Page 146 of Her Soul for a Crown
Saffron eyes caught her. Held her.
And disappeared into the cosmos.
“Wait!” Anula raced after, only for Fate to lock her in their arms. She struggled against them. “Let me go.”
“You cannot follow.”
“Watch me.” She lunged out of their grasp, reaching for the swirling seam. Her hand disappeared into the darkness, scraping her skin.
Fate yanked her back. Anula’s hand pulsed back into existence, throbbing as if she’d stuck it in fire. “If you follow, you shall not return. Blade or no.”
Anula stilled. The knowing settled deep, and an emptiness echoed, where once there had been a tether. Cold air prickled her arms, where once there had been a marking. “Will they return?”
“All shall be revealed when time remains. Have you finished, or are there more to save?”
Anula glared. Had she saved the Yakkas or not? “I’m not saving Wessamony.”
“I never said that you must.”
“Then who?” Anula glanced at the Bone Blade, at the seam, at Fate. Hope sparked. “How far back can I go?”
***
Two Kattadiya had died, torn apart by each other’s nails while under Wessamony’s curse. Anula cut the Hand of Death for each of them.
Once the silent, unmoving battle between cursed and uncursed was finished, and every life brought back, Anula’s gaze landed on Hashini, half dead. She didn’t stop.
Instead, she made her way to the first pit, now the only pit, as the room had pieced itself back together. A slight young woman lifted out, her head stitching back together, beautiful tresses framing a delicate face. The specter of Death appeared, Hand outstretched. Anula lifted the Bone Blade and attacked. Premala’s eyes flickered to life, and Anula pulled her into a tight embrace.
It was complete. The entire cave was restored.
Only the Yakkas were missing.
Sandani took her place, holding Premala as Anula flipped the blade over in her hand, the song’s chorus unbroken. What she could do for the kingdom with this relic. Who she could save…
“Will it work only in here?”
Fate smiled, sad and knowing. “You cannot go back that far.”
Anula ignored the pity. “I can’t or the relic can’t?”
“There is much the cosmos may do and much it may hold. We know not its limits.” Fate turned to the seam’s swirling mixture.
Anula bristled at another nonanswer but peered within, too. The colors circled faster, deepened and darkened, lightened and spread. The lines of a face emerged. Then a second. And a third.
Anula’s breath caught.
Thaththa, Amma, and Auntie Nirma gazed back, backlit and sparkling with stardust.
“A gift,” Fate said, “from the cosmos.”
Anula’s vision blurred. “Can I pull them out?”
“No.” Fate gently took Anula’s hands and placed them an inch from the seam’s edge. “Though they be gone, their touch reaches far.”
Her family stretched their hands across the dark expanse, broke through the lip of the seam, and wrapped around hers. It was like a kiss, spreading warmth from the soles of her feet to the tip of her head, and suddenly, she felt it. Good-night kisses and cold-morning cuddles, races along paddy fields, laughter at sunset and dancing under stars, bedtime stories and dreaming out loud…Homecracked her open.
Tears caught on her lashes. They streamed down her family’s faces.
