Page 77 of A Song to Drown Rivers
History seemed to be holding its breath, gazing down upon us.
The king of Wu crumpled, and then he was no longer a king at all, but a boy, bleeding against my robes. I held him. His eyes fluttered open, focused on me; it was how he had looked at me in all our time together, across the palace rivers, across the polished floors of his chambers, underneath the moonlight. No matter where we were, he was always the first one to spot me, always the last to look away. As if afraid I would disappear at any moment, like smoke in a breeze. As if he knew that one day, he would run out of time, out of chances.
“Xishi,” he said. By now he was already too weak, his breathing shallow, his voice but the faintest whisper. I had driven the sword all the way in. “Let me—see you properly.”
I bowed my head, my shoulders shaking. His blood pooled on the floors around us, shining on stone. He stared up at my face for a long time, saying nothing, his black locks spilled over my lap. Something wet splashed onto his cheeks from above. Tears.
Who was I crying for? Perhaps for myself. Perhaps for him.
Perhaps for both of us, the borders of our fate. Now that he was dying, I could finally bring myself to admit it: I did not want to lose him.
We were close enough for me to feel his broken heartbeat. I wasused to listening for it, how it quickened and changed in my presence, whenever I smiled at him or touched his hair or simply drew near. Now I listened to it fade, to its faint, finalthud—
Then everything went quiet.
Those last moments I remember only in flashes.
Someone came to prize Fuchai’s body away from me. They told me later that I was weeping, pressing my palms to his chest as if I could stanch the bleeding, as if I could undo the fatal wound. Someone else led me down the mountain, the Yue soldiers following, the glint of their swords and spears like fish scales under water. All of it like a dream.You can go home, they kept telling me. But now when I thought of home, my mind was blank. It was a foreign word. I was free, yes. Finished with my mission. Perhaps I could travel across the kingdom, to every place the river water touched the soil, witness all of the four seas. But home? I could no longer even tell you what it meant, much less where it was.
Then—suddenly, it seemed to me—we were offered a sweeping view of the kingdom. The sun shone, bright and piercing, and the winding river threw off silver ripples of light. The sky was a blue so deep it hardly seemed real. Birds glided over the off-white houses and the little bridges and the clustered roads, and the mountains stood layered against each other in darkening shades of indigo. All under Heaven, laid out before me. It was strange. It seemedwrongin some vague but fundamental way. In folklore, when the monster was killed, the enemy conquered, there was always some sort of unnatural sign, some rare sighting to mark the birth of a new era. Fuchai was meant to be the problem, his downfall the one solution. But now he was gone, and the world remained the same.
My robes were still stiff with his blood. It coated the hem ofmy sleeves, stained my hair. I was offered a flimsy cloth to wipe my hands clean, but I refused. I said nothing, except—
“Where’s Fanli?” My voice was hoarse, rubbed raw. I had to repeat myself. “Where is he? Is he safe? Is he coming?”
“He’s aiding King Goujian with state affairs,” came the response from behind me. “But he asked to give you this.”
The emissary handed me a scroll. I unrolled it with shaking fingers. It was his writing, his beautiful calligraphy, his familiar, concise tone:
Find me by the river where we first met. And you must watch out for—
I frowned down at the message, my pulse picking up. Watch out for…what? The side of the scroll had been smeared with blood, stained during the battle. I held it up to the sunlight, but I could only see dark red blots, obscuring the words underneath.
Despite the warmth of the day, a shiver rolled through me. It felt like my scalp was trying to crawl off my head.
Watch out…
Instinctively, I turned around to scan the narrow path, but there were only the soldiers murmuring among themselves as they walked.
“… is dead.”
My heart thudded. I slowed my steps and listened harder.
“The Wu minister Bo Pi?” Another voice asked in shock. “You can be certain?”
“It’s spread all the way from the palace. He was killed by King Goujian.”
It felt like somebody had shoved me without warning. A coldness spread through my bones.
“On what grounds?”
“For disloyalty, apparently. Something about deceiving his king with poor advice and throwing all the realm of Wu into danger.”
The other soldier was silent for a moment. “He is a fair man, then; one who weeds out all traitors, even the traitor of his own enemy. He should make a good king.”
Those around him nodded in assent, but my blood only grew colder. They did not know what I did. That all of Bo Pi’s poor advice, his deception, his lies—they were merely done upon Goujian’s instruction. The two of us were Goujian’s greatest weapons in the court of Wu, his eyes and ears. To have killed Bo Pi for exactly what he had been bribed to do…
Unease prickled over my skin like tiny needles.You are being paranoid, I reasoned with myself, forcing my fingers to uncurl.It has nothing to do with you.After all, no matter where Bo Pi’s loyalties lay, he was still at his core a man from Wu, born and raised in the enemy kingdom. It made sense for Goujian to distrust him. But I was different. I was Yue, just like him, just like the civilians he had sworn to protect. He ought to recognize me as one of his own.
