Page 55 of Her Soul for a Crown

Dark clouds gathered as Reeri and the others followed Anula through the brush and down a set of stairs. Heat clung to him. It drew out his sweat, leeched his breath, as if to hollow him out. A monsoon was nigh. The mark of the Maha season.

“Those are Divinities.” Bithul sucked his teeth, the tap of his sword-cane scratching to a halt.

The tunnels spread wide beneath the ground, walls bare save for the occasional portrait of a woman, halls tight and made tighter by grandiose stone statues. These, Reeri recognized. Neither short nor tall, female nor male, but all and none and everything in between. A chill ran up his spine.

“The Kattadiya survived, then,” Sohon growled. “That is how your bargain was broken, Calu.”

Unease filtered through their line. The memory of the Kattadiya’s powers had not faded with time, and they were not keen to experience them again.

“When were you going to tell us of your Kattadiya connections?” Calu asked.

Anula stared, a droplet of sweat tracking down her cheek. “I—”

Her hand twitched, her lips pursed, and Reeri saw the color of fear in her eyes. It soured in his mouth.

Despite her forgiveness, there were still so many ways he could fail her, fail them all. Mayhap she realized that, too. She continued deeper into the tunnel, without giving an answer.

“Did you tell her of the soul sacrifice?” Calu whispered, swinging the foreign sword he had bought in the night market, ready to battle any unseen Kattadiya. “She looks scared to find the relic.”

Reeri’s heart squeezed as he watched the tension stiffen Anula’s shoulders.

The urge to take her hand in his sizzled down his arms. Why should she not be scared?

Even without knowledge of her sacrifice, they were still attempting the impossible: killing a Heavenly being. None of them knew what was to come.

Even Reeri had only ever heard stories of a soul’s use. What if he could not stop it from completely cleaving her? What if it could not be done? Would he have to choose betwixt freeing his brethren or saving her soul?

Reeri brushed a hand through damp curls and took a breath that shook more than steadied.

“How much farther?” Sohon whispered.

Calu grunted. “If we knew that, do you think we would be crawling our way through this?”

“There!” Kama shouted. Calu clapped a hand over her mouth, yet she was right. Ahead of Bithul and Anula, to the center of the hall and off to one side, it stood: the statue of Fate.

Blessed with curves and star-filled eyes, a gown wrapped tight around their waist, stardust glittering the length of their arms, down to their hands, which held an ivory-and-iron blade. It was small and delicate and made Reeri’s palms sweat.

“Is it real?” Bithul breathed, more starry-eyed than the statue.

“Y-yes,” Anula choked, coughing as she lifted a hand toward it. “I feel it wants to be used.”

“Like the paintings in the palace,” Bithul murmured.

Sweat trickled down her neck, her eyes flicking to the shadows, as if Wessamony would appear as soon as skin met bone. Reeri’s fingers twitched. It was not too late; they could skip the soul cleaving.

But no. He squeezed his eyes shut, blinked them open again. This undertaking was too important. He could not retreat now. Ratti deserved a life. They all did. Reeri had promised.

“Good. On our count, Anula, pick up the relic,” Kama said, pulling out a silk saaluwa.

She revealed a heart wrapped within and nodded to the others to take out their own essence offerings.

“We must wield the soul you offered and then call upon the Bone Blade’s power to kill Wessamony. The equinox is hours away.”

Eyes wide, Anula nodded, her hand hovering at the hilt.

“Strike fast,” Calu said, taking out his rice bowl made of teeth. He shot Reeri a look. “Mayhap Bithul could stand by, in case.”

Reeri’s pulse pounded as Bithul shifted nearer to Anula, ready to do his duty. The Yakkas tightened their circle, Kama pulling Reeri along. Anula lifted the Bone Blade from the statue’s grip, and it began.

“Great and vast cosmos,” Kama sang low. “Hear our prayer…”

Relic shaking along with her hands, Anula cast sidelong glances into the shadows. Reeri gripped his vial of blood, clenched his teeth, as Kama beseeched the cosmos to hear their bid and accept their offerings. This was the only way. Anula had agreed.

“I give to you a journal of secrets, offered to me for my benevolence,” Sohon said, laying his book on the ground.

“I give to you a heart, offered to me for my benevolence,” Kama said, laying hers right beside.

Calu offered his, and as he laid it on the ground, the journal of secrets disappeared in a mist. A shiver racked Anula, and the mehendhi on her arms swirled, tightening. A noose of her own skin, cinching tight, cutting flesh and drawing blood. Her offering of a soul being called upon.

For once, Reeri did not feel it, too. For once, it was only her pain, her anguish, her—

Reeri’s heart tripped.

A light bloomed in her chest, growing brighter. Joy and peace and happiness shifted out and breezed across Reeri’s face, taunting him to reach out and grasp them, to take control, to pull and cleave.

His will extended forward—Kama’s, Sohon’s, and Calu’s, too.

They touched Anula’s soul, and heavensong rippled through their own.

But Reeri did not rejoice, did not smile as the others did, because he saw it.

Beneath the light they held grew a darkness, twining around Anula’s chest, curving claws around her heart. It paled her and turned her sallow.

No, this was not right. Even partially cleaving her soul was taking too much. He could not bear to witness the passion dim from her eyes or the jests be ripped from her lips. It was too high a cost.

Anula, alive but silent.

Anula, a husk with a crown.

“No!” Reeri shouted, ripping his hand from Kama’s and shooting forward.

Tearing the relic from Anula’s hand, he threw it out of the circle, watched it clatter to the floor, and then fell to his knees before her.

“I am sorry.” His voice broke. “I am sorry.”

“What are you doing?” Calu asked. Sohon and Kama exchanged a look.

“Please, I cannot do this. I cannot mar another soul. Not hers. I beg you, not her.”

Calu blanched. “But she offered her soul.”

“And I have fallen in love with it.”

A sharp breath echoed.

“Take mine, sacrifice mine. Mayhap it will be enough.” Reeri bowed his head. “It is all I can offer. My life should have been the only one forfeit from the start. It should be mine now, to bring our brethren back.”

“Reeri.”

It was her voice, thick and broken on the end. Yet he dared not turn. Dared not look into those fierce eyes and face what he had been about to do, the selfishness that had nearly taken her from him. He could not bear it.

“Take my soul,” he repeated. “It is the least of what I deserve.”

Silence stretched.

Then came a sneer. “You imbecile.”

Reeri blinked up.

Calu bent at the knee, leveling a furious gaze. “Do you not see? We have never blamed you.”

“But—”

“No. Listen to me for once in two hundred years,” he snapped.

“Mighty Heavens, how do you not see? I lost my brethren that day, but I lost my closest friend, too. You shut me out, Reeri. You shut us all out. Were there unintended consequences to what we did? Yes. Were they deserved? No. Were any of us to blame? No. We have missed you, as wholly as we miss Ratti and the others. I miss you, Reeri. I love you, brother. Come back to us. Come back to me. Come back.”

The words clawed at Reeri’s chest, trying to catch and sink in. With wet lashes, Reeri looked at his family. Tears streaked Kama’s cheeks, and a sniffle ripped from Sohon’s nose.

They missed him.

They loved him.

They had never not.

Regardless of what had happened, of what he had done, he was loved. And he had always deserved it. His heart split open, and he vaulted into Calu’s arms.

“I love you.” His voice broke. He squeezed tight, tighter than even Ratti had ever done. A promise to never let go, to never forget again. “I love you.”

Two pairs of arms fell on them. Hot tears dropped on his cheeks. Reeri had found his way home. It had always been there, in plain sight. He had only needed to listen and see.

“Reeri.” Anula’s whisper tingled down his back.

This time, he turned. Her eyes sparkled with unshed tears and an unspoken question—but he was already pressing her close, one hand tucking the hair behind her ear, the other caressing her cheek.

He pushed his thoughts into her mind, where he was not mere shadow, but had a body and a life, and she was just as she was now, a beautiful soul, stubborn and burning bright.

The one who lit up his shadow, who gave life to his existence.

The one he had dreamed of finding: the one who communed with his soul.

Anula sucked in a breath. Her hand rested on his cheek. “Reeri—”

Boom.

Reeri tensed.

Boom.

“What is that?”

Boom.

“Drums,” Bithul said, unsheathing his cane. “Tovil drums.”