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Rin blinked. Did they not recognize her? Did they not know who she was?
“Maybe he’s new,” Kitay said.
“Can I hurt him?” she muttered.
“Just a little.”
She tilted her head back and opened her mouth. Breathing fire was harder than shooting it from her hands because it gave her less directional control, but she liked the dramatic effect. A stream of fire shot into the air and unfurled itself into the shape of a dragon that hung for a moment in front of the awed soldiers, undulating grandly, before rushing the captain.
He was never in any real danger. Rin extinguished the flames as soon as they made contact. But he still screamed and fell backward as if he were being charged by a bear. When at last he resurfaced over the cliff wall, his face had turned bright pink, and smoke drifted up from his singed eyebrows.
“I should shoot you just for that,” he said.
“Why don’t you just tell Vaisra that the Speerly’s back,” Rin said. “And bring us something to eat.”
Word of their return seemed to have spread instantly to the entire harbor. A massive crowd of soldiers and civilians alike surrounded them the moment they passed through the gates. Everyone had questions, and they shouted them from every direction so loudly that Rin could barely make out a word.
The questions she did understand were about soldiers still missing from Boyang. The people wanted to know if any others were still alive. If they were on their way back. Rin didn’t have the heart to answer.
“Who dragged you out of hell?” Venka elbowed her way through the soldiers. She seized Rin by the arms, looked her up and down, and then wrinkled her pert nose. “You smell.”
“Nice to see you, too,” Rin said.
“No, really, it’s rank. It’s like you’ve taken a knife blade to my nose.”
“Well, we haven’t seen properly clean water in over a month, so—”
“So what’s the story?” Venka interrupted. “Did you break out of prison? Take out an entire battalion? Swim the whole length back down the Murui?”
“We drank horse piss and got high,” said Kitay.
“Come again?” Venka asked.
Rin was about to explain when she caught sight of Nezha pushing his way to the front of the crowd.
“Hello,” she said.
He stopped just before her and stared, blinking rapidly as if he didn’t know what he was looking at. His arms hung awkwardly at his sides, slightly uplifted, like he wasn’t sure what to do with them.
“Can I?” he asked.
She stretched her arms toward him. He pulled her in against him so hard that she stiffened on instinct. Then she relaxed, because Nezha was so warm, so solid, and hugging him was such a wonderful feeling that she just wanted to bury her face into his uniform and stand there for a very long time.
“I can’t believe it,” Nezha murmured into her ear. “We thought for sure . . .”
She pressed her forehead against his chest. “Me too.”
Her tears were falling thick and fast. The embrace had already stretched on much longer than it should have, and finally Nezha let her go, but he didn’t take his arms off her shoulders.
Finally he spoke. “Where is Jinzha?”
“What do you mean?” Rin asked. “He didn’t return with you?”
Nezha just shook his head, eyes wide, before he was pushed aside by two massive bodies.
“Rin!”
Before she could speak, Suni wrapped her in a tight hug, lifting her a good foot off the ground, and she had to pound frantically at his shoulder before he released her.
“All right.” Ramsa reached up and frantically patted Suni’s shoulder. “You’re going to crush her.”
“Sorry,” Suni said, abashed. “We just thought . . .”
Rin couldn’t help but grin even as she felt her ribs for bruises. “Yeah. Good to see you, too.”
Baji grabbed her hand, pulled her in, and pounded her on the shoulder. “We knew you weren’t dead. You’re too spiteful to go that easy.”
“How did you get back?” Rin asked.
“Feylen didn’t just wreck our ships, he whipped up a storm that wrecked everything in the lake,” Baji said. “He was aiming for the big ships, though; somehow a few of the skimmers held together. About a quarter of us managed to get out of the maelstrom. I’ve no idea how we paddled back out to the river alive, but here we are.”
Rin had an idea of how that had happened.
Ramsa’s eyes flickered between her and Kitay. “Where are the twins?”
“That’s a long story,” Rin said.
“Not dead?” Baji asked.
“I . . . ah, it’s complicated. Chaghan isn’t. But Qara—” She paused, searching for the right words to say next, just as she saw a tall figure approaching from just over Baji’s shoulder.
“Later,” she said quietly.
Baji turned his head, saw who she was looking at, and immediately stepped aside. A hush fell over the soldiers, who parted ranks to let the Dragon Warlord through.
“You’ve returned,” said Vaisra. He looked neither pleased nor displeased but somewhat impatient, as if he’d simply been expecting her.
Rin instinctively ducked her head. “Yes, sir.”
“Good.” Vaisra gestured toward the palace. “Go clean yourself up. I’ll be in my office.”
“Tell me everything that happened at Boyang,” Vaisra said.
“Haven’t they already told you?” Rin sat down opposite him. She smelled better than she had in weeks. She’d cut her oily, lice-ridden hair; scrubbed herself in cold water; and traded in her stained, pungent clothes for a fresh uniform.
A part of her had been hoping for a warmer welcome—a smile, a hand on her shoulder, at least some indication that Vaisra was glad she was back—but all he gave her was solemn expectation.
“I want your account,” he said.
Rin considered pinning the blame on Jinzha’s tactical decisions, but there was no point in antagonizing Vaisra by rubbing salt into an open wound. Besides, nothing Jinzha had done could have prevented what had happened once the battle began. He might as well have been fighting the ocean itself.
“The Empress has another shaman in her employ. His name is Feylen. He channels the Wind God. He used to be in the Cike, until that went sideways. He wrecked your fleet. Took him minutes.”
“What do you mean, he used to be in the Cike?” Vaisra asked.
“He was put down,” Rin said. “I mean, he went mad. A lot of shamans do. Altan let him back out of the Chuluu Korikh by accident—”
“By accident?”
“On purpose, but he was stupid to do it. And now I suppose Daji’s found a way to lure him onto her side.”
“How did she do that?” Vaisra demanded. “Money? Power? Can he be bought?”
“I don’t think he cares about any of that. He’s . . .” Rin paused, trying to figure out how to explain it to Vaisra. “He doesn’t want what humans want. The god has . . . like with me, with the Phoenix—”
“He’s lost his mind,” Vaisra supplied.
She nodded. “I think Feylen needs to fulfill the god’s fundamental nature. The Phoenix needs to consume. But the Wind God needs chaos. Daji’s found some way to bend that to her will, but you won’t be able to tempt him with anything humans might want.”
