The Poppy War (The Poppy War #1) - R. F. Kuang Page 0,180

They glinted a bright blue.

“Altan!” Rin screamed.

And Feylen wrenched his commander across the plinth and flung him toward the abyss.

It was not a strong throw. Feylen’s muscles were atrophied from months of disuse; he moved clumsily, like newborn fawn, a god tottering about in a mortal body.

But Altan careened wildly over the side, flailing in the air for balance, and Feylen pushed past him and scrambled up the stone steps toward the exit. His face was wild with a gleeful malice, ecstatic.

Rin threw herself across the stone; she landed stomach-first on floor, arms extended, and the next thing she felt was terrible pain as Altan’s fingers closed around her wrist just before he plunged into the darkness.

His weight wrenched her arm down. She cried out in agony as her elbow slammed against stone.

But then Altan’s other arm shot up from the darkness. She strained down. Their fingers clasped together.

Rocks clattered off the edge of the precipice, falling away into the abyss, but Altan hung steady by both of her arms. They slid forward and for one sick moment she feared his weight might pull the both of them over the edge, but then her foot caught in a groove and they came to a stop.

“I’ve got you,” she panted.

“Let go,” Altan said.

“What?”

“I’m going to swing myself up,” he said. “Let my left arm go.”

She obeyed.

Altan kicked himself to the side to generate momentum and then threw his other hand up to grasp the edge. She lay straining against the floor, legs digging into the stone to keep herself from sliding forward while he pulled himself over the edge of the precipice. He slammed one arm over the top and dug his elbow into the floor. Grunting, he hauled his legs over the edge in a single fluid movement.

Sobbing with relief, Rin helped him to his feet, but he brushed her off.

“Feylen,” he hissed, and set out at an uneven sprint up the stone pathway.

Rin followed him, but it was pointless. When they ran, the only footsteps they could hear were their own, because Feylen had long disappeared out the mouth of the Chuluu Korikh.

They’d given him free rein in the world.

But Altan had overpowered him once. Surely they could do so again. They had to.

They stumbled out the stone door and skidded to a halt before a wall of steel.

Federation soldiers thronged the mountainside.

Their general barked a command and the soldiers pressed forward with their shields linked to create a barrier, backing Rin and Altan inside the stone mountain.

She caught Altan’s stricken expression for a brief moment before he was buried beneath a crowd of armor and swords.

She had no time to wonder why the Federation soldiers were there or how they had known to arrive; all questions disappeared from her mind with the immediacy of combat. The fighting instinct took over—the world became a matter of blades and parries, just another melee—

Yet even as she drew her sword she knew it was hopeless.

The Federation had chosen precisely the right place to kill a Speerly.

Altan and Rin had no advantage in here. The Phoenix could not reach them through the thick walls of stone. Swallowing the poppy would be useless. They might pray to their god, but no one would answer.

A pair of gauntleted arms reached around Rin from behind, pinning her arms to her sides. From the corner of her eye she saw Altan backed against the wall, no fewer than five blades at his neck.

He might have been the best martial artist in Nikan. But without his fire, without his trident, he was still only one man.

Rin jammed her elbow into her captor’s stomach, wriggled free, and whipped her sword outward at the nearest soldier. Their blades clashed; she landed a lucky, wild swing. He tumbled, yelling, into the abyss with her sword embedded in his knee. Rin made a grab for her weapon, but it was too late.

The next soldier swung wide overhead. She ducked into close quarters, reaching for the knife in her belt.

The soldier cracked the hilt of his blade down on her shoulder and sent her sprawling across the floor. She fumbled blindly against the rock.

Then someone slammed a shield against the back of her head.

Chapter 24

She woke in darkness. She was lying on a flat, swaying surface—a wagon? A ship? Though she was certain her eyes were open, she could see nothing. Had she been sealed inside something, or was it simply nighttime? She had no idea how much time had passed. She