by Samit Basu
A door creaked open, and Spikes stepped out on the balcony behind him. Kirin did not move.
‘Any news from the hunt?’ asked Kirin.
‘Yes. The surviving Xi’en and their acolytes have been found.’
Kirin’s jaw tightened. ‘Where?’
‘They’re hiding in a valley just across the Grey Mountains. We attack at dawn.’
‘Why wait till then?’
‘Assembling forces. They’re going to fight like wild monkeys when they realize they’ve been cornered.’
Kirin looked around, finally, at Spikes standing dour and menacing in the last rays of the hiding sun.
‘How is she?’ he asked.
‘Still unconscious. Nasiviv will tell you if there’s any significant change.’
‘I’ve heard that line every day for a month now.’
‘I know. It’s not a particular favourite of mine either.’
‘Right.’ And Kirin returned to contemplating his dark domain.
They stood silently for a few minutes.
‘Talk to me,’ said Spikes.
‘It wasn’t your fault,’ he said after a while.
‘I’m going to push you over the railing if you don’t stop being a drama queen,’ he said after a while.
‘What do you want me to say, Spikes? I could start whining again about my shortcomings as a Dark Lord, but we’ve done that. And I think I’m getting a lot better at the Dark Lord business, actually.’
‘That’s what I’m worried about.’
‘I had to take my responsibilities seriously at some point. What happened happened because I didn’t.’
‘What happened was bad luck.’
‘Bad luck?’ Kirin whirled around, eyes blazing. ‘Don’t coddle me, Spikes. You told me yourself. I remember every word. “There’s trouble at the tower. A bunch of Wu Sen monks and Pimawen assassins have turned up to kill you and take the Gauntlet back to Xi’en, and every time they’ve raided the tower looking for you, they’ve killed everyone in their way.” And I did nothing.’
‘You did nothing wrong. You knew you could protect yourself. You did not fear them. Rightly so, as it turned out.’
‘I don’t think the people who died protecting me would see it that kindly, Spikes. I was their great Leader. I had no right to return and pretend to take charge if I had no intention of looking after the safety of my followers.’
‘You didn’t ask them to come help you.’
‘I chose to be Dark Lord. When I did, these people, asurs and rakshases and pashans and humans and monsters all, became my people. All I’ve done since then is try to mislead them, turn them from their ways towards what I thought was right, make them do what I wanted, what I thought was better for them.’
‘Peace, education, brighter futures. How selfish of you.’
‘No, Spikes. I’ve been guilty of the same sort of arrogance I’ve always despised in every chest-thumping hero in history, dragging the weak and confused towards his own stupid heroic visions of ideal futures against their will. How could I not have seen this?
‘I think it’s time I stopped trying to impose my wishes on my people and started trying to give them what they want.’
‘Even if they want war and destruction? Wasn’t stopping wars and saving lives the only reason you accepted your father’s offer? Would you lead them into war now, just because you feel guilty about one act of carelessness?’
‘I don’t know.’ And Kirin turned his back on Spikes again.
‘Whatever you do, I trust you to know the difference between right and wrong, Kirin,’ said Spikes.
Kirin said nothing.
‘Don’t make the mistakes your father made.’
Silence.
‘I preferred the complaining to the sulking, I think,’ said Spikes, and left.
Kirin gripped the railing until his hands turned white. Spikes was right, he knew. Or was he? If he’d done his duty, would she still be battling death in the healers’ quarters? She had saved his life, and in return his weakness and indecision had almost cost her hers.
His thoughts turned again to her. To their first night in the tower…
She’d shut the door with one wave of her hands, and filled the air with sweet, strange scents with another. She’d walked slowly up to him, slithered into his arms and before he even knew what was happening, there they were, kissing hungrily, their clothes melting away like water. And as her warm hands sent shivers down his bare back, he’d opened his eyes, seen her face – Maya’s face – and he’d broken the kiss and turned away, his heart beating frantically.
‘What’s wrong?’ she’d whispered.
‘I know you’re not Maya,’ he’d said.
She’d stepped back, looked down at herself, at her smooth brown skin glistening in the candlelight, and then at him, his breath tightening as their eyes met. ‘I can be anyone you want me to be.’
‘I want you to be you,’ he’d said, unable to take his eyes off her. ‘I don’t even know you.’
‘But you like me. Very much,’
‘Yes.’
‘That’ll do.’
‘No, it won’t,’ he said. ‘Not if you look like Maya. I want to see you.’
And he’d watched her lines and curves swirl and harden from one flawless form to another, felt desire course through his veins anew as he feasted his eyes on an unbearably lovely warrior-woman, ebony-skinned, ruby-haired.
‘Is this you?’
‘This is me tonight.’
They’d stared at each other in silence for a few moments. Then Kirin had reached out for her, but she’d skipped away, laughing, and transformed herself into Spikes.
‘Oh my,’ she’d giggled, looking at him archly, tracing arabesques on the floor with a stumpy foot, ‘is that for me, Kirin? All these years of faithful service, and I never knew.’
He’d just stared at her then, laughing foolishly.
‘Put your clothes on,’ she’d said, changing into warrior-woman form again. ‘You’re in love with Maya, and it turns out, to my surprise, that I’m a romantic at heart. I’ve been watching and waiting for you two to stop being idiots for years, and I can’t do this to you now.’
‘Who are you?’ he’d asked in complete wonderment then, one part of his mind reminding him it would be polite to stop goggling at her.
‘I’m not entirely sure,’ she’d said. ‘It might have been interesting if you’d helped me find out. But we can talk about that, and many other things, in the morning.’
‘No,’ he’d said. ‘Don’t go.’
And for the first time since he’d met her, covered with dust and sweat and blood amidst the ruins of the ravian temple in Vrihataranya, he’d seen confusion in her eyes.
And right then, as they’d looked at each other in the flickering light, each breathlessly considering drastic, immediate revisions of their lives, fifteen wildly shrieking Xi’en assassins had thrown themselves through the ceiling.
Darkness fell and stars came out over Izakar, and the moon rode out in full glory, but time had stopped for Kirin.
Kirin looks up, and sees Wu Sen monks hurtling towards him in mid-air, and Pimawen assassins running miraculously down the walls. Far too late, he remembers Spikes’ warning, and realizes they are after the Gauntlet. Which is on a small table next to his bed, open and unprotected. He pulls with his mind, and it flies to his hand – he catches it just as a Wu Sen monk crashes down on the table. On his other hand, the Shadowknife lengthens and hardens into a sabre; it is thirsty. But Kirin has wasted precious seconds; the Pimawens have already hurled poison-tipped darts at him, and they almost scrape his throat as he turns them aside in mid-air, sending them crashing to the ground.
‘Leave!’ he shouts, wanting her to vanish, but she does not. Instead, she swings her arms in a wide arc, and a sheet of flame rushes upwards at their assailants. It burns the Pimawens, but the Wu Sen monks are unharmed. Now all fifteen are on the floor, in attack positions amidst the falling stones an
d rubble of the ceiling; with a flowing gesture, Kirin shatters the stones that would have crushed him, and her, an instant later. Swords are drawn. More darts are thrown and hurled aside. The door crashes open; Spikes is here. Behind him are rakshases and asur guards. A Pimawen strikes Spikes repeatedly, his fingers blurring as they perform a complicated sequence of jabs and thrusts on pressure points on his body, intending to paralyze him. Spikes raises his hands and claps, crushing his assailant’s head like an eggshell.
The attackers are faster than any humans their opponents have ever seen. She throws fire and venom at them, but they are masters of close-quarters combat, and they duck and weave and skim over walls, doubling and circling and leaping, and she has nowhere to run. But an asur has thrown her a sword; she does not want to run.
Rakshases materialize. But the room is small and crowded, and they are careless; two appear hideously merged - one’s arm sticking out through the other’s chest. A monk shoots a streak of blue fire at them from his open palm, and they fall screaming through the window, trailing blue fire and smoke. The Dark Lord’s soldiers form a circle around him, but he is not protected; the men from Xi’en attack in no discernible formation, but the circle is never allowed to remain complete. Fresh corpses pile up on the floor – mostly asur corpses, but more asurs keep coming.
Kirin stays close to her; the Shadowknife defends them. The room is an impossible blur of blades, fists, feet and fireballs. Spikes is in the centre, a death-dealing pivot. Blood drips from his spikes and claws; he seems not to notice sword-thrusts, and the Wu Sen’s pigtails-with-blades head attacks only annoy him. He knocks two monks’ heads together, ties their pigtails in a knot, and releases them; they spring apart instinctively and slice each other’s throats.
Aciram arrives, laughing as he strikes, and now the attackers are fighting for their own lives. The wily rakshas has fought Xi’en warriors in small enclosures before, and under his guidance, the rakshases rally and charge. The Pimawen fight in the style of the monkey, lurching and crouching. They move faster than the rakshases, but the rakshases are stronger; the attackers are slowly herded together, their backs to the window.
A Wu Sen monk, the oldest and most skilful, leaps up on the windowsill, dodging a fireball, and takes careful aim. A dragon-shaped streak of blue light extends from his palm towards Kirin. He misses Kirin.
He hits her.
She does not burn like the others; the dragon-light seems to slither around her body, and then it dives into her mouth and is gone. She lurches forwards and Kirin catches her. She sinks to the ground in his arms. A trickle of blood rolls out of her mouth, and her pupils swim upwards.
‘Healers!’ roars Kirin, casting every healing spell he knows on her. Aciram vanishes. Spikes impales another monk, his claws going right through the thin, bald man’s chest. More rakshases, big, young, terrifying, materialize in the room. But Kirin does not see them. She’s trying to tell him something, gurgling and spitting as blood wells up in her mouth and cascades down his hands. He pulls her up, one hand behind her neck.
‘They’re dead,’ she says, her eyes wide, astonished. ‘He killed Soma and Tamasha.’
‘You’ll be all right,’ he says. ‘Rest.’
‘No, Kirin, you don’t understand,’ she says, her voice suddenly childlike. ‘If they’re dead, who am I?’
He has no answer. He does not even know her name, and grief runs right through him, icy and grey.
Aciram materializes next to them, with Nasiviv the healer. Nasiviv picks her up, firmly and expertly, and Kirin rises cobra-like to return to battle. But the battle is over; the eight surviving monks and assassins leap out of the window, and as the defenders cry out in astonishment, they glide down the tower, their feet only occasionally touching its black walls. There are rakshases waiting for them at the bottom, but they never reach the bottom; shrugging off arrows and winged attackers alike, they leap over walls, jump over rooftops and are gone.
Kirin looks around in horror at the bodies littered around his bedroom. He feels as if he has murdered them all himself. Other rakshases walk over bodies, healing the wounded, but Kirin sits in a corner, staring at nothing until Spikes helps him up and leads him away.
‘Kirin? May we speak?’
Aciram walked out on to the balcony, looking immensely weary. Spikes stood behind him, stone-cold in the moonlight, not meeting Kirin’s eyes.
‘Crow’s reports are in. About fifty of them are encamped in the valley. The team for tomorrow’s attack has been assembled, and is ready to leave as soon as you give the word. Flyers, teleporters and vanars. We’ll be there in no time.’ said Aciram.
‘Consider the word given, then,’ said Kirin. ‘I’m surprised you took so long.’
‘I would have come earlier, but Nasiviv called me to his quarters.’ The massive rakshas looked uneasy.
‘There is news?’ Kirin’s eyes lit up. ‘She has recovered?’
Aciram sighed, and shook his head. ‘She died one hour ago.’
‘You do not have much time to grieve, I am afraid,’ he said. ‘There is also dark news from the east – the ravians are on the move, and you have much to do. But know this – I leave now to cross the mountains with a band of killers the like of which has never seen before, and I will personally hunt down each and every one of those Xi’en curs, and give them deaths more savage than anything you could imagine.’
The Gauntlet of Tatsu burned brightly on Kirin’s hand, as brightly as his burning eyes as he summoned his dragons.
‘No, Aciram. Stay here, and see to her last rites,’ Kirin said. ‘I will lead the attack myself.’
Chapter Two
An ancient Koli philosopher who’d wanted to get rid of an annoying houseguest had once asked the question, ‘If a tree falls in a forest and no one observes it, does it make a sound?’ He’d gotten rid of the houseguest, but the question had lingered.
A far more difficult, though less widely known, question was this: ‘If a tree falls, and is observed to fall, in a forest, but the forest itself does not exist, does it make a sound?’
This question was only asked in Ekyavan, a mysterious forest valley in Avranti, and always followed by uproarious laughter, because the seers of Ekyavan, despite possessing incredible mystic powers and impressively uncoiled inner (spiritual) serpents, had really unfortunate senses of humour.
Perhaps this was because the work they did was not funny at all.
King Aloke of Avranti had always denied the existence of the valley known (unofficially) as Ekyavan, regardless of the difficulty normally associated with completely ignoring a patch of land the size of a small city-state. It was almost certain that Ekyavan was where Avranti’s awesome magical weapons were developed and tested; that there something, or someone, hidden in the valley’s woods that Avranti was desperate to hide. Some whispered it was a fallen god, expelled from the heavens, and the valley itself was a crater that owed its origin to the impact of his fall. Others spoke of star-voyagers, secret societies, beings from other worlds who visited regularly with gifts, whose teachings could explain the nature of magic and solve all the world’s puzzles. The less imaginative spoke of secret treaties with vamans, captive rakshases, or reservoirs of pure magic. For the world at large, over the years, Ekyavan had become a running joke, a secret graveyard where lost household objects went to die, a palace where little green men decided the fashion trends of the future.
There were still, however, large numbers of people who took Ekyavan and its unknown denizens very seriously. Pamphlets had existed for centuries, written, circulated and read by cryptographers, treasure-hunters, swindlers and bored people, about the effects of Ekyavan on the world – hidden symbols and codes, architectural and agricultural techniques, languages, magic, art.
While most of these had been proved fraudulent, aimed at parting believers from their savings, or for the sheer pleasure of displaying rudely shaped objects to large numbers of people, all Ekyavan-related apocrypha had certain aspects in commo
n. They all involved recently unearthed ancient depictions of mysterious celestial beings descending from the skies, causing floods and animal extinctions, and settling down in Ekyavan, keeping themselves occupied right up to the present day by secretly controlling the world through unconventional means, such as carefully placed symbols, little stones embedded in people’s heads, popular world religions, and strange lights and sounds.
Avrantic farmers who lived in the lands surrounding (the alleged) Ekyavan refused to discuss the valley at all with even the most persuasive strangers – mostly because they had several centuries worth of handed-down experience in identifying and being rude to lunatics, cult members and spies. Though there were other rumours, dark rumours, of what really silenced the farmers – tales of sinister, black-clad men with glowing, lidless eyes who came in the night and took away anyone suspected of speaking of Ekyavan and its secrets. The only thing there was no doubt about was this: On the fringes of (alleged) Ekyavan, the king’s soldiers would stop you and ask you to return.
No one who had ventured past them had been known to return.
It was afternoon when movement on the ground caught the attention of the eagle-eyed guardians of Ekyavan, These guardians were, in fact, eagles, majestic Avrantic eagles (Rigallig aligals), ever-vigilant watchers with great mad eyes, sterling celestial-weapon reviewing skills and fashionable habits (such as never turning up before the last quarter of any major battle). The eagles had protected the valley for ages, making short meals of every bird, spy or civilavian, that strayed into their air-space, seeing through the illusions of the stealthiest intruders, from Danh-Gem’s shadowsnatcher rakshasis to shimmering, invisible Artaxerxian jinn.