She held up her hand before I could properly express my gratitude. “Come,” she said, patting the cushion next to her. There were bowls of food around her—fruits, nuts, a platter of roasted corn. I maneuvered around the long silver trays and adjusted my sword so that I could sit.
“I’ve received another missive from Major Ellis.” She handed me the letter, and after I’d read it in silence, she said, “Well?”
She was asking my opinion. Had she heard me speaking with Arjun outside the doors? I began by repeating the most relevant facts. “The British aren’t replacing the greased cartridges.”
“Yes.”
“And they aren’t exchanging the leather caps.”
“What does this make you think?”
My heart beat quickly. “I’m sorry, Your Highness. Perhaps your advisers—”
“I know perfectly well what my advisers think. Or what they claim to think. Right now, I’m asking Sita Bhosale. A girl from a farming village. Why won’t the British make these simple replacements?”
I looked down at my hands. “Because they hope for rebellion,” I whispered, my heart pounding. Why couldn’t I ever just listen without giving my opinion, even if it was asked for?
“But why would they hope for that?”
I had already spoken out; there was no sense in changing the tune now. “Because if Her Highness gives birth to a girl,” I said, “and the sepoys are rebelling, Jhansi will be viewed as an unruly kingdom with no future.”
“And then the British will come to save us all. That’s exactly what I think as well now,” she said. She folded the letter and placed it back inside its envelope. “So I will have a son,” she said simply.
Just then, the doors of the library swung open and a giant man appeared. His eyes looked wild and excited, and I leaped to my feet reaching for my pistol.
“Sita—no!” The rani got to her feet as quickly as her swelling belly would allow. “This is my father, Moropant Tambe.”
Immediately, I lowered the gun and apologized. But instead of being angry, Moropant laughed. “I will never worry for my daughter’s safety while you’re here.” He turned his attention back to his daughter. “Manu!”
“Baba!”
The pair of them met in the center of the room, and even though I knew it was rude, I couldn’t keep from staring. The rani’s father was dressed in loose-fitting churidars and an open vest, the same outfit Arjun and the other male guards wore. A pair of golden hoops hung from his ears, and a dark beard shadowed his chin. I doubt anyone would have described Moropant Tambe as handsome, but there was a larger-than-life quality about him, as if he had stepped from the pages of Robinson Crusoe.
“So who is this?” he said, looking at me.
Immediately, I lowered my eyes to the ground.
“My youngest Durgavasi, Sita Bhosale.” A silent conversation seemed to pass between them and the rani added, “She can be trusted.”
Moropant strode across the room. I bowed in front of him.
“Stand up, Sita, so that I can get a better look at you.”
I did as I was told, and the rani’s father studied my face, which made me extremely uncomfortable.
“You’re almost as pretty as Kahini. I’ll bet two of you have become good friends, haven’t you?”
“No, not exactly.”
When Moropant laughed, the rani scowled.
“Enough,” she said, but her father ignored her.
“Don’t take it personally,” Moropant said.
“Kahini was raised much like my Manu here, believing she was destined for titles and thrones. If she is bitter about her station in life, she has only herself to blame.”
I glanced at the rani, and was surprised to see her nod. “She was engaged to a very wealthy man,” she confided. “But she was carrying on a secret relationship with someone else, and when the letters were discovered—” The rani spread her hands, and in that empty space was everything that didn’t need to be said. To be caught writing to another man while negotiations are being made for your marriage to someone else . . . Well, it will end your chances at marriage forever. “It was a young woman’s mistake,” the rani went on, “but we pay for those the same as we do those we make when we’re older.”
I tried my best to look sorrowful. “I had no idea.”
“I never learned who she was writing to. Her father’s servant found the letters, but two days later, that servant was found in the Ganges.”
I gasped.
“She didn’t kill him,” the rani clarified. “She wouldn’t do such a thing.”
“But her father might have,” Moropant remarked. “I knew him when he was young,” he reminded his daughter.
“Her father has passed,” the rani explained to me, “but he swore to me—to this entire family—that nothing more transpired than letter writing. If it had, she wouldn’t be here.”
“Sit.” Moropant gestured toward the cushions, and he clearly meant me as well as the rani.
“Another letter from Ellis?” he said, seeing the envelope on the carpet. “The sepoys will rebel. You know this. And I hope those men drive the British from here to the sea.”
“We cannot have rebellion,” the rani warned. “It would be the end of Gangadhar’s rule.”