Page 61 of Her Soul for a Crown

Beads of sweat burst down Anula’s face as she fell against the rope binding her to the pyre. The tether quavered, shaking her worse than any fear of burning alive ever could. “Something’s wrong.”

“You feel Reeri,” Kama inferred.

“He’s in trouble.” Anula grunted. Nausea rose and crashed on a wave of blinding pain, and suddenly the pyre disappeared.

A cave flashed into view, with a pit full of red stones glistening menacingly and Reeri heaving as his shadow stretched and his markings flared.

She blinked and it was gone. “Hashini. The Kattadiya have him!”

“Your connection has grown strong,” Kama sang. “Can you speak to him? Soothe him?”

“What for?” Sohon hissed, craning his neck as the soldiers lit more torches. “Soon Anula will die, and we will all be back in the aether.”

“No.” Anula swallowed back bile. “They have a new tovil. It will tear a Yakka’s soul apart. It will end your being.”

“Mighty Heavens,” Calu cursed. “They finally figured it out.”

Anula couldn’t let them perform it. Not now, not ever. The Yakkas were hers, their tether part of her; their dedication for Anuradhapura and all its people, hers; their love—

“So the Yakkas will be returned to the Heavens upon your death,” Bithul clarified, “and the Blood Yakka will be no more?”

“Not if we save him.” Anula surged against the rope. Its rough fibers pricked and scraped her arms, all the way down to her wrists. Her sweat-slicked fingers slipped off its edge. The Polonnaruwans knew how to keep their captives in place.

“Valiant effort, but I do not think that will work,” Calu murmured.

“It’s all I can do!” she snapped. “I’m not a Yakka!”

Calu flinched, but still he did nothing.

She turned on Sohon.

“What?” he growled. “Do you want me to eat our way out?”

“It would be memorable,” Kama said. Sohon stuck out his tongue.

But before Anula could yell at them again, point out that the soldiers with flaming torches were bending now to strike the pyre, that they were minutes away from death, Kama frowned falsely, a twinkle in her eye.

“Who can think of love when they are consumed with death? Only a man burning for another, facing the darkness with the light of his own passionate flame. There is no line between beauty and pain.” She smiled, sharp and bright. “I shall prove it to all.”

Kama leaned close to the human on her left and cooed. “Pray to the Yakkas of Love.”

The man, tearstained and shaking, scowled. “What? They can’t help me now.”

“Do it, and if they do not come to your rescue, I will kiss you as the flames engulf us. We shall end in our own ecstasy.”

The wrinkle between his brows smoothed, his eyes lost in Kama’s, lost in the hope she gave and in the idea of feeling anything but the fire. “Great Yakkas of Love, hear my prayer, grant me strength against the Polonnaruwans to live. I offer my seed and love.”

The soldiers tapped their torches to the ground, and flame roared up. Courtiers screamed, an echo of Amma ringing in Anula’s ears, calling to that never-ending ache in her chest.

“What are you waiting for?” Anula shouted.

A spark caught on Kama’s sari, devouring the beaded trim and eliciting her laughter. “Your prayer has been heard. I accept. Now free me!”

She blew the man a kiss, the air between them sparkling like the stars, until it landed on his lips.

His eyes widened, darkened, deepened. And as the heat crept close, the man’s muscles bulged like a usurper’s and he ripped the rope clean in two.

He reached across the thickening smoke and pulled the nearest soldier down into the flame, smothering them with their iron chest plate.

The soldier wailed as he boiled inside his own armor.

The man’s strength was unmatched, unchecked, and unbelievable. Anula blinked as the smoke and fear cleared, watching as Kama’s devotee jumped from the pyre, grabbing soldier after soldier, smothering flame, leaving a path clear for the people to escape. And one by one, they did, whispering thanks.

Soldiers advanced to restrain him, yet as each hand clutched, the man grew.

Another muscle, another inch taller, until he lorded over the soldiers, barreling through them like a child in a rice paddy field.

He tore blades from their grips and turned them on their owners, drowning the remaining flame in blood.

Faith starts where strength ends, Anula. No one is above that law of the world. Not even you.

Anula hadn’t known or dared to believe, but this…

faith was more than she ever thought or imagined.

She grasped that truth and the power behind it, and dove off the pyre, the Yakkas in tow.

Kama kissed the man’s cheek, and as they fled toward the Pleasure Gardens, he protected their backs, felling every soldier, strong enough to withstand the Polonnaruwans, just as he bargained.

“A world burning with love is good,” Kama announced proudly.

Anula couldn’t argue. She fisted her sari, picking it up to race the night.

One hour was perhaps all they had now, all Reeri had, and from their placement in the inner city, it would take that long just to get to the Kattadiya pit.

The image of him inside seized her chest. Not because of the tether, but because of the place he found in her heart.

But before they could reach the edge of the gardens, another cry rang out, followed by another, and another.

This time not of soldiers, but women, children, husbands.

The sound of their suffering became one, and Amma’s cry echoed in their voice.

Anula skidded to a halt and glanced back to see people still being caught, bound, killed.

Their army was either dead or spread too thin across the courtyard, no one coming to their aid.

Just as no one had come to Amma’s, and no one to hers.

“Raejina Consort?” Bithul whispered. “We must move.”

Digging nails into her palms, she bared her teeth up at the throne room’s terrace, at another usurper standing watch as the people of Anuradhapura died.

“Mayhap I should do it again,” Kama trilled in her ear. “Set a man on fire for love, take out those guards around him. You could claim your throne, without Reeri. Do you not long for it?”

“You cannot!” Calu hissed. “Look at the moon. Wessamony will descend soon.”

Anula’s nails broke flesh. Calu was right, Reeri needed her, now . But, cursed blessings , so did her people.

Every word, every promise, every direction Auntie Nirma had ever given scraped along Anula’s arms. A mere four weeks ago, she would’ve taken the chance.

She would have bitten back any fear, any doubt, would have gripped her necklace and charged.

She would have placed the crown on her own head and sat on her new throne. But now…

The terror of her people pitched high, and Anula turned her back on the terrace. A spark flew from the courtyard to Anula, caught on the embers already glowing for Reeri, and flamed. “I won’t leave them.”

“O mighty Heavens,” Calu spat. “We cannot save them and Reeri before Wessamony descends to kill us all.”

“Yes, we can,” she asserted. “If we think quickly.”

Calu made a face at her, and an idea struck.

She grabbed his arm. “It’s you. You have to use your power and unwind the soldiers’ minds.”

Calu shook her off. “Absolutely not. I will not break the taboo.”

“If you do, we’ll have a clear path to get everyone to safety and rescue Reeri before it’s too late. I can’t leave them here to die by a usurper’s hand. Help me save them.”

“No,” he hissed. “Wessamony will punish me.”

“He won’t,” she promised, sliding the Bone Blade from her sari. Its song sank into her bones, her heart, her soul. The rightness of her vow resonated deep. “I will protect you. No one will die by his hand again.”

Saffron flickered in Calu’s eyes, as if the song now sank into his shadow and lifted the fear from his soul. He glanced at the one remaining pyre and those fleeing for their lives. He sighed. “All right.”

Anula squeezed his hand tight. “Thank you.”

He rolled his shoulders and cracked his neck. “I can only unwind those whom I can see.”

“That’s all we need.” Anula counted at least fifty men. Could he manage that many at once? Anula knocked the thought away, choosing to have faith in him instead.

“Be not afraid of your own power,” Kama whispered.

Sohon added, “Ratti would be proud.”

Calu’s shoulders fell. The tension, too. With relief, he closed his eyes and deepened his breath. In and out, slow and steady. A breeze chilled the air, the soldiers took note and stilled, and for a moment, a hush fell over the courtyard.

Then the Polonnaruwan soldiers’ eyes clouded over. Lips curled back, they turned on one another, feral as jungle cats. Sword met sword, spear met chest, teeth met flesh, and the courtiers were completely forgotten.

“Now!” Anula sprinted, the Yakkas and Bithul on her heels.

Soldiers fell around them. They swarmed out of houses and buildings and the concubine estate, only to be cut down by their own men.

Anula plucked a bloodied sword from dead hands as she reached the final pyre, arced it back, and swung hard, cutting the rope.

The Yakkas snuffed out the flames, creating a safe escape.

“Bless you,” a woman cried, gripping Anula’s hand as she helped her off the wood. “Bless you, my raejina consort.”

“Where do we go?” a man asked. “Everything is destroyed.”

“More soldiers will come!” Another panicked.

Bithul gathered what remained of his loyal guards, checking each of the ten to ensure they weren’t fatally harmed. The last man, the one he’d trained with, was bloodied and beaten, but held out Bithul’s cane, as if he’d fought solely for it. “Sir. What do we do?”

Taking it, Bithul clutched Shahan’s hand. Then he lifted his gaze, and his men’s eyes followed. “Anula?”

Thirty people faced her. Sweat-soaked and dirty, with none of her usual armor in place, Anula was exposed. No longer the raejina Auntie Nirma had cultivated, they saw her, the person she chose to be, with no crown and no title. What if they didn’t want her?

She took a steadying breath. She was no usurper; they should have a choice. Stepping into the Pleasure Gardens, she said, “We save one more and find shelter, together.”

Without waiting to see the choice everyone made, Anula walked into the Pleasure Gardens.

The Yakkas flanked her, as the night darkened the grounds and the smoke from the pyres choked what little light the stars gave off.

Her heart pounded. It was one thing to choose to follow a woman, a concubine, a wife; it was an entirely different thing to follow her into a dark unknown.

They would have to trust her, believe in her, have faith in her.

It wasn’t until the turn for the cave entrance that she dared glance over her shoulder.

Bithul and his guards, and thirty courtiers, were close behind.

She picked up her pace, gratefulness swelling, and without thinking, she whispered a prayer. One of thanks as much as hope.

She turned a corner—and slammed into a tree. “Ouch!”

“Anula?” a voice squeaked, and instead of the face of a tree, she saw Premala. The girl wrapped her in a tight hug. “Thank the Heavens.”

“Premala, what are you doing?”

“Stay away from her!” Sohon stepped forward, wrenching them apart.

“W—wait!” Premala said. “The Yak—Reeri sent me.”

“What? Where is he?” Anula demanded.

Premala wrung her hands. “In trouble. Do you have the relic?”

“Do you honestly believe I’d tell you if I did? Do I look like a—”

“Oh, shut your mouth for once!” Premala’s voice rose above the smoke. It did not shake. “If you want to save Reeri, and the Heavens and Earth, and everyone else, bring the relic and come with me.”

Anula snorted. “Are you telling me what to do, after nearly getting me killed?”

“Yes.”

There was something different about her. The desperation was gone, as though she’d freed herself. Anula took note and raised a brow. “Where do we go?”

Premala glanced at the people behind her. “The tunnels. They’ll be safest there while we fight.” She spun on her heel. But before Anula could follow, she bent over in pain. A cry split her lips.

And Kama’s.

And Sohon’s.

And Calu’s.

A piece of red mehendhi tore off each of their arms and shimmered into dust.