The darkness tossed and turned, whipping Yipachai up and down, left and right. Was he dead? No, he was the one swaying in the darkness. And his head. It ached something fierce.

  Beyond that, it seemed like his clothes were wet. In that case, he definitely wasn’t dead. Why would he be wet in the afterlife?

  Yipachai opened his eyes. It was still dark. Was he blind, then? He waved his hand in front of his face and thought he could just make out the dim silhouette of his fingers. So he wasn’t blind. That was good news.

  The darkness, however, wasn’t silent. He could hear the sound of what had to have been waves, and the thumping sounds of what must have been footsteps above him, and…singing?

  Was he on a ship?

  But that made no sense. He had just been on his way back to the monastery to give the tiger’s blood flowers to—

  Elder Satsanan.

  All at once, the memories crashed into him, like a mallet pounding nails into a piece of wood. In that darkness, he could see the flames, hear the screams of the monks and the acolytes, could smell the smoke and the metallic tanginess of blood. Elder Satsanan’s blood.

  She was really gone. And that man with the scar on his jaw had killed her.

  Yipachai felt his throat tense as hot tears rolled down his cheeks. With each sob, he felt his entire body shaking, sending fresh stabs of pain to his head. He had never felt pain like this, in his body or his heart. He had never been intentionally hurt by another Sentient. He had never lost a loved one.

  He didn’t know how long he waited after his tears ran out. Eventually, the thumping overhead seemed to get closer, until a blinding ray of light opened up above him.

  Yipachai blinked, trying to orient himself. He was in a small cargo compartment, surrounded by crates that were far less wet than his red acolyte robe. Two heads, silhouettes against the bright daylight, peered down into the hold.

  “Still alive there, boy? Take this. It’s the last you’ll get for awhile.

  One of the bandits handed him a bowl of something mushy and a cup full of water, then sat back and watched as he ate and drank. The food was simple, lukewarm rice that seemed to have been scraped out of the bottom of the pot. Flavorless, but Yipachai found he was famished after the events of…yesterday? How long had he been on this ship?

  Once he finished, the two bandits reached down, seized Yipachai by the arms and hauled him up out of the cargo hold, plopping him unceremoniously on the deck of the ship.

  “Get up, boy, time for you to earn that rice you just had. You’re hauling the main sail ‘til sundown.”

  One of the men grabbed him by his robe and yanked him to his feet, then gave him a push that sent him stumbling towards the center of the deck. Yipachai barely kept himself from falling.

  He tried to look around, to see if there was any way to make sense of where he was and how he had gotten there. They were definitely on a ship, and a big one at that. The kind Yipachai had once seen in Hanaburi’s harbor, with four masts and the slightly angled sails with the wooden cross-pieces that looked like the ribs of some bony creature.

  Counting the number of people on board proved impossible. His head still hurt, and they all kept moving around. A few dozen, maybe? It pained him to see that there were other acolytes on board as well, moving about with hunched shoulders and dirty faces.

  But it was their captors that intrigued Yipachai the most. They were all Hetanzou, like himself. But everyone knew that only the Montililun—the shorter, Singing Folk of the east—had ships this large. Only they were strong enough in Lan Mhong to Sing down the sea without being destroyed by the waves.

  Of course, a few of the bandits were trying. Singing together in a group of four at the front of the main deck. Yipachai could see the Mhong energy drifting from them, out over the deck’s rail, and into the water below, like violet flames. Their voices were fine—not the best Yipachai had ever heard, but apparently enough to keep the waves down. He could see land off to their left, so they must not have been dealing with the roughest of waters.

  The two bandits—or pirates, or whatever they were—led Yipachai to a line of men sweating and pulling on a long rope beneath the ship’s largest sail.

  “This is it, kid,” one of the men said. Yipachai thought he was the one who had spoken earlier. “Pull when they tell you to, and don’t let it all go when you let it down.” He pulled one of the other men out of the line and gestured for Yipachai to take his place. The other man, who looked like he belonged on the bandit crew, looked relieved as he made his way to a group of others who were loitering near the back of the ship.

  Yipachai took hold of the rope in both hands. There was no point in resisting. He still couldn’t believe this was real. That something like this was truly happening to him. Doing his best to imitate the others, he leaned back, letting his weight help hold the rope taut. The two men who had left him there were already gone.

  “Pull!” the man at the front of the line shouted.

  The rest of the group—six bandits and four acolytes—lurched into motion, leaning back hard and scrabbling with their feet to pull on the rope. Yipachai couldn’t believe how difficult it was. Sure, he wasn’t in the best physical condition, but he would have thought that with all those others pulling at the same time, it shouldn’t have been much of a challenge.

  As they pulled, the top of the sail rose higher along the mast. The bottom, which had been folded back on itself in an alternating fashion, unfurled little by little, adding more bones to the giant rib cage above them.

  “Hold!”

  Yipachai exhaled loudly. Holding the sail steady wasn’t quite as difficult as raising it had been, but he could feel his heart rate accelerating already, his lungs working hard to recover his breath.

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  “Where are we going?” he asked the man next to him, a bandit who had already stripped to his trousers.

  “West,” the man grunted. “We passed Hanaburi a few hours ago.”

  “How long have we been on board?”

  The bandit said something in reply, but Yipachai didn’t hear him. All of his senses had just locked onto one man, strolling along the opposite edge of the ship with two other scruffy ruffians.

  The man with the scar on his jaw. And he was holding up Elder Satsanan’s pendant, showing it off to his friends like it was some kind of trophy.

  Yipachai’s blood boiled.

  He tried to ignore it. He knew that acting on his rage would only earn him more trouble, but all the pain he felt, all the grief that still clutched his heart like a python strangling its prey, had come from this man.

  Just then, certainty washed over Yipachai—a clarity of mind he had never felt before. He would do everything in his power to kill this scarred man, even if he died in the attempt.

  The preening bandit had taken everything from Yipachai. And justice demanded recompense.

  Yipachai dropped the rope and, ignoring the shouts from the others in the line, sprinted at the man who had killed Elder Satsanan.

  The man saw him coming.

  Just before Yipachai collided with him, the bandit sidestepped, grabbing the front of Yipachai’s robe in one hand and planting the other in between Yipachai’s shoulder blades. With a firm push, he sent Yipachai crashing headlong into the ship’s railing, then followed it up with a swift kick to Yipachai’s stomach. In a heartbeat, his friends joined in the pounding.

  “Silence take you, little brat. I didn’t want my kid to be the one that had to be the example.”

  Yipachai immediately forgot his anger, unable to think of anything but trying to shield himself from the blows. He tucked his knees, trying to protect his stomach, but then the men just rained down kicks on his ribs, his back, his head, each one feeling like a hammer blow.

  It was over in moments. After a barked order from the scarred man, the kicking stopped. Then, he leaned down and grabbed Yipachai’s robe, hauling him up and slinging him over his shoulder.

  Yipachai didn’t resist as he was carried back to the hatch he had come out from just minutes ago. He could barely see straight.

  Another jarring impact, and Yipachai was lying on his back, looking up at the open hatch from the floor of the cargo hold.

  “If you’re still alive by the time we get back to the hideout,” the scar-faced bandit said, “maybe I’ll let you work again. If I don’t just sell you to someone else.” He shut the hatch with a heavy thud, and Yipachai was once again alone in the swaying darkness.

  Everything hurt. Yipachai could feel swelling already on his ribs, his head. He thought the corner of a crate had caught him in the hip when he had tumbled down into the hold. He tried to probe his injuries, but each movement was painful, each breath excruciating as it stretched his battered body.

  Yipachai closed his eyes. The darkness was the same. He had no idea where the bandits were sailing, and no idea how long it would take to get there. Would they keep feeding him down here? Would his wounds ever heal, or would he stay like this forever, crippled and in pain until he finally gave up on breathing because it hurt too much?

  He drifted in and out of sleep. The darkness occasionally made it hard to be certain if he was conscious or unconscious. It could have been an hour or two. It could have been a few days.

  At some point, the swaying of the darkness grew more aggressive. One minute he had been lying on the floor, and the next Yipachai had to hold on to a barrel to keep himself from being tossed about to bounce off of every hard surface in the place.

  The sound of the waves grew louder, angrier. Yipachai realized that he could no longer hear the Singing of the group on deck. Instead, he began to hear shouts. Footsteps that sounded more frantic than usual.

  Yipachai tried to stand, leaning heavily on his barrel, holding tight to stop himself from falling. His sides protested, screaming defiance that kept him hunched over. Despite the lack of light, he still felt the room spinning around him. He tried to close his eyes and will the wave of nausea to pass.

  Suddenly, the hatch above him was flung open. The light that came through this time was dull. Cold rain pelted down, stinging Yipachai’s skin. Two men—neither of whom Yipachai recognized—reached down and lifted him out of the hold, sending fresh waves of pain through him as his limbs were stretched.

  Once he was on deck, they quickly set to binding his wrists behind his back. Sea mhonglun danced and spun all around, their songs a stark counterpoint to the crashing thunder and waves.

  “We’ve got the kid!” one shouted to someone Yipachai couldn’t see.

  “Quick! Throw him to the Stormbringer!”

  “What’s going on?” Yipachai asked, his parched throat raspy.

  “Shut it, boy. The Stormbringer has us in his clutches and isn’t letting go. We need a sacrifice.”

  Panic cut through Yipachai’s pain, pierced through his hazy mind like lightning. “What? N-no, I can still be useful. I-I won’t fight again, I promise!”

  “Sorry, kid,” the other bandit said. He actually looked somewhat remorseful. “It’s you or the rest of us, and Mangsut said we could use you.”

  “Who?”

  “The captain. The one who owns you.”

  The one who killed Elder Satsanan. Yipachai was surprised how pure his hatred was in the face of his impending death. He had been taught to have regard for all life, to pursue peace and communion with the mhonglun. But now he had attacked a man twice, and shockingly, Yipachai was sure he would do it again.

  I’m sorry, Elder.

  Ignoring the pain, Yipachai struggled against his bonds, against the men who suddenly gripped him tighter, trying to drag him to the edge of the ship. Something inside Yipachai lent him strength, a primal drive to stay alive. He tried to kick, to bite, to twist so the men couldn’t hold him any longer. He caught one of them with a kick to the knee, eliciting a grunt and stopping their progress for a moment.

  For a brief moment, Yipachai was free. He stumbled away awkwardly, his wrists still bound tightly behind him. He hardly managed a few steps before the rocking of the ship knocked him off balance, sending him tumbling to the deck once again. In a flash, a body fell on top of him, sending a sharp stab of pain through his sides and driving the wind from his lungs.

  He was beaten.

  Rain drops ran down his shaved head and into his eyes as the bandits once again lifted him up, this time grabbing him under his arms and around his ankles. They carried him over to the ship’s rail, and he could see angry, foaming waves of dark water below him. Howling wind mixed with the songs of the sea mhonglun.

  Another bandit stepped up behind Yipachai’s carriers, and he knew exactly who it would be. Mangsut, the man with the scar on his chin. His dark eyes seemed sharper than his sword as he stared into Yipachai’s face with barely contained rage.

  “May the Stormbringer accept our humble sacrifice,” he growled, then jerked his chin towards Yipachai.

  With a short swing, the two men heaved Yipachai over the rail.

  He landed sideways in the water, the impact nearly driving the breath right out of him. The water was colder than he had expected. He tried to kick, to somehow stay afloat, but without his arms, he couldn’t propel himself up through the choppy waters and back to the surface.

  Soon, he gave up trying. His lungs were burning. He could no longer tell which way was up. He couldn’t swim to safety even if he tried. He was beaten.

  And there were mhonglun.

  More than Yipachai had ever seen, dancing and singing even below the surface of the waves. Up above, they were simply Sentient-shaped masses of water. Here, in the ocean, they gave off faint lights, like soft reflections. They were beautiful.

  Bond with me.

  The voice shook Yipachai’s mind with the weight of ages. It carried a wisdom, a power, he could feel even with the three simple words.

  Tianfu? He asked hesitantly.

  No, but he asked me to come to you.

  Yipachai’s lungs screamed. His vision was growing dark, patches of black creeping in at the edges. Was this voice a dream? Was he already dead?

  He reached out with his mind, feeling something, just as his breath ran out.

  He gasped, inhaling water as everything went dark.