The vishakanya sank into the corner, suddenly timid. “I only brushed against him for a moment … nothing that would kill him, I swear.”
“He is not for any of you,” I said loudly, swinging the knife at the rest of the gathered poisonous courtesans. I stepped protectively over Vikram’s body. “We only came here for the ruby. That’s all. Let us take it and leave, and no one will be harmed.”
“And if we don’t want you to leave?” asked one.
Her movements held all the terrible grace of a nightmare.
“You both came here willingly,” she taunted. “To know us. To see us. To take from us.”
Twelve to one, I repeated in my head. If this were a normal fight, maybe I’d have a chance. But unlike any fight, the very touch of my opponents’ skin could kill me. I tore part of my salwar kameez and wrapped my bare arms.
The vishakanya shrugged. “Admirable, but futile.”
“I’m warning you—” I started, but the words awakened something in the vishakanya. She was no longer smiling. No longer wheedling.
“No, girl,” she said, as cold as glass. “I’m warning you. That human boy is now mine.”
“He was never—”
“He is in our tent. He is not protesting. Therefore, he is ours. And now that he is mine, you should know that I am not someone to steal from. You see, girl, we like humans. Human desires are nothing like the desires of yakshas and yakshinis. Yours are a treat. There’s something different about human desire. How damp it is. The way it gloms on to your nightmares and silvers your hearts with a rime of frost. You will carry that desire, ripping up the earth at its seams if it means you can have what you want.”
“It’s destructive,” said the vishakanya.
“It’s beautiful,” chimed another.
“And we will have it,” said another.
“So don’t take my toys, girl.”
And then she lunged straight for me.
20
OF RUBIES AND SISTERS
AASHA
If Aasha wanted, she could reach out and touch the human girl. Kill her. But if she did that, the questions brimming inside her would go unanswered. Already, they felt out of control, as if they’d grown thorns and would soon cut her apart. Who could I have been? What life could I have called my own? That urgency to know made her feign a headache earlier and wait, crouched and cramped and invisible, in a corner of the tent where the Lord of Treasures had hidden a ruby. He had visited the tent in the afternoon, informing her sisters that a pair of human contestants might come searching for the jewel. If the humans failed, they were fair prey for the vishakanyas.
Aasha had hoped to get to the humans first. She had planned to negotiate with them: answers to her questions about the human world in return for letting them escape with the ruby.
But her sisters had been faster.
Now there was no chance of conversation. Her sisters licked their lips hungrily. As one, the vishakanyas lunged. Hands darted for the girl’s ankles as she leapt for higher ground. Aasha pressed herself farther into the corner. Beside her, the man stirred. Her touch had imparted a snare of sleep. Not death. Some of her sisters used the technique as a mercy killing. Aasha used it to avoid killing altogether.
Her sisters knocked over the table the girl had jumped on, slamming her backward. The girl leapt to the ground, slashing her knife across the air and catching one of her sister’s arms.
“Next time I’ll aim for your face,” said the human girl. “Give us that ruby. I have no desire to injure you.”
But Aasha’s sisters only laughed and laughed. Wariness prickled through Aasha. They had plenty of desires to eat in Alaka. Maybe it would be easier to let the girl go and forget this business.
The human girl turned her face to the ceiling, her eyes darting across the hundred mirrors knitted together. An eerie grin lit up her face. Her sisters pressed closer. The girl leapt, her fingers outstretched as she clawed for the golden tether anchored to one of the walls. Swiftly, the girl sank her knife into the rope that bound together all the mirrors.
“Now that I have your attention—” said the girl, stabbing the rope. “You may have noticed that while I may not be able to kill each of you in one movement, the mirrors can.”
Her sisters shrank a little closer to the ground. Aasha started inching along the walls, trying to get to them. The human girl swung her body, and the mirrors swayed dangerously to her rhythm, listing and groaning against their confines.
“I can do it little by little,” said the girl, sawing delicately at the rope. She raised her knife: “Or I can start hacking.”
Fear gripped her. If her sisters were injured, how would they feed? They’d wither to nothing. Aasha’s fear turned thin and cold, slipping in the space between her thoughts and numbing her nerves. She changed direction and ran to the girl.
“Stop! Don’t hurt my sisters, please,” said Aasha. “I’ll do anything!”
Something in the girl’s gaze relented. Mercy flickered across her features for only an instant. The next moment, her eyes hardened.
“Anything?”
Aasha nodded tightly.
The girl turned her gaze to the rest of the room. “Leave.”
All of her sisters but one disappeared into the shadows.
“You’re a good opponent,” said her sister, eyeing the girl with admiration. “You’d make an even better vishakanya should you seek a new outlet for your talents.”
The girl let go of the rope, dropping to the floor with her fingers splayed against the ground. She stood up, and bowed.
“My duties have already been claimed for this lifetime,” said the girl respectfully.
“Then perhaps in the next.”
Pity and gratitude flashed in her sister’s eyes. Aasha trembled. What had she gotten herself into? She only wanted to ask the humans of their lives. Now she was beholden to them. The idea of the mortal lands enchanted her, but humans were cunning and spiteful. The girl bent to check the boy’s pulse. Satisfied, she stood up and tore the ruby straight out of the tent. She tucked it and her knife somewhere in the depths of her skirt.
“What’s your name?” she asked.
Aasha blinked. She hadn’t imagined the girl would speak to her this way. Even the yakshas and yakshinis only opened their mouths to make demands. Give me something miraculous. Give me what I want. This girl was asking. Her voice wasn’t kind, but it wasn’t cruel either. She stumbled to find her breath.
“Aasha.”
“I’m Gauri,” said the girl. She prodded at the man on the ground with her toe. “How much longer will he be unconscious? Will there be any lasting damage?”
“He will be awake at dawn. His mind should be fully intact.”
The girl let out a sigh and dragged her arm across her brow. “You offered to help us, and what we need most is information. Do you know of a way out of Alaka?”
Aasha had forgotten how the rules were different for humans. For the Otherworldly beings, they could leave whenever they pleased. But if they left the game early, they forfeited a wish.