Swati had not known what to think of the Ahiranyi when they first arrived. But she’d always had a vague sense that the Ahiranyi werelesser. Not truly Parijatdvipan, because of what their ancestors had done, and the gods they believed in. But the temple elders of Parijat were her mistress’s allies, so she had been respectful. When she’d heard men muttering about witches, she’d simply done her best to ignore it.
Sima was giving her a questioning look. “If you don’t want to shoot, I can take you back to the empress’s tent,” Sima said.
Was it safe, Swati wondered, to talk alone with an Ahiranyi woman? Could she curse Swati just by looking at her?
Perhaps some would claim it wasn’t safe. But Sima had shot at a golden fish with Lady Raziya, and shared barbs with Sahar, a woman Swati greatly admired for doing all the things Swati would never dare to do in a thousand years. Killing, for one; drinking a whole glass of arrack in one swig, for another. So Swati stayed where she was and admitted, “I feel shy. And I don’t believe I would be very good at it.” Why, oh why, had the archer dragged her over?
“Here,” said Sima. “I’ll show you some the basics myself.” She smiled, her cheek dimpling. “I’m a kinder teacher than Sahar, I promise you. I used to help teach the children back in Ahiranya.”
“Oh, I…” Swati hesitated.
“You don’t have to,” Sima said, in that lilting Ahiranyi voice of hers. “But when you’re in war, sometimes knowing you have some power, even if it’s fragile, even if it’s nothing against what’s coming… It helps.”
Swati raised her head properly, and looked at the tents. The war camp. The women around her, and their determined faces, and Sahar nocking her bow, expression intent even as she explained loudly what she was doing, and why.
Swati took a deep breath, and said, “Yes. I’d like that too.”
MALINI
Her army had reached the very edge of Parijat. They could go no farther without making a decision.
The army generals met at dawn. The wind was blowing fiercely—strong enough that the map had to be weighed down with stones. Priya—not a general, and not simply one of Malini’s inner court either—stood behind Malini with her hands clasped at her back, letting the wind whip about her loose hair without a care. If anyone wanted to question her presence, they knew better than to say so. The fact that she was here at all was a mark of her favor in the empress’s eyes.
Rao leaned over the map, swiftly laying out the options that remained for them, now that they were closing in on Parijat, with the weight of the High Prince’s army behind them and an unknowable number of Chandra’s men ahead of them, their own forces split and depleted.
“Two possible routes,” Rao stated. “One takes us through farmland, near the main road, straight to Harsinghar—”
“Absolutely not,” said Narayan, frowning. “I traveled that route many a time to pay homage to the emperor. The number of outposts and watchtowers alone will ensure we fight from dawn to dusk.”
“We have all traveled that route,” Prince Ashutosh said sharply, clearly unwilling to allow a subordinate Saketan noble to have the final word. “We know this already.”
Narayan nodded graciously.
“You’ll be less familiar with the second route,” Rao said, and gestured to the lines of the Veri river—no more than a stitch of blue on cloth—to illustrate his point. “The Veri provides water to Harsinghar. To follow it is a swift route, but—difficult. The ground is bad. Crossing isn’t straightforward.”
“Can it be dammed? Can the city be starved out?” This was asked by a keen-eyed man in the Dwarali retinue.
“Depriving the city of water is not under consideration,” Malini said firmly.
“As the empress says,” Rao agreed. “And I have been told by our shared military officials—and by the Srugani officers in particular,” he added, with a nod of respect to Lord Prakash, “that the river would not be easily blockaded. It is… very, very vast, and strong.”
“No good for horses,” muttered Khalil.
“Nonetheless, we will have to cross it,” Prakash said decisively. “Swift travel is of the greatest importance.”
“If we are spotted or face Chandra’s men there,” Khalil said, jabbing a fingertip to the map with uncharacteristic ferocity, “we’ll be dead. I have good men. Good cavalry. But on shallow waters, Chandra’s forces will have the upper hand.”
They were very likely to be spotted. Malini knew that.
An army could not be moved with any subtlety. Oh, she could certainly travel with a smaller contingent: some archers, the best of her siege weaponry, the swiftest horses Khalil could spare. That would, perhaps, allow her to go undetected by Chandra’s spies as she followed the river. Perhaps. But she could not take the city of Harsinghar without a full horse-and-elephant cavalry—without plenty of foot soldiers and archers to barrage the city’s walls and face her brother’s men.
But if they avoided the river—traveled a direct path to Harsinghar…
Well, Narayan had been right enough.
She did not touch the map, as Khalil had. She let her eyes trace it instead, and mark the truth for her and her alone. If they crossed the river, they would shave days off of their journey. Weeks, even, if the water was not too high and the ford was unguarded.
The ford would not be unguarded. But there was an opportunity inherent in that, too.
