Chapter 41 Priya
PRIYA
Priya had promised Malini, Later.
But some promises were older. Some things were more important. Somewhere, Bhumika was beyond Priya’s reach. Had been beyond Priya’s reach ever since Priya set foot outside of Ahiranya. Bhumika had not tried to seek her out. Bhumika had sent her no messages. And a yaksa had stolen her face.
Priya had to go home.
She realized now, as she quietly and carefully walked through the darkness of the camp, that she should have written a letter. I meant what I said. Everything that I am is yours.
But my family, my sister—
You understand, don’t you? Malini. I can’t stay. I’m sorry.
Spirits, she hated herself already for going. Hated thinking of what Malini would feel when she discovered that Priya was gone—had left her behind without a word.
She was almost at the edge of the camp when she heard a voice.
“Pri.” A whisper. “Stop.”
She turned. Sima was behind her.
“How did you find me?” Priya whispered back, as Sima drew closer.
“You were sleeping in the empress’s tent, so I was sleeping outside it,” Sima said with a shrug. “Those guards were useless. They didn’t even move when you left.”
“I did dig my way out,” Priya said. A small application of a knife and her gifts had done the job for her. Hopefully Malini wouldn’t notice the damage to the corner of her extremely large and luxurious movable manse.
Sima sniffed. “Still.” She stopped walking. Placed a hand on Priya’s arm. “Where are you going?”
“Home,” said Priya.
“What?” Her voice was shocked, gaze searching. “Why?”
Priya thought of the yaksa, and the horror of Bhumika’s face changing, of realizing her sister was a mask and nothing more than a mask. Her throat felt dry. Her whole body ached from battle, and ached with heartsickness. She didn’t know how to explain it.
“Bhumika,” she managed to say. And then abruptly began to cry. “Oh fuck,” she gasped, and put a hand over her mouth. “I’m sorry,” she garbled out beneath her hand. “I’m so—so tired. That… my magic…”
“Pri! Shit, look, don’t be sorry. Be quiet.
” Sima embraced her bone-crushingly tight.
“What happened to Elder Bhumika? Is she hurt? Don’t sob, someone will come and if we need to go, we don’t want that.
” Her grip tightened another increment. “Priya,” she said with dawning, angry realization. “Were you going to go without me?”
“Let me explain,” Priya gasped.
“Please do.”
“As soon as I stop crying—give me a minute.”
She managed to make herself stop. Wiped her face with the back of her arm. And haltingly explained it all to Sima—the sangam. The yaksa. Bhumika’s stolen face, and Bhumika’s silence.
“Everyone at home,” Sima said in a thin voice when Priya had finished. “Anything could have happened to them.”
“That’s why I have to go,” Priya said, voice still thick with tears. “You see? Why it’s not safe for anyone but me?”
Sima was silent for a long moment. She gripped Priya’s shoulder tight, some dark thing flitting across her face, through her eyes. Then she said, “What if you stay? Stay here in the empress’s army?”
“What?” Priya asked, shocked. “How… how can I?”
“If they’re in danger, if something has happened—what can you do alone?
” Sima’s expression was conflicted. But it was growing more resolute.
In a determined voice, she said, “We came here because Ahiranya needs allies. So get allies. Let’s get your empress on a throne so that if…
if something awful has happened, we can… do something. Fix it.”
“I have my magic,” Priya said.
“Your magic almost killed you,” Sima said.
“If I stay, it won’t be for allies,” Priya admitted, her voice all rough from crying, from the raw feeling inside her. “That’s… that’s not why I’d stay.”
It would be for Malini. For this selfish, desperate thing Priya felt that she’d confessed in all its awfulness and ugliness to Malini, lying in her arms with flowers growing through her skin.
“You can stay for more than one thing, Pri,” Sima said. “It doesn’t make you a bad person if that’s true. Besides, I’m not staying just for allies, or an army.”
“No?”
“No.” Sima rubbed the back of her own hand over Priya’s tear-stained cheek. Her expression was as tender. “I’m also staying for you. Now, let’s see if we can sneak as easily back into the tent as you got out.”
The army was soon on the move again. This time, Priya traveled in Malini’s own chariot, wrapped in a heavy shawl that Malini carefully tucked around her shoulders and throat herself.
When Lata made a mild comment on the arrangement—quite rightly pointing out that the generals and their men would notice and talk—Malini simply said that Priya had done them a great service and suffered greatly as a result.
If the generals of her army were displeased with the actions of their empress, they were welcome to come and tell her themselves.
None of them did. And Priya endured the jolting of the carriage, curled on her side, and traced the shape of the embroidery sewn onto the shawl in sinewy thread.
Flowers upon flowers, twined together by flourishes of vine that wound upon themselves in whorls, knots, clearly embroidered by a delicate and skilled hand.
She could follow them for hours, probably, and not find the place where the thread began or ended.
Beside her, Malini was straight-backed, staring ahead, her face empty. But her hand remained on Priya’s hip, heavy and sure.
There was no sign of more Parijatdvipan soldiers on the road that day.
Cautiously, they made camp. Malini was required to meet with her generals.
She left Priya resting in her tent. Priya lay still for at least half an hour before she accepted that she was not tired in the slightest, and her body and mind felt as whole as they were ever going to feel.
She was human flesh, blood, thoughts. No more flowers were going to pour through her skin. She felt… normal.
There was nothing she could do about the disquiet that had settled in her heart. Sharp teeth. Bruised flower mouth. A yaksa holding her up in the liquid dark.
I don’t want you to speak to your sister. I want you to speak to me.
The memory shuddered through her. She pushed it aside and tried to think of more real things. Things that didn’t leave her blood running cold. The thud of arrows. The weight of a shield. Romesh baring his teeth, with blood in the water around him.
Not much better. But it would have to do. At least these memories kept her in her skin.
She sat up and slid from the bedding. Rising to her feet, she neatened her new sari. Tightened the braid of her hair. When she slipped from the tent, she found Sima sitting out front with the guards.
“Pri,” she said, getting to her feet. “How do you feel?”
“You’re not going to believe me, but I feel perfect.” It was deep night, the sky black as pitch, but the camp was brightly lit with torches. Sima’s assessing look was illuminated.
Priya looked across the camp, searching.
Ashutosh’s men were nearer than she had expected.
But that made sense. Their lord was still in the medical tent, being carefully attended to now that their journey had paused.
She could see Romesh. One of his arms was bound, but the wrapping was clean of blood. That was good.
Ashutosh’s men were already watching her in return.
Priya started to walk toward them. Sima matched her footsteps.
“Are you sure about this?” Sima asked.
“Absolutely.”
Sima huffed. It might have been amusement. “I suppose we’d better offend them together, if we’re going to do it again,” she said.
“We’re not going to offend them,” said Priya. “We’re going to make friends.”
“Right.” Sima sounded skeptical.
They reached the men, who looked up at them from where they were seated on the ground. They were silent.
“Mind if we join you?” Priya asked, keeping her voice friendly. “I’ll only take a little offense if you say no.”
Her tone eased some of the tension out of them, which was interesting. Priya hadn’t known she was capable of that.
“You’ve saved my life twice over,” Romesh said. “If you want to sit and share our wine, we won’t stop you.”
The men shuffled over. Priya and Sima sat down. For a long moment the silence was awkward and tense. One of the men coughed and shifted uneasily.
“How are you feeling?” Sima asked Romesh. Her voice was pitched soft—she was afraid, Priya knew, of insulting him—and he blinked at her, as if surprised by that.
“My lord got me opium,” he said. “So I don’t feel as shit as I should, is the truth.”
One of the other men snorted. “You shouldn’t say ‘shit’ to a lady, brother.”
Sima’s mouth twitched. “I’m not a lady,” she said.
“Lady’s advisor, then.” A hand clapped Romesh’s head, making him swear again. “This one was raised better. Don’t think ill of Saketa because of him.”
“Of course not,” Sima said quickly.
“We do know how to curse in Zaban just like the rest of you,” Priya said dryly. “As long as you don’t call us shit, I can promise you we won’t be angry.”
“You don’t act like a proper highborn,” Romesh said, as if he agreed. “Don’t act like I expected a priest of your kind to act, either.”
“What? You thought I’d be some kind of monster?” She softened her words with a grin.
“You did turn a river into a beast. Built something out of nothing.” There was a challenge in his voice, but it wasn’t all unease. He respected her a little, maybe. That was good.
“I did,” she agreed. “But anyone can do harm if they have the right tools. Anyone can be a monster if they have a knife. I just wear mine under my skin. I just… cut differently.” That she could cut with a real knife—expertly and cruelly—wasn’t something these men needed to know.
Sima placed a heavy hand on Priya’s shoulder.
“My lady’s had too much to drink,” Sima said, although Priya had drunk nothing. “Ignore her.”
“No, no, she’s making sense,” one of the other liegemen piped up.
“Am I?” Priya said.
“You’re a warrior, like we are.” He waved his wine for emphasis.