“Yes, you are mine. All mine,” she says before biting my lower lip. I taste bile at the back of my tongue. When she lifts her head again, traces of my blood are on her teeth. “And soon, everyone will know this.” She tosses me a scroll of paper. “Can you read this?”
“Yes,” I gasp out, not even thinking of lying.
“Truth,” Amba says, her cool voice and touch grounding me.
“Good.” The Scorpion smirks at me. “Memorize this by tomorrow. If you miss a single word, I’ll take a bite out of your tongue. Understand?”
“Yes, Rani Shayla.” I’m surprised I can speak, let alone sound as calm as I do now.
“Truth,” Amba says.
“Take our guest to his new accommodations,” the Scorpion tells Captain Emil. “And make sure you don’t let him out of your sight.”
26
CAVAS
My room isn’t anywhere near the Scorpion’s, thank Javer, but somewhere on the floor underneath, through a series of passageways that I try to memorize—and forget the moment I make the next turn.
Some spy I am.
My heart almost jumps to my throat when a gray figure floats in from one of the doors. My mother, her eyes fiery with triumph. She raises a finger to her lips as we pass her by and I blink once to show I understand. Unaware of our exchange, the Sky Warriors press forward until we reach a small room at the very end, furnished with a simple bed, table, and chair. An unlit fanas hangs in a nook in the wall, the wick hissing to life the moment we step in. There are no windows in the room. Nothing except stone, as if simulating my old cell underground. One of the Sky Warriors steps in with me and settles into the chair, while another stands guard outside my door. When it comes to keeping an eye on me, they’re taking the Scorpion’s orders literally.
“I will return tomorrow,” Captain Emil tells me. “If you need anything, simply ask Captain Shekhar over here.”
Captain Shekhar sneers at me the moment Emil leaves the room. “Don’t look at me, dirt licker. Unless you’d like me to rearrange your face.”
There’s an old Vani saying: Dogs bark, dustwolves bite. I sense that Captain Shekhar, with his bloodshot eyes and gold-plated canines, hovers somewhere between the two.
I undo the scroll the Scorpion asked me to memorize and read it carefully. A few lines in, my stomach begins churning. The speech implies that my feelings for the Scorpion are deeper than mere loyalty—that I’ve not only switched allegiances but also hearts. I refrain from wiping away the feel of her kiss from my mouth. Though we don’t speak, I know the Sky Warrior is watching my every move, ready to report back my expressions to his queen. One way to convincingly lie to someone is to believe a little in the lie yourself. I know this from years of lying to my father and the stable master, Govind. I wonder where Govind is now, if he’s still alive.
A cool draft of air enters the room. Without glancing sideways, I know it’s my mother—having slid through the gap between the closed door and the floor.
I rise to my feet. “I need to use the toilet.”
The captain points to a chamber pot in the corner of the room.
“Do you have to watch me?” I pretend embarrassment—which isn’t really that difficult if I put my imagination to work.
The captain grimaces. “Oh, all right. But be quick about it.”
I wait until the door closes behind him and then turn to my mother. “What news?”
“Gul went to Javeribad,” she whispers. “But you must have guessed already. It’s why they let you out. In the meantime—”
Sharp raps on the door cut off her words.
“Are you done?” Captain Shekhar shouts, sounding suspicious.
I sigh, glancing at the empty chamber pot. “Not yet,” I shout back.
“Stay alive,” Ma whispers. “Do nothing to rouse the Scorpion’s suspicions.”
Once Ma disappears, I call the captain back in.
“It w-was a f-false alarm,” I pretend to stutter, bracing myself for a blow. “S-sorry.”
He rolls his eyes. “Get to it,” he tells me, pointing at the scroll.
“Y-yes, Captain.”
I settle down on the bed and begin reading under the Sky Warrior’s watchful gaze. It’s going to be a long day.
* * *
Sometime during the night, I wake from a doze. In the dim light, I see that Captain Shekhar is asleep, his parted mouth drooling, his right hand on his atashban.
Now is as good a time as any.
I put aside the scroll and close my eyes. It’s a risk to do this with a Sky Warrior so close.
But it’s the only opportunity I’ve got. I breathe deep, my pulse slowing as the darkness behind my eyelids shifts, turning into a temple’s carved pillars. Figures form before the inner sanctum: a smiling Sant Javer, the sky goddess and—
“Gul!”
She hits me with the force of a dust storm, her hair smelling of the desert, of the sun itself. It’s strange how I can touch her in this meditative state. Hold her, even. Though the touch itself feels different—less real and more like the remnant of an old memory. For the first time in many days, I feel myself relax.
“You’re here!” she says, still watching me as if I’m a dream. “Are you okay? Did they let you out?”
“They did. I’m still being guarded, but I’m inside the palace now. I saw my mother, too.”
It’s strange, being able to see Gul in my mind, to talk to her from inside this fort when she’s miles away from me.
“I can’t believe this actually worked—that I can talk to you!” Gul shakes her head. “Listen, Cavas. Right now, we’re in—”
“Don’t,” I interrupt. “Don’t tell me where you are. They make Rani Amba verify my truths. I don’t want to have to lie—or have them figure out we’re complements.”
Gul frowns, but her mouth clamps shut. She nods.
I take a deep breath. Might as well get to the important stuff. “The Scorpion wants me to give a speech tomorrow.”
“What kind of speech?”
“About how I’ve switched my loyalties and everything.” I don’t tell Gul about my meeting with the Scorpion, about how she bit my lip. But she senses something is off, because she steps back and looks up into my eyes with a frown.
“Something happened,” she says. “Something you’re not telling me.”
Pain begins to throb in my temples, steady as a hammer. I don’t know if I can hold on much longer.
“It doesn’t matter. Remember: Whatever happens, this”—I press her hand to my heart—“will always be yours.” I expected to sound awkward, even nervous while expressing my feelings to Gul for the first time. But the truth gives my voice clarity, a strength I’ve never felt before.
Gul’s lips tremble. “Cavas—”
“Trust me,” I whisper, the last thing I say before the temple vanishes and I’m back inside the room with stone walls.
A moment later, when Captain Shekhar wakes with a sneeze, he finds me up, reading his queen’s scroll by the dim fanas light.
27
GUL
As a child of four, there were rare instances when I would wake shaking in the middle of the night, having dreamed of being wrenched away from my parents by Sky Warriors, a scream still encased in my throat. The night Cavas tells me about his forthcoming speech, I wake the same way, my body quivering, gasping for breath. Glancing over at Kali and Sami, who are still fast asleep, I open the tent flap and quietly head out to find Subodh.
Please be awake, I think, relief rushing through me at the sound of a pair of voices carrying in the silence, including Subodh’s distinctive rumble.
“How much longer will we continue sacrificing ourselves for human wars?”
The tension in Queen Sarayu’s voice gives me pause, my feet slowing several yards away from the reservoir. I watch them sitting side by side, Pashu king and queen, rajsingha and simurgh, their furry and feathered forms silhouetted by a gibbous yellow moon.
“We are part
human,” Subodh says. “Pashu have fought against injustice since the time of the great animal spirits.”
“The great animal spirits are remembered by none except the Pashu. Humans today don’t know they existed,” the simurgh retorts, her voice sending chills up my spine. “And Pashu have fought in a human war before, remember? We lost so many of our people to it.”
“Which is why I need you to help us with this one. To free Pashu who were captured and enslaved during the Battle of the Desert. Once he is king, Raja Amar will sign an order to free all Pashu who are under indenture contracts with humans. But we need to help him win the throne first.”
“Wars are your specialty, Raja Subodh. Why do you need my help? Take over the throne in my stead and help the humans yourself.”
“You know I cannot do that, Rani Sarayu.”
“And as queen, I cannot in good conscience risk more Pashu lives. I promised I would help you during this war—and I will. With messenger birds. With food and water for your armies. But I will not give you my soldiers. I cannot subject them to the terrible fire of human atashbans again.”
I bite my lip. It’s my fault that Queen Sarayu went to Javeribad and got injured. My fault again that we will lose this war. But before I can say anything, Subodh speaks again:
“You’re punishing me, aren’t you?”
“I am not, old friend.” Queen Sarayu’s grief is palpable. “I waited more than twenty years for you to return and take over your father’s throne. I kept convincing myself and everyone else that you would change your mind. Fool that I was.”
I find myself holding my breath in the silence that follows.
“I am going to get some sleep,” Queen Sarayu says at last. “You should talk to Savak-putri Gulnaz. The poor girl has been waiting in the cold for quite a while.”
My heart skips a beat as the simurgh turns her bright-eyed gaze at me; of course she heard me approach. It’s likely Subodh did as well.
“Shubhraat, Rani Sarayu.”
“Shubhraat, Raja Subodh.”
Cordial though their farewells are, I still feel the weight of the conversation hanging in the air as the simurgh hobbles to the nest the tenement dwellers made for her comfort from clean honeyweed bushes and the softest grass they could find.
The awkward silence continues as Subodh faces me, his great yellow eyes scanning me from head to toe.
“You meditated,” he says to my surprise. “And successfully.”
“How did you—”
“You’re still glowing a little.”
I am, I realize. There’s a faint light emitting from every part of my skin. “Did that tip you off to my presence?”
“Not really. It was your tread. Humans aren’t quite capable of silencing their feet. Now tell me. What happened?”
I recount the meditation session—how I saw Cavas and what he said to me.
“I’ll ask Latif and the specters to check on this,” Subodh says once I finish. “You should be proud of yourself, Gul. This is useful information.”
“Sometimes I wish I didn’t know what was happening tomorrow.” My triumph of having successfully communicated with Cavas has been completely overshadowed by the fear of his upcoming speech. “It’s a strange feeling.”
“Knowledge has its own price.” Subodh studies the moonlight patterning the reservoir’s surface. “We always regret the things we’re desperate to know.”
Almost instinctively, I turn to look in the direction Queen Sarayu headed, the nest utterly still in its silence. “Rani Sarayu—”
“Was right,” Subodh says. “As usual. I have always been more of a wanderer than a ruler. Kingship was thrust upon me when my father died, and I never enjoyed the burden. Raja Amar is different, though. If he wins this war, he can do a great deal for this kingdom.”
“How are we going to raise armies, though?” I ask. Without the Pashu on our side, our chances of winning any kind of war appear slim.
“I have a plan in mind,” Subodh says. “In fact, I want you to join Raja Amar and me in our tactical meetings from now on. It would help to have Kali and Falak there as well. We need to persuade non-magi from the southern tenements to join us in the war effort, and it would be better if they see you there.”
“I’ll be there,” I say at once. “Are we planning to invade Ambarvadi?”
“Eventually. But to do that, we need external support.”
“External support? You mean from other cities in Ambar?”
“Partially, yes. I will let Raja Amar address that in the morning. In the meantime, I want you to start training with the Legion again. Properly, this time. Expose them to the sort of magic you’d use against an enemy.”
I nod, guilt knifing my gut. “I will,” I promise.
“Also … I want you to temporarily block your mind from Cavas’s.”
“What?” I feel my jaw drop. “But why?”
“It will be too dangerous now, with his being so closely watched by Rani Shayla and her guards. Cavas may have escaped detection this time, but he may not be able to again. Rani Shayla likely already knows that Cavas is half magus. We don’t want her knowing you both are complements as well. For the time being, it’s better that Cavas sends us messages through his mother or another living specter.”
“Won’t they see him if he talks to the specters?” I argue. “How is that not dangerous?”
“Yes, but though dangerous, it is still easier for Cavas to communicate with a specter over directly communicating with you. He hasn’t yet learned to meditate properly with his eyes open. If the wrong person finds him in a state of sthirta and wrenches him out of it, I fear it could damage his mind permanently. It could also affect you. Tell me something. Were you and Cavas able to touch each other when you meditated?”
“Yes … though it wasn’t exactly the same as touching in real life. I could still tell I was in some sort of dream state. If that makes any sense.”
“It does. Touches in a meditative state are not the same as physical touches—your bodies still remain exactly where they are. Yet your minds are still deeply connected and, therefore, at their most vulnerable. If someone on Cavas’s side attacks him, there’s a possibility that they could reach you, too, and scar your mind in irreparable ways.”
I grow quiet. A part of me continues to battle, to resist, the idea of not being able to see Cavas, to touch him in this small way. I don’t care about myself. But if Cavas gets hurt …
“Fine,” I say, hating the word. “I won’t communicate with him.”
“Good. I’ll send a message to Harkha to relay the same information to Cavas.” Subodh pauses. “You should get some sleep. The night is still long.”
I walk back to the tent without a word, knowing I won’t be sleeping anytime soon.
28
CAVAS
Captain Emil makes me recite the speech to him the next morning, one eye on the scroll, another eye on my expressions.
“You know the words,” he says when I finish. “You even sound like you mean them.”
“I do mean them,” I lie. “I’m loyal to Rani Shayla.”
The captain stares at me. Something akin to disappointment flickers in his eyes, but it disappears so quickly that I can’t be too sure. “Come along,” he says.
Instead of going upstairs to the royal chambers, we make a left at the staircase, heading deeper into Raj Mahal, through another set of hallways held up with giant marble pillars shaped like palm trees. Indradhanush knits a rainbow-hued metal web through the glass roof, casting a shadowy lattice over the floor. Guards appear, posted every few feet, their spears embedded with firestones, their eyes the only part of them that moves under their dark-blue turbans.
The hallway ends in gold doors made with paneled mirrors, flanked by two hard-faced Sky Warriors. They nod at Captain Emil and move aside one of the panels, revealing another, smaller door.
Hot air cloaks me the moment I step outside, following Emil down a set of stairs. A pair of sleek w
hite mares are tethered to a carriage made of polished wooden doors and a glass roof, dazzling indradhanush spiking its giant wheels. Unlike open-air Ambari carriages with their colorful umbrella roofs, this carriage is from the Brimlands, one of the many that the king sent as gifts to celebrate the binding of his second daughter, Farishta, to Lohar a few years ago. The only change to the carriage is the new emblem now painted over its doors—an atashban crossed with a trident. Next to the carriage stands a familiar figure, a man whose eyes widen ever so slightly when he sees me. Apart from this, though, Ambar Fort’s stable master doesn’t speak nor give any indication of our former connection.
“Captain Emil,” Govind says with a quick bow. “The carriage has been modified as requested.”
“Thank you, stable master,” Emil says before turning to me. “Go on. I will take off your shackles once you’re inside.”
Climbing into the carriage shackled is a lot more difficult than I anticipated, pricks of pain jolting my wrists every time I make a move. Eventually Emil gets impatient, and Govind rushes forward to push me in. As he does, he presses something small and hard into my palm. I keep my expression neutral as my pulse kicks up a notch. My fingers roam over the familiar surface of the coin—a green swarna to communicate with living specters. Govind’s specialty.
I sense the magic in the carriage’s walls the moment I climb in—thick as the air outside, nearly as suffocating. Sweat forms a layer on my forehead and nape. I look out the open window and breathe deep.
“Don’t even think of escaping.” Captain Shekhar has stepped in. “You’ll kill yourself before you know it.”
So a barrier of sorts. I wonder now if this is what the rekha felt like to the women at Ambar Fort—an invisible cage that bound them to Rani Mahal. Words from the Scorpion’s speech buzz in my head, and the physical shock of Emil removing my shackles barely registers.
The carriage bounces over the steep inclines of the Walled City, and from there, it glides smoothly toward the city of Ambarvadi, its roads and alleys spreading out like a web. Throngs of people line the main thoroughfare, pointing at the carriage, speaking in loud voices. Taking advantage of the Sky Warriors’ distraction, I finally slip the green swarna into the pocket of my angrakha.
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