I won’t let us.
“Legion, to me!” I shout. “Arms at the ready!”
One by one, our soldiers unfreeze from their stupors and rush to join me, relief etched across their bruised faces.
“Stick together!” I call out. “Form the simurgh with me at the center!”
Almost instantly, the Legion falls into a haphazard V. I turn to the makara first, reaching out to them with my mind.
Do you still wish to fight for us, with Raja Subodh gone? I ask.
Coal-bright eyes blink at me. Then, a single word, a susurration more or less: Yessss.
You may join us then. One of you at each flank.
They break apart, doing exactly what I asked, adding bulk to each ragged wing of my battle formation. Next, I turn to the frightened peri and speak out loud in the Common Tongue, giving them the same choice that I did the makara.
“We will fight,” a male peri says, turning to look at his companions. They nod. He pauses before adding, “We were sold at the same flesh market, you and I. You probably don’t remember—”
“I do,” I cut in, my insides tightening. “You sang the morning raag. Brought everyone to tears. I’m sorry, I don’t know your name.”
“Peri Mahiyar.” The peri gives me a half smile. “Let’s make them cry in other ways, shall we?”
“The maha-atashbans—” I begin.
“Are only effective when shot into the sky—or directly at a crowd of people on the ground. The elephants are still a ways off and we peri are capable of fighting in more ways than one.”
Peri Mahiyar plucks out a pure white feather from one of his wings and gives it to me. “Tuck a feather into your waistband. It will protect you from our voices. Because when we sing this time, every unprotected ear is going to bleed.”
He turns to the seven remaining peri, speaking to them in their birdlike language. Soon, everyone in the Legion is tucking feathers into their waistbelts or braiding them into their hair. Cavas gives instructions to a few soldiers I don’t know—including a burly warrior who, apart from the blood streaking his face, appears unharmed.
I face a surprised Amira, who is watching me like she’s never seen me before. “Will you take over if I fall? Make sure they keep fighting?”
She simply nods her assent.
“I’ll get the non-magus army and living specters together as well,” Cavas says. He cups his hands around his mouth and calls out: “Soldiers, are you with me?”
“We’re with you!” a chorus of voices rises, pouring strength back into my tired limbs.
“We’re with you, too, Star Warrior,” another familiar voice says.
A smile flickers across my lips. “Thank you, Roda.”
When I turn around, I spot a tall woman watching my every move, only recognizable by her long hair, now entirely blue, her cheekbones so much more pronounced than I’ve seen them before. My heart leaps to my throat. But now isn’t the time for reunions—and I can tell Juhi knows this. She gives me a half smile.
“Whatever happens in battle today, Raja Amar survives,” I say in a ringing voice. “If we are defeated, I want the survivors to run—to warn Raja Amar to take the remaining troops that we have and flee.”
There may be little hope for us on the battlefield today. But there still will be hope for Ambar with the true king alive.
“Saavdhaan!” I shout. Spears and lathis and shields and daggers rise around me, waiting for the next signal.
Dust clouds the air as the enemy approaches: General Alizeh unmistakable at the head on her white horse. Next to her rides Captain Emil—the man who once reminded me of Papa—in blue and white, with the exception of his helmet, which is gold instead of silver.
No longer a captain, then, but a major.
The Sky Warriors wear strange metal plates over their helmets, angled at a way that keeps the sunlight from their eyes. Clearly, they’re aware of the eclipse’s effects. Behind them, wearing similar headgear, march Ambari foot soldiers, the tips of their long spears glowing red with death magic.
Without a word, Cavas and I turn to face each other.
“Stay close,” I tell him, unable to suppress the hitch in my voice.
Cavas isn’t fooled by my false bravado. Delicately, his callused hands cup my cheeks.
“You are my heart, the blood in my veins,” he says softly, making my skin flush with warmth. “Nothing—not even death—will take me away from you.”
The old Gul would have doubted his words. Doubted herself.
But I believe in the truth I see in Cavas’s dark-brown eyes, trust the reassuring tendrils of his magic brushing at mine like his fingers. Waiting to be let in.
“I love you,” I tell him.
There’s a flash of surprise in his eyes, a wide smile breaking his face. I keep it in my mind as we pull apart to meditate, breathing in and out, our bodies reaching sthirta far quicker than they ever have before. Instead of looking glazed the way they once did, Cavas’s eyes burn white—the way mine do.
“Charge!” My voice sounds hollow to my own ears, deeper than it is in real life. Every movement around me slows, allowing me to examine the enemy, to look for weaknesses in ways I wouldn’t be able to otherwise.
Hidden in perches and alleys around the square, the peri begin singing, their voices drawing screams among the first line of soldiers who clutch at their ears, hands coming up red with blood. But the peri’s tactic doesn’t work for long. Alizeh and Emil shoot their atashbans into the air, filling it with the familiar buzz of a sound barrier.
“Specters!” Cavas holds a glowing green coin to his mouth, his voice vibrating through my veins. “Let’s play a little hide-and-seek, shall we?”
Puzzled by the strange command, I watch as soldiers from the Legion begin appearing and disappearing, confusing the Ambari infantry enough to bring down a few of their own. Cavas himself is never too far from my side, reinforcing my magic whenever necessary, cautioning me against wayward enemy spells.
At one point in the battle, Cavas’s voice rings in my head: Amplify shield!
I shoot him a surprised glance—and then notice a pair of Sky Warriors charging our way. Even in my meditative state, there is no time for me to move in front of Cavas and defend us both myself.
Gul! Cavas urges, his power tugging at mine. Drawing on it. Hurry!
I pour forth green fire from my daggers, watch the liquid gold of Cavas’s magic merging with mine. A brilliant white shield rises before us, deflecting both of the Sky Warriors’ spells.
Cavas and I grin at each other. It’s the first time we’ve worked together this way—as a team, without fighting.
It’s a good feeling, I think, merging my power with his again to block another spell coming our way.
As the battle progresses, rocks fall from the air onto the Ambari infantry—living specters acting on Cavas’s command—several hitting their mark, many turning to ash before they hit the ground, thanks to Major Emil’s intervention.
Furious, I aim a spell at his spurs while simultaneously whispering to his horse.
Buck him off.
Startled, the horse rears, the combined act of the saddle breaking forcing Emil off. Almost instantly, he finds himself facing the end of Amira and her furious atashban, a battle that I can tell will be far too well matched despite Amira’s brutal skill.
“Brigadier Moolchand!” Cavas’s voice draws my attention. “No!”
I spin around to find a pair of soldiers sparring in the distance, so similarly garbed that for a moment I wonder if the infantry have begun fighting among themselves. The only difference between the two is that one of the men has only one arm and, unlike the helmeted infantry commander, he wears a bright indigo turban.
So that’s Zamindar Moolchand’s brother, I think.
We have to stop them! Cavas tells me telepathically. We can’t lose the brigadier!
As we fight our way through to get closer to the brigadier, something strange begins to happen. Four infan
trymen break off from where they’re feuding with a group of Legion soldiers and race toward the fighting pair. Instead of targeting Brigadier Moolchand the way I expect them to, they shield him, forming a barrier between him and the man he was fighting.
“What are you doing?” the latter says angrily. “Get out of my way!”
“No, sir,” one of the soldiers says calmly. His voice isn’t loud, but it carries to where we now stand, stunned. “We will not let you hurt Brigadier Moolchand.”
“He’s not your brigadier anymore, fools! I am!” The man lashes out with a sword—only to be impaled by a spear from one of his own men.
We aren’t the only ones drawn to the scene. Soon enough, other Ambari soldiers are, too, more and more breaking away from their Sky Warrior commanders to protectively encircle the one-armed man.
“It’s the Amirgarh soldiers,” Cavas whispers in awe. “They’re still loyal to Moolchand!”
So loyal that they refuse to move aside, even when shot at by the Sky Warriors.
So loyal that they turn on the men they were fighting with, joining forces instead with an astonished Kali, Juhi, and Amira.
So loyal that ultimately, out of sheer frustration, General Alizeh shouts a command that sounds like music to my tired ears:
“Infantry, retreat!”
49
SHAYLA
Retreat.
After a whole day of fighting and a near victory, forced to retreat thanks to mutinous defectors who should have been dealt with a long time ago.
But how do you deal with two hundred of your own soldiers, Shayla? Do you round them up and imprison them? Do you order a mass execution?
“Well?” I turn to General Alizeh, Major Emil, and Acharya Damak. Three people who should still be loyal to me. “Which of you is going to tell me how terribly flawed my plan was?”
“It wasn’t as flawed as you think, Ambar Sikandar,” Alizeh says. “The suryagrahan was a risk, but it worked. Their side lost more soldiers during the eclipse than we did. After the Brimmish Butcher fell, we would have won—if not for our own traitorous infantry.”
I lock gazes with her and see no deception there. Only guilt. The kind that makes me want to throttle her.
“How do I keep a kingdom where my own soldiers won’t fight for me?” My voice sounds bleak, even to me.
“Perhaps you don’t need your armies to fight for you,” Acharya Damak says after a pause. “The old kings and queens of Ambar often settled throne disputes with duels. You could challenge the conjurer Amar to one. The people feel they have a choice right now between the two of you. Take out their other choice and they will be forced to accept you as their queen.”
The throne or the grave. I suppress an unexpected chill.
“Do you think the conjurer will agree to a duel?” I ask, raising an eyebrow.
“He will if his mother and sister are in danger,” Acharya Damak says quietly.
There’s a long silence.
“The spared snake proving useful at last,” I say. “Well played, Acharya Damak. Well played. You may go now and attend to your normal duties.”
The acharya bows before leaving the room.
I turn to Alizeh and Emil. “Watch him closely,” I tell them. “He’s the biggest snake of them all.”
“Yes, Rani Shayla,” they say.
I pull forth a sheaf of rolled parchment from my desk. “I think it’s time to send a letter of my own.”
* * *
The conjurer sends his answer that very night by return shvetpanchhi:
I accept your challenge.
The duel will take place tomorrow, in the maidaan—the empty land between Ambar Fort and Ambarvadi—ensuring that no civilians accidentally enter the fray, the conjurer insisted in his letter. It was a request I was glad to oblige.
The throne or the grave. Again, the chill, following me from the study to my bedroom, pervading my nightmares, where I find myself swimming inside a pool of my own blood.
My linens reek of sweat. I shed them, walk to the floor-to-ceiling windows, and stare out at the fog of pink magic floating over Ambarvadi in the distance. The curfew over the city ended at midnight. A few lights illuminate the streets or the windows of darkened—in some cases, newly abandoned—buildings. A city that never sleeps now strangely watchful in its silence. A knock on the door makes me spin, reach for the atashban at my bedside.
“Ambar Sikandar.” The night guard is careful to keep her eyes averted from my disheveled form. “The general is here to see you.”
“Alizeh?” I frown, lowering my weapon. “Send her in.”
Alizeh enters, her gray eyes reflecting the moonlight from my windows. “You couldn’t sleep, could you? Or you had a nightmare.”
I will myself not to shiver. “How did you know?”
“You were like that at the academy, too. You never slept before an important battle. Or you would wake up, shaking from a bad dream, and come find me.”
Tonight, she’s the one who came. She walks to join me by the window, and for a few moments, we simply stand there side by side as we once did at the academy, a day before the final test, which qualified us as Sky Warriors.
“What if I lose, Alizeh?” I ask. “What if I lose everything?”
“You won’t,” she vows. “I swear on my life, you won’t.”
“You can’t make such promises, Alizeh.”
“I can, Shayla.” There’s a challenge in the way she says my name, daring me to correct her. “My life has always been intertwined with yours. No matter how many titles you throw between us. No matter how many lovers you’ve taken into your bed since me.”
I turn and lock gazes with a woman I’ve known since my first day at the academy, a scrawny, gray-eyed thing who bit a boy so hard during a practice fight that she drew blood. My heart skips a beat.
“Alizeh … I…”
I made a mistake. I knew it that night and I feel it now, deep in my bones.
“I know it isn’t the same for you. I’ve accepted this truth for a while now,” Alizeh tells me with a shrug so casual that I almost believe her. “So let me do what I can. What I have always done. Let me protect you.”
With a final, too-brief squeeze of my hand, she leaves me standing there staring after her, holding on to a grief I didn’t realize I was capable of.
50
GUL
Silence shrouds Ambarvadi after our battle, a deathly quiet that makes the fine hairs on my arms rise, when the sun disappears and darkness sets in. Magic hovers in the air around the roof of the safe house, its dull, rose-tinted fog nearly obscuring the lone thanedar patrolling the street outside.
Cavas and I watch his lightorb pause before the door to the safe house and stare up at the roof. At us. They know we’re here by now, of course. Along with Amar, Juhi, Kali, Amira, Falak, Sami, and others they would love to imprison. But a part of Amar’s bargain asked that no arrests be made until the duel ends tomorrow. This includes Brigadier Moolchand and the defected Amirgarh forces, who have chosen to spend their night at inns and taverns across the city—those that haven’t been abandoned by their owners, at any rate.
While it looks like Shayla is staying true to that promise, tonight is but a temporary reprieve. Breaking Queen Amba and Princess Malti out of Ambar Fort isn’t an option—though I suggested it moments after Amar received the Scorpion’s letter.
“You were lucky the first time,” he told me sharply. “It won’t be as easy to sneak in or out anymore.”
He spoke little after that, only choosing to inform us that he accepted Shayla’s challenge and that it would not involve any innocent civilians.
“A duel,” I grumble again for what must be the hundredth time. “How could he have agreed to a duel with her?”
“His mother and sister are in danger, Gul.”
“Don’t look at me like that, Cavas. I don’t mean we should leave them there. But let’s face facts,” I say, forcing myself to keep my voice low. “Amar is a brilli
ant conjurer. He has a sense of honor that can appease everyone, magi or not. But he cannot perform death magic. By the goddess, he can’t produce an ordinary shield! We both know that!” If not for Cavas restraining my magic, I might have killed Amar months ago.
“Well, we can’t do much,” Cavas reminds me in his quiet voice. “Juhi said that the rules of dueling allow for no interference or replacements. Besides, Amira and Juhi both offered to coach him, didn’t they?”
Full-scale chaos erupted downstairs once Amar agreed to the duel. Everyone wanted to offer their opinions and help. I knew that we needed to refrain from overwhelming our future king, but none of us could. Eventually, Ramnik stepped in, silencing us.
“Raja Amar needs his rest,” Ramnik told us firmly before leading Amar away to his own bedroom for some privacy.
“Do you really think Shayla will not try to cheat?” I ask Cavas now. “Or that she cares about a code of honor written hundreds of years ago?”
“Amar does. He might abdicate the throne if it’s won by dishonorable means.”
I swear loud enough for the thanedar to grow still and raise his lightorb higher, beaming it barely a foot away from where we’re standing. Though we’re still rendered invisible by Ramnik’s protection spells on the roof, on instinct, I slide down, out of sight, my back pressed against the short brick wall. Cavas follows, tilting his chin to the rose-tinted sky.
“Goddess save us from scrupulous would-be monarchs,” I mutter. “Honestly, I prefer Shayla to Amar right now. At least her tactics make sense.”
Cavas laughs, the sound drawing the thanedar’s beam exactly over our heads.
“Should we start chanting the prophecy for him?” I say, referring to the thanedar. “Make things more interesting?”
“Didn’t think you cared about bored thanedars,” Cavas quips. “We might regret it tomorrow.”
The smiles fade from our faces. Joke though we might about our predicament, there is the very real possibility of the duel ending with Amar’s death. Of a tyrant still ruling Ambar. Or worse: of the kingdom being thrown into a state of anarchy. Eventually, the thanedar’s light moves away; perhaps he grew bored of us after all.
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