Hasan Dar shook himself, dropping to one knee before the Rani and lowering his head. “My lady, forgive me,” he said in a hoarse voice. “I failed you.”
Amrita laid one hand on his head. “Not yet, my friend. Go after them, I beg you, and see this finished. Your men will look after me. And…..” She glanced at me. “Try not to kill the young man from Ch’in, please.”
He nodded and sprang to his feet, striding toward his mount.
I shivered. “Thank you, my lady.”
She caught my hand and squeezed it, her dark, lustrous gaze searching my face. “Are you all right, Moirin?”
“No,” I said honestly. “Not even close.”
SIXTY-THREE
We passed the night in the hidden encampment in the spruce copse.
I was a wreck.
It had all gone wrong, so very wrong. It had been a good plan, but it was a plan largely conceived by a ten-year-old boy who had not taken into account the possibility that Kamadeva’s diamond would be set in play, rendering ten grown men and one highly susceptible daughter of Naamah’s line vulnerable to desire.
Desire that would not go away.
Ah, gods! It was all entangled and complicated, my diadh-anam and Naamah’s gifts warring against one another, my heart’s yearning for Bao and the unholy wanting that Kamadeva’s diamond had loosed in me doing battle. It gripped me like a fever.
Jagrati.
Her face swam before me in my dreams, gaunt, high-boned, and compelling. Although I did not trust her for an instant, some of the things she had said rang true to me. It was a cruel, unfair world that had given shape to her hatred.
Bao.
My heart ached.
I had come close, so very close, to reaching him. Now, again and again, I reached for him, reached for his diadh-anam, willing that faint flicker of uncertainty to kindle into a blaze, wherein he knew me once more. But although I sensed he was alive, I couldn’t feel him clearly anymore. When I tried, Jagrati’s face arose in my thoughts, mocking me. I would have said “yes” to her without a second thought, without a thought in my mind at all. She had taken what I believed was my strength, and turned it against me. I’d thought I could pit my diadh-anam and Naamah’s gifts against the lure of Kamadeva’s diamond and win.
I’d thought to do battle for Bao.
Instead, I was at war with myself.
“Hush, young goddess.” Amrita stroked my hair, my head pillowed on her lap. “It is not your fault.”
“I should have known,” I murmured.
“How could you?” she asked quietly. “None of us expected it.”
I sighed. “No, but at least you were not vulnerable to it. And it is probably best if you do not touch me so, my lady.”
Her hands went still. “It troubles you still?”
The incessant pulse of desire beat in my veins, timed to the flickering glow trapped in Kamadeva’s diamond. “Yes.”
Amrita shifted gently away from me. “Very well.”
In the morning, Hasan Dar and our company of archers returned, grim-faced and defeated. Once again, he knelt before the Rani and bowed his head in abject apology. “I’m sorry, highness, but I have failed you in truth. We killed several of their men, but Tarik Khaga and his cursed Queen escaped.”
“Ah, no! How?” Amrita looked dismayed.
“They had weapons and armor cached along the path. One of their men held a narrow pass long enough for them to cause a rockslide above it,” he said dully. “It must have been rigged to fall beforehand. We worked through the night to clear it, but by the time we succeeded, they were long gone.” He glanced at me. “Your young man was with them. I do not think he was injured.”
I nodded, grateful for the confirmation. I wasn’t sure I could trust my desire-snarled diadh-anam at the moment.
“Well, then.” The Rani Amrita’s slender shoulders slumped. I wished I dared to comfort her, but I was barely managing to contain the maelstrom of desire raging inside me. “What do we do now?”
“We go home,” Hasan Dar said in a grim voice. “And brace ourselves for assassins.”
“I’m sorry,” I whispered. “I’m so very sorry.”
“It was not your fault.” He turned his weary gaze toward me. “All of us thought the attempt worth making, and all but one of us failed in the face of Kamadeva’s diamond. If her highness had not been with us, you and I would be on our way to Kurugiri, Lady Moirin.” He shivered. “Willingly.”
“It’s a good thing I didn’t let you talk me out of coming, then, isn’t it?” Amrita observed with a faint spark of her usual good humor.
With an effort, I summoned a smile for her. “You were heroic, my lady. Truly.”
She shook her head. “I was fortunate. Kamadeva’s diamond cannot compel false desire.”
It was a somber procession that made the journey back to the meadow where we had made camp the first night. We had lost five men in the effort, hewn down by the Falconer’s assassins. I was afraid to ask if Bao had killed any of them, but in the end, I had to know.
“No, I don’t think so,” Hasan Dar said in a tired tone. “He was guarding that cursed Jagrati with some sort of fighting-staff. It must have been hidden in their caches.” He rubbed at his face. “He’s good, that one. I’ve never seen a man quick enough to bat arrows out of thin air.”
“Aye, that would be Bao,” I murmured.
Our somber procession met a somber welcome in the base camp, news of our failure spreading quickly. Hasan Dar posted every man he could spare around the perimeter, wary of assassins. Everyone not on guard slept fitfully that night, though perhaps none more so than I did.
The desire hadn’t faded.
It didn’t seem to have taken anyone else the same way, and I did not know whether it was because Jagrati had targeted me specifically, touched me and kissed me, staking a claim on me; or if it was because of Naamah’s gift, sparked into unrelenting flame by the shifting fires of Kamadeva’s diamond. I only knew that it racked me mercilessly, filling me with wanting, until I literally shook with it.
“Moirin…..” Amrita sounded miserable. “I do not like to see you suffer. Is there nothing I can do?”
I shook my head at her, wrapping my arms around my knees. “No.”
The following day, we returned to Bhaktipur. There was no tossing of flowers, no calling out of blessings. Folk in the street were silent and downcast, whispering to one another, whispering of death and cunning, skilled assassins on the way. I felt the skin between my shoulder blades grow tight and itching.
In the palace, Ravindra wept with relief to find his mother alive and well, and wept with remorse that his plan had failed us.
“Do not blame yourself, young chess-master.” His mother hugged him tight. “It was a very good plan. We shall just have to continue sleeping in the hidden room for a time, you and I.”
Ravindra gazed at me, eyes damp between tear-spiked lashes. “I am sorry about your Bao, Moirin.”
My diadh-anam gave a painful flare, setting off another wave of desire, making me shudder to the bone. “So am I, young highness.”
After we had bathed and eaten, and Ravindra had been sent away to sleep in the hidden room, Amrita insisted on sending for her physician to attend to me in my quarters, despite my protests that it would do no good. He felt at my brow and took my pulse, examined my tongue, and prescribed a diet of cooling foods.
“Yoghurt, cucumber, and mint,” the physician said, papering over uncertainty with a decisive tone. “Yes, this will help!”
Out of courtesy, I waited until he was gone to laugh in despair. “Yoghurt?”
“Oh, Moirin!” Amrita put her arms around me, worried and concerned. “Only try it, will you not?”
I buried my face in the crook of her neck. She smelled good, like flowers and spices—not as intoxicating as my lady Jehanne, but close. I kissed her throat, opened my mouth and tasted her warm skin with my tongue.
And I hadn’t the faintest idea I was doing it until I felt her stiffen in shock.
“I’m sorry!” I jerked away from her, hiding my face in my hands. “Amrita, I told you not to touch me!”
“I’m not sure I minded, actually.” There was a surprisingly pragmatic note in her musical voice. “It felt rather nice. After all, the role of the sainted widow can be a lonely one.” Her hands tugged at mine, lowering them. Reluctantly, I lifted my head and met her dark, lustrous gaze. A little silence came between us. “Would it help?” she asked me.
Like a shower of golden sparks, her words and their meaning fell drifting through my awareness.
“Yes,” I said simply.
“Well, then.” Amrita smiled at me. “You will have to show me what to do, Moirin, for I confess, I have no idea.”
“Gladly,” I whispered, cupping her face in my hands and kissing her. I felt her lips soften and part beneath mine.
The bright lady smiled, setting loose a flurry of doves.
“Oh!” Amrita sounded surprised. “Well, that is different.”
I sat back on my heels. “Does it displease you?”
“No.” She smiled at me beneath her lashes. “Not at all, actually. Show me more, Moirin.”
I did.
Gold; she was like gold, something pure and shining in the midst of this mess. And like an alchemist’s magic, her kindness transmuted the base metal of the desire that racked me into something golden and pure. I undressed her reverently until she was clad in nothing but bangles and tinkling anklets, kissing every inch of amber skin I uncovered, until she shivered and wrapped her arms around me, murmuring my name. I knew it was compassion, and not desire, that lay behind her offer, but that didn’t mean I couldn’t please her—and that alone would have been enough for me. But it was in Amrita’s nature to be generous, and she did her best to return the gift of pleasure that I showered on her.
Bit by bit, the terrible, searing need drained away from me. Afterward, I couldn’t find enough words to thank her.
“I am not sure it is necessary, dear one.” She laughed her chiming laugh. “You have considerable skill in your art.”
I smiled. “I take considerable pleasure in it.”
Amrita stretched languorously. “That cursed Jagrati was right about one thing. It was certainly interesting. You are a veritable poet of desire, Moirin.” She gave me a serious look. “Do you feel better now?”
“Oh, yes.” I kissed the graceful curve of her bare shoulder, gleaming in the lamplight. There were still a thousand fears and worries pressing me, but in this moment, Amrita’s presence held them at bay. “If there is room in the world for love, there is room for hope. Although mayhap you will have to be more fearful of Kamadeva’s diamond now,” I teased her.
“Do not even think it!” She tapped my lips in reproach. “I could never have done this if I did not care for you, Moirin. Never.”
“I know.” I caught her hand and kissed that, too. “I know the difference between kindness and genuine desire, my lady. And I am very, very grateful.”
“Yes, I know,” Amrita said humorously. “You do not need to demonstrate it again. I am a little worn out by your gratitude.” She fell silent, thinking. Sensing her mood shift, I kept my own silence. “I think perhaps Jagrati may have said more than one true thing,” she said presently. “What she said about the way the world treats those unfortunate ones born outside of a caste….. they were harsh words, but they have stayed with me.” She glanced at me. “I have not forgotten what you said about ambitious men attempting to shape the gods to serve their own ends. And I do not think you would disagree with what Jagrati said to me.”
“No,” I murmured. “I don’t. But that does not give her the right to become a monster, treating the lives of others as playthings to be stolen or destroyed.”
“No, but it tells us something about how the monster was made,” Amrita said. “And perhaps we must take some responsibility for it.” She frowned a little. “There was a sadhu in Galanka when I was a girl, a holy man who had renounced all things of the world, who refused to shun the untouchables. I wonder if he is still there, and if there are others like him.”
“Yeshua ben Yosef went among folk you would reckon unclean and tended to them,” I offered. It was one of the things Aleksei had taught me. “Lepers, beggars.”
“So did your D’Angeline gods when they passed through Bhodistan. I remember my father discussing it with an ambassador, for he sent me away when he caught me listening.” She sat upright and began winding her hair into a knot. “I have been thinking, trying to make sense of our failure, Moirin. Five men slain, and for nothing! I was certain that the gods sent you to me for a reason—”
“So was I, my lady,” I said. “And I am so very sorry—”
“Hush.” Amrita touched my lips again, gently this time. “Let me finish, young goddess. I was also certain that I knew the reason, that it was to rid the world of the Falconer and his Spider Queen. But perhaps I was wrong. Perhaps that was not it at all, and Jagrati’s harsh words were part of the message I was meant to hear. What do you think?”
I gazed at her beautiful face, my heart feeling very full. “My lady Amrita, I cannot say. I only know for sure that if I were a Bhodistani god with a message of compassion to deliver, I could choose no one better in the world than you to hear it. However…..” I glanced toward the balcony, and saw that it was fully dark outside. “There is still the matter of the Falconer’s assassins, and I think it would be best if you went to the hidden room now, and we talk more in the morning.”