I remembered Nalini falling to her knees, the knife pressed to her throat. Skanda’s words—so carefully chosen—I know what you want. I thought … I thought he meant that I wanted her safe. But he’d performed to both sides.
How many times had Arjun begged to speak to me in private after I had rescued him? All this time, I had assumed he wanted to speak about what he had seen, the traumas that had held him captive. I didn’t pay attention. It was too risky, too much of an open declaration that we were in league with one another. I told myself that I would be there for him as a friend later, that right now I could spare neither time nor security. The callousness that had saved me so often had destroyed me too.
“I begged Skanda to send you to an ashram where no one else could get hurt. I begged him to spare your life, even after everything you’d done to hurt us. Why did you come back?”
Before I left Alaka, I told Vikram I didn’t know myself. Now I was staring at the depths of what that meant. Heroine. Savior. Villain. What were those words but different fistfuls of a tale that all depended on who was doing the telling? You see, a story is not just a thing told to a child before sleep. A story is control. I saw it now. Felt the talons of that truth scrape through me. I saw how I had laid down the bones of Skanda’s story: a tale of a turned heart and insatiable greed.
“Skanda lied to you,” I said, my voice breaking.
I sank to the floor, my head in my hands: one glass, one flesh. One translucent. One opaque. One that could wield a knife and one that could not. Past and present. Alaka had cut my life in half. When I looked forward, the hand that had been my horror became my hope: transparency. Nalini breathed sharply. Arjun tried to hold her back, but she crouched beside me, cradling the glass hand.
“What happened to you?”
I laughed. “I cannot even begin to tell you everything.”
“Try,” urged Nalini. “Arjun was sent to fetch you, but I couldn’t … I had to see you…” She stopped, blinking back tears. “You know your brother will send another attendant soon.”
I tried. I told them about what I had felt the day I emerged into the throne room to see the soldiers cut down and Arjun standing at Skanda’s side. I told them about being thrown over the Ujijain border, my mouth gagged and my wrists bound; the months of silent torture while the empire decided what to do with me. I told them how Vikram changed everything, about the invitation to the Tournament of Wishes in the city of Alaka down to the moment where I earned escape. I didn’t tell them about the wish though. Knowing Arjun, he would want a demonstration, and I couldn’t risk giving away the last weapon I had. When Nalini held Kauveri’s gift, her eyes narrowed from uncertainty to awe. Even Arjun stopped frowning to hold the dagger. The dagger shimmered in his hands, transforming into a trident of water. From where I sat, I could feel the rush of an invisible river, the magic of a powerful wave brimming through the room and roiling with energy.
“Why would I come back just to be killed?” I said when Arjun turned away from me. “This whole time I thought that you had turned on me. I don’t know how else to prove—”
An attendant knocked at the door.
“General Arjun?”
My pulse raced. The attendant was knocking on my door. So why was he addressing Arjun? Arjun spoke through the door.
“I wasn’t able to comply with the Raja Skanda’s directive,” he said. “Her travels have worn her and it seems that one of the servants gave her a sleeping draught to calm her nerves. Tell the Raja that I will escort her to the throne room.”
“Very good, General.”
Footsteps echoed and disappeared down the hall.
“… He sent you here to kill me?” Arjun’s mouth tightened to a cut, which was all the answer I needed.
“I wouldn’t let him,” said Nalini. “Not without seeing you. Or hearing why you did what … what we thought you did.”
My heart leapt. “You believe me?”
Nalini held my gaze. “I don’t know what to believe.”
I reached for her hand, but Arjun stopped me.
“We need to go,” he said tightly. “We can confront Skanda ourselves.” He yanked me to my feet. “You have one chance to make me believe you. Otherwise, I’ll follow through with the order.”
And then he turned to Nalini, cupping her face between his palms and kissing her gently on the forehead. How blind had I been before now? All this time, I thought Arjun hadn’t loved Nalini enough to protect her from Skanda. The truth was that he loved her so much that he had betrayed me. Nalini watched us as we walked to the door, her eyes never leaving my face.
“Thank you,” I said when we started walking down the hall.
“For what?”
“For not killing me, for starters. And for keeping me safe when you didn’t have to.”
“I didn’t do it for you.”
“Arjun, I know how it looks. But we were like siblings—”
“Exactly,” he said cuttingly. “We were like siblings. And then you changed. Skanda can set this record straight.”
“Skanda is a liar. The things he’s done and made me—”
“That’s what you said before to make me pledge you soldiers. I did it because I trusted your word until you kept proving you weren’t worth it. But did you ever once prove that he did everything you said?”
Weakness is a privilege.
I had never told him. I thought … I thought I was keeping myself safe. But sometimes weakness wore the face of strength, and sometimes strength wore the face of weakness.
“You may not believe me, but surely you’ve seen some of his deception ever since you became his second-in-command? Has nothing he’s done convinced you that he might not be innocent?”
Arjun faltered. Skanda may be an expert storyteller, but even he couldn’t keep up a ruse of innocence for too long. Pausing before the throne doors, Arjun fixed me with a dark look.
“Don’t try anything.”
I held up my hands in surrender. “I won’t.”
Inside the room, Skanda reclined against silk pillows. I scanned the room: no attendants. Not even a servant to answer his thousand insignificant needs. He looked as if he wanted this to be informal, but it felt calculated. On a glass tray stood goblets full of cold thandai. My mouth watered. I could smell the vetiver seeds and rose petals steeped in the milky drink.
“You used to drink this every time you came home from one skirmish or another,” said Skanda, his voice swelling with mock brotherly pride.
I sat in front of him, mindful of Kauveri’s dagger slung against my hip. I had placed it on the left side, hoping that Skanda would interpret it as a sign of peace and not a sign that my right hand refused to hold weapons. Arjun sank into the pillow next to Skanda, one hand protectively on his dagger.
“Now, now, Arjun, no need to be so aggressive. After all, the Princess Gauri has come back from a long and arduous trek. She was so weakened she could hardly stay awake.” Skanda flashed a thin and oily smile. He held out cups of thandai to me and Arjun. I took mine gingerly, breathing in the spicy scent.
“May I see that dagger of yours, sister?”
“Later,” I said. “I tire.”