“What’s happening?” Mandar exclaimed.
A soldier rushed in to report to the rani. “They’ve destroyed the entire magazine!” he cried. “All of the—”
The rani covered her mouth with her hands. Her first thought wasn’t that all of our gunpowder was gone. “Heera and Rajasi . . .” she whispered.
Mandar closed her eyes.
“Come,” the soldier said, leading the rani away. “You must see this.”
We waited an hour for the rani to return, listening to the rising panic in the hall. Heera and Rajasi were gone. I couldn’t believe it. They were dead.
When the rani returned, she summoned three of us into her chamber. “Arjun, Sita, Sundari,” she said. We followed her down the stairs into her room. Inside, she told Arjun to lock the door. Then she held out what looked like an official letter from the palace. “From Tatya Tope.” Her hands were shaking. “He discovered it on one of the British soldiers.”
I took it and read it aloud. It was a letter in English from Gopal, detailing where the powder magazine could be found inside the fortress, and how a pair of ten-inch mortars could destroy the whole thing and cripple Jhansi’s army.
“We’ve been betrayed,” Sundari whispered.
“And not just by Gopal,” Arjun said. “Has he already been arrested?”
“Yes. And I have men questioning him.”
I felt sick. My entire body was like a heavy stone, dragging me toward the earth. If only I had told the rani before. Arjun looked at me, and it was all I could do to whisper, “There’s something I know.”
I could see from the rani’s expression that she was afraid I was going to confess to being a traitor. Instead, I told her what I’d seen. How Kahini and Gopal had sent someone a ring, how that same ring had appeared with Sadashiv when he arrived, her insistence that Sadashiv’s life be spared, and finally, how Kahini had discovered hemlock in my murti.
The rani walked to her bed and sat down. She didn’t look at me. She didn’t look at anyone.
“I’m sorry,” I said, and felt the inadequacy of the words even as I said them, the way you feel when offering a starving woman a cup full of rice. “I didn’t know if you would have believed me.”
She was quiet for several moments. Then she admitted, “I wouldn’t have. The raja once said that was my greatest fault as rani. I trusted too many people. And so did he . . .” Her voice slipped away, and we were silent while she spent some time with her thoughts. “I want to hear Gopal confess. I’ll tell the men to spare his life if he’ll expose Kahini. The British will kill him anyway.”
Of course they would. If a man was willing to expose his own country’s secrets, what made them think he wouldn’t expose theirs?
“Go back to the hall and keep a watch over Kahini. Make sure she doesn’t leave. If she does, restrain her.”
We returned to the Durbar Hall. Inside, infants were still screaming while their siblings did their best to pacify them. Their mothers looked shocked. Some rocked back and forth on their knees, praying. Others stared blankly at the wall in front of them. Were the husbands of all these women still alive? Would they ever see them again?
Kahini was sitting in the queen’s room on her favorite cushion. Perhaps it was animal instinct: she rose the moment she saw us and fled into the courtyard, navigating the broken tiles.
The three of us gave chase.
“Stop!” Sundari shouted, and to my surprise, Kahini did as she was told. But when she turned around, she leveled the pistol at Sundari’s chest and fired.
I launched an arrow, striking Kahini in the arm. She stumbled backward, and in the time it took to regain her balance, Arjun was on top of her, taking her weapons. He shouted and several guards came to help while I went to Sundari.
The captain of the Durga Dal clutched her chest. After so many years of devoted service, the enemy had come from within, not without.
“You’re going to be fine,” I swore. I thought of the first day we’d met, when she had reminded me of a cat. There is a saying in English that cats possess nine lives. But Sundari only had one. Her breathing became ragged and she squeezed my hand. A thin trickle of blood escaped her lips. “Sundari!”
Kahini’s face was a perfect mask.
“You killed her!” I screamed. Kahini’s arm was bleeding heavily, but she didn’t look down at it. “You poisoned the rajkumar,” I said, moving toward her. “You poisoned the raja. The rani was next, but you were hoping the British would do your work for you!”
“And what did you do about it?” She wore a satisfied smile.
“Take her to the prison,” Arjun said. “Guards!”
But I reminded everyone that this was where her lover, Sadashiv, was waiting.