Page 46 of Her Soul for a Crown

The scent of cinnamon tingled Anula’s nose and roused her muscles. She sighed contentedly as she woke.

Reeri, on the other hand, snored softly, his breath blustering a fallen lock of hair.

Heat radiated off him. She hadn’t felt a nightly chill since this raja had arrived.

His frame took up the bed, feet dangling off the end, and yet he slept deeply, peacefully.

A characteristic of either Vatuka or Reeri, but which one?

His eyelids quivered. If she opened one now, would it be filled with saffron?

Another snore rippled, sending a twitch through his body, and she saw it, his dream. The light touch of a loved one, the connection of family and friends. An empty ache rattled his chest.

She glanced down—their hands were entwined. His fingertips were stained a light brown from constantly stirring his tea with cinnamon bark while neck-deep in memory books. She wondered if the sweet flavor also spiced his tongue.

Anula noticed how his hand dwarfed hers. She couldn’t help her thumb rubbing a gentle circle over his knuckles. Couldn’t stop herself from doing it again. Were his true hands this rough? Would they scrape if he brushed her lips?

She stilled. That wasn’t what he was dreaming about.

He yearned for his friends and family, a craving she knew all too well.

The last time she’d held a hand was that night.

Hers had been swallowed then, too, by Amma’s as she desperately drew her through the house and the courtyard, away from death.

Anula slid her hand from Reeri’s grip and shifted to the edge of the bed.

A groan sounded, longing and homesick, as Reeri stretched awake. “Good morning,” he murmured.

“Not with that breath on my face.” She grimaced, pulling farther away.

He frowned as the bedchamber door opened and a servant rushed in, flushed and bowing, to deliver an urgent missive.

A tongue clucked behind Anula. The blessed gift raejina whispered, “You fear what you want.”

“You have no idea what I fear.”

The artistry sighed. “Oh, darling consort, it is written all over your beautiful face.”

A chill racked Anula. She pulled the pillows high and pressed them against the wood carving, as if she could smother the words.

“Commander Dilshan has returned,” Reeri announced and stood, avoiding her gaze. “He is waiting with the ministers to give a report on the war with Polonnaruwa.”

Anula dropped the pillows. “I’m coming with you.”

“No.”

Anula snorted, already reaching for her necklace, tinctures and poisons flicking through her mind. She wrapped a robe around her waist; justice didn’t need to be served in a sari. But Reeri stepped into her path.

“What are you doing?” she asked.

“Do you trust me?”

“As far as a chicken can throw an elephant.”

“Will you try, once?”

Agitation skittered up her arms. “He’s—”

“On your list,” Reeri finished. “I know. I am not telling you to leave him alone, only asking that you wait, and trust me.”

Every muscle flinched. She trusted him with Wessamony, because she trusted his hatred, but this? It might be her only chance. “Why?”

“Because I want to help you.”

Anula startled. Not at the words but how they sang with truth, how she heard it as surely as a bulbul’s song. It swelled in her chest, tilting her off guard, and she almost didn’t hear herself say, “All right.”

***

For an hour, Anula tried and failed to avoid thinking about Reeri, about the ease with which he had convinced her to stay, the feeling he’d stirred up—the want for her old dream—and what that said about her, about him, about them.

Not even summoning Premala to deliver her morning meal could fully pull her from her thoughts.

Anula thought Premala would like it, seeing all the gifts from those she venerated most, but she quaked the moment she stepped into the bedchamber, half the tray’s food tumbling to the floor.

She peered around vases and jumped at the sound of the wind as if the terrible Yakkas would spring out and eat her.

“Tell me, how did a girl from a fishing village become a—” The word choked. Anula flicked at the kiribath. “Cursed blessings, I can’t even say it to you?”

“Not outside the caves. It’s for protection, yours and ours, my raejina consort.” Premala checked a shudder. “If the Yakkas were to find out, they’d kill us all.”

That feeling rose again, this time with a sea of questions. Namely, why she’d bent beneath it, why it had felt so familiar and yet so foreign, why she wanted Reeri to come back and explain himself. Why she was afraid if he did. She murmured into her food, “You don’t know that.”

The chamber door slammed open, cutting off the argument poised on Premala’s lips.

“The commander awaits you in the administration building,” Reeri said, skidding to a stop at the sight of the maid.

Premala squeaked, fear flaring in her eyes as she took in the raja.

Clearly, she believed her own theory. She bowed and fled before Reeri had a chance to give her an order.

Perhaps terrified it would have to do with the Yakkas.

The girl needed to find her backbone if Anula was to save her from the Kattadiya.

Though prying her out of the caves one-handed would work, too.

But that was a problem for another day. Today, there was Dilshan.

He had returned to her city and was waiting for her. Because of Reeri.

“Why?” Anula stood, finally asking aloud what she’d chewed on for hours.

“He is a man who bargained to allow an entire village to perish,” Reeri said, meeting her gaze. “He must stand trial and face the consequences of his actions. I have set it up for you to be his judge and juror.”

Anula quirked a brow. “I thought you didn’t want me to be a murderess.”

Reeri’s lips pressed tight, and she saw it in his eyes, the same thing she had seen when they touched this morning: a dream of connection.

Anula swallowed.

“I understand that you want to change your kingdom for the better,” he said. “Though for what it is worth, mayhap it is best if you deal with him differently than you did Prophet Ayaan.”

Anula stepped back. This didn’t feel like a connection, but more…it felt like caring. She should decline, draw a line.

But it was Commander Dilshan: the first voice she’d heard after Amma’s screams had died in her ears, and now the second name on her list. His heart was promised to Kama for the sake of the Yakkas. His death would lead directly to Wessamony’s.

Stepping around the back of the table, she gave Reeri a wide berth. “You’re giving him to me for free, no bartering?”

Reeri dropped his chin. “The fastest way to earn trust is to prove myself trustworthy.”

She grabbed a knife on display. Perhaps Reeri only did this for the bargain and she was reading too far into a feeling.

Reeri cleared his throat. “If I were to ask you a question, would you answer it, with no bartering?”

“Depends on the question.”

“Where do you go with Kama?”

Ask no questions, tell no secrets.

Anula tucked the knife into her sari. Again, his intent felt more like concern than curiosity…but was that so wrong? “To see a friend who doesn’t know she’s in trouble.”

“Oh.” Reeri blinked in surprise. “I hope all ends well.”

“I won’t let it end any other way.” Anula left Reeri and opened the bedchamber door, vowing that when she claimed the crown, her first act would be to protect the kingdom from those above and below the ground. Nothing would harm her people. That’s all she cared about.

“Good morning, my raejina consort.” Bithul bowed. “The commander is waiting.”

“Bring Kama to the administration building.”

Bithul stilled, half-bent. “Does this have to do with a certain offering she’s expecting?”

Anula raised a brow.

“Unlike my ankles, my ears are uninjured, my raejina consort.”

“Bring her.”

“Do not let hatred beget more hatred. Think of the kingdom. What is the most important thing, now?”

Justice . The word rang through Anula. It had always been justice, as Auntie Nirma had taught her, as Reeri agreed. The Kattadiya flashed in her mind. Their idea of justice was wrong. Not hers.

Right?

“Don’t do anything rash.”

Anula scowled as she marched down the hall and called back, “I am not rash.”

A sighed followed her.

***

The weight of the knife pulled at Anula’s side as she walked into the room where men had once sat at the long table and refused to listen to her.

Now a man stood, waiting for her to be seated first. Anula touched a finger to her necklace.

There were so many ways to stop a heart.

But Kama wanted one still beating, Reeri wanted a trial and sentence different than Prophet Ayaan’s, and Auntie Nirma wanted the deaths of the men responsible for evil.

“My raejina consort.” Commander Dilshan bowed. Gray hair topped a tall man. Leathery skin and deep wrinkles evidenced that he was a soldier of a long war, living in the elements instead of the palace. “It’s a pleasure to finally meet you.”

His voice was as rough as she remembered, as smug and unaffected. The lack of smile proved his lie, but was death the sentence he deserved? Amma and Thaththa hadn’t deserved to die that night, and yet the man before her had chosen it for them.

Anula sat, held up a hand when he moved to do the same. “I know what you’ve done.”

Commander Dilshan raised both brows. “And what is that?”

He did not use her title. She tore her gaze away and reached for the tea on the table. “Do you care for all the people of Anuradhapura?”

“Of course,” he said, gruff and impatient.

“Even the small villages?”

Silence rang out. Dilshan glanced at the door. Anula poured him a cup of tea, her finger tracing a small diamond at her throat, a sapphire to its right. When he was satisfied that no one was listening, he growled, “Who told you?”

At least he had the boldness to admit to it. “Prophet Ayaan.”

Dilshan frowned. “The prophet? How? Did he foresee my rule?”

“ Your rule?”