Aru risked a glance at Mini. Her eyebrows were drawn together. Aru may have freed the Sleeper, but she hadn’t done it on purpose. Would Mini ever believe her now? Aru couldn’t get the words out—they were clogged by guilt.
“I—I can explain, Mini,” she said. “Later.”
Mini’s face hardened, but she nodded. There was no point hashing it out now, right before certain death.
The Sleeper’s eyes narrowed. He dropped the birdcage beside him. It wasn’t empty after all. Small clay figurines in the shape of horses and tigers rattled together as they hit the floor.
“Give me the sprig of youth,” he said.
Aru and Mini started inching backward. Aru was aware of Boo flying in frantic circles above them, as if trying to signal something. She risked a glance up. Boo dipped, landing on a book with a silver spine. It was too far away for Aru to read, but she knew what it said: Adulthood.
The second key was right over their heads. If they could just distract the Sleeper, they could get it. Mini caught Aru’s eye and nodded once. Apparently they’d had the same thought. Which would’ve been really cool if Mini didn’t also look as though she’d like to strangle Aru at the first chance.
They wedged themselves between the stacks of A-shelves.
“How’d you find us?” asked Aru.
“Rakshas are very talkative,” he said, smiling. “Two little girls entering the Night Bazaar with enchanted objects bearing the marks of Lord Indra and the Dharma Raja? How curious.”
“What kinda name is Sleeper?” asked Aru. “Are you just really good at napping?”
He frowned. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Mini touch her diamond bracelet.
“Or is it like a metaphor?” pushed Aru, proud that she’d remembered the word from last week’s English class. “Maybe a bad nickname from middle school, when you fell asleep on a test and all the ink got on your face?”
“Enough!” he thundered. “Where’s the second key? You know what it is, don’t you?”
Mini slid her backpack to the floor, nudging it closer to Aru. When Mini turned around, Aru saw that she had managed to tuck the sprig of youth into the back of her jeans.
Aru felt as if she’d tapped into a wavelength that belonged only to her and Mini. They moved in sync, their thoughts aligned.
“If you want the key, catch it!” shouted Aru.
She picked up the backpack and threw it into the air. The Sleeper lunged after it, while Mini tore off her bracelet. With a flick of her wrist, it expanded, flashing and shimmering. Cold flooded the air. Frost seeped out, lacing the floor.
Mini tossed the Cloak of Winter over the Sleeper.
“I’ve got him! You go grab the you-know-what,” Mini called to Aru.
Mini wrestled with the cloak, her feet skidding across the floor. Underneath, the Sleeper froze. But he wouldn’t stay frozen solid for long. Already, cracks were forming in the ice and his eyes were rolling furiously. Mini pushed him and he fell over on his side, knocking into the birdcage on the floor. It rolled down one of the library aisles.
“Over here!” shouted Boo from atop the books.
Aru really wished she could fly. But since she couldn’t, she lost a couple of moments grabbing the stools, restacking them, and climbing to the top shelf. She was out of breath by the time she spotted the book.
It stood apart from the other volumes. Aloof and—if books could act that way—a little judgmental of its neighbors. Its title glowed in silver foil on the spine: Adulthood. Boo hopped onto her head and pecked at her hair, urging her to take it.
Aru glanced at the other titles next to it. Adulation was singing. Pink hearts kept oozing from its pages. Adullamite hopped away, running toward the B titles, which flapped their pages to welcome it.
A bite of adulthood… What was she supposed to do? Grab the book and actually sink her teeth into it?
She glanced at Mini, who was trying to keep the cloak tied over the frozen Sleeper. But he was beginning to move. Shards of ice flew off him. Mini met Aru’s eyes and hollered, “Do it!”
Boo soared down to help Mini, leaving Aru on the shelf.
“What are you waiting for, Aru?” demanded Mini.
“Ew, ew, ew!” said Aru. She squeezed her eyes shut, grabbed the book, and bit into it.
It squealed.
She hadn’t given much thought as to what a book might taste like. But Adulthood had a strange flavor. Sweet and bitter at the same time, like candied orange peel. It reminded Aru of walking to school on a cold February morning, when the sun was bright but distant and everything was a little too stark.
She spat the bite of Adulthood into her palm. The wet wad of paper transformed into a glowing silver coin. Aru shoved it in her pocket, then ran her tongue along her teeth, hating that she couldn’t quite rid herself of the taste.
“I got it—” she started, but her victory was short-lived.
The Sleeper had thrown off the cloak. Now it lay dull and limp on the floor, slowly melting.
“You are testing my patience—” he hissed.
“You slept in a lamp for a hundred years and that’s the best you could come up with?” shouted back Aru. “What a cliché. All you’re missing is the villain mustache.”
She was trying to keep his attention on her while Mini fumbled for another magical item from the Seasons. But it wasn’t Mini who launched herself at him next. It was Boo.
“Those!” he snapped. “Are!” He pecked at the Sleeper’s eyes. “My!” He pooped. “HEROINES!”
Aru clambered down from the stools and snatched the backpack off the ground. Mini was trying to shake the Cloak of Winter back into something that would tame the Sleeper, but it stayed lifeless.
Boo let out a loud, pained squawk. The Sleeper had caught him in one hand. With the other hand, he wiped the bird poop off his head. He peered more closely at Boo. He didn’t yell or scream. Instead…he laughed.
“What has happened to you, old friend?”
A Strange Case
Friend? Aru almost dropped the backpack.
“You are much changed since you were the king of Subala.”
“Boo, what’s he talking about?” asked Mini.
The Sleeper smiled. “Boo? That’s what they call you? Has all that guilt made you soft?”
Something clicked in Aru’s head. Subala wasn’t Boo’s name, but the name of his kingdom. She remembered Urvashi’s laugh….If they really are Pandavas, then the irony that you are the one who has been chosen to help them delights me.
“I get it,” said the Sleeper mockingly. “Boo is short for Subala.” He turned to the girls, his eyebrows knitted in that oh-I’m-so-sorry-for-you-NOT way that only truly awful people can pull off. “His name isn’t Subala. It’s Shakhuni. I suppose you could call him Shocky. In which case I imagine this might be a shocker.”
He chuckled at his own joke. Which is another thing that only truly awful people do (grandparents, dads, and that one well-meaning but weird uncle are exceptions).
Shakhuni. Aru’s heart went cold. She knew that name from the stories. It was the name of the deceiver. The sorcerer who led the eldest Pandava brother astray in a cursed game of dice, where he was forced to gamble away his entire kingdom. Shakhuni started the great Kurekshetra war. His revenge consumed his own kingdom.
He was one of the Pandavas’ greatest enemies.
And she…She had let him sit on her shoulder. Mini had fed him an Oreo. They’d cared for him.
“Your quarrel is not with them,” Boo said to the Sleeper.
“My, you have become quite the addled one,” said the Sleeper. “You’re telling me you have actually been tasked to help the Pandavas? What is this, your penance for committing so horrible a sin?”
“No,” said Boo, and this time he looked at Aru and Mini. “It is not my penance. It is my honor.”
Aru felt a flush of pride in the same instant that she felt a stab of misgiving. Nice words, but why should she believe them? Poppy and Arielle had been nice to her up until the moment when they weren’t.
“You have gone soft,” said the Sleeper, frowning.