“A meal,” he repeated. “I’d feel happier accepting if you would have your men lower their weapons.”
“Your men haven’t yet lowered their own,” the stranger said. “So I’m afraid I can’t.”
“Let me pass,” Kunal said again.
“You’re heading for the city of Saketa,” the stranger said. When Kunal said nothing, the stranger nodded to himself. “Please tell me your name.”
“Sunil,” Kunal said.
“I had a friend once,” the stranger went on as if Kunal hadn’t spoken. “He was a low prince of Saketa. I trained with him many times. And spent time in his home. Sometimes other highborn brought along their children to visit while I was there. There was never a shortage of young princes in Saketa.” A pause. “I recognize your face, Prince Kunal.”
Kunal should have raced away. Should have reached for his blade. But he was outnumbered, exhausted, afraid. And he could not.
“I’m afraid you’re coming with me,” said the stranger. He drew a chakram from his wrist. His eyes were gentle, sorrowful even as he raised it in the air. “You have my apologies,” he said. “But I cannot afford to let you go.”
CHANDRA
Chandra kept dreaming the same dream.
He stood upon a field. It was night, and the field was black beneath him, the ash smoldering, fractured with starlight. Around him were women dressed in bridal red, crowns of fire glowing on their skulls. They stretched off into the distance, so many women that he could not count them all.
“We are waiting for you,” one said, wreaths of smoke gathering at her feet.
Always, it was the same: relief crashing through him. Elation. He was where he was meant to be. He knew them, and they knew him.
He went to his knees.
“Mothers,” he gasped. “Mothers of flame. I am here. Tell me what you desire, and it will be done.”
“Oh, Chandra,” another said pityingly. “We are not the mothers. The mothers don’t wait to greet you with glory. You are no one’s chosen. A tale you tell yourself is not a true thing simply because you say so. Do the tides obey you? The waning of the moon? No. Then why should pitiless fate garb you in glory, simply because you believe you should be glorious?”
“You are not chosen,” said another voice. Sweet, airy. He almost knew it. Had he heard it before, in the palace, from a girl walking at his sister’s side? “Your mothers speak. The nameless speaks. And you close your ears.”
“Iamchosen,” he said, and the ashen wind caught his voice and carried it away, leaving his mouth empty. “I am,” he whispered. “My faith guides me. My faith protects me.”
“Faith,” one laughs.Faith, the rest echo. “What is there to have faith in? There is only the void, Chandra.”
She loomed over him. Her crown was dripping fire like water. It poured down over her face, which was empty—nothing and everything all at once.
“We are waiting,” she said. “In the void, Chandra. We are waiting for you.”
The fire wound its way into his mouth. Burned, hot and vicious and agonizing, through his lungs, his belly, the viscera of him.
He woke with a howl.
One of his loyal lords advised him in the presence of the court that he should lead the fight against his sister. “You must go beyond the walls, Emperor,” he urged desperately. “You did not go to the Veri. But you must defend Harsinghar. Your men need you.”
“An emperor’s place is in his mahal,” Chandra snapped. “Not in the dirt of battle. I will not abandon my throne.”
“Emperor, it would not be abandonment,” the man said. “Your father led his men in battle. And his father before him—”
“Am I my father?” Chandra thundered. His vision was swimming, exhaustion and fury mingling together. “Am I an emperor who debases himself, lowers himself to the level of those who do not have Divyanshi’s blood? No.”
Silence. The lord bowed deep, lowering his gaze.
I will not leave my throne, Chandra thought wildly.It is mine, by the mothers, by destiny, by blood.There was a terrible fear in him that if he walked away from the mahal—walked from this hall, this throne, the carapace of his power—he would have nothing. He wouldbenothing.
“Get out of my sight,” he said. “You do not deserve to be in my presence. Go. All of you.”
