The Lotus Empire (The Burning Kingdoms #3)

Chapter 74 Arahli Ara

ARAHLI ARA

Ahiranya was burning, and Taru Ara could not climb the Hirana alone.

She had revealed her wound to their kin when they had felt their newborn sibling die in Alor. She had screamed and wept, bared to them. I am broken, ruined. I am not what I should be.

None of us are, are we? None of us are!

Since then disquiet had spread between them. The Parijati had a weapon once more that could kill them. Mani Ara had no vessel. And they were changing, he and his kin—growing flesh and feelings, growing human .

Their last hope was extinguished. Cira Ara had promised to find Priya. But Cira was dead. He had felt her go, as he’d felt their poor newborn kin in Alor perish. He watched Taru now and wondered if he would soon feel the unraveling of her life. The part of him that was Ashok and always would be could not believe she still lived, rotten through as she was.

“I am weak,” Taru said, furious, as Sendhil— Vata Ara —reached for her. “I am not the creature Mani Ara made me to be. I fight the pain and yet it grows and grows. Brother, my kin, you should leave me.”

“Weak you may be,” Vata Ara murmured. “But you are ours.”

He lifted her and walked to the Hirana. He would rise to its highest zenith, as far from the flames as possible. Avan Ara followed, light on his childish feet. There were pilgrims trying to scramble up the Hirana’s surface in a panic, seeking shelter and the kindness of the yaksa. Some had already fallen. Arahli saw a handful of broken bodies upon the ground, arms splayed, necks broken. A dozen living pilgrims, fearful of the climb, reached for Avan Ara as he crossed their path. He shook them off with a bristle of thorns.

Bhisa Ara watched them go.

“I slept last night,” Bhisa Ara said into the silence, “as humans sleep. At last light, I walked into a deep lake and submerged myself, and I could not breathe. I should not have needed breath. When I rose, my body grew mottled like it wore mortal flesh.

“I am trapped in this monstrous body. And I see the same monstrousness on you. I even dream,” she told him, with a bitter laugh. “I dream Chandni’s dreams, and her life, and I wake with salt on this face.” She touched a fingertip to her cheek. “Do you think we will forget what it means to be green, Arahli?”

“Climb the Hirana, Bhisa,” he urged her. He could hear the growing roar of fire. “I will follow.”

She smiled. Sorrow in her eyes.

“I know this is your fault, dear heart,” she said. “You let Elder Bhumika go. Filled her up with secrets. She is our death, and you are our death.”

“Ashok acted,” he said roughly. “Not me.”

“Are you not Ashok? Am I not Chandni? Oh, sweet one, we are sickened with their mortal longings and mortal acts. You destroyed us. We should have feared little Bhumika, but we did not understand what mortals can do with nothing but their bodies and their dreams, did we?” She lowered her hand. “Now we know.”

“Priya is in Ahiranya once more,” he said, and thought he might scream. His throat hurt. He felt too much, far too much. Humanity’s curse lay heavy on him. “I will go to her—save her—”

“She is surrounded by fire,” said Bhisa. “She is dead. As Cira is dead, poor little one.” She said it without emotion. She began to walk to the Hirana. “Come,” she said. “Let us wait for the fire together.”

He watched her for a moment, then turned and walked away.

Bhumika was here, in Ahiranya. Bhumika had come home. The others of his kin could not feel it. But he was the one who had ripped her from the waters, and he knew the shape of her magic. He marked where she stood.

He walked calmly into the mahal, where people were screaming and running for their lives, and walked down a corridor. Another.

There was a room with a door encased by roots so thick and rot-riven that no mortal man could cut through them. He parted them with a glance and walked through the door. Inside sat Ganam. Rukh, and Bhumika’s child, fastened close against his side. Ganam looked up at him, tired and defiant, and said, “Yaksa. Please.”

Perhaps Ganam begged for forgiveness, or mercy. Arahli did not know or care. “Take your people to the Hirana,” he said. “Climb it. Take the temple children too.” He turned away. “If you try to walk the paths you carved to escape, I will make them close over you and pierce you to death with thorns. Or I will break your necks with vines. I haven’t yet decided.”

Ganam scrambled to his feet. “Yaksa—why?”

“Fire is coming,” Arahli said, already walking away from them. They would obey or they would not. It no longer mattered to him. “Go to the Hirana, and you may survive. Walk into the forest and you will burn.”

He heard Ganam’s shaky swear, and the boy Rukh’s high-voiced question. But then they were running—Ganam yelling at people to follow him now. Farther into the mahal he found the broken hilt of the blade Avan Ara had taken from Ganam.

He steeled himself and picked up the hilt—and with the hilt, the black shards of stone still upon it.

Emptiness, cold and painful, swallowed him.

The stone was a negation of magic. Magic green or magic flame, it was all the same. It would hurt him, but perhaps it would also protect him.

Arahli left the mahal. He walked into the woods. In the distance, the trees smoldered an awful gold.

He walked to Bhumika. The flames were coming from the border of the forest, and had not quite reached him yet, though he felt them. But Bhumika had clearly run from fire. Ash stained her face. She stood in front of the two mortals with her, shielding them with her body. Her eyes met his own.

“Bhumika,” he said. The leaves above them moved with his voice, spearing her face with shadows. “Why did you come back?”

Her look assessed him slowly. There was no fear of him in her eyes.

“I promised myself I would keep the Ahiranyi people safe,” she said. “I came for them, and my child, and my sister. You know me, yaksa?”

“Yes,” said Arahli. “Of course I know you.”

“I knew you once,” she said slowly. “I feel it.”

“I was the one who broke you from the waters,” he told her. “I was the one who gave you the knowledge of how to end our lives.” A step closer. “The fire will burn Ahiranya entirely,” he said. “It burns everything in its path. We have killed Ahiranya, you and I.”

“We can lead our people out of the forest,” said Bhumika. “Seeker’s paths could lead them to safety.” Her gaze was unflinching. “I won’t easily give up on hope.”

Strange, to have her brother’s memories, fresh and bleeding within him, and not be her brother. Strange, that she could be so entirely Bhumika, and yet empty of her old memories. Perhaps it was this strange kinship, this twisted mirroring, that made Arahli extend a hand to her.

“Come,” he said. “Your child waits for you on the Hirana. Take my hand, and you can see her once more.”

The man behind her stiffened. But Bhumika stepped forward and took Arahli’s hand with utter trust.

“Yaksa,” she said. “Show me the way.”