The Heartless Divine

by Varsha Ravi

  Impossibly, he was still smiling. She could think of nothing but it. When he spoke, her lungs unfolded, empty with desire. “What time is it?”

  “I don’t know,” she said roughly. She shook her head and dug her hands into the pockets of her jeans, searching. “Late, I’d guess. Where’s my phone?”

  He held it up with an illusionist’s grace, frowning as he turned it on. The bright light washed out his skin, hollowed him. “Quarter to eleven. When are we meant to leave?”

  “Midnight,” she managed, reaching out for the phone. Kiran shifted it from one hand to the next, holding it out of her reach. It was ridiculous; he didn’t have that much height on her. “Give that back.”

  “No,” he said, the line of his mouth crooked and sharp. He rose out of his chair, limned by the lights of the bar. “I’ll give it back if you can catch me.”

  Kiran turned on his heel and slipped through the crowd; it parted for him in brief, uneven gaps, and she ducked through the same gaps, shoving through before they closed entirely. She could hear his laughter in her head like a song, and she followed it all the way out into a side street straddling the bar.

  The door fell half-shut behind her, crashing against a wooden crate. The sounds of the bar were distant—low, thrumming alt rock, shouts and chatter. The air smelled like sugar syrup and rainwater as she wound through discarded furniture and crates in the alley.

  He glanced back at her, eyes bright like a challenge, and she swore under her breath, reaching forward to wrap her fingers around his wrist. But he slid out of her grip, laughing even as he did it, and despite everything, she found herself smiling too, as if this were a game—as if the night had turned everything dream-slick and mutable and none of it was real, not a single damn thing.

  Eventually, she managed to grab a single shoulder and she dug her nails in, holding him still until she could fully catch up. Suri twisted him around, slamming him back into the brick wall of the bar and bringing up her other hand to hold him in position.

  His gaze was dark, soft with something like yearning or pain. She loosened her grip on him as awareness flooded through her, but he didn’t move. She felt jagged, raw.

  Something crackled in the air streets away—even from this far away, she could hear the tinny melody of the band, the useless delight of strangers. The glare of distant streetlights cast them both in a faint glow, just bright enough to see what they were not allowed.

  Let go, she thought, the words so quiet, so muffled they seemed of no importance at all. Let go, and ask for your phone, and then you can leave early.

  But her heart stuttered, unthinking, and she bent toward him, and she felt the precipitous, terrifying movement without the opportunity to draw back. Muscle memory, but abyssal and eternal and old, as if she knew him by heart and the knowledge was carved into her, soul-deep.

  His breath caught, hitched as if with fear or anticipation, and her lips met warm skin, knuckle after knuckle after knuckle. She opened her eyes, mouth pressed against the back of his hand, and stared at him. There was nothing more to say; he held her gaze, cheeks flushed and pale, and then removed his hand silently. The night air was cold, sweet, and she drank it in.

  Suri pulled away, taking a step back, and then another, until she stood in the center of the alley. She wrapped her arms around herself in the chill and refused to shiver, refused to look away.

  “I’m sorry,” he said, faintly stricken. “It isn’t that I didn’t… want to.”

  She folded her arms, impossibly tired. “I know you wanted to. I saw it. So why?”

  Pain flickered across his face, quick and violent. Kiran pushed off from the wall, stepping closer to her before pausing, hesitant.

  He held out his hand; her phone laid in it, dull and glittering, and she took it carefully, without touching him. They walked for a bit in silence, back to the side entrance to the bar. When he spoke, his voice was strained. “You remind me of someone I used to know.”

  “In a good way?” she asked warily, glancing over at him. The planes of his face were opal-smooth, eyes glittering like a prayer flame.

  He made a soft noise of amusement, but it held its own measure of sorrow. “In every good way, and in every bad. In every way that matters.”

  Suri wasn’t sure how she felt about that, about her effectively being a cosmic stand-in for someone he’d once loved and lost. She wondered, idly, if it was easy to pretend they were the same. But there was a careful gravity to his voice, one of shallow, deathless graves, and so she discarded the bitter humor and ventured, “What happened to them?”

  “She was hurt,” he said evenly, after a moment had passed. “I’d rather you weren’t.”

  “How?” she asked, suddenly gripped by an intense, insidious curiosity, the kind that led young children down forgotten forest paths and into the bellies of beasts.

  Kiran looked at her oddly, as if surprised she expected him to answer. She poked him, forcing a smile. But it was too sharp, too humorless. “Are you afraid of speaking it into life? Make it into a story, then.”

  His lips twitched upward, wry and self-deprecating. A car drove by the mouth of the alley, reflecting thin white light onto them, not unlike the sheets pulled over fresh corpses. “All stories have power, Suri. Even dead ones.”

  17

  Enesmat

  “Hold still,” Isa scolded, voice muffled by the pin stuck in the corner of her mouth. “I cannot fix your hair properly if you keep shifting from side to side like a child.”

  Suri relented, bracing her palms on the edge of the vanity in a futile attempt to keep herself still. But it only worked for moments—then she began to fidget with the corner of her wrap, embroidered in gold thread. Isa let out a long-suffering sigh but didn’t say anything.

  The festival had come quicker than she had expected—it had always been a far-off, unreal marker of time, one that delineated so many different events. The upcoming assassination, the upcoming war, the upcoming destruction. But now, she could only define it in a single way: I will die a week after Avyakanth. The words reverberated through her, a lilting, melancholy melody.

  In an uncharacteristic moment of daring, she wondered if she could convince him to escape. But the thought disappeared just as quickly as it had appeared. There was nothing that could possibly shake his faith in his nation, his sense of duty. And more than that, he seemed resigned to his own death.

  A knock came at the door, and Isa shot it an exasperated look before finishing Suri’s hair and going to unlock it. Lucius was leaned against the doorframe, roguish and sheepish as always. He had discarded his old cloak, opting to dress solely in black and deep Athrian red. He grinned when he caught her looking, explaining, “The streets are going to be full of fire. I doubt the city will be anything but warm all night.”

  She rolled her eyes. “You would bet your comfort on those fires?”

  He lifted his shoulders in a shrug. “I have attended for ten years, and the festival has never wavered from my expectations.”

  The adjoining door cracked open, and Mohini entered the room. She glanced at Suri—quickly, nervously—before offering Lucius a faint smile, which he reciprocated.

  They walked through the halls, the lovebirds chattering away endlessly. Suri kept quiet, and yet there was an odd, jagged kind of desire in her chest. It was childish, hopeless and heedless, and it colored the frustration that rose up to meet the reality that no matter what they did, their moves were predetermined, their souls long ago set into the crooked slots of this old tragedy.

  The citizens were slowly trickling from the gate at the far edge of the street to the thin, winding path that led over to the foothills and up to the temple. In the night, they were a stream of fire burning through the darkness.

  Lucius pulled crimson candles from his satchel, lighting them in a nearby brazier before doling them out. The flames cast them all in an uneven golden glow, and it lit Lucius’s face when he smiled. “We should hurry. The temple is small; if we arrive
late, we may well be watching the service from the foot of the hills.”

  Mohini’s thin, strained expression betrayed that she truly did not mind watching from so far, but if Lucius noticed he did not let on. They carried the candles as they trekked across the empty expanse of land that wrapped around the city, and Suri futilely tried to keep her mind off what awaited at the top.

  By the time they arrived, the clearing around the temple was congested with so many people the ground was invisible. Yet the temple itself was sparsely populated; Suri could only discern the silhouettes of Kita and a few other priests. They were all dressed in the customary white of the main temple, but the high priestess’s ivory wrap was embroidered with soft golden flowers and flames, her robes a sheer red.

  The captain and king were nowhere to be seen, though there was a small contingent of guards by the far pillars, organized near the inner sanctum. The statue within had already been decorated, kino blossoms and creamy, star-shaped magizham flowers framing the black stone, wrapped in glittering red cloth. Silver ash cut strong, elegant lines across the idol, giving it the illusion of life. Even the stone bird at the head of the altar had been doted upon, wrapped in gold thread and dotted with shining kita jewels and flowers.

  The temple was nearly unrecognizable, a stark, unsteadying contrast to the warm, empty place Suri knew. There had been a kind of safety in its emptiness, in its loneliness—an untold secret, a hidden adoration. And yet it was beautiful now as well, lovely and immortal and alive with fire and faith.

  Lucius weaved through the crowd, flashing the pin on his collar when asked for identification, and paused at the front. Suri frowned at him, but he simply grinned. “A courier’s badge gets you into many places. Regardless, I couldn’t have allowed the future queen of Athri to watch the service from the edge of the mountain, could I?”

  Her stomach roiled at the title, sick with nausea, but she forced a faint smile. The chatter of the crowd shifted and suddenly cut off, a heavy silence falling over the mountain. And in the midst of this soft, expectant hush, as if borne from it, three figures peeled off from the pathway that led to the high priest’s cottage. Two figures—distant and blurred in the light of the flames, paused by the contingent of guards, while the last one cut through the crowd without words or commands.

  Kiran passed them without pause, but he glanced at Suri out of the corner of his eyes. He was expressionless, a practiced calm, but his eyes glinted, dark and blazing. There was an unspoken challenge in them, and it set her heart on fire.

  He ascended the steps quickly, pausing beside the entrance. The priests had taken up rehearsed positions, standing one after another between each of the two sets of columns. They faced the city below, but each held a different object in their hands. Kita stood by the inner sanctum, the only of them to hold Kiran’s gaze.

  He accepted the objects from each of the priests and then laid them on the edge of the altar. He murmured something soft and unintelligible under his breath before taking a knife and slashing his palm open. He dipped the fingers of his other hand in the blood and then traced something on the altar—it was too far for her to see, but Suri knew it was the carved icon, the single flame.

  As the service continued—he wiped his hand clean and then lit a scarlet candle, touching it to the surface of the blood and lighting it aflame—a soft, lilting murmur began to course through the crowd. At first it was nothing more than a faint rustling, but then it swelled into something resonant and melodic, and Suri realized it was a hymn.

  The song rose and fell as a heartbeat, and Suri watched as the boy king strode forward from the guards, the captain behind him. They ascended the steps separately, each holding a candle in their hands. Kiran cupped his hands around the flame, lifting it gently away from the wax and letting it fall from his fingers into the small, blood-borne fire of the carved symbol. He marked a line of ash across both of the king’s cheeks and the latter dipped his head in a brief show of reverence before descending the steps. And then Tarak stepped forward, and the process began again.

  There was a rhythm to it, one that twined in harmony with the hymns. The crowd resolved into a coiled, serpentine line, one that led up to the altar and then led down and twisted around the mountainside.

  “Where are they going?” Suri whispered to Lucius.

  “The main temple,” he replied, words nearly inaudible in the wake of a swell in the hymn. “That is where the majority of the night’s festivities will occur. This is simply a tribute to the god.”

  Mohini nudged her, and she saw that the line in front of them had dissipated—Kiran stood at the altar, waiting. Lucius went first, uncharacteristically deferential, as he held out the candle and ducked his head. There was a wry tilt to Kiran’s mouth as he accepted the flame, but he did not speak.

  And then it was her turn. Suri focused on the flame so she did not have to meet his gaze, and yet she could feel the heat of it. His fingers closed around the wick and tugged the fire away. He dipped his fingers into the ash and brushed them against her cheekbones, the touch feather-soft but searing.

  She was oddly breathless as they descended the mountain, as if she were still lost in that moment, in the heat and the smoke. A lingering, suppressed ache spread through her chest, but she refused to acknowledge it.

  The reverence dropped from Lucius the moment they left the temple, and he chattered on endlessly as they returned to the streets of Marai. The braziers were still burning, but the silence of the city had faded; in the distance, Suri could hear the sound of sparks popping in the sky, shouts of joy and of desire.

  The entrance to the main temple was, unsurprisingly, flushed with people. By the time they made it through the foyer and to the main area, another hymn had begun, distinct from those they had sung at the mountain. This one was less melancholy, hungrier—there was a wild beauty to it.

  Lucius led them down the steep stone steps that ringed the pool, down to the moonlit walkway. Priests rushed by them, shouting orders to one another and carrying baskets that overflowed with supplies. Out of respect and a certain measure of fear, they flattened themselves to the edge of the steps and allowed the priests to pass. Suri glanced over at Lucius. “Am I to assume this is another benefit of your badge?”

  His smile cut across his face, bright with mischief. “Yes. Though this particular benefit has less to do with what Galen gave me and more to do with a friend of mine.”

  Suri expected him to elaborate, but for once, he seemed unwilling, amusement glittering in his eyes.

  After a few moments, the boy king and the captain joined them at the edge of the steps. The captain was tugging the king along by his wrist; the latter glared at him spitefully. Tarak smiled sweetly at Suri. “How are you finding the festivities, Your Highness?”

  “They’re beautiful,” she said truthfully. “I’ve seen little like them.”

  His eyes crinkled at that, pleased. He elbowed the king unsubtly, who frowned up at him before dipping his head in acknowledgement of her. She reciprocated, silently grateful that all they would have to do was exchange formalities. She thought she understood the king a little more these days, but it changed nothing of his hatred, of the chasms that lay between them.

  “How long will it take?” Lucius asked. Suri startled for a moment before realizing he was speaking to Tarak.

  The captain tilted his head, considering. “The tributes should be finishing soon. And then he’ll have a few moments before the dance.”

  Once the two boys had left, Suri turned to Lucius. “What dance?” There was nothing of the temple that suggested it could—under any circumstances—be transformed into a ballroom, but still she worried.

  He laughed, nodding toward the pool. “You’ll see.”

  Her breath caught. The pool had been drained of water, yet it was not dry; a thin layer of oil glistened against the gray stone. “You cannot be serious.”

  “But I am,” he said. He glanced around, gaze catching on a pair of faraway figures. “Oh,
there they are. Princess, I’d like to introduce you to someone.”

  Suri looked helplessly back at Isa and Mohini but they waved her off. Isa smiled faintly, but it held a hint of inexplicable amusement, an untold joke where only Suri could catch it.

  Despite the crushed shadows that lingered beside the entrance to the north tower, it had not taken long for the citizens to realize who they were standing beside. The crowd parted, slow but sure, as Lucius and Suri ascended the steps.

  Kiran and Kita were speaking about something, their voices low and hushed. There was ash smeared across both their faces; they glanced up in synchrony when they approached, Kita’s eyebrows curving upward.

  She patted Kiran’s arm before dipping her head toward Suri in a swift bow. “Well, I must begin the preparations for the dance. Try not to take too long.” The last part was directed toward Kiran, who—in an odd display of youth—made a rude gesture at her. She laughed and took the steps down to the emptied pool two at a time.

  Lucius grinned at both of them. “Your Highness, it is my pleasure to introduce you to the high priest of the temple of Avya. Kiran—”

  The other boy was watching him with no small amount of amusement. “We’ve met, Lucius.”

  He blinked at him, eyes wide with mock hurt. There was an easy balance to the way that they spoke, a casual warmth Suri could not help but envy. “And you, what? Decided not to deign to inform your loyal old friend? Now I’ve humiliated myself.”

  There was a fond exasperation in the line of his smile. “Apologies. Did you enjoy the service?”

  He had turned to Suri, and it took a few seconds for her to realize the question was meant for her. She opened her mouth to speak, but for some reason, the words caught in her throat. She recalled the fire of the altar, the cupped flame. The ash on her cheeks burned. “I did.”

  Kiran smiled, just as lovely and just as wild as the temple he served. “I’m glad to hear it.”

  Lucius glanced between them and shot his friend a familiar look. Suri had to endure it from Isa constantly. But when he spoke, he only said, “It is poor manners to keep the people waiting, Kiran. They’re all here for you.”