Page 58 of Her Soul for a Crown
A deep yearning bloomed. He reached for another offering, another piece of communication, another ghost of the past. Yet Reeri tamped it down, wrenched his hand away.
The fault lies entirely with you.
Reeri had stolen that life from the Yakkas. It was only right that they lived it again before him.
“I believe Ratti would have liked Anula,” Calu said, standing after ordering his own elevated offerings.
Reeri darkened at the turn of conversation. Calu knew as well as the others that he did not like speaking of their brethren and what he had sentenced them to. Yet he also knew that, oftentimes, Calu could not help it. His pain leaked like a damaged irrigation tank. The least Reeri could do was listen. “Why do you say that?”
Ratti was the oldest sister of the Yakkas of Love, the Yakka of Passion. She cared for all in a loving manner, like a mother hen to her chicks. She raised no walls and poisoned no creature. She was pure love. A far cry from what he had seen of Anula.
Calu gazed at a mural of the Second Heavens. “Ratti loved everyone. The real person. She always helped those who sought love find it after first loving themselves. She taught people not to hide their true selves. Anula is solely herself, not even willing to hide. She is as Ratti told me to be, fearless.”
Reeri’s shoulders fell. “Fearless of what?”
“Of them.” He nodded to the door. “You were too busy with your schemes and your communion to notice, but she did. The humans did not connect with me like they did you. I was not invited to birth celebrations or gatherings of any kind. I did not have a gaggle of women fawning over me, bargaining with the Ladies of Lust.”
Reeri flushed. “They did not—”
“They held back with me,” Calu asserted. “Who could blame them? I could make them think whatever I wanted. So they constantly second-guessed whether they truly liked me, truly trusted me, or if it was an illusion bestowed upon them.”
“They still prayed.”
“Oh yes, they prayed. For protection or revenge. But they never communed with me. I tried to be affable, caring, like Ratti, but that made them suspicious. So I tried being cavalier, like you.”
“I was not cavalier.”
“Of course not.” Calu rolled his eyes. “Eventually I gave up. Ratti saw it immediately and disapproved. She told me that you had not worked so hard for me to wallow in a mud puddle. She told me that if I were my true self, that energy would flow through the cosmos to resonate with the right people, and that I must try because without connection, I was not truly living.”
A beat of silence passed, the wind whistling through the window. Had Reeri been so blind? Cavalier, Calu had called him. Was he still?
“I will not be afraid next time.” Calu stroked a finger along Ratti’s depiction in the painting. “I will make Ratti proud.”
Reeri closed his eyes. He did not need to hear Wessamony’s condemning words. He knew this was his fault. But he would fix it. He would give Calu a second chance. He would ensure their eldest sister was there to see. Their lives were within his grasp, and he would not falter this time.
Anula would not make him.
23
A flaying tended to stick in one’s memory.
Two crawled over Anula’s skin like ants on a hill. Each step away from the Blood Yakka felt as dangerous as throwing knives. But the tether stayed calm, even as Anula and her guard moved farther from the palace gate. Her suspicion had proved correct; the sullen boy at her side was just as good an anchor.
She glanced down at him, a foot shorter and frowning at the bustling market ahead. Sohon hadn’t volunteered to escort her. Kama had merely flitted off, chasing a couple down the corridor, an auntie bent on matchmaking, the only difference being that she encouraged their wish for a dark, quiet corner. And the Blood Yakka could go nowhere without Calu, as though they shared an even more demanding tether, which meant she won the company of the one Yakka who sighed more than he breathed.
Silent and stoic, Sohon marched alongside her, scowl deepening as the sounds of haggling drew near. The outer-city market was larger than the one in the inner city, a place where vendors with less valuable items had a better chance of making their living,where no one questioned quality or authenticity. It would only get louder the farther they ventured. She tilted her head, eyeing the mehendhi marking peeking from under his tunic. Swirls ran along his collarbone, bold lines wrapped around chubby arms. She wondered if there was an animal hidden beneath, like the Blood Yakka’s elephant and her lion; wondered what Kama and Calu’s markings held and whether the tether felt like reins to them as well, restraining and controlling.
“Commission a portrait, it will last longer,” Sohon grouched.
Anula snorted. “In your dreams, Yakka. Speaking of which, why haven’t I seen your nightmares?”
“What?”
“I’ve seen the Blood Yakka’s and he’s seen mine. Why haven’t I seen yours or the others’?”
He huffed. “Ask Reeri.”
“He doesn’t seem to know much.” She raised a brow, glancing at the space between them, at the tether decidedly not trying to kill either of them.
