Deeti has a vision of a tall-masted ship while working on her poppy farm and draws it into her family shrine.

Through deaths and desertions at sea, Zachary Reid rises from novice crew member to acting captain of the Ibis before reaching Calcutta.

Neel Halder watches the Ibis arrive near Calcutta and invites its officers to dinner aboard his budgerow.

Benjamin Burnham arrives to inspect the Ibis and offers Zachary the position of second mate for its next voyage.

After Neel refuses a final time to relinquish his lands, Burnham warns him that whatever happens next is entirely his own fault.

Police arrive at Neel's budgerow and arrest him on forgery charges secretly filed by Benjamin Burnham.

Kalua rescues Deeti from the widow's pyre and carries her away to the river on a makeshift raft.

Deeti and Kalua hold a makeshift wedding ceremony on the riverbank, beginning their new life together as a couple.

Captain Chillingworth and Mr. Crowle board the Ibis to inspect it; Crowle attacks Serang Ali, and Zachary steps in to defend him.

Justice Kendalbushe sentences Neel to seven years of hard labor in Mauritius and orders the forfeiture of all his properties.

After overhearing Bhyro Singh offering rewards for their capture in Chhapra, Deeti and Kalua secretly sign on as indentured servants to escape.

The migrants board the Ibis; Deeti spots Bhyro Singh among the ship's guards and nearly gives herself and Kalua away.

Chillingworth comes above deck to address panicking migrants, brandishing a whip and declaring himself the sole law of the sea.

Crowle and Bhyro Singh force Ah Fatt to urinate on Neel in exchange for what Ah Fatt believes is opium.

Ah Fatt kills Crowle; Serang Ali, Jodu, Neel, Ah Fatt, and Kalua escape on a stolen longboat, leaving Deeti and Paulette on deck.

Sea of Poppies opens with Deeti, a poppy farmer who has a mysterious vision of a ship she has never seen, while Zachary Reid rises from novice sailor to acting captain of that same ship across a disastrous voyage from Baltimore to Calcutta. In Calcutta, the powerful merchant Benjamin Burnham moves against the indebted Raja Neel Halder when Neel refuses to surrender his lands, having him arrested on trumped-up forgery charges. Meanwhile, following her husband's death, Deeti escapes a widow's funeral pyre with the help of the low-caste ox-cart driver Kalua, and the two marry and flee downriver. After spotting the man hunting them in the town of Chhapra, they sign on as indentured servants and board the Ibis, only to discover their pursuer is already aboard as a guard. The novel builds to a violent climax at sea in which Kalua kills the corrupt subedar Bhyro Singh, Ah Fatt kills the brutal first mate Crowle, and a group of prisoners and lascars seizes a longboat and escapes, leaving only a few survivors on deck.

The headline events that drive the Ibis and its passengers toward collision.

In Port Louis, Zachary receives a letter from Monsieur d'Epinay requesting migrant workers for Mauritius to replace his now-illegal slaves.

The Ibis destroys Jodu's boat as it arrives in Calcutta; Zachary throws him a lifeline and pulls him to safety aboard.

Zachary finds his lost flute below decks; Baboo Nob Kissin hears it and becomes convinced Zachary is an avatar of Krishna.

Paulette and Jodu reunite unexpectedly in the Ibis's cargo hold; Zachary agrees to find Jodu a position on the ship.

A drunk Doughty grows offensive toward Neel's mistress Elokeshi at the Burnham dinner; Zachary and Serang Ali forcibly remove him.

Steward Pinto tells the crew how Crowle effectively killed his cousin Miguel by forcing him up the foremast in dangerous conditions.

At Neel's first court appearance, he learns Justice Kendalbushe will preside and that Elokeshi has supplied a damaging affidavit against him.

The migrants board a transport vessel downriver; Deeti and Kalua quietly adopt new names to conceal their identities from anyone who might recognize them.

Jodu ferries the migrant women to the Calcutta camp by boat, flirting with Munia as she leaps across to his vessel.

Jodu and Rajoo explore the newly renovated Ibis together and dream aloud about one day captaining their own ship.

Crowle sends Zachary out on a damaged, flooding gig as the tidal bore rushes in; Jodu races out and rescues him.

Baboo Nob Kissin visits Neel and Ah Fatt's cell under the pretense of inspection, secretly bringing Neel food as Taramony's chosen son.

Mamdoo-tindal catches Jodu and Munia exchanging glances and harshly warns Jodu that nothing good can come from pursuing her.

Crowle forces Jodu to fix the ship's jib in dangerous rough waters; Zachary climbs out to rescue him; Jodu falls at Paulette's feet.

After being beaten for meeting Munia, Jodu warns Paulette that some of the men on the ship are planning a secret escape.

Before the Ibis reaches Calcutta, Zachary's stop in Port Louis reveals the colonial machinery driving the ship's next purpose: carrying indentured laborers to Mauritius to replace illegal slaves. In Calcutta, a chain of smaller incidents pulls the characters aboard the ship — Jodu's boat is destroyed by the Ibis itself, Paulette engineers her own presence at a Burnham dinner party to stay close to Zachary, and the crew learns just how dangerous their new first mate Crowle truly is. The journey down to Diamond Harbor is marked by new dynamics forming below decks: Jodu earns his place among the lascars, the migrant women form their own community, and Deeti quietly begins to emerge as a leader among the passengers. Tensions between Zachary and Crowle escalate through two near-fatal incidents, while Baboo Nob Kissin moves between the ship's worlds with purposes of his own. By the time the Ibis reaches open water, the alliances and enmities that will determine the final confrontation are firmly established.

The significant moments shaping each character's path to the Ibis and through its voyage.

By drugging her mother-in-law with opium, Deeti learns through the woman's confessions that her daughter was fathered by her brother-in-law Chandan.

Hukam Singh dies; Deeti decides to die on his widow's pyre rather than surrender herself to her abusive brother-in-law.

Baboo Nob Kissin discovers the crew manifest marking Zachary as black and takes it as a divine sign confirming his beliefs about him.

Mrs. Burnham presents Paulette with Justice Kendalbushe's marriage proposal; a horrified Paulette quietly allows Mrs. Burnham to believe she may be pregnant.

Paulette secretly meets Zachary on Jodu's boat at night, reveals Burnham's sexual abuse, and begs for passage on the Ibis; Zachary refuses.

Neel is placed in a jail cell with Ah Fatt, a young Chinese opium addict suffering through the horrors of violent withdrawal.

Neel overcomes his caste aversion and cleans Ah Fatt's cell; a recovering Ah Fatt finally speaks his name and calls Neel his friend.

Paulette disguises herself as a Bengali woman and boards the Ibis as Putleshwari, claiming to be Baboo Nob Kissin's niece traveling for an arranged marriage.

Trapped below decks, Neel hears the lookout cry the name of his former estate as the Ibis sails past Raskhali.

Baboo Nob Kissin shows Paulette the manifest marking Zachary as black; she finally understands his choices and resolves to reveal her true identity.

Zachary confronts Serang Ali about the watch; Ali confesses that Adam Danby was his son-in-law and that he has mentored Zachary as a surrogate son.

Sarju the midwife discovers Deeti is pregnant; as she nears death, she gives Deeti valuable seeds and asks to be included in the shrine.

Bhyro Singh traps Deeti in the guards' quarters; Kalua rings the ship's bell to save her, and in the chaos a guard falls overboard.

Chillingworth allows Bhyro Singh to publicly flog Kalua; Kalua bites through his restraints at the right moment and kills Bhyro Singh.

Paulette reveals her true identity to Zachary in his cabin; on deck, Zachary recognizes Deeti's grey eyes though they have never met.

Sea of Poppies is structured around concealed truths that surface at pivotal moments, and this pool follows those revelations from the earliest secrets to the final reckoning. Deeti's discovery of her daughter's true parentage sets her on a collision course with death and then unexpected rebirth; Neel's fall from power begins the moment Burnham files his charges, and accelerates through each new humiliation in prison. Paulette's desperate nighttime meeting with Zachary and his refusal to help her forces her to devise her own plan, while Baboo Nob Kissin's discovery of the crew manifest quietly reshapes how several characters understand one another. At sea, the hidden truths multiply: Zachary learns who Serang Ali really is, Paulette learns who Zachary really is, and Neel finds an unexpected friend and humanity in the wretched Ah Fatt. The pool closes as these revelations converge — Paulette steps forward to identify herself, and Zachary, running to the deck, finds himself looking at Deeti as though he already knows her.

The discoveries, confessions, and decisions that change everything for every character.