The Star-Touched Queen (10 page)

When I walked outside, Gupta flashed the bare bones of a smile before nodding and starting off down one of the halls. Despite Akaran’s coldness, the pallid corridors and mirror-paneled foyers sang to me. The same dining room from before had been laid out with a placemat set with rich foods, fruits and water. I drew my chair to the table, stealing glances out the window toward Akaran’s barren landscape. Loneliness in Akaran was worse than being stared at by the Raja’s harem. At least I knew
who
was doing the watching. Here, even the walls were leering, weighing and examining me.

“I trust you slept well,” said Gupta.

“Yes, thank you.” I glanced around the wide dining room. “Will you be joining me?”

He hesitated. Like yesterday, he didn’t meet my gaze.

“I suppose that will be agreeable.”

I stopped myself from joking.
I don’t bite … often.

The moment Gupta sat down, he began to rub at the table, inspecting an invisible speck of dust.

“I hear Amar apologized on my behalf.” This time his voice was softer, hesitant.

I froze. He had referred to Amar by his first name. I’d never once heard a councilor or adviser—no matter how close he was—call my father by his first name. They’d sooner behead themselves. Gupta’s gaze was shy, perhaps curious about what I’d make of his familiarity. When I said nothing, he noticeably relaxed.

“He did, but there was no need,” I said. “I think it’s … refreshing, that you grew up away from the protocols of court speech and etiquette.”

Gupta itched his hawkish nose, his eyes widening. “You do?”

I smiled. “It doesn’t matter to me.”

Gupta grinned back and his nose spread impishly across his face. “I’m glad to hear that, Rani.”

I chewed my cheek. I didn’t want to be locked in by invisible rules of caste or rank. My father’s words echoed in my head: Immortality lay in emotions. If this was going to be my kingdom as much as Amar’s, I needed to prove it. And that meant knowing Gupta the way Amar did. Not as a councilor or an adviser, but as a friend.

“Call me Maya.”

Gupta’s hands clenched and he quickly looked away. I thought I saw tears glittering in his eyes, but instead of facing me, he rubbed at a spot on the table.

“I detest dirt. Did you know there are at least five thousand different kinds of tiny beasts in a unit of dirt? It’s appalling. You can’t clean it properly,” he said, crinkling his nose.

“How do you know that?” I asked, torn between disbelief and laughing.

“I am the scribe of this kingdom,” he said, drawing himself up. “I make it a point to know as much as I can. For instance, I once interviewed a snail that had slept for three years. I have also detailed the song of sunbears and translated the treaties of autumn trees. Absolutely critical things to know.”

“I see. Well, I hope … I hope we can be friends.”

He stared at his lap. “Once a friend, always a friend.”

A sound spidered through the floor. A laugh, a trill. The ghost of another’s voice. I spun around, expecting someone standing behind me, but there was no one. Nothing but empty space and gleaming walls.

“What was that?”

“Or who,” said Gupta casually.

“Who
?”

“I’m not sure … it could be anyone. Or anything. It could be a wind angry with its lover and dreaming of revenge. It could be the voice of a
nagini
remembering her first kiss. Akaran’s strange position makes it a home for a thousand voices.”

I remembered Amar’s words from yesterday.

“Is it because Akaran lies in between the human and Otherworld?”

“Precisely,” said Gupta. “There’s all kinds of hidey-holes dotted about. There are places where you can jump and find yourself buried beneath the earth. There are pools of glass that you can swim through and find lost monsters with no names. In Akaran, things just
are
.”

“Could I see these places?”

“Eventually,” said Gupta. “But all things must wait. For the right time, for the moment when—” His eyes suddenly bulged as he clawed at his throat.

The moon
,
I thought. Gupta must be bound into silence by it too.

“I apologize,” he gasped. “I—”

“I know,” I cut in. My hands balled into fists in my lap. I felt helpless. I could feel magic coating the air around me. It felt like starlight and a swoop in my stomach, something heatless and bright and extraordinary. And yet I couldn’t
know
it. A mere turn of the moon
,
I reminded myself.

“But, Maya,” said Gupta, leaning forward. His eyes gleamed. “Be careful not to follow the sounds of the palace. It is a tricky thing. It will test you. It is fine to explore. The doors that cannot open to you will not do so.”

He pulled aside one flap of his jacket where a thousand keys—of horn and bone, metal and pearl—jangled.

“Look around,” he said. “Akaran is a land that is, by nature, easily accessible.”

He stood up, pointing to the barren expanse around us. It hadn’t changed. Not a single cloud drifted across its sky. No bird trailed its shadow on the ground. A world draped in silence.

“There are places behind our doors that must never be opened. Cunning, dark things. They can sense an invitation by something as small as another person’s breath in the same room.”

I shivered. “The most minor acts can herald destruction?”

“Well, only if you get behind the doors,” he said, patting the jacket flap. “Those places are locked away. I doubt you’ll ever find them. But you shouldn’t go looking either. Sometimes the palace sings and murmurs. Bored and tricky thing.”

Gupta glanced at the scrolls on the table and his face paled. “Amar!” he exclaimed suddenly. “We must go. He won’t forgive me if I don’t take you to the throne room in time.”

When Amar wasn’t there in the morning, I assumed he’d left Akaran entirely. The thought of seeing him again sent a rush of heat to my cheeks. I looked at my lap, tamping down my eagerness. I’d seen enough of the harem women begging for scraps of the Raja’s attention that my mind revolted against it.

“Is that where he is?”

Gupta nodded. “Yes, he’s waiting for you.”

Waiting. For
me
. I smiled to myself as Gupta led me through the empty corridors. Doors of all shapes and sizes dotted the halls, some of them carved and inlaid with ivory and gems, others plain slabs of dark wood. Rich rugs sprawled out beneath my feet, softer than silk and festooned with more detail and beauty than all of Bharata’s paintings combined.

All along the hallway, hundreds of mirrors caught the light, but as I stood before them they did not twin my image. One mirror boasted a plain wooden frame, splintered at the edges. When I looked through it, I saw the sands of a desert piddling out beneath an ochre sun. Another mirror studded with sapphire showed the reflection of a glittering port city, heavy boats with ivory prows gently rocking on a gray sea.

Mirror after mirror … giving way to countries spiked with spires, turrets bursting with small ivy flowers, cities awash in color, and a thousand skies painted in vespertine violets of anxious nightfall waiting for stars, dawns just barely blooming pink and orange with new light, afternoons presiding over sleeping towns … it was all
here
. I could have stared through those mirrors for hours if Gupta hadn’t kept marching forward.

“You see?” said Gupta smugly. “Lovely, aren’t they?”

“And you can get to any of these places?” I breathed.

“Oh yes.”

“Could I go?”

“Soon enough.”

We passed the mirrors, and the corridor gave way to a stone archway.

“May I ask you something?” I said suddenly.

“You may, but I cannot guarantee I can answer it.”

“Why does the Raja of Akaran hide his face? Is he … disfigured?”

“So many of us hide behind our glazed words and practiced expressions. Amar is not like that. His expression leaves no room for mistake. Around you, let us say his expression would make his feelings too obvious. Give him time.”

Gupta threw open a pair of doors. “This is the throne room,” he said, quickly blocking my path. “Gaze lightly. This kingdom is magnificent, but its power is old and runs deep and will not hesitate to test you.”

I nodded uncertainly before walking past him, my eyes widening as I took in the stark and imposing room. But what stole my breath was the tapestry covering the wall beside the dais. On the left wall, obsidian threads shimmered, forming a tempestuous ocean streaked with foamy white waves; rose-gold filaments arced into a bulbous lotus and silken veins stretched into gnarled orchards.

Across the tapestry’s middle stretched a terrible seam, rent apart on either side like the scalloped edges of a flesh wound. Something about the tear struck me, I could feel the rip
inside
me, forcing me to glance down and lightly tap my wrist to make sure that it was flesh that met my fingers and not a thousand threads. The tapestry stretched far beyond the walls of the throne room. I could feel it like a cloak around my heart.

“We’ll meet again in the evening,” said Gupta.

“Anything else I should know before you leave?”

Gupta grinned. “Amar is terrible at flattery.”

I smiled, but I couldn’t help but wonder who had been the last person he had attempted to flatter. The thought bothered me.

“I was never wooed by courtly speech anyway.”

As Gupta closed the door behind him I heard a soft laugh by my side.

“Is that so?”

Amar.

I turned to face him, my gaze tracing the emerald robes that matched my sari perfectly. Like yesterday, he wore a hood that left only the lower half of his face in view. I looked at him, and even if it was only a moment, he eclipsed the staggering pull of the tapestry.

“I’m not swayed by flattery,” I said. “I think a woman could feel insulted by a compliment. But I suppose that depends on the delivery.”

“I think it depends on the
sincerity
. If you tell a woman she sings beautifully when she knows the sound of her voice might as well drop a slab of stone on the person next to her, then a compliment would be insulting.”

I crossed my arms. “She could think you’re blinded by love.”

“Or deafened.”

“You seem quite learned in the art of giving compliments,” I countered. “Do you give them often?”

“No. Gupta was telling the truth. I’ve forgotten how to pay courtly compliments,” said Amar. “For instance, etiquette demands I tell you that you look lovely and compliment your demure. But that wouldn’t be the truth.”

Heat rose to my cheeks and I narrowed my eyes. “What, then, would be the truth?”

“The truth,” said Amar, taking a step closer to me, “is that you look neither lovely nor demure. You look like edges and thunderstorms. And I would not have you any other way.”

My breath gathered in a tight knot and I looked away, only to catch sight of the tapestry. The threads throbbed behind my eyes, sharp as any headache. My vision blurred, swallowing the room around me. I blinked rapidly, squinting at the threads.

All I could see were that all the threads were out of place. Some had either skipped a stitch or poked out altogether. I walked toward the tapestry in a daze, my hands outstretched.

I could feel the tapestry’s pull, sharp as hunger, dry as thirst. Nothing would sate or slake me. All I wanted was to adjust the threads, tuck them back into place. There was an order, a pattern, like a stitching trick. I could feel it like a word balancing on the tip of my tongue and all I had to do was—

Amar’s hand closed around my wrist. He moved before me, blocking the tapestry.

“Stop!”

I blinked, my head woolly. His hands were around my shoulders, drawing me to a wobbly stand.

“Did I fall?”

“That sounds ungraceful,” he said, a smile playing at his lips. He was trying to joke with me, to ward off whatever happened as though it were nothing. But his hands were tight at my shoulders and there was the slightest tremble in his fingers.

“A graceful tumble, then?” I suggested, stepping out of the circle of his arms.

I didn’t need any help keeping myself upright.

“I should’ve explained the tapestry before showing it to you. It can be overwhelming.”

Amar led me to the throne and I sank into it wearily. There was a new ache tethered inside my bones. In the haze, the pressure of Amar’s hand against my arm was warm, comforting even. I closed my eyes, concentrating on the warm pulse in his fingers.

When I finally felt strong enough to speak, I opened my eyes to find Amar’s face mere inches from mine. I could count the immaculate stitching of his emerald hood, the stubble along his chin and the veins raised along his hand. His eyes, as always, lay hidden. But he was so close that if I wanted, and I did, I might be able to peek—

Amar jerked backward, his jaw tightening. “The tapestry is how we keep the borders between the Otherworld and human realms safe.”

He walked to the tapestry and ran his hands over the flickering threads. “Each of these threads is a person.”

“The threads represent
people
?” I repeated, sure I had misheard him. “And the entire tapestry…?”

“It’s what keeps everything in order.”

“Everything?” My brows drew together. “As in—”

“As in the movements of fate.”

“Fate is in the purview of the stars,” I quipped, not without some bitterness. I had been fed that line my whole life. It was hard to forget my blind jailers in the sky, shackling me to a fate I didn’t even believe. Not that it changed anyone else’s mind.

“Fate and order are entirely different. And one cannot rely on stars for order. Some of the threads represent the people who have fallen accidentally into the Otherworld,” said Amar, pointing at a darkened section near the corner. “Our task is deciding which people should be allowed in, and which ones shouldn’t.”

“Why not just keep everyone out?”

“Some people are bound to fall into the Otherworld. Their fate is fixed. All we can do is move between its fixed rules and change what we can to maintain a balance. Let me show you,” he said. I rose to my feet, masking a sigh of relief that my legs wouldn’t give out from under me.