“Then how will I fit?”
“It will make room,” said Boo airily. “You should have seen it in its glory days. There was a Night Bazaar where you could purchase dreams on a string. If you had a good singing voice, you could use it to buy rice pudding dusted with moonlight. Finest thing I’ve ever eaten—well, second only to a spicy demon. Mmm.” He ignored Aru’s cringe. “We’ll take you to the Court of the Sky. There you may formally ask the Council of Guardians for the details of your quest.” Boo’s feathers ruffled when he mentioned the Council. “You’ll get your weapons. I shall get my place of honor back, make no mistake. And then it’s up to you and your brother. Or sister, gods help us.”
“Weapons?” repeated Aru. “What kind of weapons? That’s not something they teach you in seventh grade. How am I supposed to stop the Sleeper from getting to the Lord of Destruction if I can’t throw a bow and arrow?”
“Youshoota bow and arrow!”
“Right. I knew that.”
Aru wasn’t exactly the best at gym. Just last week she’d scratched at the inside of her nose hard enough to fake a nosebleed and get out of dodgeball.
“Perhaps you have a hidden talent somewhere inside you,” said Boo. He squinted at her. “Buried quite deeply, I imagine.”
“But if there’re all these deities, why don’ttheyhelp? Why leave it up to, as you said, a bundle of hormones and incompetence?”
“Gods and goddesses may occasionally help, but they don’t mess around with affairs that affect only humans. To them, mortal lives are but a speck of dust on the eyelash.”
“You don’t think the gods would be even a little upset to find out that their entire universe was stamped out?”
Boo shrugged. “Even Time has to end. The real measure of when others will get involved comes down to whether or notyousucceed. The gods will accept the outcome either way.”
Aru gulped. “Awesome. That’s just the best.”
Boo nipped her ear.
“Ow!” said Aru. “Could younot?”
“You are a child of the gods! Stand up straight!”
Aru rubbed her ear. A deity was her…father. She still couldn’t quite believe it.
She had lied about many things, but she’d never invented stories about a father. She would’ve felt ridiculous bragging about someone who had no interest in her. Why should she go out of her way to make him sound better than he actually was? He’d never been there. The end.
Her mother didn’t speak of him, either. There was only one photo of a man in the house. He was handsome and dark-haired, with skin the color of dark amber, and he had the strangest pair of eyes. One was blue, and one was brown. But Aru wasn’t even sure he was her father. And he didn’t look like a deity at all. At least, not like anyone in the Hall of the Gods. Then again, ancient statues weren’t always a good reference. Everyone looked the same when they were cut out of granite and sandstone and their features were worn down to faded smiles and half-lidded eyes.
Apparently she herself was divine-ish, but whenever she looked in the mirror, all she noticed was that her eyebrows kept trying to join up. And it stood to reason that if you were even a little bit divine, you should not have a unibrow.
“Now,” said Boo, “tell the Door of Many where you want to go.”
Aru stared at the door. There were several symbols and scenes etched into its frame. Images of warriors notching their bows and letting their arrows fly.
When Aru blinked, she even saw a wooden arrow zoom across the tableau. She reached out and placed her palm against the door. The engraved wood pressed back, like a cat nuzzling her hand. As if it were trying to get to know her, too.
“Take me to…the other Pandava.” She said the words breathlessly.
She was right. Words did have power. When she said the wordPandava, all the feelings that came from discovering who she really was uncoiled like a spring jumping to life.
It was not unpleasant.
It was like riding a roller coaster and relaxing enough to let the initial panic turn into something else: Exhilaration. Joy. Anticipation.
She was Aru Shah.
Suddenly the world she thought she knew had opened up, as if stage curtains had been yanked back to show her that there was so muchmorethan what she’d imagined. There was magic. Secrets crouched in the dark. Characters from stories, like the ones she’d been told all her life, were taking off their masks and saying,I was never a tale, but a truth.
And—the thought wiped off her grin—there was also her mom…now frozen with a worried expression on her face. Aru’s heart felt like a painful knot inside her.I’m not letting you stay like that, Mom. I promise.
The door opened.
