4. WEAPON OF CHOICE

Cloud. Head aching, I stumble to my feet, out of my shrine, into the dawn.

I race to Ren's quarters.

Her doors open just as I reach them, Ren seemingly seconds from striding out herself. "Lotus." Her face is pale, her expression gaunt. "I was about to find you. I . . . I had a dream."

"Of what?"

"Cloud. She was standing in my room, drenched in blood."

The bottom of my stomach falls out. Cloud, gone.

No—I don't believe in premonitions.

But I also didn't believe in gods.

I coax Ren back into the room, sit her on the bed, and kneel before it.

"I sent her away, thinking it'd protect her," Ren whispers. "I knew if she stayed here after the coup, people would wonder why the martial law hadn't been applied to her. I thought she'd be safer, out of mind and sight. But I was wrong."

I'm silent. Even if Ren hadn't exiled Cloud to protect her, I'd tell her that it's no crime to have guarded her reputation. "Perhaps Qilin would have advised differently," Ren says, and on this, I'm less certain. Perhaps I wouldn't have staged the coup at all as Qilin.

By then, I was already a different strategist.

What I do know is this: "Ren. Let me ride to Cloud. With me, we can take Bikong faster."

Her eyes rise to mine, and for a heartbeat, I feel like Zephyr. Like I could have spoken the words as Zephyr.

Like I could be Ren's Qilin andcall her and Cloud my swornsisters.

Then Ren nods, and I remember my place. "Go," she says. "Go and protect our sister."

"Lotus will."

Please be okay.

The thought pounds through me, harder than even the gallop. The others in the convoy, insisted on by Ren, refresh their mounts halfway. I keep Rice Cake. Lotus wouldn't want him handed off, and he shows no signs of flagging. It's as if he knows we're racing toward his owner's swornsister.

Ren's only surviving one.

Please be okay.

She's alive, Dewdrop finally gives up on day three when she realizes that no matter what she withholds, I'm riding to Bikong. For now.

What do you mean? Where was Cloud hit?

Inconsequential, is Dewdrop's maddening answer. You see weather patterns in the stars' configurations. I see the streams of human life. This Cloud of yours has not long for this world.

"You're wrong." I speak out loud in my adamancy, the wind swallowing my words before they can reach the other riders. "I will save her."

Cloud, and our Southlands alliance.

In two moves, I will turn the conditions in our favor.

Luring the enemy out is half the battle. Now that Cloud's been struck, Cicada will be advancing on the Marshlands, where Tourmaline is ready and waiting. I will convince Cloud to reinforce her.

Assuming she's conscious enough to be convinced.

Please be okay.

The river winds up the plain.

Please be okay.

Another day.

We arrive at Bikong in the wee hours of the sixth. The empire has set up camp, and Cloud's camp—is still standing. It's not until I see her tents that I realize I hadn't allowed myself to imagine the alternative. Now it floods my mind: a waking nightmare of empire soldiers falling on Cloud. Our camp, routed. Our cause lost right here at Bikong to Miasma. Talon. Crow.

I'll kill him. I'll kill them all.I urge Rice Cake faster, pulling ahead.

"Halt!" cry our soldiers on guard before the camp.

Rice Cake rears.

"Who dares stop me!" I roar from atop him, brandishing my ax.

"General Lotus!" The soldiers fall back.

"Where's Cloud?"

"In her tent—"

I plow forward. The dawn is still young.

In the dark, Cloud's tent glows orange.

I dismount and stride in before I can process thought or emotion.

Cloud sits at the low table, left arm bare and stretched over a bowl. Blood oozes from a puncture wound below her elbow. The injury seems mild, but I'm no physician. I search the tent for one of ours. There's only a woman in tan, grinding herbs in a mortar, and a soldier, sitting opposite Cloud, a chessboard between them. His gaze lifts from the game at my entrance. "General Lotus . . ."

"Out," Cloud barks—at me, I'm thinking, before she says, "I want to play my swornsister."

The soldier shoots to his feet, bows, and scurries.

I take his place, ignoring the game. "How bad is it?"

"Nasty little vermin poisoned the bolt."

Poisoned.It explains Cloud's sickly pallor, her under-eyes bruised purple.

After five nights on horseback, I doubt I look much better. "Why are you just getting treated?" I glance to the woman, then back to Cloud. My voice lowers to a hiss. "It's been six days."

"Blame our physicians," Cloud says. "They extracted the bolt, but it took three days of the wound not closing before they realized it was poisoned. And then none of them had any ideas as to how to remove it without removing the arm. Until this one here." Cloud nods at the woman. "She said the treatment is straightforward."

The physician neither denies nor affirms it. She only asks Cloud if she'd like wine to endure the procedure.

"None needed," says Cloud.

"Wait—" My eye whirls to the physician. "State your name."

"Jin Hua, General."

"What are your credentials?"

"I trained under the late Chen Ling."

"Who do you serve?"

"Forgive my swornsister," Cloud cuts in, then turns to me. "You're being rude."

"And you're being brainless. This is your life at stake."

"My life, which means I get to decide the treatment." Ugh. "All physicians swear an oath to do no harm when they complete their training. As Master Shencius would say—"

Listen to me, not him!

"—they are second only to monks in benevolence. I trust them."

Good for Cloud. I used to judge by role alone too. I can no longer. I may look like a warrior, but I still hate gore.

"What does the procedure entail?" I ask, brows hiking when Cloud doesn't answer. "You don't know."

How, oh how, has Cloud lived to be twenty-some years old?

"Well?" I prompt the physician.

"I'll need to part the skin and flesh," she explains, "to get to the bone itself. Then I'll scrape it."

"The bone."

"Yes. I know the properties of this poison well. It comes from a plant native to the South." Wellthere you go, Cloud. Evidence of Cicada's alliance with Miasma. "If any trace of it remains, she'll lose use of the arm."

"Poison is the weapon of cowards," Cloud spits.

And of bugs. Who's to say the physician isn't working under Cicada? Or Miasma? "May I proceed?" asks the woman, lifting a small knife, and my stomach turns at the risk of letting a stranger, affiliations unknown, slice into Cloud. But if it is poison, and none of our physicians can remove it—

"Yes," says Cloud.

That reckless, obstinate warrior. My lips purse as she clears her game with the previous soldier and resets the board. "Must we?"

"Did you not hear the physician?" asks Cloud, placing two white and two black stones in the opening formation. "I intend to keep my arm."

I meant the chess. Cloud hands me white before I can ask for black, the color traditionally offered to the stronger player to offset the disadvantage of starting second. Reluctantly, I take the white pot of stones, and Cloud smirks. "You're not the only one with brains."

Tourmaline was right about Cloud's hobbies. She was right about Cloud staying on Bikong too. But Cloud is poisoned, about to be cut open.

If I fail to convince her under these conditions, I am no strategist.

"The siege must end." I place a white stone, beginning the game.

"It will, tomorrow, with our victory." The physician starts to cut. Cloud is soundless; with her other hand, she plays her piece.

Fighting nausea, I force myself to speak.

"The cicadas are still singing." May Cloud understand the message in the poem. "Their numbers gather nearby. Soon, to the reeds they will fly."

"And before then"—Cloud builds out a diagonal—"these walls will fall."

I ignore her play, establishing territory in a different part of the board. "Stratagem Eleven, Cloud," I croak. "Cede the Hill for the Mountain. One day, we will take Bikong, but it doesn't have to be now. The greater Marshlands are more crucial to us. Without them, our future offensives against Miasma will face steep odds."

Cloud lifts a stone, but doesn't place it. A scritch-scratching fills the tent.

The sound of metal filing bone.

My eye stings as I swallow the acid in my throat. Cloud is quiet, but her own eyes shine, and there's the faintest gleam of moisture at her hairline.

Now's my chance to dig in my knife. "Tourmaline is in the Marshlands. She needs your help." Surely, this will move Cloud, I think as blood streams into the bowl.

Cloud remains quiet.

Then: "I'm here for a purpose." Her voice betrays no pain. "To send a message to Miasma, and one message only: Victory for my queen." She places her stone, mindless of my forays. "Would you abandon Ren for that Crow of yours? No," she says, silencing my protests. "Then don't think less of me by using my heart against me. I know my priorities, and I know the risks. I'll go to Tourmaline after I report the win."

"Cloud—"

"Play."

I do, making sure to slam my pieces.

"General Cloud," the physician says at long last. "I've scraped the bone and drained the blood tainted by poison."

Cloud closes her fist and flexes. "Thank you. I feel better than ever." And I feel faint. "Will you not consider serving Ren?" Cloud asks the woman, who bows.

"I'm a wandering physician, loyal to all in the realm."

Cloud's gaze softens, and despite myself, so do my misgivings. We both must be thinking of Ren's mother.

"I came by your camp because I'd heard legends of your divine feats," the physician adds, and Cloud snorts.

"Me, divine? Blasphemy."

As the resident god, I'm inclined to agree.

The physician smiles. "I'll allow my senses to be the judge. Many a human would have screamed, undergoing what you did." She rises and bows again. "But even so, I do not wish to bind myself to one person or place."

"I respect your wishes." Cloud rises too. "Let me see you safely out of the camp, at the very least."

I stay in the tent as they exit, studying the chessboard dotted with Cloud's and my pieces.

I would have won, but by fewer than seven points.

The margin is slimmer than I'd like.

Maybe Cloud is right. Maybe Bikong is a day away from falling. Maybe we can secure both objectives, and I've grown too wary to see it.

But the tides of war can also change without warning. As I step out of the tent, a soldier finds me. "From the Westlands, General," she says, delivering a reed tube.

Inside is a message from Sikou Hai.

Watchtower after watchtower has lit up on the banks of the Mica. It's Tourmaline's signal. I'm writing to you so that you may receive this faster than a missive from the Marshlands capital, which sees the arrival of the thief.

Send Cloud quickly.

Just as I forecasted. Cicada's moved in. The hour to withdraw from Bikong is now. But Cloud won't, so long as she believes she can take the fort—a belief that will stand, untested, until the Northern relief force overwhelms or outmaneuvers us.

Why haven't they? It's strange, after all this time. I look out to the empire camp. The river remains high. But with each day, the danger of another flood recedes with the water levels.

Something else that's strange: Miasma's generosity toward the South. Yes, they're allied, and yes, Miasma sent my head partly to create an opening for Cicada in the Marshlands. But if I were Miasma, I wouldn't allow Cicada the element of surprise for long. I'd leak her movements to Cloud to hasten our abandonment of Bikong. So why hasn't the empire spread news of Cicada infiltrating the Marshlands?

You're frowning, thinks Dewdrop, buzzing by my shoulder. What are you thinking about now?

My gaze drifts from the chessboard to the bowl of blood.

I'm thinking about him. The empire strategist who knows exactly what he is—or isn't—doing.

He holds the answers.

I'll pry them out of him, strategist to strategist.

"Leave. Master Crow won't see anyone."

These words. They take me back, to the junk. I'm outside his cabin doors, clueless as to how he's faring behind them. He could be dying or already dead, killed by the arrow on course for me. My heart constricts. I shouldn't care. Shouldn't care. Shouldn't care.

He's the enemy, and I'm standing in front of the enemy camp.

The memory fades, the soldiers before me bleeding back in. Their spears are pointed—have been since they saw me approaching from across the plain.

"I come not as a warrior," I explain, "but as a negotiator."

The soldiers don't move or speak.

If that's how they want to do this, fine. I have a way of making Crow want to see me.

I reach under my breastplate and withdraw the letter I wrote, as Qilin.

About time, thinks Dewdrop.

I saved it for a reason."Deliver this to him."

I hold out the letter, but the spears only press closer.

Melon-brains. Crow too. Just what are you planning? I think, stalking back into our camp. Something stubs my toe and I curse, then slow. It's an arrow, stuck in the ground.

I pull it out.

Minutes later, I've tied my letter to the shaft and found a bow. I walk back to the front of our camp.

Fit arrow to bowstring.

Careful now, lest you kill him, thinks Dewdrop, reminding me of all the targets I've missed. All the duels I've lost. My frustration sparks against the frustration of not being able to convince Cloud. Mortals!

Thankfully, I'm not them. I'm definitely not a real warrior. I can't hold my own in a duel like Cloud did against Leopard.

But I can guide this arrow as a god.

I let go.