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“They’re proselytizing,” Rin said. “Spreading the good word of the Maker.”
“Doesn’t seem like fantastic timing.”
“I suppose they have to take a captive audience when they can get it.”
They sat cross-legged on the shore in the Kingfisher’s shadow, watching as the Gray Company’s missionaries made their way through the clumps of huddled civilians. They were too far away for Rin to hear what they were saying, but every now and then she saw a missionary kneel down next to several miserable civilians, put his hands on their shoulders even as they flinched away, and speak what was unmistakably a prayer.
“I hope they’re talking in Nikara,” said Kitay. “Otherwise they’ll sound ominous as hell.”
“I don’t think it matters if they are.” Rin found it hard not to feel a sense of guilty pleasure watching the crowds shrinking from the missionaries, despite the Hesperians’ best efforts.
Kitay passed her a stick of dried fish. “Hungry?”
“Thanks.” She took the fish, worked her teeth around the tail, and jerked off a bite.
There was an art to eating the salted mayau fish that made up the majority of their rations. She had to chew it up just so to make it soft enough that she could extract the meat from around the bones and spit out the spindly things. Too little chewing and the bones lacerated her throat; too much and the fish lost all flavor.
Salted mayau was a clever army food. It took so long to eat that by the time Rin was finished, no matter how little she’d actually consumed, she felt full on salt and saliva.
“Have you seen their penises?” Kitay asked.
Rin nearly spat out her fish. “What?”
He gestured with his hands. “Hesperian men are supposed to be much, ah, bigger than Nikara men. Salkhi said so.”
“How would Salkhi know?”
“How do you think?” Kitay waggled his eyebrows. “Admit it, you’ve thought about it.”
She shuddered. “Not if you paid me.”
“Have you seen General Tarcquet? He’s massive. I bet he—”
“Don’t be disgusting,” she snapped. “They’re horrible. And they smell awful. They’re . . . I don’t know, it’s like something curdled.”
“It’s because they drink cow’s milk, I think. All that dairy is screwing with their systems.”
“I just thought they weren’t showering.”
“You’re one to talk. Have you gotten a whiff of yourself recently?”
“Hold on.” Rin pointed across the river. “Look over there.”
Some of the civilian women had started screaming at a missionary. The missionary stepped hastily away, hands out in a nonthreatening position, but the women didn’t stop shrieking until he’d retreated all the way down the beach.
Kitay gave a low whistle. “That’s going well.”
“I wonder what they’re saying to them,” Rin said.
“‘Our Maker is great and powerful,’” he said pompously. “‘Pray with us and you shall never go hungry again.’”
“‘All wars will be stopped.’”
“‘All enemies will fall down dead, smitten by the Maker’s great hand.’”
“‘Peace will cover the realm and the demon gods will be banished to hell.’” Rin hugged her knees to her chest as she watched the missionary stand on the beach, seeking out another cluster of civilians to terrify. “You’d think they’d just leave us well enough alone.”
Hesperian religion wasn’t new to the Empire. At the height of his reign, the Red Emperor had frequently received emissaries from the churches of the west. Scholars of the church took up residence in his court at Sinegard and entertained the Emperor with their astronomical predictions, star charts, and nifty inventions. Then the Red Emperor died, the coddled scholars were persecuted by jealous court officials, and the missionaries were expelled from the continent for centuries.
The Hesperians had made intermittent efforts to come back, of course. They’d almost succeeded during the first invasion. But now the common Nikara people remembered only the lies the Trifecta had spread about them after the Second Poppy War. They killed and ate infants. They lured young women to their convents to serve as sex slaves. They’d more or less become monsters in folklore. If the Gray Company hoped to win converts, they had their work cut out for them.
“They’ve got to try regardless,” Kitay said. “I read it in their holy texts once. Their scholars argue that as the Divine Architect’s blessed and chosen people, their obligation is to preach to every infidel they encounter.”
“‘Chosen’? What does that mean?”
“I don’t know.” Kitay nodded past Rin’s shoulder. “Why don’t you ask her?”
Rin twisted around.
Sister Petra was striding briskly down the shore toward them.
Rin swallowed her last bite of fish too quickly. It crawled painfully down her throat, each swallow a painful scratch of unsoftened bone.
Sister Petra met Rin’s eyes and beckoned with a finger. Come. That was an order.
Kitay patted her shoulder as he stood up. “Have fun.”
Rin reached for his sleeve. “Don’t you dare leave me—”
“I’m not getting in the middle of this,” he said. “I’ve seen what those arquebuses can do.”
“Congratulations,” Petra said as they returned to the Kingfisher. “I’m told this was a great victory.”
“‘Great’ is a word for it,” Rin said.
“And the fire did not come to you in battle? Chaos did not rear its head?”
Rin stopped walking. “Would you rather I had burned those people alive?”
“Sister Petra?” A missionary ran up from behind them. He looked startlingly young. He couldn’t have been a day over sixteen. His face was open and babyish, and his wide blue eyes were lashed like a girl’s.
“How do you say ‘I’m from across the great sea’?” he asked. “I forgot.”
“Like so.” Petra pronounced the Nikara phrase with flawless accuracy.
“I’m from across the great sea.” The boy looked delighted as he repeated the words. “Did I get it right? The tones?”
Rin realized with a start that he was looking at her.
“Sure,” she said. “That was fine.”
The boy beamed at her. “I love your language. It’s so beautiful.”
Rin blinked at him. What was wrong with him? Why did he look so happy?
“Brother Augus.” Petra’s voice was suddenly sharp. “What’s in your pocket?”
Rin looked and saw a handful of wotou, the steamed cornmeal buns that along with mayau fish comprised most of the soldiers’ meals, peeking out the side of Augus’s pocket.
“Just my rations,” he said quickly.
“And were you going to eat them?” Petra asked.
“Sure, I’m just taking a walk—”
“Augus.”
His face fell. “They said they were hungry.”
“You’re not allowed to feed them,” Rin said flatly. Jinzha had made that order adamantly clear. The civilians were to go hungry for the night. When the Republic fed them in the morning, their terror would be transformed into goodwill.
