So why doesn’t Cavas answer when I reach out to him? The thought nags at me, makes me want to pull out my hair after every meditation session.
“You’ll go bald at this rate,” Kali tells me, smacking my hand away from my head early one morning. “Be patient. He must have his reasons for not responding to you.”
“It’s been twelve days since they reached the safe house!”
“There may be enchantments protecting the safe house to make its occupants undetectable,” Kali says reasonably. “Any magic coming in or going out gets nullified, which is great for secrecy, but it does make communication difficult for complements. Stop looking so sullen, my girl. At least you know he’s safe.”
Heat rises up my cheeks. I know she’s right. I should be happy that Cavas is safe now and away from the kalkothri at Ambar Fort. I should also give him some time to recuperate his strength. Yet every day that I don’t hear from him, I grow more anxious. Torture can deplete magic; couldn’t it very well destroy the complementary bond that exists between us?
So? a voice in my head asks. Why does that matter?
I take a deep breath. Instead of meditating to communicate with Cavas, this time I simply do so to calm myself, to find sthirta in the seething ocean that is my mind. Accept love, no matter how barbed it may look. The words, spoken by the sky goddess months ago at Ambar Fort, appear in my mind now: sparks in a mass of darkly spiraling thoughts. Slowly, my heartbeats regulate and my body grows still. My mind, though still active, is no longer as turbulent.
Long moments later, I open my eyes. I never told Cavas that I loved him—not directly, anyway. But what else can define this strange thing I’m feeling now—a draw that goes beyond friendship, lust, or magic itself? Cavas, on the other hand, already told me he loved me. And he showed it time and time again—first by coming back for me to Ambar Fort, and later by enduring more than I can bear to think of. He could have changed his mind, truly turned loyal to the Scorpion. I certainly would have. But Cavas didn’t. I might be the Star Warrior, but I’ve never had Cavas’s resilience.
“I love you,” I whisper into the silence. “And one day I will tell you this.”
I’m rising to my feet again when Kali comes racing toward me, her face taut with anxiety.
“What happened?” I ask, my hands instantly reaching for my daggers. “More bounty hunters? Sky Warriors?”
She shakes her head. “It’s … well, it’s better shown than explained.”
Curious about my friend’s tone, which is tense but not fearful, I sheathe my daggers and follow her toward the center of the camp, where a group of people are gathered. I squint, trying to get a closer look … and realize they aren’t human, the way I initially thought, but Pashu.
Gold-skinned and gold-eyed peri, their wings clipped by human slavers. Scaly green makara, still wearing the blue-and-white turbans of palace guards on their crocodile heads. They are gathered before Subodh, the peri watching as the makara open their jaws wide in an eerie croaking sound that raises goose bumps over my skin.
Subodh opens his mouth, lets out a similar croaking sound in response.
“It’s been going on for a while now,” Kali says quietly.
The peri are next to speak, their voices somewhere between human and bird, so chillingly beautiful that they make everyone stop and listen.
“It’s said that peri can sing a human to sleep, can make their ears bleed with their voices if they wish,” a voice speaks from behind us. Amar, who now watches the Pashu with awe. “It’s why humans clip their wings. Clipping diminishes the deadly magic of their voices, makes them lose their will to live.”
I say nothing, sickened by what I hear.
“It’s a miracle that this lot survived,” Amar continues. “The makara, on the other hand, went to my father willingly during the Great War, changing sides when they thought Raja Subodh was dead. I suppose you can call them survivors in their own way.”
“Does Raja Subodh trust them?” Kali asks me.
After some hesitation, I reach out to Subodh through our bond. Enemies or friends?
After a moment, a response comes: Neither at the moment. We will find out soon.
“We don’t know yet,” I tell Kali.
“I’d drafted an order to free the captive Pashu in Ambar, you know,” Amar says softly. “It was the day the Sky Warriors ambushed me. I never had a chance to sign it.”
“Did you tell Raja Subodh this?” I ask.
“I did. He made Kali verify the truth of my statement.” Amar gives me a wry smile. “Raja Subodh may say he’s not a good king, but when it comes to the Pashu, he is as fierce as a parent protecting their young. If he didn’t trust my intentions, I wouldn’t be alive. Neither would the Pashu queen be ready to feed us during this war.”
“I wonder how the peri escaped,” I comment. “The man at the flesh market said that indenture contracts were magically binding.”
“They must have killed their owners,” Kali says quietly. “It’s really the only way a contract can end before its time. That, or if the owners voluntarily let them go.”
As she speaks, the sky overhead splits with a crack.
Heads crane up, daggers, lathis, and spears rising as a shadow emerges from the clouds. Sunlight glints off a pair of enormous wings, about six feet in length, with a wingspan twice that size. Silvery feathers shift color, hold a striking resemblance to the indradhanush mined in the Brimlands—amethyst, iolite, sapphire, emerald, citrine, spessartite, and ruby—every jeweled hue of the rainbow contained in their depths. From between the wings, gold limbs unfurl—a woman with long black hair and a bone-tipped spear in her hands. She hovers overhead, watching the crowd of peri, makara, and humans, shock and fury emanating from every inch of her regal face.
“Peri Armaiti,” Subodh calls out to her. “You honor us with your presence. Please, everyone, make room for her to descend.”
A small space opens up among the gathering and the peri lands, her wide gold eyes unblinking.
“I had heard rumors of some peri escaping captivity in Ambar. I was flying overhead, looking for them, when I heard voices. Singing our lament.” Like Rani Sarayu, the peri’s voice has a strange musicality to it while speaking the Common Tongue, birdlike and not, human and not. She pauses, watching Subodh. “I see that you’re still here. Among humans.”
No one misses the derision in her voice or the way she watches us—like we’re vermin.
“Peri Armaiti—” Subodh begins.
“I told Rani Sarayu over and over that you weren’t coming back to rule Aman,” the peri cuts in. “That once more, you would use her and our people to fight a futile human war.”
“You are mistaken, Peri Armaiti,” Subodh says calmly. “I am not going to rule Aman again. I cannot—for I am not good at it. And never again will I pressure anyone to fight in a war of my choosing. I made that mistake more than two decades ago, and I paid the price tenfold. My rajsingha siblings were slaughtered to near extinction during the Great War; peri were captured and clipped; simurgh were nearly wiped out, with the exception of Rani Sarayu and a few others.”
“You call the dead rajsingha your siblings, but none were truly your family, were they, Pashuraj?” the peri accuses. “None of them were related to you by blood. I, on the other hand, lost nearly all my loved ones. My brothers, Bahman, Ardibehesht, and Sherevar, were shot down from the sky by foul human magic. My sisters, Khordad and Amardad, were clipped and brutalized by Sky Warriors before their heads were chopped off. Spenta and I are the only two siblings left—and Spenta refuses to speak of their experiences in this war.”
My eyes prick, grow heavy with tears. As I wipe them away, I notice that everyone else is much the same; some non-magi openly sob—an effect, I realize, of the peri’s voice.
Subodh is the only one who remains unmoved. “I sympathize with you, warrior of the skies. But Pashu must also accept that we lost the Great War because of our arrogance. We underestimated our human opposition a
nd the power of their maha-atashbans. We paid the price for that arrogance.”
“Are you here to rub salt in my burning wounds?” the peri demands.
“No, Peri Armaiti. I would like to give you and your people a gift instead. If you will accept it.”
Subodh raises his head, facing the peri eye to eye. A sudden glow surrounds his face, one that makes Armaiti step back, her strong wings brushing a gust of air our way.
“Pashuraj … you can’t—”
“Take it!” he roars.
“What’s happening?” I ask Kali. “What is he doing?”
“I don’t know,” Kali says, her tear-streaked face looking as baffled as I feel.
The peri reaches forth, touching Subodh’s whiskered cheek. From there, she plucks a glowing golden drop and then turns, gesturing one of her clipped brethren forward. Slowly, carefully, she places the gold drop on one of the scars marring the peri’s back. At first, nothing seems to happen. Then the peri begins to cry out in pain and shock as feathers erupt from his back, bones and skin stretching, forming wings where there were none.
“What’s happening to Raja Subodh?” Kali cries out.
Still processing the miracle happening in front of me, it takes me a while to register the change in the Pashu king’s appearance—the faded sheen of his fur, the streaks of gray shooting through his mane, his trembling limbs.
“He’s transferred some of his living force to them.” Amar sounds furious. “He’s paying the ultimate price.”
But Subodh does not stop there. He sheds another glowing tear from his eyes, regrowing the wings of not one, but ten of the peri who had come to him for aid, each haggard face regaining vitality as it is leeched from the Pashu king.
“Enough!” Amar shouts suddenly. “Are you trying to kill him?”
A shocked Armaiti glances at him and steps back. “The human is right. I can no longer take any more of your life from you, Raja Subodh. You didn’t have to prove yourself this way.”
“Yes, I did, Peri Armaiti,” Subodh says, his voice sounding older than I’d ever heard it before. His brown mane is now completely silver, his fur gray. Liver spots dot his wrinkled limbs and torso. Only his eyes retain their brightness, a vivid yellow that now gleams with triumph. “I have lived far too long anyway. Seen too many battles. Why does it matter if I live for half a millennium instead of one?”
Armaiti stares at him, her eyes brimming with tears. Then, to my shock, she kneels, her head bowed, her spear held before Subodh. Peri behind her do the same, yet their new wings are not as still, blowing cool gusts our way, pushing the hair back from our faces.
“Pashuraj Subodh,” Armaiti says. “For your sacrifice of life, I will fight for you and your human king as long as this war lasts and no longer.”
“So will I,” the ten peri behind her assert, a perfect chorus of voices.
“I accept your aid with gratitude,” Subodh says.
He turns to the makara, who have been watching the proceedings with slitted orange eyes.
“I will speak to Rani Sarayu on your behalf, warriors of water and earth,” he says in the Common Tongue—more for our benefit than for theirs. “You do not deserve punishment for your choice to survive the Great War. Neither do you need to fight for us now. You may leave in peace.”
Three of the five makara who stood before him quietly slither away—a pardon was all they were seeking. Visible tremors go through Subodh’s limbs as he thanks the two who remain, expressing gratitude for their loyalty.
“Well, Raja Amar,” he says finally, turning to the future king. “Will these troops suffice?”
* * *
Human bounty hunters are no match for peri.
The very sight of the flying Pashu, led by a vicious Peri Armaiti, makes many of them turn tail and run. A few stay behind, shooting at the peri with flaming red arrows—which the latter simply pluck out of the air and blow against, dousing the flames like candles. The peri’s flapping wings create a gust so strong that the bounty hunters struggle to remain on their horses. When they attempt to run, the peri chase after them, pluck them off the ground and hang them upside down by their ankles, uncaring of their screams.
I wince when I see a skull crash against the rocks below, as if it’s nothing more than a coconut offered at a temple.
It’s a war, Gul.
It’s a war—and the peri have been holding on to nearly a quarter century of rage. The makara do not hold back, either. They slither after the bounty hunters at terrifying speeds, hissing, biting, their jaws crunching through skulls and bones.
I turn away from the carnage, my insides squirming. Warriors should not be squeamish, but somehow, despite killing so many people, I still am.
Later that night, long after everyone has fallen asleep, the peri’s screams continue to ring in my ears—jubilation and triumph, underscored by anger.
We will reach the capital in two days, I remind myself. Everything will be resolved there.
For better or for worse.
44
SHAYLA
I learned as a young girl, even during the best of times, to remain watchful. To find patterns in an enemy’s movements and then disrupt them without mercy. As queen, though, I often can’t tell who my real enemy is. Or, when surrounded by enemies, I often have to decide which one deserves most priority. Like the man before me, kneeling on the floor, his head bowed, his nape vulnerable to my atashban.
The infamous Brimmish Butcher is surprisingly mild-mannered. Soft-spoken in a way that reminds me of a saint.
“Rise, Surya of the Brim.” I use the title the leader of the mercenaries prefers, give him a polished, practiced smile. The Butcher smiles back, his brown eyes colder than mine.
“I hope you find our arrangements for your soldiers satisfactory,” I tell him.
“Most satisfactory, Ambar Sikandar. Perhaps…” his voice trails off.
I wait in silence, not prodding him in the slightest. Two can play at this game.
“Perhaps we can amend the terms of the bounty,” the Butcher says after a pause. “Should you win this war, my army and I will receive a small portion of Ambar for ourselves—the northern patch closest to the border of the Brim and Prithvi, stopping short of Meghapur.”
A patch of land rich in tez and roopbadal—two crops the Butcher’s minions consume the most of.
“If we win,” I say pointedly, “I will consider this.”
“Oh, my young rani, mere consideration isn’t enough. I will not risk the lives of my army without a blood pact.”
With a dagger hidden inside the sleeve of his tunic, the Butcher opens a gleaming line of scarlet in his palm.
On another day, I would have his head for his insolence. Would relish chopping it off myself. But today I’m held back by the knowledge of my makara guards deserting their posts, by the reminder of my kingdom’s most secure prison now reduced to ash, its most dangerous prisoners—my greatest leverage against the Star Warrior—gone.
It didn’t take long to discover the damned tunnel through which they escaped or link it to the only person who had access to it in this godforsaken fort. Alizeh was her most brutal yet: She reduced Amba’s fingers to stubs. It did little to satisfy me.
“Don’t execute Amba now,” Acharya Damak advised. “You can still use her as leverage. Spare a snake’s life and—”
“Oh, spare me the proverbs!” I snarled back. “Had the shadowlynx not perished in the fire, I would have fed her to it, snakeskin and everything!”
But, as patronizing as he could be, I knew Damak was right. With new rumors about peri now joining the conjurer’s army, I can’t take any chances.
Using the point of my atashban to cut my own hand, I clasp the Brimmish Butcher’s in a punishing grip. His face loses some of its humor.
“I vow to give you a piece of Ambari land, Surya of the Brim,” I say. “Provided you win this war.”
The magic between us mingles, burns my palm for what feels like an eternity b
efore I release him.
“You are dismissed,” I say.
I don’t miss the flash of hatred in the Butcher’s eyes or the cold finality of his smile. He trusts me as little as I trust him. But, for now, there is the promise of food and shelter, of men and women to be taken for play by his soldiers, of loot to be gathered after the war.
He bows low. “Ambar Sikandar,” he says before backing out of the room.
A moment later: “That was a mistake, Rani Shayla.”
I turn to face the speaker—Acharya Damak, whom I asked to witness my conversation with the mercenary leader.
“I did not specify the sliver of land in question, Acharya ji,” I say. “I said a piece of Ambari land. Which could very well mean this.”
I point to a glass jar on my desk, filled with red sand.
“The mercenaries will not forgive you for cheating them,” the high priest warns.
“It’s good that I do not seek their forgiveness, then, isn’t it, Acharya? Now, moving to the matter at hand. The conjurer and his army approach. Our bounty hunters haven’t been able to stop them. According to General Alizeh’s reports, the enemy are about a day’s march away.”
I pause. “I want a suryagrahan.”
“The next solar eclipse is during the Month of—”
“Not an actual solar eclipse,” I cut in. “A magical one. You and your priests are capable of that much, aren’t you?”
“My queen, eclipses lie within the realm of the sky goddess. We priests can create an eclipse with magic, yes. But doing so will force us to go against nature, will unleash magic that goes beyond our control. The Holy Scroll warns against such abominations. It’s too dangerous!”
“You have two choices right now, Acharya Damak. A magically created suryagrahan or the head of every priest in Ambar Fort on a pike—including yourself.” I examine the cut on my hand, now bleeding onto the study’s expensive paisley carpet, and look up at the high priest again. “What do you think is more dangerous?”
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