When the doors had been firmly closed, I collapsed onto the pillows behind me as I tried to make sense of the dizzying specter in front of me.
The door to Nallini and Parushi’s room slammed open, and Parushi charged in. “Did you hear what he said?”
I stared at the pillow mutely, holding it up for her to see. Nallini let out a gasp and fell to the floor, but Parushi was too incensed to stop.
“He knew about the servant who poisoned your uncle!”
I blinked at her in surprise. She was right. Vishwajeet had mentioned a “treasonous servant,” even though we had kept Ulagan’s betrayal a secret.
My hands shook on the pillow, which I wanted to both pull closer and throw across the room, but I couldn’t find the strength to do either. Squeezing my eyes shut didn’t stop memories from flashing in front of them. During Aru’s first visit, it was Vishwajeet who had screamed at Ulagan when he tried to serve Aru after Uncle Trimulya declined. He had stopped Aru from eating from the poisoned platter and ensured it went back to my uncle instead.
My head felt oddly light on top of my heavy body, and the world spun. Vishwajeet had almost certainly orchestrated my uncle’s death. What else had he done?
Parushi had finally seen the pillow and bangle, and her face lost its color, but I said nothing as I remembered that the Porcugi’s first attack had happened after our emissaries had visited Banghervari. Vishwajeet could have easily told them what route my uncle would take and where to expect us. Why else would the Porcugi be attacking on land when there were no goods to be taken?
Vishwajeet had almost certainly planned the first attack. Perhaps even the attack when Banghervari saved us in Ullal.
He’d planned my uncle’s murder.
And Chaaya’s.
And Maraan’s.
All of it.
He had planned all of it without me seeing it until he’d decided to show his hand. We were exactly where he wanted us to be, and he wanted me to know it.
I had been a fool.
The little girlwith big brown eyes blinked at the lion standing in front of her.He blocked her from entering the cave as his yellow eyes searched hers for answers.
“What are you hiding from today, little one?” he asked.
“I just thought it might be a nice day to say hello.” Abbakka tried to make her shrug look innocent. It didn’t work.
Matanta waited.
“And my uncle wouldn’t stop lecturing about diplomacy.” The words she’d been holding back came spilling out. “He kept going on about the people of Bidanur and the battles we fought with them over the land at Berdatte because they think it’s theirs when really it’s ours but someone’s great-great-grandfather once did something, and I’m supposed to care about it now. A lot, apparently.”
The lion raised an eyebrow at her. “You keep telling me you’ve grown, but in some ways you are much the same.”
Abbakka blushed as she stared at the dirt and drew a line by dragging her foot back and forth.
“Anyway, today is not a day for you to hide in my cave.” Matanta cast a look over his shoulder, toward his pile of bones. It had grown of late.
The little girl with big brown eyes bristled at the mention of hiding. She put her hands on her hips and opened her mouth, puffing out her chest as she prepared to speak. But she withered under Matanta’s piercing stare.
“I’m sorry,” Abbakka said. “I really did want to see you, but I’ll leave if that’s what you prefer.”
Her fingers waved the smallest goodbye from beside her hip, and she turned back to the mountainside.
“You need not hurry away, little one,” the lion rumbled.
Abbakka stopped in her tracks.
“It is not a good day to sit in the cave... when we could be walking together instead,” Matanta finished.
Abbakka’s smile lit up her whole face. She ran back to the lion with a joyful skip in her step and buried herself in a hug. The lion’s stern expression softened as she embraced him?—his leg, more accurately?—but he caught himself quickly.
