The Skyfall Era Trilogy: Books 1-3

by Matt Larkin

  “Malin, get someone from the Ministry of Health.”

  Malin removed his baju, wadded it around the wound, then ran. For once, no hint of a smirk crossed his face.

  Rahu had gone lunatic. Even her father, a master of Silat, had failed to stand up to that power. But Chandi would. Chandra forgive her for what she had to do. A direct confrontation was impossible. But Chandi would not allow the lunatic to destroy the peace. She would not allow him to harm her people. Or Naresh.

  CHAPTER FIFTY-FIVE

  Ratna chased after her father. What on Chandra’s great beaming smile had she just seen? He’d nearly killed his own brother, and that was bad enough. The real question, though, was how? He’d somehow moved the keris without even touching it. Was that some witchcraft he’d learned from her mother? It didn’t look like what she knew of evoking spirits, but since she’d never actually seen that done, she couldn’t be certain.

  “How did you do that?” she called after him as he reached his room.

  Eyes wild, he spun on her, then blinked several times.

  “Father? How did you do that with the teapot and the keris?”

  He exploded into motion so quickly she shrieked, grabbed her by both sides of her jaw, and drew her into his room. “You want power? Power, my child? Power is everything. Everything. With power you can protect what’s yours.” He pulled her face close to his own, forcing her to stand on her toes. “Ours, our family’s destiny. We have to be able to stand against him. He’s coming for us. The bastard. I should have killed him so long ago.”

  “He’s your brother.”

  “Brother …” Rahu snorted. “Soon, daughter. Soon we’ll escape here, return to Bukit. You’ll have all the power you want. The Blessings can still be yours. That bastard Ketu denied them to you, my daughter, and he gave his your birthright. Oh, he’ll pay. Will he live?” He shook his head. “Doesn’t matter. If he lives, he bows. If not, he dies.”

  Rangda’s burning spit. Chandi had been right. Her father must have overdrawn his Blessings, gone lunatic. This was not real. This was not happening. She had lost her mother to the Arun Guard. She could not lose him too. Nodding weakly, she backed out of the room. He had to believe she’d do whatever he wanted. A lunatic was a megalomaniac, and worse, prone to turn on anyone around them at the slightest provocation.

  Outside his door, she covered her mouth, choking down a sob. Not this. This was not happening. She couldn’t lose another parent.

  Sweet Chandra, what about Revati? Ratna gasped, trying to suck air into her lungs but unable to catch her breath. This was going to get very bad. She had to get her daughter and find a way out of this city.

  Before she could even form a plan, Malin stalked out of Ratna’s room.

  He paused, meeting her gaze, though his normally expressive face was hard to read. Was it pity? Fear?

  “Help me,” she mouthed to him.

  At once, Malin’s eyes widened and he reached a hand toward her. Ratna scampered toward him and he drew her away, out of earshot of her father’s room, the led her through the palace.

  Malin. She could count on the weretiger. The Macan Gadungan had never let her down. That’s what he was there for, after all. And Malin had seen lunacy before, probably many times during the war.

  “Is my father …?”

  “He’s on the edge, if not already pushed over,” Malin said, his voice soft and filled with sympathy. He hadn’t spoken to her like that since … What, since she was first forced to marry Kakudmi.

  “He’s paranoid that someone is coming for him.”

  Malin nodded. “Rahu is so convinced Ketu will betray him that he leaves the priest no choice but to do so.”

  “Is my uncle going to live?”

  “Maybe. I have to get someone from the Ministry of Health to see to his wounds.”

  She followed him out of the palace. “You have to get Revati and me out of this city, Malin.”

  The weretiger paused a moment, then shook his head. “I can’t do that yet, but I will help you. I have to go.” At that, the man took off at a pace she couldn’t have matched even with her Potency Blessing drawn.

  Hugging herself and cursing under her breath, Ratna walked back into the palace. Back into her prison.

  CHAPTER FIFTY-SIX

  Though the Minister of Health didn’t like it, he accepted Chandi’s claim that her father’s injuries were internal matters of the Lunar Empire. He wouldn’t pass the incident along to the Ministry of Law, though Chandi had no doubt Kakudmi would hear of it. Still, if Chandi never saw the inside of the Ministry again she’d praise Chandra for it.

  The sun had long since set when medics left her father in his chamber. He’d grown pale from blood loss, but they had assured her he’d recover.

  When he spoke, his voice a dry rasp, she jumped. They had given him tonics that should have made him sleep. “Malin. Arrange a ship for me, now. Any Lunar ship. I’m going to the Astral Temple in the morning.”

  Malin had said little throughout the ordeal. Now he brooded in the corner, hiding in shadows. “You should not leave. You know what Rahu has become.”

  “Don’t tell me what to do, Macan Gadungan. Know your place and follow your orders.”

  “Don’t go,” Chandi said.

  “I have to, Chandi. Rahu has revealed his true self at last. A devastating blow. But an opportunity, as well. The chance to advance our side of the family.”

  Malin growled, and stalked from the room.

  “Why? Why do we have to do any of this? Let the Solars have the damn Temple. Isn’t it worth losing a monument to save so many lives? Isn’t it worth it to make this peace mean something?”

  “We will not be forced to the Solar religion.”

  She sat on the bed beside her father. “We’re not talking about forced conversion. We’re talking about peace, and making a real effort rather than this sham of Rahu’s.”

  “They’re blasphemers. Chandra will not stand for their rule over these Isles.”

  “Blasphemers because they worship Surya?” She took his hand in her own. He had to understand. “You once told me the story of how the Skyfall Isles got their name.” Her father sighed and nodded, so she continued. “Tell me if I get something wrong. All the gods of the sky, sun, moon, and stars together cast a rock from the heavens into the endless ocean of the Earth. Algae from the sea covered this rock and became the Skyfall archipelago.”

  “Yes.”

  “And the sun cast a wooden sword into the ground. And the moon cast a vine around this sword. And these things grew into a tree. And from the tree came man and woman.”

  “Yes.” His voice had grown quieter, but harsher.

  “So aren’t we all the children of both sun and moon?”

  Her father didn’t answer her for so long she decided to check if he had fallen unconscious, but he brushed her away.

  “Chandi, there are things you don’t understand yet. Maybe it’s time. You won’t remember, I’m sure, but when you were very young, you caught malaria. Almost died …”

  “And?”

  But her father just shook his head. “No, please, I need something from Rahu’s chamber first. He has plans, sketches we’ve been working on for the Astral Temple. Can you get them without being caught?”

  “I don’t want to think about the Temple anymore. I’ve had enough of this.”

  “Chandi, please. You saw what Rahu’s become. If we want to stand against him, we must take the Temple from him.”

  Chandi rose and glared at him. “Why? What is it about that place that makes any difference?”

  “Get the plans. I’ll tell you.”

  For a moment more she lingered, then slipped from his room. Years of sneaking about the palace had taught her how to move without making a sound. And in the shadows, with the Glamour, she was almost invisible.

  She listened at Rahu’s door. The reeds concealed little noise. Breathing. Rhythmic. With a glance down both directions of the hall, she cracked the do
or ajar to peek inside.

  Very little light crept in through the crystal pane over the window. She waited for her eyes to adjust. Shame she didn’t have Malin’s night vision.

  Chandi left her sandals beside the door and crept in on her toes, silent as a shadow. Beside her uncle’s sandalwood dresser sat a trunk carved with Lunar etchings. It took longer than she’d like to pick the lock. The creak it made when she opened it sent a shudder through her.

  Her uncle stirred.

  Chandi set the lid closed. She drew the Glamour to shadow herself, and rolled under the bed.

  Tight. Too tight. Had he seen her? He’d need a moment to adjust his eyes. Wouldn’t he? She needed to quiet her breath. Calm. For once, she envied the Solars’ meditation techniques.

  Rahu grunted. The bed creaked as he shifted his weight. Chandi tried to push back farther to the other side. Her back brushed against hard wood. She ran her fingers over it. A box.

  A phase, it seemed, she waited there. Her uncle’s breathing had long since become regular again. But Chandi couldn’t bring herself to move. If she woke him, he’d kill her without a second thought. What in Chandra’s name was she doing here?

  No. No, she’d sworn to stop him, to save the peace. If her father could use those plans to stop Rahu, then she would get them.

  On her belly she slid from the bed and crawled back to the trunk. With agonizing slowness, she opened the lid. A book sat on top. She could just make out that it wasn’t written in the Skyfall tongue. Useless. Silks, exotic teas. Beneath them, a scroll case. Chandra let it be the right one.

  She eased the trunk closed, but paused at the door. Why had he hidden a box under the bed? He’d kept valuable plans to control the Astral Temple itself in a chest, yet hidden something else under his bed. She knelt and drew it out. Heart pounding, she snuck from the room with box and scroll case in hand.

  She grabbed her sandals, but didn’t bother to put them on. Chandi started for her father’s door, then stopped. What had she risked her life for? She slipped into her own room and lit a lamp.

  She unfurled the scrolls on the floor. A complex diagram seemed to match Naresh’s description of the Astral Temple. But the diagrams went on, describing chambers hidden beneath it. The notes, some of them in her father’s hand, indicated not astral observation, but astral manipulation. The ability to actually affect celestial bodies. How and why would they dare to touch the dwelling of the gods? Wasn’t that the ultimate blasphemy? What would a lunatic do with the power to control the heavens?

  Chandi couldn’t imagine the use for such plans, but if her father thought they would allow him to overthrow Rahu, she needed to get them to him. She shoved the scrolls into the case and turned to the box.

  It had no lock, but wouldn’t open. Rangda’s frozen underworld.

  She ran her hands over the edges, feeling the intricate carvings. One gave a little under her touch. She pressed it deeper and heard the lid unlatch. Three ceramic vials lay inside. The kind Rahu used to add milk to his expensive teas. Two vials were empty, but the third held a silvery liquid. It smelled like milk, but in the dim room it glittered, like moonlight on the sea.

  What in Rangda’s underworld? Chandi corked the vial and slid the box under her own bed.

  “Chandi.”

  Hand to her chest, she spun at Malin’s voice. Damn tiger.

  “Ketu’s ship leaves at dawn. He wishes to see you first.”

  Scroll case in hand, she followed Malin to her father’s room. Despite his injuries, her father had dressed in his Silat uniform, a hideous black and yellow suit that he must have thought looked solemn.

  Chandi tossed the scroll case onto her father’s bed. And waited.

  “Malin, carry my luggage to the ship,” her father said. “We’ll follow in a moment.”

  When the Macan Gadungan had left, her father turned to her. “I suppose I owe you answers.” Chandi said nothing. “Do you know where the Moon Scions come from?”

  Chandi shrugged. “After the gods created mankind, Chandra came to human women and loved them. We are their descendants.”

  Her father eased himself back to the bed with obvious effort. “That’s the story. But the Moon Scions come from the Astral Temple. We found the secret there, in the old script, on the pillars. The Amrita makes the Moon Scions.”

  “Amrita?”

  “Nectar of Chandra. He chose us as his human disciples, gave us the secret to brew the Amrita. We can only distill it at the Astral Temple. This is why I must go. Must begin production immediately.”

  Chandi’s mind reeled. Everything she’d known about herself was a lie. “What does that have to do with malaria?”

  Her father coughed for a moment. “I gave you the Amrita when you were very young. You’d have died without it. Gave you more than we had to spare, to save you. Rahu was furious. He’d given his own daughter so little. We had to ration it.”

  Chandi tried to swallow. They had changed her, while denying her cousin strong Blessings. No divine blood. No grace of the gods. “We … lie to everyone. Tell them we’re the blood of Chandra so they follow us.”

  “They follow us because we’re strong. The Moon Scions learn the truth when they have children of their own. But I could have died today, and then you’d never know. Not with Rahu like this. He probably never told Ratna, either. I sent the priests to brew more Amrita as soon as Malin took the Temple. Our supplies are exhausted. We’d lose everything without the Temple. You understand what’s at stake, now, Daughter? Our very way of life will collapse.”

  Chandi slumped to the floor. She didn’t have the blood of a god in her. She was no better than anyone else. She’d been given a magic drug, and called divine for it.

  Her father must have read her face. “We are the chosen of Chandra.” She shook her head but he continued without noticing. “We guarded our secrets too closely. We need more Moon Scions to match the Solars.”

  “So now you’ll take more? Become stronger?”

  Her father’s eyes went wide. “To take more is a short road to lunacy. No, it can only be given to someone new.”

  The very nectar that gave them the power of a god brought them lunatics. Fitting. “What makes you think Chandra wanted any of this?”

  His jaw tightened. “The script on the pillars. It’s older than us, than our people. Chandra wrote that script for his children to find.”

  Chandi scoffed. The same pillars that gave the Solars the Sun Brand. “We should go if you want to make the ship at dawn.”

  Chandi helped her father from the palace and down the harbor, ignoring the way he watched her. She’d find a way to keep the peace.

  She would not lose Naresh.

  Malin waited on the pier, by a ship bound for the Lunar trade ports on Puradvipa. A short trip from there to the Astral Temple.

  Rain had come and gone during the night, but the dawn came clear. The cawing of seagulls filled the air as they searched the docks for spoils.

  Chandi waved farewell to her father. She and Malin remained standing on the pier long after the ship had drifted from sight. Even as it had become crowded with Solars about their day’s work.

  When she turned from the sea, Malin followed, as she knew he would. “I need your help, Malin.”

  “Past time you saw that. We have much to offer one another.”

  “You saw what I saw yesterday. Rahu has gone lunatic. He once sent me to kill Anusapati for that.”

  “I hope you’re not asking me to kill the War King. Even if I could, it would mean chaos through the Lunar Empire. Only your father could attempt it, and, obviously, he is not up to the task. Rahu is the most powerful Moon Scion I’ve ever known.”

  They wound their way past Igni porters and entered the tube to the Civic District. Chandi tried not to glare at Malin. He spoke the truth. “One day my father will have to challenge him. He’ll have to. And I want you to support him.”

  Whatever mistakes her father made in judging the Solars, he was her best hope.
He had to see peace was best for all.

  Malin grunted. “If I did that, I’d want his support in freeing the Jadian.”

  Chandi nodded. They’d speak of this more. But she needed to return to her room, now that she knew what was in that vial. She dared not let it out of her sight again.

  CHAPTER FIFTY-SEVEN

  The harbormaster haggled with a Lunar captain about docking fees. Or perhaps the harbormaster set exorbitant fees, and the Lunar captain merely complained. Either way, he paid the fees.

  Chandi had sought Naresh all morning. She’d hadn’t slept since she’d seen her father off at dawn. Somehow, she had to believe Naresh was the key to fixing all of this. If she told him of the Amrita it might earn his trust. It might also sabotage the hold the Moon Scions held over her people. Perhaps that was justice, after twelve centuries of lies.

  But Naresh had gone to escort Ratna. On the first sunny day since the rainy season began, Chandi’s cousin had decided to bring Revati to the harbor, if only to escape the domes. The smell of sea salt and shellfish almost overwhelmed Chandi. Even if she had grown to tolerate fish as meals, the uncooked stench turned her stomach. Hundreds of small fishing jukungs came and went. With the sun shining overhead she could see all the way to the seafloor. Children swam under the docks, harassed by the watchmen to stay out of the boats’ ways.

  During her first year in Kasusthali the arrival of any Lunar ship would have caused a stir, but such things had become far more common as the peace drew on. Despite her uncle and her father’s protests about the Solars holding the Astral Temple, the three years of peace had seen more stability and prosperity for both sides than the decades before. But had she, or the Solars, understood about the Amrita, they would have known no such peace could last.