“As are you.” The fire-god’s gaze sears into mine. “We are always more than we think we are.”
I inhale his spring water scent, and longing floods up from a well of secrets that I cannot see or grab hold of. I search for the source inside me, but I am trying to read an expression on a face that is turned away. “Who is Cala?”
Enlil stills, frozen as a statue. “You told me you did not wish for me to interfere with your memories.”
I still do not, but I feel her lurking. She is out now, and I do not know how to put her back. Perhaps if I understand who she is, I can force her from my mind.
“How did you meet?”
Enlil picks up my left hand and laces our fingers. “That was a long time ago.” He kisses my knuckles in sequence. Memories bubble up from a well of secrets and cascade over my mind. The surge sweeps me from my bearings and drags me further into myself.
I kneel in the garden near the rhododendron forest, my charcoal stick in hand. Father will be irritated with me for sketching on his terrace tiles. The whole of the world is my sketchbook, and the sunshine is friendliest this hour of day.
A shadow falls over the sketch of my mother, blocking the midday sun. I gaze up into startling, fiery eyes. I open my mouth to call for Mother, but Fire Eyes speaks.
“Did you draw this?”
I glance nervously at the open double doors to my home.
He sits near my pile of charcoals. “You are gifted.” He brushes my hair behind my shoulder, his touch natural as an afterthought. “How old are you?”
“Eighteen.”
“And your name?”
His soothing scent, like spring rain, relaxes me. He must be a friend of Father’s for the guards to have allowed him through our front gate. “I’m Cala.”
“Would you draw for me, Cala?”
He asks tentatively, as though expecting me to refuse. His shyness does not suit his striking appearance. He must be lonely, like me. “Yes, I will draw for you.”
And I do.
The vision swirls around, and a torrent of new memories arrests me. Cala and Enlil stand at an altar in Ekur, Enlil wearing a fitted white-and-gold tunic and Cala a silk gold-and-red sari. She vows to love him until the end of time, and he promises her his heart forevermore.
Enlil kisses the last of my knuckles and lets me go. The loss of his touch reels me back to the present. I gape at him, my head still in his lap. Cala was his wife. Her love for him pushes me to bury my burdens in his embrace.
Kiss him. My emotions twist and tangle with Cala’s. He’s our fate.
Enlil’s nearness is intoxicating. Any closer and I will be fully drunk on him. I roll onto the ground. “Get out of my head.”
He crouches over me. “Cala? Cala, are you there?”
Enlil! I’m here!
Get out of my head!
I dig my fingers into the dirt and shove Cala back down into my chest. Her presence finds lodging beside my drumming heart.
I blink myself into awareness. Cala’s cries for Enlil drift to muffled pleas. I am not alone, but I am in charge. I stagger to my feet.
“My name is Kalinda, and you are my guide. We have come to find Deven Naik. He’s the entire reason we’re in this awful place, so let’s move.”
Enlil peers into my eyes. I stare icily in return, willing any trace of Cala from my expression.
The fire-god picks up his spear and treads on.
I glimpse a single shadow loitering at the border of the crystals in the valley below. I stomp after Enlil and let Cala’s reflection die in my vision.
24
DEVEN
The long-needled thorn slips off the hilt of my janbiya hilt and punctures my thumb. I shake my hand to ease the stinging and slip my bleeding finger into my mouth.
Mistake. I spit out the grimy taste of my skin and throw away the dull thorn. I break another needle off the tree in front of me and return to my project. My progress engraving Kali’s name into the hilt of my dagger has been painstaking. I only just completed the first letter.
As I work on the next one, my eyesight blurs. I still have not slept. The rabisus and demons still camp at the blockade down the road. They have been quiet for some time. By nightfall, every one of them will be awake and alert. If I do not sleep now, I will be awake all night again. I drag the needle through the dirt, writing KALI so I remember to finish the engraving, and lie on my side.
Knocks come from the Road of Bone. The bones are solid but resonate with a scant tapping when walked upon. I come awake and lie on my front at the base of the tree.
Something travels in my direction from the blockade. Big shapes that begin as shadows soon sharpen. Two demons astride ugallus pause every so often to canvass the thicket. Edimmu and Asag are on patrol.
I roll onto my sides and then my back, smothering myself in dirt. Demons have a powerful sense of smell. After my first few days on the run, the putridness of the Void camouflaged me. I coat myself in grime for extra protection.
On my stomach again, hot breaths blow off some of the filth caking my lips. The demons stalk closer. I stretch out low with my dagger.
Close enough that I can count her scales, Edimmu halts her ugallu and licks the air with her forked tongue. The ugallu’s silver feline gaze stays on the trees. I breathe only when necessary and swallow even less.
“The road is clear,” Asag rumbles.
“I smell flesh,” his sister hisses.
She can only mean me. Her sense of smell must be stronger than Asag’s.
Edimmu jumps off her mount, her tongue flicking the air. She follows the taste of my smell closer to the spiny trees. The grove is thick with brambles and undergrowth. To get in, I had to slide on my belly to the middle. Getting out in a hurry, and without them seeing me, is impossible.
Skies above, why isn’t my dagger a sword?
Asag rides up to his sister, his ugallu growling and snapping at hers. “The road is clear. We can return to camp.”
Edimmu samples the air again. Her crocodile snout bears brown stained teeth. “Whatever it is will soon be carrion.”
She mounts her ugallu and they ride up the road. Their ugallus steal away, tails twitching. My pulse hammers at every pressure point. I could seek out another hideout, but I would have to sneak past Kur’s lair. The roadblock prevents me from going out to the obstructions, and I will not go into the city. The wanderers live there and so does she.
I lessen my grasp on my janbiya. A pattern is impressed into the handle, a K and a slash?
The dirt beside me has markings—letters. Near them is a pile of dull thorns. I must have rubbed away some of the letters when I rolled around. All that remains is an L and an I.
The letters swirl around my mind in a jumble. I inspect the dirt closer. The missing letter is barely visible, an A.
Kali. Memories of her flood my thoughts, some hazier than others. The flimsy recollections may float away in an instant.
How could I forget Kalinda? The gap in my mind is expanding like a sinkhole. Any wider and who I am right now, who I was when I was first brought here, will fall in.
My hand shakes as I pry off another thorny needle from a tree. I resume carving her name, faster and more fervently. My remembrances of her turn around and around in my mind as I work. Her solemn expression and thick, silken hair. The way she touches her mother’s daggers at her side when she is deep in contemplation. How she juts out her chin anytime someone suggests she do something she does not like.
Thoughts of her bring my awareness back into my grasp.
When Kali’s memory is alive, so am I.
25
KALINDA
We arrive at the third gate. The rabisu stands from behind the low stone wall and stretches until its shoulders are nearly in line with Enlil’s. The guardian’s furry physique is mannish; it even has hands with fingernails. Saliva runs down its chin, dripping from fangs. It watches me and licks its chops. Enlil tosses a hunk of stinky meat at the beast.
The rabisu catches his payment. “Cross the River of Ordeal. The gate is on the other side.” It rips into the meat with its teeth.