Chaghan paused by the door, Qara close behind him.

“Having fun?” he asked.

“Sure,” Baji said. “You want in?”

“No, thank you,” Chaghan said. “But it’s nice to see you’re all having such a good time.”

No one responded to that. Rin knew she was being mocked, she just didn’t have the energy to get into it with Chaghan right now.

“Does it hurt?” Qara asked.

Rin blinked. “What?”

“When the gray-eyed one takes you to her cabin,” Qara said. “Does it hurt?”

“Oh. It’s—it’s not so bad. It’s just a lot of measurements.”

Qara cast her what looked like a glance of sympathy, but Chaghan grabbed his sister by the arm and stormed out of the cabin before she could speak.

Ramsa gave a low whistle and began to pick the dice up off the floor.

Baji gave Rin a curious look. “What happened between you two?”

“Stupid shit,” Rin muttered.

“Stupid shit about Altan?” Ramsa pressed.

“Why would you think it was about Altan?”

“Because with Chaghan, it’s always about Altan.” Ramsa tossed his dice into a cup and shook. “Honestly? I think Altan was Chaghan’s only friend. He’s still grieving. And there’s nothing you can do to make that hurt less.”

Chapter 17

The storm passed with minimal damage. One skimmer capsized—the force of the winds had ripped it from its anchor. Three men drowned. But the crew managed to salvage most of its supplies, and the drowned men had been only foot soldiers, so Jinzha wrote it off as a minor setback.

The moment the skies cleared, he gave the order to continue upriver toward Ram Province. It was one step closer to the military center of the Empire and, as Kitay anticipated, the first territory that would present a fighting challenge.

The Ram Warlord had holed up inside Xiashang, his capital, instead of mounting a border defense. This was why the Republic encountered little other than local volunteer militias throughout their destructive trek north. The Ram Warlord had chosen to bide his time and wait for Jinzha’s troops to tire before fighting a defensive battle.

That should have been a losing strategy. The Republican Fleet was simply bigger than whatever force the Ram Warlord could have rounded up. They knew they could take Ram Province; it was only a matter of time.

The only wrinkle was that Xiashang had unexpectedly robust defenses. Thanks to Qara’s birds, the Republican forces had a good layout map of the capital’s defensive structures. Even the tower ships with their trebuchets would have a difficult time breaching those walls.

As such, Rin spent her next few evenings in the Kingfisher’s office, crammed around a table with Jinzha’s leadership coterie.

“The walls are the problem. You can’t blow through them.” Kitay pointed to a ring he’d drawn around the walls of the city. “They’re made of packed earth, three feet thick. You could try ramming them with cannonballs, but it’d just be a waste of good fire powder.”

“What about a siege?” Jinzha asked. “We could force a surrender if they think we’re willing to wait.”

“You’d be a fool,” said General Tarcquet.

Jinzha bristled visibly. The leadership exchanged awkward looks.

Tarcquet was always present at strategy councils, though he rarely spoke and never offered the assistance of his own troops. He’d made his role clear. He was there to judge their competence and quietly deride their mistakes, which made his input both irreproachable and grating.

“If this were my fleet I’d throw everything I have at those walls,” Tarcquet said. “If you can’t take a minor capital, you won’t take the Empire.”

“But this is not your fleet,” Jinzha said. “It’s mine.”

Tarcquet’s lip curled in contempt. “You are in command because your father thought you’d at least be smart enough to do whatever I told you.”

Jinzha looked furious, but Tarcquet held up a hand before he could respond. “You can’t pull off this bluff. They know you don’t have the supplies or the time. You’ll have to fold in weeks.”

Despite herself, Rin agreed with Tarcquet’s assessment. She’d studied this precise problem at Sinegard. Of all the successful defensive campaigns on military record, most were when cities had warded off invaders through protracted siege warfare. A siege turned a battle into a waiting game of who starved first. The Republican Fleet had the supplies to last for perhaps a month. It was unclear how long Xiashang could last. It would be foolish to wait and find out.

“They certainly don’t have enough food for the entire city,” Nezha said. “We made sure of that.”

“Doesn’t matter,” Kitay said. “The Ram Warlord and his people will be fine. They’ll just let the peasants starve; Tsung Ho has done that before.”

“Do we try negotiating?” Nezha asked.

“Won’t work—Tsung Ho hates Father,” Jinzha said. “And he has no incentive to cooperate, because he’ll just assume that under the Republican regime he’d be deposed sooner or later.”

“A siege might work,” said Admiral Molkoi. “Those walls are not so impenetrable. We’d just have to break them down at a choke point.”

“I wouldn’t,” Kitay said. “That’s what they’ll be preparing for. If you’re going to storm the city, you want the element of surprise. Some gimmick. Like a false peace proposal. But I don’t think they’d fall for that; Tsung Ho is too smart.”

A thought occurred to Rin. “What about Fuchai and Goujian?”

The men stared blankly at her.

“Fuchai and who?” Jinzha asked.

Only Kitay and Nezha looked like they understood. The tale of Fuchai and Goujian was a favorite story of Master Irjah’s. They’d all been assigned to write term papers about it during their second year.

“Fuchai and Goujian were two generals during the Era of Warring States,” Nezha explained. “Fuchai destroyed Goujian’s home state, and then made Goujian his personal servant to humiliate him. Goujian performed the most degrading tasks to make Fuchai believe he bore him no ill will. One time when Fuchai fell sick, Goujian volunteered to taste his stool to tell how bad his illness was. It worked—ten years later, Fuchai set Goujian free. The first thing Goujian did was hire a beautiful concubine and send her to Fuchai’s court in the guise of a gift.”

“The concubine, of course, killed Fuchai,” Kitay said.

Jinzha looked baffled. “You’re saying I send the Ram Warlord a beautiful concubine.”

“No,” Rin said. “I’m saying you should eat shit.”

Tarcquet barked out a laugh.

Jinzha reddened. “Excuse me?”

“The Ram Warlord thinks he holds all the cards,” Rin said. “So initiate a negotiation. Humiliate yourself, present yourself as weaker than you are, and make him underestimate your forces.”

“That won’t tear down his walls,” said Jinzha.

“But it will make him cocky. How does his behavior change if he’s not anticipating an attack? If he instead thinks you’re running away? Then we have an opening to exploit.” Rin cast about wildly in her head for ideas. “You could get someone behind those walls. Open the gates from the inside.”