Page 50 of Her Soul for a Crown

For a moment, it was just them and the embers sparking between their lips.

It was a moment Anula had once dreamed of, a moment that had never come, though her lips had met many others. A kiss had long ago become a bartering tool, a way of justice, a path to change. But now, with him, she felt that a kiss could do more. Like wake a long-slumbering dream.

Reeri’s eyes snapped open. He jerked away, leaving her arms suddenly empty and cold, and she had to cling to the blessed bed frame to stop her fall.

“We—we cannot,” he breathed heavily.

Anula flushed. “Sorry.”

Reeri’s nostrils flared. He stared at her lips with a thirst, as if desire had parched him, too.

“My raja.” Bithul’s voice cut through the bedchamber; his haunted gaze burned their moment to dust. “An urgent missive.”

They barely had time to right themselves before Bithul thrust the small paper into Reeri’s hand. He half stood, half kneeled on the bed and breathed, “No.”

He glanced at her, all cravings forgotten. Dread thickened the air.

“What?” she asked.

Reeri’s jaw worked, as if he couldn’t say or wouldn’t say, as if he wanted to protect her.

“ What? ” she repeated, braced and demanding. “Reeri, tell me.”

He blinked. “Wh—what did you call me?”

Anula blushed. It had slipped out. She wasn’t sure when she had stopped thinking of him as a Yakka and started seeing him as Reeri.

Less a bloody legend or Heavenly being, and more of a…

being. Not unlike herself. Perhaps it happened in the moment between their lips touching and her old desires sparking anew.

Perhaps it had happened before that, quietly, silently.

She cleared her throat. “Don’t change the subject. ”

She ripped the missive from his grip, and all thoughts of lips and kisses and names blew away.

“Anula—”

“No.” Her voice cracked. She met his shadow-lined eyes. “No. It can’t be true.”

Contingent of Anuradhapura army killed in Polonnaruwan attack. No survivors. Villages burned to ash.

“No,” Anula repeated, the letter in her hand shifting in and out of focus. “Dilshan said…”

Bithul scowled. “He lied, to aid the Polonnaruwa Kingdom into a strategic advantage. The villages had not yet been taken. When our army arrived, they struck and razed all three to the ground. Not only do they now have a clear path into the kingdom, they took out a third of our military. The raja must declare wartime.”

The missive shook in her hand.

Reeri whispered, dark and low, “These men do not merit the dignity of war. They must reap what they have sown. Let them be taken by surprise, ripped from their beds and bled out on the streets.”

Anula shivered. Red sky. Red hands. Red water. Look away.

A hand fell upon hers. She glanced up into Reeri’s dark eyes, spilled ink masking saffron.

“I can do it,” he said. “I will do it, without a bargain. I will burn them in their own blood, for you.”

“The taboo—”

“Curse the taboo.”

Anula’s breath caught. What he was offering to do…for her …

“My raja,” Bithul interjected. “I don’t think that’s the way.”

“There is no way in vengeance,” Reeri declared.

“But there is in justice.”

Anula tore away from the bed, the words creeping up her arms as she paced.

It was no accident, Anula. You were meant to survive.

Why?

Justice. You were chosen to carry out a further purpose. Together, we must make it count. We can change the kingdom for good, in their name, for their justice and the justice of all others forevermore.

Was this justice? A village burned, people murdered—

If you do this right, songs will be sung about you.

And if I do it wrong?

A pyre will be built instead.

Perhaps it should be.

Anula eyed her hands, not the mehendhi, but the blood that stained them.

Reeri was right: This wasn’t justice. It was vengeance.

She was no better than a usurper, the very thing she had come to end.

Death was all she granted the kingdom. Even the Yakkas couldn’t evade her corruption. Where had she gone wrong?

Auntie Nirma had trained her, taught her, honed her.

For them—Amma, Thaththa, and all in Eppawala, all in the kingdom.

So why were her hands drenched in blood?

Why was her name next in the history of the Age of Usurpers?

Was this the dream she was meant to chase by the Heavens’ hand, the person Auntie Nirma had wanted her to be?

Was she who she wanted to be?

“We must send aid to the villages that are now threatened by a Polonnaruwan attack,” Bithul urged. “Evacuate the people. The outer city is full, but we could take them into the inner city, keep them safe.”

“There will not be a threat when the enemy is removed,” Reeri growled.

“We must focus on what’s important,” Bithul argued. “People’s lives.”

Gooseflesh prickled her arms. She’d heard those words before, thought she knew what they meant.

She’d been wrong. Up to this point, Anula had focused on death—Amma’s and Thaththa’s, each name on the list—because according to Auntie Nirma, the world was made up of two types of people: allies and enemies.

She was wrong.

It was more complex than that. The good and the bad were one, like a river banked with mud on one side and dried, cracked earth on the other.

Anula had seen it in Premala, caring for others while practicing vile traditions.

And, of course, she’d seen it in Reeri. She’d judged him to be the Blood Yakka from the stories of old, yet he wore his care on his sleeve unknowingly.

Bithul, though, was different. He focused on life, on preserving and protecting no matter the cost to himself.

Auntie Nirma had not trained Anula to be both.

She didn’t know how to rule, what diplomacy or governance took.

That was a job for allies. She had been honed only as a weapon.

But if her path was not to wield judgment and justice, or vengeance of any kind—if she was not to rid the palace of evil men—had it all been for nothing?

No, she couldn’t believe that. Amma and Thaththa didn’t deserve to be killed; no one did.

Justice was always called for. But perhaps not the justice Auntie Nirma had sought.

Though her visions for a peaceful Anuradhapura were worthy, the pain of loss had blinded her, pulled her across the river to the bed that was dry and dead.

Perhaps Anula had been blinded, too. She didn’t want to be. She didn’t want to look away any longer.

Anula lifted her gaze, squared her shoulders. “Send help.”

Reeri furrowed his brows. “But I can—”

She placed a firm hand on his arm. “That’s not who I want to be, and we both know that’s not who you are.”

Confusion cleared, the darkness receding like the tide at night.

“Protect them. Save them,” she said. “That’s what we do.”

Fear had stolen her sight for long enough. Anula would be no usurper.

Power and hatred would not be her legacy.