by SGD Singh
“Nice of you to bring her up at a time like this, Asha. Classy.”
Kelakha turned to Jax and she looked up at him in the darkness.
“You doing okay?” He asked.
Be tough. Push through the fear. Jax didn’t meet his gaze as she shoved her night-vision glasses onto her face and pulled her hood up, closing the flap over her mouth and nose and straightening her shoulders. “Yeah, sure. Fun, right?”
Kelakha looked at her silently for a long second, then secured his own hood and glasses. “Right. Yeah.”
Asha led them across the river and onto the far shore, taking slow, careful steps forward. They followed her carefully, Aquila first, then Ursala, followed by Kelakha and then Jax.
Asha seemed to stop with every other step to close her eyes, presumably feeling for any horrific fate that awaited them if they continued on that course. She’d jump sideways, making a small adjustment to her direction, take one large step, then several normal steps, then stop again. Soon, Jax stopped trying to find a pattern and just focused on Kelakha’s footprints. One hour felt like ten, and the temperature continued to drop.
Finally, she heard Ursala whistle. “Holy fuck, would you look at that?”
The procession came to a halt, and Jax looked up.
They’d reached the palace.
It rose above them like a colossal beast, made of the same black stone as everything else in this realm, only polished to a glimmering shine. Hundreds of oval windows twinkled like green eyes all along its twisted and knotted skin. Its center was crowned with what looked like an enormous ribcage, smaller towers topped with the claws of monsters at prayer, curving pillars shining in the violet light.
It was absolutely terrifying.
Kelakha reached a hand behind him, and Jax gripped it before she could think to stop herself.
His fingers tightened as Aquila’s voice reached them.
“Asha? What is it?”
Something about those four words, and the concern in Aquila’s voice, made the hair on Jax’s neck stand.
“We…” Asha shook her head. “We can’t go forward.”
She was met with silence.
Then Ursala said, “Are you saying we go back? ’Cause you destroyed that river, which means we—”
“No. I’m saying…”
Jax watched Asha close her eyes. She looked as if she were in pain. Then Asha said two words Jax realized she wished she would never hear a Seer say.
“Oh, shit…”
With a deafening crack, the ground began to crumble out from under them and the next instant Jax felt herself falling.
A detached part of her mind was amazed she didn’t scream. In fact, she didn’t feel much of anything.
This is the moment of my death, and all I feel about my life ending is… nothing.
But in the next moment she wished she still felt nothing, because the thought of Kelakha’s death filled her with sadness. His death seemed like such a senseless waste. Kind, talented Asha, Ursala, who made sure everyone around him laughed. Brave and terrifying Aquila. They should all live long lives.
But as for herself, Jax had already lived longer than anyone could reasonably expect her to. And there wasn’t a single person outside this group who would notice if she ceased to exist.
Jax closed her eyes and welcomed the fall.
A sharp pain in her ribs jerked her eyes open and made her cry out, and Jax felt something—an arm—wrapped around her, lifting her out of her descent. There was something strange about the arm, though…
Well, shit. A gorilla caught me. I’m about to be eaten by a giant, extra-fluffy, flying Atala-gorilla-demon.
With a beat of its enormous bat wings, the creature swooped sideways, diving to snatch Ursala out of the air, crushing him against Jax.
And then the ground was there, and they tumbled down a steep slope of black stone, rolling until Jax didn’t know which way was up.
The next instant, the most excruciating pain Jax had ever experienced stabbed through her mind, and she fell back, clutching her head, unable to think, unable to breathe as her entire world was engulfed in nothing but torturous suffering.
Something metal moved against her, rolling her over, and Jax felt its cold grip close around her, engulfing her. She heard the whir of machinery through the fog of pain.
Then the pain stopped, disappearing as fast as it appeared, and Jax blinked her eyes open, gasping for breath.
She looked through a metal cage with hexagonal openings just large enough for her hand to reach through. The cage held her tight, as if it were made for someone exactly her size, keeping her stuck in a fetal position. Looking around at the landscape of rocky devastation, Jax saw there were four other cages, all of them round, all of them made from the same latticework-metal. Ursala lay unconscious in the one closest to her, his leg twisted at an alarming angle. There were two much smaller cages holding birds of prey, their wings held firmly to their sides.
Asha and Aquila.
The fourth cage was much larger, and Jax gasped as she recognized the giant, winged gorilla-bat.
Kelakha had transformed into an animal that doesn’t exist.
To save you.
He sat hunched, trapped in the vice-like cage, a giant ape-like creature with the fur of a snow leopard. Bat wings large enough to hold the creature’s weight were crushed in what looked like a painful twist. He looked at Jax from across the rubble with sad eyes.
She opened her mouth to call to him, when a movement across the open space caught her attention.
Urnayu.
But instead of coming toward them with those hideous, gaping mouths, they were scuttling away, up the sides of the steep embankment.
And then the sound of voices. A woman stepped from the shadows and approached them, followed by at least twenty others, all with hair as white as snow, though most were no more than girls. Jax noticed they kept a respectful distance from the woman in front, and watched her with religious rapture.
Witches. Jax’s heart sank.
The lead Witch moved with smooth, reptilian grace, power rolling off her in waves. She wore a full skirt of emerald silk that billowed and trailed gracefully behind her, and elaborate folds of what appeared to be leather wrapped around her torso, twining along her delicate arms and extending just past her hips. A collar of feathers fanned out at her neck, running along her shoulders beneath hair as straight and black as liquid tar.
As she grew closer, Jax saw that the Witch wore a mask of intricate gold, feathers, and jewels that covered her eyes.
Most surprising of all was that the Witch looked no older than Jax herself.
There was something terrifying about the girl’s beauty, and Jax realized she was holding her breath, as if this being could steal the oxygen from the air.
The Witch moved smoothly to Asha’s cage and stopped, tilting her head with a smile, wiggling metal-covered fingers at the trapped falcon. The silence held as all the other Witches seemed to be waiting for something. Finally, breaking into loud laughter that set Jax’s teeth on edge, the girl began to clap, and the crowd joined in, their laughter echoing off the cliff walls.
Oh, shit, Jax thought.
Ranya.
Chapter 33
“So twenty-four hours down there is a week here?” Uma was watching Avinash watch his wife, who no longer looked dead.
The skin on Kairav’s leg had healed so quickly that it was easy for Lexi to tell herself the torn tissue and bones peeking out from gaping holes in the flesh just minutes before had only been some grizzly trick of her imagination.
“I told you,” Avinash growled, without looking up. “We’d been there about twenty-four hours when this happened.”
“And at that point there were four hours until this party, right?” Chakori said.
“Correct.”
Uma turned to the Upperworlders. “Well, that settles it. We have to go, and we have to go now. Asha needs a Werewolf—she told Barindra that much. One of
you will bring one of the new Werewolf Jodha from Thailand, and then we’ll leave. There’s literally minutes until they could all be dead, or worse.”
Lexi mouthed or worse in time with Uma, winking at Ariella.
Zaiden shook his head. “It’s not that simple, Master Uma. We have never—”
“No is not an acceptable answer to my request.”
Uma was close to losing her temper and although Lexi thought it would probably be entertaining to see it happen, she had to admit that this time, Uma was right. Asha needed them, and they were running out of time.
You better come up with something, Prince. She’ll kill you before she accepts the death of this Seer.
The Upperworlder nodded once, glancing at Lexi. “We have never travelled with… passengers. Not anywhere, especially not between realms. It could kill you.”
“All due respect, Your Highness, but that’s not a good enough reason to abandon our people.” Uma stood to get in his face. “Someone knows how to make this happen. You get them on the phone, or whatever the fuck you use to communicate, and you get them here. Right. Now.”
Zaiden looked uncomfortable.
What? What’s the problem? You’re wasting time.
We are forbidden to interact with foreign-realm species, let alone aid your efforts. It’s believed to interfere with the balance of the realms.
That won’t matter to Uma. She could give a flying fuck about your beliefs.
“Sashi,” Dinesh said, looking at the prince, and Lexi watched the gold of Zaiden’s skin go from twenty-four carat to ten carat.
“It’s the only way,” Satish added.
What is a Sashi?
My sister. She’s a Healer, a doctor of sorts. She knows how all this stuff works.
So call her. Do it now. Seconds are minutes.
Lexi could feel his dread, but he nodded. Taking something silver out of one of his many pockets, he twisted it, pushed buttons, waited, then pushed two more buttons.
He turned to Uma. “Sashi is coming. She’s not happy about it, but she’s coming.”
“Glad to hear it,” Uma said, clapping her hands once. She started to say something else, but the air above the flash portal shimmered, and then a fourth Upperworlder stood in the training room.
Lexi tried not to gawk. The new arrival’s skin was the sparkling green of a hummingbird’s chest, and her hair and wings the luminescent blues, greens, and purples of a peacock. She wore the same sort of traditional Japanese-embroidered dragon-skin fusion as the others, in a more feminine cut.
She ignored everyone else in the room except her brother, who she glared at with open disbelief. Zaiden, Lexi noticed, had turned a shade of brighter gold.
“Sashi,” the three Upperworlders said in unison, bowing low.
A torrent of what was obviously an angry reprimand flowed from Sashi, and even as she felt the depth of Zaiden’s embarrassment, Lexi found herself completely captivated by the sound of the Upperworlder’s voice. She wondered what the language, which felt like a beautiful song, would sound if it was spoken in kindness. Or, oh God. Song.
“We will speak English out of respect to our hosts,” Zaiden told her.
“Our hosts?” Sashi snorted in contempt, approaching her brother with one gliding step. Her voice didn’t loose any of its beauty. “Humans are now our hosts? What are you talking about, Brother? Would you disrupt The Balance?”
“They are not humans.” Zaiden didn’t flinch from her gaze. “They are Infernal Guard. And they need our help.”
“We do not interfere with Satya realm problems that do not directly concern us, brother.” Sashi shook her head, then turned on Satish and Dinesh. “You two were supposed to be watching out for my soft-hearted brother. How could you let this happen? When I tell father how—”
Uma had Sashi by the hair and slammed her against the wall, a knife at her lovely green throat, before anyone could blink. “While I would love to stand here and listen to you bitch and moan about inter-realm politics until I puke, we just don’t have time for it right at the moment.” Sashi’s reptilian pupils were like serrated knives, and her skin had gone a kind of mint ice cream hue. Uma leaned against the Healer until their noses almost touched. “Now. We need to help our friends in Atala.” Uma jerked her head toward Zaiden. “He says you’re the one that knows how to make that happen. So I’m asking you this: Do you want to do this the friendly way, or the fun way? It makes no difference to me.”
Zaiden turned to Lexi in horror, but she stepped closer to Chakori, and they crossed their arms in unison, smiling at the prince. Nidhan shook his head, looking up at the ceiling, and Ariella shrugged at Satish, casually flipping a knife in her hand.
Only BapuJi stepped forward. He placed a hand on Uma’s shoulder. “Do not bully the Healer, Uma. We want her help.”
With a growl of frustration, Uma shoved Sashi and stalked across the room, leaning on the kitchen counter.
“How did you know she is a Healer?” asked Zaiden.
BapuJi turned to Sashi and bowed slightly. “I am a Healer myself. Also,” he smiled, “she is green, the color of life.”
Sashi frowned at BapuJi, straightening her top. “What you… ask,” she shot a dark look at Uma, “is that we take you to Atala, after bringing two of your Werewolf, uh, recruits here from Thailand, yes?”
“What we ask is that you help us save the Seer of the Triputi Prophecy as well as a group of Infernal Guard who set out to rescue him. One of them is my granddaughter.”
At his mention of the Prophecy, Sashi’s eyes widened. She glanced at her brother with what Lexi thought could have been fear, but a moment later she was as unreadable as before.
“Provided we have an object to connect us to a person or location you want to reach, travel with passengers can be arranged without the limitations of a traditional portal.”
“Convenient.” Lexi glared at the Upperworlders. “Let’s hope you’re more careful with this device than others.”
“Only those with our race’s blood can operate the device. We aren’t complete idiots.” Sashi leveled her gaze at Lexi and blinked in surprise when Lexi didn’t back down. “The only question you should be asking, Jodha, is wether you have anything to connect us to your friends.”
Avinash raised a black stone. “As a matter of fact, yes. We do.”
Chakori handed the stone to Sashi with a smile. “That’s our Asha.”
Inspecting it with a frown, Sashi nodded. “The Under-worlders will not give up this Seer easily. We have all been waiting for him to grow old enough to be found, Upper and Underworld alike.” She put a hand to her throat. “Our kind have been peaceful too long. We are not equipped or trained to face such a fight.”
Uma, Chakori, and Lexi stepped forward. “But we are,” Uma said.
Sashi regarded them steadily, her colorful hair shimmering in the light. “I will not help you if Zaiden goes. It is too dangerous.”
Zaiden moved toward his sister in protest, but Chakori blocked him with her arm and pushed him back.
“Done,” said Uma. “We’ll take Dinesh.”
Dinesh bowed slightly. “It will be my honor,” he said.
Zaiden moved past Chakori with more force than Lexi had seen him use before, and she felt his anger. He gripped his sister’s arm. “Sashi, you—”
“Those are my terms, Zaiden. Take them or leave them.” Her green eyes flashed and she jerked her arm out of his grip. “And you can cut out the threatening attitude. You know these… humans are incapable of killing me.”
I see the females of your realm aren’t as nice and peaceful as you led us to believe. Should I tell her about the soulmate issue now or later?
Lexi saw Zaiden’s mouth twitch. You really are trying to get me killed, aren’t you?
Lexi looked at the floor to stifle her own grin. The Upperworlder was beginning to fit into her world more quickly than she thought possible.
She squashed the thought and moved closer to Nidhan.
“Now we’re getting somewhere.” Uma clapped her hands. “C’mon, people, we move out in fifteen.”
† † †
Ten minutes later Lexi finished collecting her gear and weapons and went looking for Nidhan.
He stood on the deck, gazing down at the ocean below. He had changed out of his swim suit into black cargo pants and a T-shirt, his hair wrapped up in its usual dumala. As she approached him, Lexi heard Nidhan sigh.
“I’m going,” she said.
He turned and smiled his familiar smile. Joy that never seemed to leave his eyes directed at her, and Lexi felt as if she’d been kicked in the chest by how much she loved him.
“Of course you are,” he said.
“Uma says only Jodha can go, and there’re just the four of us here.” Lexi spared a moment to regret sending the K triplets back to Central HQ to report. She studied the small flask of holy water to her belt. She didn’t mention that Uma had also told them that other than their night-vision glasses and survival suits, they shouldn’t bother with survival packs, since they’d either be there for just a few hours or they’d be dead. She took a breath. “Barindra says the rest of you are going back to Central Headquarters to wait. I think there’s a good chance of us coming back. It’ll be fine. It’s gonna be fine. I mean, what can…”
Lexi felt Nidhan’s strong arms around her, and she leaned against him, feeling the tension of the last week leave, as if his cheerful calm could heal. Closing her eyes, Lexi breathed in his clean scent of sandalwood and orange-vanilla, and hoped it wasn’t for the last time.
“It’ll be more than fine,” Nidhan said, raising her face to his. He kissed her once, deeply, as if he couldn’t help it, as if he’d forgotten about Zaiden, and Lexi wrapped her arms around him and held on as tightly as she could, willing the moment to stretch beyond all possibility.
When Nidhan straightened, his eyes shone with tears and something more. Pride. “It’ll be more than fine, Lexi. It’ll be fun.”