“For someone draped in all the stories of the world, how much of it have you seen?”
Stars flickered against my skin, and I wondered whether they were listening to him, tilting a little farther out of the sky to hear the lustrous dark of his voice.
“Very little.”
His words grasped at a yearning I barely acknowledged. I didn’t want to tell him how dearly I wished to see the world in all its states. To see how the night transformed other cities and landscapes beyond my grove. Or the ocean. Or how much I wanted to see the true sun, and not some torn half of it.
“I thought so,” he said. “Where would you like to go? This will take us anywhere.”
“How did you come across something like this?”
“Hundreds of mirrors fill Naraka’s halls. You could see and visit any world and any city you wished.” A note of pride struck his voice. “In my kingdom, nothing is impossible.”
“I don’t think I’d like to live in a world with no impossibilities.”
He frowned. “Why not?”
“It strikes me as … uninspired. What property is left to dreamers when every idea has been tamed and conquered? What about the poet who dreams of embracing the night sky? It’s utterly impossible. And yet the thought of it sparks song and dance, poetry and philosophy.”
The Dharma Raja fell silent. “Then I hope I am wrong.”
“There’s always impossibilities in dreams. Dream more.”
He looked at me. “I’m beginning to.”
I reached out to trace the place where his fingers had graced the mirror. “Will you take me to see the ocean?”
“I know just the place,” he said. He held out his hand to me. “May I?”
Sparks of light danced down my spine. His thumb ran over my knuckles. Together, we stepped into the mirror. Black and cold. And then falling. My heart raced as a swoop and weightlessness feathered inside me. On instinct, I clung to him and his arms folded around me. Still, my heart raced.
A moment later, we stood along the shore. I caught my breath, dizzied from the sudden jolt of solidness beneath me.
“You were wrong,” he said.
“About what?”
“I have done the impossible,” he announced. “I have embraced the night sky.”
“You did no such thing.”
“Is that so?” he asked. His voice felt too close, and I realized that I hadn’t stepped out of the circle of his arms. It had felt too natural to lean against him. I looked up to see his brow arched, his lips tilting into a knowing grin. “Then what do you call this?”
I thought about the fall and how he had offered zero warning. I lifted my chin: “Opportunistic.”
A wolfish grin lit up his face. “You caught me.”
“Now who’s performing impossibilities?” I smirked. “Someone should write a story about me, for I have ensnared death himself.”
“Not ensnared,” he said, and his voice burned low in my ear. “Enchanted.”
“You’re getting far better at flattery.”
I stepped out of the circle of his arms and into the silky sand that hugged the ocean. When I turned to look at the water, I forgot everything. The ocean churned the constellations, rearranging a thousand tales in its ink-dark water. Water always had a calming effect on me. But standing before the ocean, I felt awed. The ocean stretched infinite, so that nothing but a delicate thread of land kept the sky and sea apart.
“What do you see?” asked the Dharma Raja.
I told him what I saw—ink and starlight, torn stories and new endings. And as I spoke, his obsidian eyes seemed to gleam in longing.
“I would give anything to see the world the way you do,” he said softly.
“And I would give anything to see the world as you do. You travel everywhere. Never tethered to one place or one allotted time.”
“True. But my eyes have squandered every sight I have been given,” he said, resentment deepening his voice. “I am trying to change how I see the world.”
“Are you following advice from the same instructor who taught you how to pay a compliment?” I asked, teasing. “If so, I might counsel you otherwise.”
“In truth, I think you have been my instructor in seeing the world differently,” he said. His fingers brushed against mine, just soft enough to be coincidence. “Lately, I have tried to summon wonder like a lens. But it does not come to me until I stand beside you.”
We walked along the shore. Water pooled around our ankles, and the shock of it was cold and welcoming. The Dharma Raja murmured something under his breath, and colorful glass diyas and white petals sprang up along the waves. Like wading through a festival.
“I envy you too,” I said suddenly. I couldn’t stop thinking of the legendary Tapestry in Naraka, an object where every mortal life possessed a thread and every life was held in fragile balance. “When a thread is frayed in a thousand directions, no one but you gets to decide which path to choose. Only your voice counts in that tale, and there is no story more potent than life.”
“So this is why you ask for your patrons to tell you about their dreams and their days. You wish to know whether the dream fruit you created made a difference?” I nodded, and the Dharma Raja murmured: “You want your voice to be heard. I understand.”
His words—simple and unfettered—rang in my ears. He understood. In the Otherworld, striving for things beyond what you were given was unreasonable. Even Nritti and Uloopi couldn’t fathom why I wanted so much.
I hadn’t realized, until now, how understanding could coax a small, shared world into existence. When I answered him, even my words felt new. Like they were spoken in a language birthed into being for this very moment.
“I believe you,” I said. And then, I gave away a secret. “Night resets the world. It is a blank page for a story to be writ upon. But I have no hand or voice in the matter. That is why I envy you.”
He stopped walking, and reached for my hand. “Is that what you want?”
His face bent to mine. This close, it was impossible to ignore the nocturnal beauty of him. This close, it was impossible to break his fathomless gaze.
“I do,” I said. “And now that I’ve told you what I want, it’s only fair for you to tell me what you want.”
“Fair?” He laughed. “No one is guaranteed fairness. Not in any life. And not by any god or goddess.”
“Fine,” I said, waving a dismissive hand. “Keep your secrets.”
I turned away just as his hand snaked out for my wrist.
“It’s no secret that I want you,” he said. He bowed his head to mine, and his eyes burned black. “Come with me. I will make you a queen among storytellers. I will give you a kingdom. A place full of mirrors where you can step into any world you please. With your perspective and my position, we could rewrite the world.”
I want you …
We could rewrite the world …
It was more than tempting. His offer sang to me. When he stood this close, my heart didn’t race. It slowed. As if my heart and mind had conspired to live in this moment forever.
“As your bride?”