Chapter 30: Malini

MALINI

The dizzy spells grew worse after Priya left. Tremors shook her body, and there were times when she saw and heard nothing for long moments, then found herself in a new position. Leaning against the wall, or collapsed on the floor, her body not her own.

No one would come if she called. She and Priya had made sure of that, after all.

Priya was gone an hour. Two. Three. Malini forced herself to remain on her charpoy, curled up on her side like a small child, her hands bunched in the concave of her stomach, as if the heat of her own skin could ground her in place.

Perhaps Priya has died, Malini thought. Ridiculous. But time moved differently when you were captive and your body refused to obey you.

She heard the whisper of footsteps behind her. Raised her head and—

There was no one there.

She couldn’t stay on the charpoy with strange noises brushing her ears. She felt vulnerable and scared, her heart howling in her chest. She climbed down—dizzy for a moment—and crossed the floor. Lowered herself down against the wall.

There was a memory of fire humming inside her. She closed her eyes and listened to the splintering pop of wood and flesh under flame. The hiss of it. The screams.

She was not well. Not well. Not.

She saw two shadows cross the floor. She watched them.

Not real. This is not real.

Not real.

“My la—” Priya stopped. “Malini. I’m back. Why are you sitting in the corner of the room?”

“It felt necessary,” Malini said in a rasp. She didn’t move as Priya approached her. She heard no footsteps this time, which was at least normal. Priya always walked with strange, silent grace. Her face was achingly alive—dark and real above Malini’s own. “Did you find him?”

“I did,” said Priya, kneeling down.

“Can he free me?”

Priya was silent for a moment.

“That’s a no, then.”

“He had messages for you.”

“Tell me,” said Malini.

Priya told her. There was comfort in knowing her work had not gone to waste. Aditya had all the tools she’d been able to provide for him—everything he required to crush Chandra to dust. But not enough to see her free from this: her prison, her poisoning, the black marks of fire upon the walls around her.

“Has Lord Rajan tried negotiating directly with General Vikram?” Malini asked. “Vikram has a great deal to lose from Chandra’s rule—and more to gain from Aditya’s. There could be a benefit.”

“I don’t know,” said Priya. “I didn’t know it was something I should suggest.”

“No. You wouldn’t have.”

Priya frowned.

“Don’t bristle, Priya,” Malini murmured. “Such things are my business, not yours. I was raised to consider politics, always.”

But she knew Rao. He knew the value of affability, of the subtler plays for power. It was why they had always gotten along so well, and why he and Aditya had been such fast friends. He would have approached Vikram in some form. That approach had clearly not borne fruit.

“You must go back soon,” said Malini. “You must tell him…”

Ah. She could not remember what Priya needed to tell him. The words had slipped from her mind. Her hands shook a little.

This would pass.

“You need to take this,” said Priya. She held a cup in her hands. When had she obtained it? Had she walked in with it? Malini did not know.

“What is it?”

“A very, very small dose of needle-flower,” said Priya. Her expression was serious. “I spoke to a healer after all. Your body has grown used to the poison. Apparently reducing the intake too swiftly is just as likely to kill you as continuing to consume it. We need to give you a few more doses. Only a few. I’ll measure them carefully and cut them by halves each time. Even that probably isn’t safe, but it’s… it’s the fastest way we can see you free of it.”

“Ah,” murmured Malini. She looked at Priya’s hand—at the cup, and her strong, fine-boned fingers curled around it. “That explains a great deal.”

She reached out. Then drew her hand back. “Take it away,” she said. “I won’t drink it.”

“Why not?”

“Because I don’t want to,” said Malini.

“Malini,” said Priya.

“No. I won’t touch it again. What it did to me…” The bile of poison on her tongue. Her mind in a terrible fog, a choking haze. Her grief, winding itself around her, a constant and whispering noose. “No. I won’t take it.”

“You’ll die if you don’t take it,” Priya said bluntly. “You’ve trusted me with so much. Trust me on this.”

Trusted by necessity. But yes. Yes, she had. She’d trusted Priya with the knowledge of Rao’s existence, after all. Rao, who had kept his promise and awaited her word.

“Not yet, then,” said Malini. “Not quite yet.”

“Why not?”

Malini looked past her.

Beyond Priya’s shoulders, in a room wavering as if through a mist of heat, stood two figures. They watched her. Smoke coiled from their hair. Their crowns of stars burning. Malini looked at them, reached out, as her vision wavered once more, as blackness came for her.

Narina had always been the prettiest of the three of them. A long, fine nose and arched eyebrows, which she plucked to an even finer arch. High cheekbones that she rouged. In the fashion of her father’s people, she blackened her teeth, which made her lips look an even lusher red in comparison.

She stood and gazed at Malini with a singed smile. No teeth. Only char and ash.

“We’ve missed you, heart sister,” she said.

“You needn’t say anything,” Alori said tenderly. “We know you’ve missed us too.”

Time passed. Flickered. But Malini was still upon the floor, and Priya was shaking her, shaking her awake, as those two ghosts shifted about the room, mirages of colored smoke, red silk coiling and glistening, the stars in their hair glinting, fire-hot.

“Malini. Malini.”

Oh, her head ached.

“If this is a ploy to make me help you escape, it’s a dangerous one,” Priya said. Her voice was trembling. “Pramila is awake, and I’ve managed to distract her but—please. You need to drink. Please.”

“How is my mother?” Narina asked. She cocked her head to the side, with a crackle like kindling wood. “No. I know. I don’t even need to guess. She’s twisted herself into knots of grief for me. She blames you for everything. Better than blaming the emperor. Better than blaming herself.”

Alori said nothing. She looked at Malini with eyes like sad hollows, deep and dark.

“My mother will never forgive you,” murmured Narina. “I hope you know that.”

“Of course I do.”

“What?” Priya looked confused. Alarmed. “I don’t understand.”

“Does she think I’m immortal now? A mother of flame? Do you?”

“I don’t know what to believe anymore,” Malini said honestly.

Kneeling before her, Priya lowered her head and let out a curse.

Priya.

When had Priya spoken to Pramila? How long had Malini been on the floor, watching the slow coil of Narina’s dead smile?

“Just drink,” Priya said, her voice a fearful whisper. “Please.”

Malini shook her head. And with a sickening lurch, Narina and Alori were beside her, before her.

“Do you remember how we both cut our hair, after your brother cut yours? We used silver shears and made ours even shorter. My mother was furious,” Narina said. “She said, What are you without your crowning glory? But now I wear a crown of fire and I am gristle and dust, so I suppose it doesn’t matter.”

“You’ve lost so much,” Alori said, infinitely gentle, infinitely sad, as her gossamer fingers brushed over Malini’s forehead. And Malini felt… nothing.

Because they were not here.

“Your lovely silks. Your jewels. Your network of allies. Your friends. Your power. All gone. And who are you without them?”

“Cruel,” murmured Malini. “You were never cruel, nameless princess.”

“What is your name, beneath all the finery you’ve lost?” Alori whispered. “What did the nameless call you, on the day you were born?”

“That,” Malini said, “is your faith, not mine.”

“It doesn’t make it any less true,” Alori said. “Believe in it or not, fate will find you. As it found me. You were named long before you were born, princess. Your tale is written.”

Was it written that Malini should live when Narina and Alori burned? Was it written that she should live and be reduced to this? She had tried so hard to build herself an impenetrable armor of power. She had learned classic texts of war and rule and politics, reading by moonlight when everyone else in the mahal slept. She had made fast friends with the wives of kings and the sisters of princes.

“And now you have nothing,” said Narina, in a voice of wood sap and ash. “Not even us.”

No sisters of her heart. No one to turn to.

“I have Priya,” she forced out, and through the haze she heard the press of a voice on her ears. Yes, yes, I’m here, please—

A laugh.

“A maidservant with monstrous gifts, who doesn’t even particularly like you?”

“Oh, she likes me.”

“She liked a false you.” Croon of a voice. “A you that you created for her. You crafted yourself into something warm and hurt, like a fat hare in a trap. I don’t think she knew if she wanted to save you or consume you whole. But you’re no hare, are you? You are a night flower if anything, precious only for a brief time before you decay.”

That was not Alori’s voice, or Narina’s. They wavered and…

There was… herself. Princess Malini, daughter of Parijat, crowned in a profusion of flowers, pale jasmine radiating into marigold, to mimic the rising sun. Princess Malini, a sari of peacock-green silk, with a chain of knot-worked gold roses around her waist, a string of fat pearls around her throat.

She was everything Malini was not anymore. And she was smiling.

“You,” said Malini raggedly, “are not real either.”

It seemed easy—easy and correct—to push her old self away, to shove and then beat with her fists, as something ugly and furious rushed up into her lungs and her eyes and her mouth as she thought of Narina and Alori curled up with her in her bed, or her mother’s funeral, or her father’s, or Aditya leaving her behind with nothing but a letter and a kiss upon the forehead. The ugliness grew into a wail, and she was screaming and laughing, even as Priya hushed her and caught her fists, a furrow in her brow, and it was Priya she was fighting against after all—

“What is this?”

Pramila’s voice.

“My lady, I don’t know. She simply—turned on me.” Priya’s voice was frantic. She was gripping Malini’s hands, forcing them still.

“She needs her medicine,” Pramila said. “Do you have it? Give it to me, and—”

Malini laughed. And laughed. She could barely breathe through it, but she forced herself to, and bared her teeth into a smile, and thought of Narina.

“Your daughter,” she said to Pramila, “your Narina, whom you mourn and mourn… the morning she died—did you know?—when she drank the opium wine and waited for the priests to come for us, she pressed her head to my arm, and told me, ‘I want my mother.’ Did you know she said that? I don’t know if I ever told you. I think perhaps I wanted to spare you. I don’t know why.”

Pramila gave a full-body flinch, as if Malini had struck her. Had she struck her? Pramila’s hand was on the wall. Was she weeping?

“I should get the guards,” muttered Pramila. “I should—they can force her to drink, see if they don’t—”

“My lady—”

“I don’t deserve this,” sobbed Pramila. “I…”

“I’ll make her drink,” Priya was saying. “I swear it. I’ll deal with her. Please, Lady Pramila.”

“I can’t. I can’t. I—”

“Please, Lady Pramila,” Priya pleaded. “Please spare yourself.”

Pramila gave another sob. She nodded, her face blotchy, unlovely. She turned. Left.

Priya exhaled, and Malini gripped her by the arms as her own body shuddered against her volition.

“You need to drink now,” Priya said. “And as you’ve seen, I can make you, if I have to.”

Malini turned her head.

“You’re not yourself,” said Priya gently.

“You’re not the first to tell me so today.”

“What?”

“I’m hallucinating,” Malini said impatiently. “Do keep up, Priya.”

She did not want to explain that when Narina and Alori had appeared before, she’d needed to speak to them. It did not matter if they were immortals or hallucinations. It only mattered that the loss of them burned, sore and powerful, and she had wanted to pick at the soreness, feel the fresh blood of them again.

“You need to tell Rao to go,” Malini said, instead. “Tell him to go. Tell him Aditya needs him.”

“Rao,” Priya repeated. Her lips shaped the name with care. “Of course.”

“It’s not his name,” Malini said. “None of them have names. Only words for the rest of us to use, to pin them like a cloth beneath a needle. You understand?”

“Not at all,” said Priya.

“The royalty of Alor,” said Malini. “They worship the nameless god. They keep their names a secret. A whisper. Because their names are their fates. I only… I only trust him, now. And I want something good to come of this. He cannot save me from this place. He knows it. You know it, too. His presence here is a waste. But if he goes to Aditya… If I can have even the barest taste of vengeance…”

Fire crept up her tongue.

The pyre burned, before her. Chandra stood before her. There were hands dragging her toward the pyre. None of her careful, cutting words had worked. They would watch her burn, all these princes and kings, so many of them allies she had cultivated with pretty words and pacts and—yes—coin. She reached for Chandra, fought furiously. If I must burn, then I’ll take you with me, throne and all.

But there was no Chandra. Just Priya lying beneath her on the stone floor, pinned by Malini’s hands, looking up at her with those clear eyes. Her eyes were surrounded by lashes more brown than black. Against her dark skin, they were like gold.

An absurd thought. But it brought Malini back to her own flesh again. It made her crumple down, as Priya took hold of her and held her steady.

“Hush,” said Priya. “Or Pramila will hear you.”

Was Malini making noise? She hadn’t realized it. She ground her teeth together, lowering her head.

“You’ve let me hold you,” said Malini, “when you could knock me down without even trying.”

“I don’t want to hurt you,” Priya said, voice steady and sure. She had said it before, Malini remembered. A long time ago.

“And why not?” Malini demanded.

“Because we have a deal.”

“Ah, no,” said Malini. “No. That’s not why.”

She crumpled a little further, a spasm of pain running through her. Ghosts. Flame. The gossamer spirits of Narina and Alori dancing around her.

“Malini. Princess. Come on, please. Let me help you back to your bed.”

Malini allowed herself to be moved. Priya gathered her up like a child, helping her onto the cot.

“You care,” said Malini. “You care about me. You hate that I need you so much and that I tried to give you what you wanted from me—what I thought you wanted from me—to get what I needed from you. But you still care. Don’t lie to me and tell me that you don’t. I can see it in your face.”

“You don’t know what you’re seeing,” muttered Priya. There was a frown line creasing her brow.

“I know exactly what I’m seeing,” said Malini. “But I don’t understand why. Oh, when you thought I was something gentle and wounded—that I could understand. But now, now you know I’ve lied to you and used you, now you know I am a traitor, impure, that I have a hard heart, that I am the empire and the empire is me—”

“I don’t know,” Priya said. Her voice was a lash. “I don’t know why I care, is that enough? Perhaps I’m simply not monstrous enough to enjoy watching another human suffer, no matter how hard their heart may be.”

“Sincere goodheartedness that has nothing to do with me,” Malini said. Slow. The words came out of her slow and thick like honey. “I am not sure I can believe anyone like that exists. Everyone wants something. Everyone uses those wants. That’s what survival is. That’s what power is.”

“Then your life has been terrible and sad,” Priya replied bluntly.

“It has not. I have everything I need.” Loyal friends. Loyal allies. “I used to have everything. I used to…”

She trailed off.

Silence. One beat of it, followed by another. Then Priya spoke.

“You’re not proving your strength,” Priya said, “by refusing the needle-flower.”

“I can fight it,” Malini said thinly.

Priya touched her hand to Malini’s. Priya’s fingers were rough at the palms. Her touch was utterly soft.

“I don’t think you can,” she said. “I don’t think anyone can.”

“All bodies suffer and die the same, like it or not,” said Alori helpfully.

“You’re not here,” said Malini. “So shut up.”

“Still rude, I see,” Alori said, with an exasperated sigh.

“She can’t help herself,” said Narina.

“Even in my mind you’re awful to me,” said Malini. Her eyes ached. “If I tell you I miss you… well. You both would have known that, when you lived. And now, it matters to no one but me. So I won’t.”

“Malini.” Priya’s fingers threaded with her own. “Please. Focus on me. The needle-flower. Will you take it?”

Priya. Priya leaning over her. Priya squeezing her hand, trying to draw her back into the steady world.

Priya’s hair was so very straight, so dark where it draped over the curve of her ear. Strange. She was not lovely, no, but parts of her were lovely. Parts of her.

“There are so many ways I could have convinced you to set me free.” Dark thoughts, light thoughts, like a flicker of shadow on skin. “I wish I had the strength to use you as I need to, in order to escape here,” Malini said. “And yet I’m rather glad I can’t.”

Priya just looked back at her, unflinching.

“Please,” she said. “Drink.”

And finally, Malini took the barest sip. Choked it down, acrid and sweet. And fell back into a dark slumber, her fingers still intertwined with Priya’s own.