It was a hollow threat, but Manil Datar didn’t know it—and what I had done before scared him enough that he left me alone.
Even so, I was in trouble. Every little thing was a tremendous effort, even sitting upright in the saddle. My vision was blurred, and I had to struggle to focus. By the time we made camp that evening alongside a river, I felt as weak as a newborn kitten. My throat was raw and swollen, and it was excruciating to swallow. I couldn’t even think about water, let alone food. I managed to get Lady unsaddled and unload Flick’s packs, and then I sat helpless before the jumbled mess of my tent, unable to summon the energy to erect it.
Sanjiv came trudging over with his buckets of water. “Why do you not put up your tent, Lady Dakini?”
I closed my eyes briefly. “Tired.”
He set down the buckets and squatted before me. “Tired or sick?” As gently as he tended his yaks, he touched my brow and frowned. “Sick, I think.”
My pack-horse Flick wandered over to confer, thrusting his head between us. I reached up wearily to scratch the hinge of his jaw, and he snorted into my hair.
It decided the matter for Sanjiv. “I will put up your tent,” he said in a firm voice. “I will take care of you, Lady Dakini. You are good to animals and they like you, so I do not think you should suffer.”
I gazed at his disfigured face with profound gratitude. “Thank you, Sanjiv.”
A good deal of what transpired in the days that followed is vague in my memory, a series of impressions merging into one another, all drenched in a feverish haze. Having appointed himself my guardian, Sanjiv took his role with the utmost seriousness. He struck my tent in the mornings, saddled and packed my horses, helped hoist my aching body into the saddle. In the evenings, he unsaddled and unpacked them, tended and watered them. He set up my tent and spread my blankets. All of this he managed, and his other duties, too.
He brought me food—and for a period of days when I could not bear to swallow at all, snow. I held lumps of it in my mouth, letting it melt and trickle down my throat, soothing the incessant pain.
No one spoke against his actions, not even Manil Datar. Between his skill with animals and his uncanny ability to hear an avalanche before it broke, my scarred friend Sanjiv was a lucky talisman, and the other porters regarded him with superstitious awe.
My fever waxed and waned.
On the bad days, my vision was doubled and I could barely cling to the saddle, sweating in the cold air, shivering violently as my sweat turned to ice on my skin. There were a few days when I thought I might die, and the thought didn’t trouble me if it meant I could rest at last.
On the good days, when I felt more lucid and was able to string two thoughts together, I wondered if mayhap I was wrong after all, and Bao was suffering from a lingering illness. To be sure, mine was doggedly persistent. But when I consulted my diadh-anam, it was bright and unwavering within me, undeterred by my body’s profound misery.
Bao’s…..
Bao’s was unchanged, but I was growing closer to it. Closer and closer, his always calling to mine.
It kept me going, day after day.
On the cusp of this tantalizing nearness, the first deadly storm of early winter struck us. Manil Datar was minded to push on throughout the day in an effort to outpace it, but for a mercy, he listened to Sanjiv, and we broke early to make camp in a gorge where an outcropping of rock provided a natural windbreak.
The storm raged for over a full twenty-four hours, winds howling with unrelenting force, the heavens dropping an unholy amount of snow on us. I spent the time huddled in my tent, dozing fitfully. For once, I wasn’t fearful of Manil Datar—even he wouldn’t attempt to assault me in this tempest—but I was afraid my tent would collapse and suffocate me. And I daresay there was a good chance it would have if Sanjiv hadn’t twice waded through the gathering drifts to dig me out, bringing a waterskin filled with hot, buttery tea. How and where he had managed a fire in that gale, I couldn’t imagine.
The second time, even with my feverish eyes, I could see he looked weary enough to collapse himself, and he was shivering with effort and cold.
“Stay,” I croaked. “Don’t go back. Unless you are afraid to take sick?”
“No.” Sanjiv shook his head and accepted my offer, crawling into my tent and sealing the flap behind him. “I am born here. I will not get the mountain-sickness.”
I shared my blankets and my sheepskin with him. Almost instantly, he fell into a deep, exhausted sleep, his back turned to me. I curled against his back, and for the first time in more days than I could count, I slept soundly.
Somewhere in the small hours of the morning, the storm blew itself out. I awoke to stillness.
Sanjiv was asleep. I gazed at him in the faint, dull light that filtered through the tent’s worn seams. Above the raking scars that disfigured his features, dragging them sideways, his long lashes broke like waves below his smooth lids, as lovely and innocent as a boy’s. I wondered at a world that produced such a simple, kindhearted soul alongside a Manil Datar, a sweet boy like my Aleksei alongside a Pyotr Rostov.
And yet when Sanjiv awoke, he flinched away from me.
I smiled wryly. “It is well. Do not fear.”
“Thank you, Lady Dakini!” he said breathlessly, scrambling to leave my tent and return to his duties.
Outside, the world was transformed, buried beneath a thick blanket of white snow. Overhead, the sky was a remorseless blue, and the sun shone blindingly bright on the white snow, forcing us to squint and shield our eyes.
Despite it all, I felt a little bit better. A full day’s rest and a sound night’s sleep had done me a world of good. Once the porters floundered through the snow, took stock of the damage, restored our camp to order, and kindled a proper cook fire, I managed to eat a full bowl of rice and lentils, managed to swallow without wincing.
Leaving the gorge was a long, hard slog. The porters and the yaks went first to break a trail, wading through chest-high snow. The rest of us followed in their wake, our mounts struggling in the churned snow.
Bao’s diadh-anam called to mine.
Close.
So close.
Closer and closer with every step Lady took as she labored her way up the path out of the gorge, close enough that it was like a drumbeat inside me. But I had to be careful; I had to concentrate. I felt better, yes, but I was not well. If I moved my head too quickly, a wave of dizziness came over me.
I breathed the Five Styles, concentrating.
Once we passed the treeline, the path was clearer, windswept. Upward and upward we clambered, scaling the long ascent. I concentrated on Lady’s bobbing head, on her pricked-forward ears. When we gained the summit on the second day after the storm, a new vista unfurled before us—and my diadh-anam gave a clarion call I could not ignore.
I drew rein, staring.
The Path of Heaven’s Spear had led us along the shoulder of a low mountain peak. Now it would lead us downward, down a long, long descent. In the distance, I could see forests, and more greenery beyond them, a promise of a warmer, gentler clime.
But opposite us, a higher peak towered.
To be sure, I had seen higher; snow-capped peaks wreathed in mist. But those had been the Abode of the Gods, and no one human had dared set foot there, let alone dwell there. This, this was different.
I forced my gaze to focus. Hidden in the high peaks and crags was a man-made structure, towers and crenellations challenging the sky. Humans dwelled there. The steep slope that led to the eyrie was a complex labyrinth of fissures and moraines, unnavigable to the eye at a distance, and doubtless even more confusing at close range. I remembered picking our way through the Stone Forest in Ch’in, and how we would have been hopelessly lost without the dragon’s guidance. This looked much, much worse—and infinitely more dangerous.
Nonetheless, my diadh-anam blazed in exultation.
“Bao!” I whispered.
“So it’s true,” a neutral voice remarked. Manil Datar had come alongside me without my realizing it. When I reached for the twilight in unthinking panic, he raised one hand in a peaceable gesture. “Do not curse me. I mean no harm. You are god-touched. I did not know, or I would not have taken you as a passenger.”
I was confused. “Why?”
He shrugged. “It is bad business when gods fight.” He jerked his chin at the distant peak. “Kurugiri, eh?”
I echoed the word. “Kurugiri.”
Manil Datar glanced at me sidelong. “You mean to pit your magic against hers, Lady Dakini?” He made the term a subtle insult. “Against the Spider Queen Jagrati?”
I shrugged, too. “Maybe.”
His mouth hardened. “Bad luck for you. You have some tricks, yes. She has powerful magic.”
“What do you know of her?” I asked him. I didn’t want to be beholden to the man, but all knowledge was worth having.
Datar gestured. “She comes from the south, far south. She has stolen a great treasure there, and come to the one place where no one dares take it from her. With this treasure, she has bewitched the Falconer into marrying her even though it is forbidden, bewitched the men who serve him.”
“What is this treasure?”
He lowered his voice. “It is the kaalahiira that Lord Shiva made from the ashes of Kamadeva.”
“What is kaalahiira and kamadeva?” I knew Lord Shiva was one of the many gods of Bhodistan, but I didn’t know the other words.
Manil Datar gave me a disgusted look. “You do not know the story? How can your gods send someone so ignorant?”
I touched his sleeve. “Please?”
He snorted, but he relented. “Kamadeva is the god of desire. When he disturbed Lord Shiva at his meditation, Lord Shiva burned him to ashes with his third eye. When Lord Shiva heard the grieving of Kamadeva’s widow, Rati, and learned that Kamadeva was trying to awaken him to fight against a demon, he squeezed the ashes, so.” He made a fist. “To make a hiiraka, the gem-stone that shines like ice. Only it was black because of the ashes, so it is called a kaalahiira.”
“A diamond,” I murmured to myself. “A black diamond.”
“It makes desire come, very strong desire.” Datar pointed toward the peak of Kurugiri. “So. The Falconer rules his nest, but the Spider Queen rules him.” He shook his head. “You are beautiful, yes, but no match for the kaalahiira of Kamadeva.”
To be sure, I didn’t feel like it in my current state. “How did Jagrati steal it?”
Manil Datar turned his head and spat. “She was nobody, a no-caste nothing, a collector of night-soil. One night, she profaned the temple where the kaalahiira was kept and took it. I do not know how.”
Shivering beneath the bright sun, I stared at the stronghold. It was a harsh place, and I couldn’t imagine much grew there. “How do they live up there?”
He shrugged. “I do not know. The Falconer demands tribute for the services of his assassins.” He pointed again. “You cannot see it from so far, but there is a great pot that hangs on a chain from that plateau. People who wish to hire his falcons to kill someone put messages and tributes in it. So.” He gave me a mirthless smile. “Do you wish to go to Kurugiri? I will show you the way. You can send the Falconer a message or try your luck in his maze.”
“No.” I shivered again. If I were a great heroine from the days of yore like Phèdre nó Delaunay, that was likely exactly what I would do; but I was too scared and miserable to attempt it on my own. “I will go to Bhaktipur to ask the Rani for help.”
Datar raised his brows. “In eleven years, she has not found a way to defeat the Falconer and the Spider Queen. I do not see why one sickly dakini will change anything.”
A coughing fit took me, loose phlegm rattling in my chest. I doubled over in the saddle, swallowing hard against the pain in my throat when the fit ended. “Well,” I said in a hoarse voice. “We will see.”
“Why?” There was a rare note of genuine curiosity in Manil Datar’s voice. “Why do you care?”
I touched my aching chest, where my diadh-anam called futilely to Bao’s—so near, and yet so far. “Someone I love is there.”
“Bad luck for him,” Datar said wryly. “Or maybe not. Maybe he is happy there.”
I shook my head, setting off another wave of dizziness, steadied myself against the pommel, and sneezed. “No. He’s not.”
Manil Datar nudged his mount, moving away from me. “Bad luck for both of you,” he said over his shoulder. “Come, we are losing time.”
Rounding the shoulder of the mountain, we began the long, perilous process of making our descent. By the end of the day, we were back below the treeline and the peak of Kurugiri was behind us. In our camp, I gazed at its silhouette surrounded by a nimbus of gold and crimson, the heights catching the light of the setting sun long after shadows had settled on the long, low slope we travelled.
“I will find a way, Bao,” I murmured. “I promise.”
FIFTY-SIX
Sanjiv had called my ailment the mountain-sickness, and I’d hoped that as we left the mountains, I’d leave my sickness behind.
Not so.
It had sunk its claws too deep into me to let go that easily. Downward and downward we proceeded, travelling on a steep decline toward the valley that held the tiny kingdom of Bhaktipur. My eardrums strained and popped. Over and over, I swallowed against the pressure, even though it still hurt to swallow.
The pockets of snow dwindled.
The air grew thick and moist, and it seemed my head thickened with it. I could no longer breathe the Five Styles, forced to breathe through my mouth only.
If not for my illness and the persistent yearning of my diadh-anam, I would have been glad. We were venturing into inhabited territory, and after the rigors of the mountains, I was pleased to see stone houses with thatched roofs, fields of reddish soil planted with sorghum and millet, farmers working in the fields. For once in my life, I’d had a surfeit of wilderness.