabin. He kept one arm around her shoulders, warm, solid, comforting. The ship rocked against a particularly violent wave, and she staggered into his side.

“I’m sorry,” she said.

“Don’t be sorry,” Suni said. “And don’t worry. I’ve got you.”

Five days later the Seagrim sailed over a submerged town. At first when Rin saw the tops of buildings emerging from the river she thought they were driftwood, or rocks. Then they got close enough that she could see the curving roofs of drowned pagodas, thatched houses lying under the surface. An entire village peeked up at her through river silt.

Then she saw the bodies—half-eaten, bloated and discolored, all with empty sockets because the glutinous eyes had already been nibbled away. They blocked up the river, decomposing at such a rate that the crew had to sweep away the maggots that threatened to climb on board.

Sailors lined up at the prow to shift bodies aside with long poles to make way for the ship. The corpses started piling up on the river’s sides. Every few hours sailors had to climb down and drag them into a pile before the Seagrim could move—a duty the crew drew lots for with dread.

“What happened here?” Rin asked. “Did the Murui run its banks?”

“No. Dam breach.” Nezha looked pale with fury. “Daji had the dam destroyed to flood the Murui river