The Star-Touched Queen (32 page)

“Of course not,” he said, waving a dismissive hand. But I caught a tremor in his fingers. “Still, we need to control the peace. We must care what they think.”

“Why? It won’t change anything.”

“It’s your”—he caught his words—“
our
reputation.”

*   *   *

The realms held council in illustrious courts above the clouds, where thunder stalked in the corners and lightning crowned each throne. The air was uncommonly bright, livid with sunshine and splendor. Many-limbed
devas
reclined on carved clouds, clutching ambrosial
soma
in golden goblets as they questioned me.

Throughout my questioning, the Dharma Raja stood by my side, a silken shadow against all this light. I believed in myself, and with Amar supporting me, my decision was invincible.

“How could you be so cruel?” exclaimed one. “No wife in his mortal life?”

“His wife would not be reincarnated with him. I will not give him another.”

A woman with a white veil, whose skin glowed like dawn, shot me a trembling smile.

“And what about his brothers? Did they not also partake in his crime of theft?” retorted another.

“They did,” I said.

“Then why must he endure a whole life as a human when his brothers live less than a year in that realm?”

“Because they were accomplices. Not the instigators of the crime. It was he who committed the most wrong. It is he who must live the longest.”

The
deva
beside me stomped his feet and lightning flared behind him.

“And what say you, Dharma Raja? How will you defend your queen’s decision?”

I remembered holding my chin high, surveying the crowd with the tasteful indifference of one who knew she was impervious. And I remembered when that moment fell with his next words:

“If you doubt her, then I propose an
agni pariksha
. Fire will always tell.”

The
devas
and
devis
nodded approvingly to themselves. A trial by fire. Humiliation burned through me. I dropped my hand from his and the world broke between us.

*   *   *

Betrayal felt bitter and acrid in my throat, and the ghost of it was everywhere, taunting my reflection. How could he do this to me? How could he doubt me so much to expose me to the ridicule and glances of the celestial world? All this time, Amar said nothing. Our bed became a cold thing and my heart froze with it.

*   *   *

I remembered the night I awoke all alone, my eyes still puffed and swollen from weeping. Our bed was empty, the room echoing. I heard my name called through a mirror portal that Nritti had once used. Silently, I walked through the halls, my hair unbound and catching along the newfound icicles hanging across marble eaves.

Nritti was there. Waiting. I ran to embrace her, not once seeing that her fingers were stained red, that the smell of rot clung to her. I was blind.

“I forgive you,” she said tonelessly. “And I come in warning.”

“Of what?”

“Your Dharma Raja has turned on you, sister.”

Her words became my poison and I let it fill me, blind me, until all I saw was betrayal.

*   *   *

Nritti fed me images through an obsidian portal—Amar tearing out the tapestry threads like throats, of him gloating in the fallen lives, of him ignoring my words, waiting for the moment where he could use the
agni pariksha
to exile me forever.

“You were nothing but his dark plaything,” Nritti said.

And I let myself believe her.

*   *   *

On the day of the
agni pariksha
, light transfixed Amar’s face.

“I have every faith in you, my love,” he said, trailing fingers along my jaw. “This will put an end to every rumor. This will keep you safe from them. I know our days have been cold, but after this, we will be as we once were.”

Inside, my heart snarled, but I kept my face blank. “I will not disappoint.”

All the members of the Otherworld assembled for my trial. I wore white, the dress of mourning. In the Night Bazaar, a dim glow lit up the faces of the attendees, clinging to well-oiled horns and scaled skin. Leonine
rakshas
waited patiently, weapons quivering in their grip. If I failed, they were free to depose me. If I succeeded, they would end their bloodshed in the human realms.

Sacred flames lapped up from the ground. Ribbons of fire snaked out like tongues and grasping hands. I looked to Amar. His face was stern. Hopeful. For what outcome, I thought I knew. But I was wrong.

The
agni pariksha
scraped through me, burning talons that combed through my being. Survive unscathed and it was proof of my worthiness as queen. I did not doubt that I would pass. The question was what to do after. Nritti’s words floated through my mind as I burned and burned and burned.
He wants you to fail, sister. He does not know how strong you are. When you succeed, leave. Leave his horrible kingdom. Let him fend for himself. Let him weep. Let him fail. Start anew. With me.

Nritti had fed me so many images—Amar dancing with a beautiful
nagini
in a sea palace carved of glass. Amar flinching from my touch. My tongue was full of smoke and heartbreak. My mind was full of lies.

I don’t remember when the
agni pariksha
ended. I only remembered emerging, my ankles encircled with ash. A deafening roar—applause or resentment, fury or joy—as I left. And I remember Amar’s face, one dark eyebrow arched as he surveyed the crowd, a proud smirk on his face as though he expected this all along.

All that time, I thought he was merely pretending.

*   *   *

In Naraka, a feast awaited me. Every room dripped silver, glass blooms and petals carpeted the floor. The walls of our kingdom shimmered as if underwater and moonlight glimmered through the lattice windows. Sweet
kafir
cream and
pista
cakes in golden bowls lay piled high among the tables. But I would touch none of it.

“Are you disappointed?” I asked coldly.

Amar slipped his arms around my waist. “I always believed in you. It is the world outside who needed convincing.”

“Liar,” I hissed, stepping out of the ring of his arms.

“What is the meaning of this?”

“You humiliated me. You left me to them like carrion before vultures. And like vultures, they devoured me.”

My voice was hoarse and brittle. I hated him. I hated him for abandoning me. I hated him for needing him.

Amar stepped back, his jaw clenched. “I did it to quell dissent. To keep you safe. I was ashamed that I had to ask you to undergo the
agni pariksha
.”

“So ashamed you distanced yourself from me the moment
you
demanded that trial?”

Amar looked stunned. “I am the Dharma Raja for a reason. I would not have my own impartiality questioned by favoring you. Surely, you knew this.”

“What would you have done if I failed?”

“You couldn’t fail,” said Amar. “That’s why I did not worry. You were meant to be the queen of these lands. We were meant to rule together. For all of eternity.”

“I would rather die than rule by the side of a coward.”

Shadows curled away from Amar’s body.

“Coward?” he hissed. “Cowardice is running from the difficult choices made by the ones that love you most. If I have been a coward, so have you,
jaani
. But we may start anew. Let us not speak of this time any longer.”

He tried, once more, to tilt my face into a kiss, but I moved away.

“I saw you spread the rumors yourself in the Otherworld. I watched you take solace in another’s arms. And if surviving the
agni pariksha
means spending eternity with you, then I would rather live life as a mortal.”

The room became damp and sticky with darkness.

“What
lies
you hurl at me,” he murmured.

“I don’t trust you.”

He stepped back, wounded. “Has your judgment become so compromised? If you truly do not believe the truth in my words, then you have no place here.”

We stared at one another, fury swelling between us. The silence expanded, solidifying our words like manacles.

“Once, I thought you loved me,” I said in a broken voice. “I refuse to live in your shadow for the rest of eternity.”

His eyes widened, obsidian eyes searching and disbelieving.

“Then leave!” he said, gesturing to the door angrily.

*   *   *

So I did.

I stepped into the reincarnation pool, letting the waters tease my life apart, inflicting upon myself the same curse that had forced me to undergo the
agni pariksha
. In the distance, Amar’s voice roared for me. Pleading. But it was too little. And far too late.

*   *   *

I blinked furiously and the images spun away. The two threads lay against my palm, scalding and writhing like twin serpents. My head was full of what I had seen and what I now knew. I had allowed myself to hear lies and never questioned their truth. I had let suspicion rule me at a terrible price.

My grip on the threads tightened. I had to release myself from her hold.

Outside, the sky pulsed yellow and the marble floors of Naraka sweltered with heat. In the distance, I heard the faintest shattering sound and my heart lurched. Nritti had gotten through. Any minute now and she would run into the throne room. She would wield her powers and I—still powerless, still mortal—would fall.

I tugged at the threads. But they wouldn’t budge. My lungs filled with fire.
No. No, please … not now.
The tapestry was leering and weighing, waiting and wondering. The weight of its magic was a crushing thing and my mind was splintering beneath it. Images skittered across my skin, pushing up beneath my fingernails, prickling against my feet. I heard Nritti’s voice filtered through the threads—“unworthy.” I heard my own thoughts echoing, tilting around my hurt.

And then I stopped. Those moments were mine, but they didn’t define me anymore. I wouldn’t let my doubts cripple me. I had to accept who I was, what I had done and, more important, who I could
be
. Amar’s voice wrapped around me.
Trust yourself. Trust who you are.
I hadn’t listened to him then, but I would now. I stared down the tapestry. I knew, now, why it had refused my touch. It didn’t know me because I didn’t know myself. And so I spoke as if in greeting:

“I am Maya and Yamuna and Yamini. I am a frightened girl, a roaring river and night incarnate,” I said. My voice was strong and clear. Around me, the tapestry shrank back, like a scolded animal. “I have been a forgotten princess, a stubborn queen and a false
sadhvi
. And I will not be tethered.”

Calm spiraled around me. I no longer saw Naraka’s livid sky, nor heard the scrape of glass along the halls. I had slipped into a moment of lost time, a moment for me alone, something sacred and inviolate—as precious as self. I grasped hold of my thread, untwisting it slowly from Nritti’s.

“My life belongs to me,” I said.

And then I pulled.

29

AN END. A BEGINNING.

Light seeped through my skin like water. Light pressed its fingers against the cracks in my being, patched the rifts and ravines with memory until I was drenched in color, in sound, in
life
. When I stepped away from the tapestry, I felt … heavier. As if all this time, my existence was an ethereal thing spent searching for myself.

It was time. Time to leave this limbo. Time to embrace the light that was neither banished nor tainted, but buried deep within me, waiting until I could claim it once more. The tapestry shivered. I thought I heard a sigh of relief echo in the halls. Before me, the threads convulsed, weaving an entirely different image—
Amar
. His eyes were still open and unseeing, but I knew he wasn’t lost. The tapestry was trying to tell me something. I thought about his last moments, his last actions … he had called me
jaani
and tapped his lips twice before his hands fluttered to his heart.

And then I understood. I knew why Nritti couldn’t destroy him.

I was his
jaan
. His life. Kill me, and he would be rendered useless, an echo of himself.

“I will save you,” I whispered to his image.

The tapestry sank away, shimmering into a mirror-portal where I could see the Otherworld’s reflection glittering in the distance. I could see Amar’s body sprawled out, waiting for me. I was about to push through the portal when the sound of a blade dragging through dust stopped me.

“Found you,” sneered Nritti.

I didn’t turn immediately. Her voice rippled in my head. Despite everything, I mourned her. I mourned
us
. I mourned for the girls that had crouched beside a riverbank and fished out tortoises and pearls. I gathered all that sorrow … and then I let it go.

“I was not hiding,” I said, turning to face her.

Her face blanched. “You’ve … you’ve changed.”

I looked down. I had changed. But not in looks. I was not splendidly clothed like Nritti and neither bangles adorned my wrists nor did tiaras sparkle at my temples. Instead, inky clouds scooted across my skin before fading softly into rose-gold and plum-velvet. Warm stars dusted my palms and storm clouds danced about my ankles. I was wreathed in light.

“So did you,” I said softly. “Is this what Vanaj wanted? He loved you.”

Nritti stepped back, flinching. “He did. And you wouldn’t save him. You were too weak to do anything for me.”

“No, my friend. It was you who was weak.”

I looked past her, to the ruined Night Bazaar in the portal. The sky should have shown the sun and moon dancing above. Instead, there was only clammy dark. And I was tired of the dark. I closed my eyes. In my mind, I pictured the mango grove outside my room in the harem. I pictured the sweetness of Amar’s kiss, the fierce look in Gauri’s eyes, Kamala’s blood-curdling laugh. Those moments were parsed pieces of myself and they held a power more potent than chaos—it was life, strong and pulsating.