“You have to be willing to try,” he said. “Hiding is not a solution.”
She prickled. “I’m not hiding.”
“Prove it, then.”
Unable to argue with him further, Poppy turned to stare out the windshield at the dusty road ahead.
Eventually, Hasan slowed, parking the car in a gravel lot.
She gave him a skeptical look. “This is it?”
Sanivali Square appeared rather bleak, composed of a handful of crisscrossing dirt roads bordered by weathered shops and stalls covered with sun-faded awnings. The tallest thing in sight was a massive banyan tree, which stretched so far into the sky, it hurt her neck to look. Hasan led her toward it, crossing through a patch of dead grass to approach the trunk. As they grew closer, she faltered in surprise. What she had thought to be the ridges and grooves of the bark were actually intricately carved faces and figures.
“This is the oldest tree in Sanivali,” he said. “When the temples were ransacked, our ancestors carved the likenesses of the gods into the tree as an act of defiance. For those who don’t have household shrines, this is where they come to make offerings.”
As though summoned by his words, a widow in white came into view. She kneeled in a cradle of roots, arranging a small assortment of flowers and fruits. As they approached, she looked up, stiffening slightly when she noticed Hasan.
She started to rise. “Jackal?—”
Hasan waved his hand. “It’s fine, Lopa. May I introduce Miss Sutherland? She’s the Duke of Cloudcliff’s daughter, and hopefully, the future vicereine as well.”
Lopa scrambled to her feet, bowing. “Miss Sutherland.”
Poppy’s cheeks flushed. No one had ever bowed and scraped before her like this?—especiallynot while using her common title. She had no idea how to respond. Fumbling, she managed, “You don’t have to do that. Don’t let us interrupt your naumya.”
This time, Lopa turned red, looking down. “I wasn’t?—I can’t?—I’m vasudhakt, miss.”
“Really?” Poppy blinked. “Why do you leave offerings, then, when you can’t receive divine energy?”
Lopa’s eyes lifted back to hers. Her earlier reverence had faded, seemingly marred by Poppy’s question. “Not all prayers are answered in power. Just because the gods do not grant me control over the elements does not mean that I have not been blessed for my faith.” Her gaze darted back to Hasan’s face, and she added, “It’s okay?—I was done anyway.” Making haste, the widow lifted her empty basket and left.
Poppy watched Lopa’s retreating figure, her white dupatta fluttering gently. “Why are there so many young widows around here?”
Hasan traced a finger over the trunk. “When Jagat Rai surrendered administrative powers to his Council of Lords during his illness, they abused their powers in a coordinated effort to reduce competition. They gave themselves tax breaks and increased taxes on independent farmers. When farmers went bankrupt, Welks bought the land and expanded their yield of commercial crops, such as tea leaves and cotton?—things that fetched a good price in Welkland but couldn’t feed Virians. They hired Virian farmers to tend the land and paid them in meager wages and rations of imported food. Despite the corruption, some Virian farmers still own their ancestral farmland, but they are under contract and must surrender a fixed amount of their crops after the harvest, regardless of how bountiful it is?—which means some families are literally left with nothing.
“Without daivyakt to summon rains, the island has become increasingly prone to droughts, particularly within the last two decades, making groundwater an essential resource. Welkish-owned companies were able to fund the construction of deep wells on their own land, but contracted farmers, who had been underpaid for years, had to take large loans to fund the construction. Some couldn’t secure financing and had to sell their land to the Welks. Others took loans and couldn’t repay them. Many took their own lives.”
Poppy’s throat grew tight. “So all these young widows?—”
Hasan’s mouth tightened into an unsmiling line. “Their husbands were farmers, mostly. Starvation is the most common cause of death. Your father’s export targets have forced farmers to grow cash crops instead of edible crops, but there’re not enough food imports from Welkland to go around.”
Poppy recalled every dinner she’d attended, satin tablecloths barely visible under loaded silver dishes, servants whisking away half-eaten porcelain platters of food. Therewasenough food to go around, but the distribution had been intentionally clogged in one place. Clarence Sutherland boasted a legacy of growth and prosperity. For the first time, Poppy saw her father’s life’s work for what it really was: a legacy built on the corpses of the nation he’d sucked dry.
“And the maharajas of old,” she asked carefully, “they’d have been able to stop the drought? With their daivyakhi?”
He nodded. “Daivyakt leaders would have maintained the earth, keeping the villagers protected from harsh elements. Like I told you before, they didn’t do it for free?—greed and brutality existed on this island long before the Welks?—but it was our way of doing things, and Welkish imperialism robbed us of the chance to grow ourselves.”
She grimaced. With her subpar control over her daivyakhi, she wasn’t certain she was in any position to protect anyone.
“Come on.” Hasan led her away from the banyan tree. “There’s more we have to see.”
• • •
Hasan walked Poppy through the village streets, introducing her to the villagers as they came upon them: wizened old men; gaunt, bony children; and young widows hunched over from carrying the weight of the world. They all looked at Hasan the same way?—like they were trapped in a pit, and he was standing at the top with a rope, but they weren’t sure if he planned to haul them up or hang them with it. At first, they regarded her with the same suspicion as they did Hasan?—but when he explained who she was and what she might become, many of them were willing to talk. Though Poppy’s Virian was rudimentary, the villagers were patient, many of them just relieved to have someone to talk to.
“Baron Redbriar is in charge of this region,” one of the widows told her. “He’s not visited usoncein the last three decades, let alone during this drought.”
People came in motley groups, patchwork families missing key family members who were either deceased or had gone to find work in the city. They showed her account books with faded pages, battered plastic jugs full of yellow water, empty warehouses with holes in their ceilings. They brought their problems to her like patients bringing their wounds to a doctor. As she examined each one, her heart sank lower and lower.
