“There’s no way you manage that,” Nezha said. “You’d need to get an entire platoon to fight through from the inside, and you can’t hide that many men in one ship.”

“I don’t need an entire platoon,” Rin said.

“No squadron is capable of that.”

She crossed her arms. “I can think of one.”

For once, Jinzha wasn’t looking at her with disdain.

“Who do we send to negotiate with the Ram Warlord, then?” he asked.

Rin and Nezha both answered at once. “Kitay.”

Kitay frowned. “Because I’m a good negotiator?”

“No.” Nezha clapped him on the shoulder. “Because you’ll be a really, really bad one.”

“I was under the impression that I was receiving your grand marshal.” The Ram Warlord lounged casually on his chair, tapping his fingers together as he appraised the Republican delegation with sharp, intelligent eyes.

“You’ll be meeting with me,” Kitay said. He spoke in a perfectly tremulous voice, obviously nervous and pretending not to be. “The Dragon Warlord is indisposed.”

The Republican delegation was deliberately shabby. Kitay was guarded only by two infantry soldiers from the Kingfisher. His life had to seem cheap. Jinzha hadn’t wanted to let Rin come, but she refused to stay behind while Kitay went to face the enemy.

Their delegations had met at a neutral stretch along the shore. The backdrop made the meeting seem more like a competitive fishing match than the site of a war negotiation. This move, Rin assumed, was designed to humiliate Kitay.

The Ram Warlord looked Kitay up and down and pursed his lips. “Vaisra can’t be bothered, so he sends a little puppy to negotiate for him.”

Kitay puffed himself up. “I’m not a puppy. I’m the son of Defense Minister Chen.”

“Yes, I wondered why you looked familiar. You’re a far cry from your old man, aren’t you?”

Kitay cleared his throat. “Jinzha sent me here with proposed terms for a truce.”

“A truce should be settled between leaders. Jinzha does not even afford me the respect that he ought a Warlord.”

“Jinzha has entrusted negotiations to me,” Kitay said stiffly.

The Ram Warlord’s eyes narrowed. “Ah, I understand. Injured then? Or dead?”

“Jinzha is fine.” Kitay let his voice tremble just a bit at the end. “He sends his regards.”

The Ram Warlord leaned forward in his chair, like a wolf examining his prey. “Really.”

Kitay cleared his throat again. “Jinzha instructed me to convey that the truce can only benefit you. We will take the north. It’s up to you to decide whether or not you want to join our forces. If you agree to our terms then we’ll leave Xiashang alone, so long as your men serve in our—”

The Ram Warlord cut him off. “I have no interest in joining Vaisra’s so-called republic. It’s just a ploy to put himself on the throne.”

“That’s paranoid,” Kitay said.

“Does Yin Vaisra seem like a man inclined to share power to you?”

“The Dragon Warlord intends to implement the representative democracy style of government practiced in the west. He knows the provincial system isn’t working—”

“Oh, but it’s working very well for us,” said the Ram Warlord. “The only dissenters are those poor suckers in the south, led by Vaisra himself. The rest of us see a system that’s granted us stability for two decades. There’s no need to disrupt that.”

“But it will be disrupted,” Kitay insisted. “You’ve seen the fault lines yourself. You’re weeks away from going to war with your neighbors over riverways, you have more refugees than you can deal with, and you’ve received no Imperial aid.”

“That, you’re wrong about,” said the Ram Warlord. “The Empress has been exceedingly generous to my province. Meanwhile, your embargo failed, your fields are poisoned, and you’re quickly running out of time.”

Rin shot Kitay a glance. His face betrayed nothing, but she knew, on the inside, he must be gloating.

As they spoke, a single merchant ship drifted toward Xiashang, marked with smugglers’ colors provided to them by Moag. It would claim to have run up from Monkey Province with illegal shipments of grain. Jinzha had packed soldiers into the hold and dressed the few sailors who would remain visible on deck as river traders.

If the Ram Warlord was expecting smuggler ships, then he might very well let it within the city gates.

“There’s a way out here that doesn’t end in your death,” Kitay said.

“Negotiations are a matter of leverage, little boy,” said the Ram Warlord. “And I don’t see your fleet.”

“Maybe your spies should look harder,” Kitay said. “Maybe we’ve hidden it.”

They had hidden it, deep inside a canyon crevice two miles downstream from Xiashang’s gates. Jinzha had sent a smaller fleet of skimmers manned by skeleton crews out toward a different tributary to make it appear that the Dragon Fleet was avoiding Xiashang entirely by sailing east toward Tiger Province instead. They’d done this very conspicuously in broad daylight. The Ram Warlord’s spies had to have seen.

The Ram Warlord shrugged. “Perhaps. Or perhaps you’ve taken the easy route down the Udomsap tributary instead.”

Rin fought to keep her expression neutral.

“The Udomsap isn’t so far from you,” said Kitay. “By river or by ground, you’re lying in Jinzha’s warpath.”

“Bold words from a little boy.” The Ram Warlord snorted.

“A little boy speaking for a great army,” Kitay said. “Sooner or later, we’ll come for you. And then you’ll regret it.”

The blustering was an act, but Rin suspected the frustration in his voice was real. Kitay was playing his part so well that Rin couldn’t help but feel a sudden urge to step in front of him, to protect him. Standing one-on-one before a Warlord, Kitay just looked like a boy: thin, scared, and far too young for his position.

“No. I don’t think we will.” The Ram Warlord reached over and ruffled Kitay’s hair. “I think you’re trapped. That storm hit you harder than you’ll admit. And you don’t have the troops to press on into the winter, and you’re running out of supplies, so you want me to throw open my gates and save your skins. Tell Jinzha he can take his truce and shove it up his butt.” He smiled, displaying teeth. “Run along down the river, now.”

“I admit this might have been a terrible idea,” said Kitay.

Rin’s spyglass was trained on Xiashang’s gates. She had a sick feeling in her stomach. The fleet had been waiting around the bend since dark. The sun had been up for hours. The gates were still closed.

“You don’t think he bought it,” Rin said.

“I was so sure he’d buy it,” said Kitay. “Men like that are so incredibly arrogant that they always need to think that they’ve outsmarted everyone else. But maybe he did.”

Rin didn’t want to entertain that thought.

Another hour passed. No movement. Kitay started walking in circles, chewing at his thumbnail so hard that it bled. “Someone should suggest a retreat.”