“I know where it is, Ma.”
“What?” I reached for his forehead, but he ducked under my arm and moved briskly toward the farthest end of the chamber, weaving in and out of the labyrinth of papers. He paused near a hanging shelf, then began shuffling through the scrolls there. He was working through the mess with great determination, so I decided to let him be.
At last he offered me a thin, rather unremarkable-looking scroll. My eye immediately caught on an illustration halfway down the page.
It was the asura from the forest.
“How did you find this?” I demanded.
Lakshmana shrugged. “I dreamed of it, of this shelf and scroll. When I woke, I knew where it would be.”
I set aside that odd proclamation for a moment to read. The scroll was dated more than a hundred years prior and spoke of an asura called Bhandasura, born of a forest fire that had nearly razed Janasthana to the ground.
I realized, with mounting dread, that the story had uncanny parallels with what what was occurring here and now. At first, people in the city had dismissed the stories of women as mere nightmares. And had I not done just the same, when the trader had told me her tale? The city’s old council had heard the claims that strange beings walked the forest, but when nothing more came of it, they took no action.
It was only when the fires began that people took note. Women would wake up in their own beds, covered in agonizing burns, and describe a demon with the head of a bull and the body of a man, who had kidnapped them. Not all survived.
Now deeply afraid, the people of the city prayed to the gods. But the gods did not come to their aid. Instead, the gods told them the asura was not as powerful as his more ancient counterparts, and a mortal could bring him low—a spearman was fated to strike him down.
So the soldiers of the city armed themselves with spears and marched on the asura. Only five returned.
I could not imagine such devastation, an army breaking against a single being. Was this the fate awaiting Janasthana? Awaiting Ayodhya?
The destruction continued for years, until at last, one of the holy men of Janasthana completed several acts of penance to Sarasvati and was granted a boon. He asked for her to defeat the asura, but the goddess could not kill an asura on earth in her immortal form. Instead, she trapped him in the deepest recesses of the forest, where nobody dared venture for years until a sage became lost and came upon Bhandasura. The asura let him live in exchange for writing down his legend.
“If he was confined to a grove, how has he broken free?” Lakshmana asked, reading over my shoulder.
“I don’t know. And I’m not sure how this helps us either. If an army could not defeat him, what can we do?” I scanned the paper again, then shook my head, confused. “We should show this to Ravana. Can you go and ask a messenger to fetch him?”
But when Ravana arrived, he read the scroll and gave a slow smile. “I think it’s obvious, then, isn’t it?”
“What is?”
“Why he hates women traversing his forest so much.”
“Because of Sarasvati?” Lakshmana asked.
“No, because he fears his mortality.”
“What is that to do with the traders? Any spearman can kill him,” I reminded him.
Ravana looked puzzled for a moment before understanding smoothed his features. “Not quite. This dialect is unfamiliar to you.”
In my heart I knew, before he said the words.
“It does not say spearman. Bhandasura can only be slain by a spearwoman.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
WE DECIDED TO ENTER the forest at noon, so the asura would have trouble hiding in the dark. As soon as we stepped outside the gate, I regretted it. The sun’s heat was scalding, and sweat dripped down my back. We had wrapped our faces in scarves so that he could not recognize us, and I struggled to breathe through the fabric.
In a way, though, I was glad to focus for a moment on minor discomforts. It distracted me from the bone-crushing fear that filled me with every step. When Dasharath and I had fought Sambarasura, I had been frightened, but there was a sharp difference between mortal and immortal danger. How could we be so arrogant as to think that we would succeed where whole armies had failed? I thought of my sons, wondered what would become of them if I never returned from this battle. I imagined Lakshmana in particular, waiting in my mother’s house, trapped in the city as flames slowly overtook—
“Radnyi Kaikeyi,” said Bhandasura, and I screamed as his hand touched my arm.
Never take your eyes off the enemy.
Heat seeped into my shoulder, and I smelled smoke rising from my plain cotton clothing. “Good to see you again.” His voice was high and light, as if greeting me in the halls of a palace, not threatening me on a dirt road.
“Bhandasura,” I acknowledged, trying to keep my composure.
His red eyes widened, and when he exhaled, smoke poured from his bull’s snout. I tried to force the thoughts of what this asura liked to do to women from my head. Instead, I gripped the staff tight, ignoring the burning pain in my shoulder. Ravana had fashioned me a cunning staff with a hidden point, and now I moved my thumb lightly over the catch that released the spear tip.
“Now, none of that,” he said, and the spear was suddenly alight in flames.
I screamed at the sudden pain, the spear falling from my slack fingers. My hand was red and raw, already beginning to blister. His grip burned into my shoulder, and I fought to break free, twisting my body this way and that. His dark hand looked almost human, but his hold on me was anything but.
“What do you want?” I asked. My mouth tasted bitter, and I could no longer feel my legs. My heart was a wild beast in my chest, throwing itself against my rib cage as though trying to escape this place. I felt light-headed with fear.
Bhandasura smiled and gestured widely around him, releasing his hold on me. “Everything.” I stumbled, colliding with Ravana, who was watching the proceedings as though paralyzed, unable to do anything to help.
A cry stuck in my throat. Without my spear, we were not going to make it out alive.
And yet, I could not accept it. “There is nothing for you in Janasthana,” I said, stalling for precious minutes of life.
He snorted, bull-like. “You really do not understand? I had heard you were intelligent.”
“You heard I… How have you heard of me?” I asked. Ravana’s sword tapped against my leg, hot from the flames. I kept my eyes on the asura even as I slowly moved my unburned hand behind my back. Warm sweat trickled down my spine.
“My master wished to draw you here,” Bhandasura hissed. “And I have done his bidding.”
“You have a master? You are less powerful than I thought.” I was scrambling, but perhaps I could goad him into a mistake.
“My master is all-powerful!” Bhandasura declared, and angry gouts of flame encircled us in unbearable heat. Ravana stepped closer to me to avoid the flames, and a weight pressed into my hand. I had little faith that this could work, but we had no other choice. “He will create a new empire of this world. He freed me from the prison that meddling goddess placed me into.”
“Tell me who your master is, and perhaps I will spare you,” I said. The smoke burrowed into my lungs and my words came out weak, punctuated by coughs.
Bhandasura laughed, and his eyes closed. I saw my opening. “Even if I had seen his face, I would never—”
Ravana’s long, thin, remarkably spear-like sword embedded itself in his chest. I had thrown it with my nondominant hand, but from this distance I could hardly miss.
Bhandasura looked down, his mouth open in surprise. “This will not—” And then he staggered. He fell to his knees.
“You. Whore,” he ground out, one hand pressed to his chest. “You will never leave here alive.”