Page 33 of A Song to Drown Rivers
“Yes, well. One cannot save the world and live in peace. That’s not how these things work.”
Something about his words reminded me of my own thoughts from when I was standing outside my house, scared, my decision weighing on my chest:a kingdom, or my happiness. We had both made our choices. Was it too late now to regret them?
“What will you do?” I asked. “When we are gone?”
He was quiet. The oars creaked and splashed the water in a rhythmic motion, and a gentle mist rose around us like white steam.
“I cannot be sure. But I will stay by his side.” The planes of his face were smooth, certain, his shoulders squared. “Wherever he goes, I will follow, for as long as he lets me.”
Perhaps a flicker of envy or longing showed in my eyes, because he took one look at me, then threw his head back and laughed, the sound half-bitter. “Trust me, it’s not so much better a position, compared to you,” he said. “I know he will be thinking of someone else.”
Before I could reply, the boat lurched, the planks wobbling beneath my feet, and came to a stop on one side of the canal. Fanli emerged from behind the curtains, his sword gripped in one hand.
“Are we there already?” I asked, confused. I couldn’t see the palace, only the emerald water flowing on and on ahead of us, and the crimson glow of the lanterns.
Fanli shook his head. “We’re not, but I’m getting off here.”
It was as though someone had flipped the boat over, yanked the world out from under me. I couldn’t breathe. A sharp pain tore through my throat, even fiercer than where the arrowhead had pierced me. “You’re—not coming with me?”
“No.” His expression was impossible to read, his eyes unfathomably dark. “I’ve given it some thought, and there is no need for a dramatic farewell. You should arrive at the palace alone, without any attachments to the Yue Kingdom; Luyi will be there to ensure your safety. It is best.”
It is best.Such simple words, so cold in their practicality, so unfeeling. I wanted to hit him then, to shake him, seize his wrist and squeeze. Would he not miss me at all? Did he not understand that this was his last chance to see me, our last moments together? Could he not be so rational, just for once?
He stepped forward and held out his sword to me on two opened hands. The same way I had given the sword to him, back on the riverbank.
“What is…”
“Take it,” he said. “It is yours now, for protection.”
I stared at him. “But—you always carry this—”
“You need it more than I do. Keep it. Please.” There was something else behind his words, but he said no more, just extended the sword farther to me, concealed in its familiar sheath. I swallowed, taking it from him. As I did, our knuckles brushed; just the barest second, skin against skin, yet my whole body shivered from the awareness, my throat tightening.
The sword was heavier than I recalled. I pulled it out a fraction, enough to see the inscription in the polished metal:The mind destroys, the heart devours.
“Remember,” he said quietly.
When I looked up, he was already stepping onto the stone-paved platform, his chin lifted, his hands clasped behind his back. Removed, detached. Only his fingers trembled. Without turning to me, he motioned for the boat to continue on. The oars picked up again, water misting the air. He remained standing. The distance between us spread, inch by irreconcilable inch.
“Wait!” I cried out, desperation rising inside me. I scrambled forward, as close to the edge of the boat as it would allow without my weight tipping everything over. Tears pressed against my eyes, burned in the back of my throat. My hands grabbed on to nothing. Civilians had started to stare from the overhead bridge, the other side of the canal, but I didn’t care. “Wait—stop—I don’t—” I whipped around to Luyi. His expression was bleak, his lips pressed into a tight, resigned line. “Help me,” I said, half pleading. “Turn the boat back. Only for a few more seconds. I just want to tell him—I never got to tell him…”
But Luyi gave a small shake of his head and rested a hand on my good shoulder. It was meant to comfort, I knew, but in that moment I only wanted the familiarity of Fanli’s touch, his presence, his scent. I only wanted him. “Can’t you make this a little easier for him?” Luyi said, his tone laced with pity. Not for me, I realized, but for Fanli.
“Him?” My mind spun. The boat was drifting farther and farther away from the platform. “What—what do you mean?”
He sighed. Gave me a look that was almost exasperated. “Why do you think he’s getting off early, Xishi? When he so rarely leaves anything before its completion?”
Because he’s heartless, I wished to say out of spite, though I understood even then it wasn’t true.Because he does not care as much as I do. Because he wishes to be rid of me sooner. Because he will always choose the kingdom before me.
“Can you not imagine,” Luyi continued, “that it might be difficult for him to deliver you straight into the jaws of the enemy palace, and watch you marry another man? He is disciplined, Xishi,” he said as his words buzzed in my head like a wild swarm of hornets, “but he is not made of stone. He suffers too. Privately.”
I clutched at my throat, made a choked, anguished sound I’d never made before. I could not bear it. The realization was overpowering. There would be no more dinners with him by the warm, gentle candlelight of the hall. No more strolls in the hazy purple evening, no more coming across him by the pond, his reflection swimming under the lotuses. There would be no more stolen glances in the corridors, footsteps slowing in his shadow. No more suppressed smiles and almost-touches, slender fingers skimming over silk. No more finding him in his room, his silhouette outlined against the fire, opening the door a crack just to see him more clearly. No more spring flowers and autumn rain. No more sneaking onto the highest ledge, watching the mortal smoke and fire of the distant city with him beside me. No more words of advice or words of caution, no more stories coaxed from him when he was in a lighter mood. No more morning greetings. No more watching him secretly, with his head bowed, an ink brush in his hands. No more tenderness. No more solace. No more possibility.
Now there was just me, standing on the prow of the boat, gazing at his lone figure on the opposite bank. He was already too far away for me to make out the lovely details of his face, only the lines of his shoulders, his knife-straight spine. The water rippled and glimmered between us, expanding, the tides pushing the boat onward, away from all I knew and toward the terrible palace. My fingers curled tight around the cool hilt of his sword, as if I could feelthe ghost of his grip, the impressions his hands had made in the wood. I had been prepared for this, had taken everything with me except what I really wanted. I wished to weep, but my own tears felt insubstantial, a broken gesture. The feeling swelling within me like churning waves was greater, heavier, absolute.
I tore my gaze away from Fanli’s fading silhouette, unable to look anymore, to see what I would miss. Yet as soon as I did, a fresh pain tore through my chest, a pain I had not felt since the day I first met him, as if my heart had been wrenched apart.
I arrived at the Wu palace a ghost.
