by SGD Singh
“Sit down, Asha.” BapuJi's voice was stern. “Silas is right. It is every conscious human's duty to know, to learn, and to accept the truth of the past before they can truly embrace the future. Otherwise, are we no better than beasts? Destined to repeat the same mistakes over and over again?” BapuJi shook his head. “No. I should have told you the truth long ago.”
Asha sat. “You know I haven't believed that my parents died in an accident for a while now.”
BapuJi sighed again, nodding at the ocean as if it spoke to him.
“And if it causes you pain to tell me what happened, I'd rather not know.”
He had a distant look in his eyes again, as if he couldn't hear her. He was in another time. Another place.
Asha resigned herself to the fact that now, whether she wanted to know or not, BapuJi would tell her about her parents. For one brief second, Asha considered getting up and walking away, knowing her grandfather wouldn't even notice, but she remained at his side, as if she, too, were frozen in the past.
When BapuJi finally spoke, his voice was steady. He kept his gaze on the ocean, its movement like the hands of a thousand-fingered creature, grasping at the wet sand as it struggled to join them on the beach, before being pulled back into the salty water again and again, its sound the applause of a greedy and crazed crowd.
“Your father was always a happy child,” BapuJi began. “He inherited his crazy, irrational love for life from his mother. But the day he met Giovanna, I realized something. Even though he had been filled with more joy than any other person I knew, until that day he had only been partially happy.”
Asha looked up at the stars and tried to focus on bringing oxygen into her lungs.
“When they got married, the two of them were so euphoric, it was ridiculous.”
BapuJi was smiling, but Asha realized his cheeks were wet with tears.
“When you were on the way, Giovanna met with the Seers. She wanted you raised Innocent. So the two of them found a house not far from Headquarters in a quiet, peaceful neighborhood. Of course, they made me move with them so we could tag team taking care of you, they said, but I knew they didn't want me to feel lonely.” BapuJi's smile turned sad. “Balraj hired a housekeeper to stay in the guesthouse, with the understanding that she would be on call during odd hours of the night, for the rare occasions we were all three needed at Headquarters. He gave her some tale about how we worked important jobs at the local factory.
“Your mother was not good at refraining from helping people for the sake of secrecy, and it didn't take long for her to make friends with all the nosy women in the neighborhood. It was only days before word spread of ‘la sìquica increìble’ who could find anyone. Within a month, even the police were showing up at our door with missing person cases, usually at ungodly hours in the middle of the day.”
Asha smiled as she remembered the infinite supply of aunts who surrounded her as a child. In her memory, there were at least five loud and laughing women hanging around the kitchen, delivering food, or singing on the porch at all hours. She also recalled those same aunts keeping her in the kitchen with noisy stories and games while her mother talked in whispers to visitors in the sitting room, in that not-so-clever way adults have of trying to distract kids and thinking they won't realize something serious is happening.
“Your father didn't love the idea,” BapuJi continued. “But anyone could see the pride at Giovanna's kindness and generosity.” He shrugged. “And anyway, isn't that what The Guard does? Help people? Save people?”
BapuJi watched the ocean in silence again, and Asha began making grooves in the velvety sand with the palm of her hand. She still had to remind herself to breathe.
When he continued, his voice was solemn. “Naturally, when civilians started stirring up hysteria about monster hyenas in the town's graveyard, her friends rushed to Giovanna.”
Asha straightened. “Wait. Ghouls? In Colombia?”
“Ghouls.” BapuJi nodded, glancing at her for the first time since they left the dinner party. “At first, we didn't believe it either, but once Giovanna and Balraj spoke with the witnesses, there was no denying that Ghouls infested the graveyard closest to Headquarters. Your mother made an impressive show of envisioning for her neighbors that no cemetery was safe after sunset, and fabricated a curse and its counter-curse. She told everyone the curse caused people to hallucinate, tricking their minds into seeing Jinn that eat the dead. See, she sprinkled in just enough truth to make it believable. She warned them that these curse-hallucination-Jinn could take on the form of the deceased. She left out the part about how Ghouls take on the form of the corpse they most recently consumed.
“Giovanna's counter-curse required everyone to stay inside their homes and burn a certain kind of incense at their southern windows until the next full moon, which was in two days. We were confident the Jodha could take care of the problem long before then.”
Confusion clouded Asha's mind. “My parents were killed by Ghouls? That doesn't make sense. Mom was a Seer. Why was she even in a combat situation? Especially if it was only Ghouls! I mean, a Trainee can take on five at once. They aren't exactly—”
“Giovanna and Balraj weren't killed by Ghouls,” BapuJi snapped. “The Ghouls were merely a tool.” He sighed at the ocean. “A tool used by a Rakshasi Demon.”
Asha felt as if her skin had turned to ice. She tried to swallow, but her throat had gone dry. “The Rakshasi who command the armies of Asura?”
“The very same.”
“The Mahatala Demon with the power over freaking blood? What does that even mean, anyway?”
BapuJi narrowed his eyes. “It means Rakshasi Demons can track any family member of anyone they've sniffed. It means they can find their victims anywhere. And it means they have an extraordinary capacity for torture.”
“Holy…” Asha was suddenly aware of the blood coursing through her veins, and shuddered. “But, what would the Rakshasi want with Mom and Dad? I mean, why them?”
“What do Underworlders want, Asha?”
“To break out of their realms?”
“And what is the main thing in the way of them achieving that goal?”
“The Guard?”
He shook his head. “Think bigger. What do we know will stop them permanently?”
“The fulfillment of The Triputi Prophecy.” Asha shivered. “Which claims there are three needed to achieve peace. But I was eight when my parents died! That makes no sense.”
“Once the Underworlders lost their main target—Silas—the Asura put their energy into killing Infernal Guard Seers, especially any Seer born in the year The Prophecy foretold. It was only a matter of time before their Witches found us. But they knew they couldn't find Headquarters without the help of their superiors.”
“Rakshasi Demons…”
BapuJi stood, brushing sand from his clothes with absent, automatic movements. Asha jumped up to follow him as he started walking again at a steady pace along the damp sand just beyond the reach of the waves.
“The night the Jodha moved to take out the Ghouls,” he began again, “the Seer from London called Giovanna to warn us of a trap. Some danger hung over the operation. Balraj had already left for the graveyard, but Giovanna could find him, See him, and said that everything had gone smoothly, that he would be home within minutes. Even still, the Seer's warning made us nervous. We decided I would take you to Headquarters, where it was safer. Giovanna would wait for Balraj and then follow, and the Jodha Commanders would call the Seers and figure out what to do from there.”
BapuJi's pace slowed, and his shoulders slumped.
“The Rakshasi Demon killed them,” Asha said, healing him again as they walked. “You really don't have to talk about every single painful detail…”
Asha recalled an illustration of a Rakshasi Demon from her training books. She had long, glistening reddish-black hair that flowed down her back in a fountain of blood, dripping thick liquid down her legs and soiling her clothes that were
nothing more than golden chains and writhing red serpents. Her skin was entirely hidden beneath dried and cracked blood. She had curving fangs, bulging eyes, and breasts the size of watermelons. Her arms and legs could turn all the way around at their joints, like some sort of macabre doll, and she held numerous blades in her clawed hands. Ursala had made some typical remark about her giant boobs, and Asha felt nauseated to remember she'd laughed.
“We knew something was wrong when they didn't arrive at Headquarters within half an hour. I went back to the house with three Jodha. When we got there, all the lights were off except the one above the dining table. And we could see…” He paused. “From the back garden, we could see that Balraj was already dead. The Demon turned her back to your mother, who lay on the table. I realized later that Giovanna must have been waiting for me, because her eyes found mine as soon as I rushed toward the glass, and she…” BapuJi had to pause again, swallowing the emotion that clogged his throat. “She smiled, and she gestured for us to stay outside, a gesture that meant…”
“My mother told you guys to leave her?”
BapuJi shook his head. “She told us to save ourselves. She had set the house to blow with holy fire.”
“Holy Fire? Isn't that a myth?”
“Not the one you think,” BapuJi said. “Holy fire was our name for a holy water fire bomb. The Tvastar in Colombia installed it for Guard who wanted extra security. Each house was rigged to explode with both fire and holy water, killing the intruders from any realm, if a Guard hit the right sequence on their security ring. Giovanna was telling us that she was going to use it, that there was nothing we could do to save her.”
“So… she killed herself?” Asha stopped walking, and BapuJi turned to her. “My mother killed herself to keep me away from the Rakshasi Demon?”
Why in the hell would Silas want me to know this right before my wedding?
“Asha, she was already dying. Three Jodha and one Healer could not have taken down a Rakshasi Demon. Your mother knew that. She knew there was no time. Her beloved husband was beheaded. The demon would come after you next. She knew she had to destroy it.”
“But…”
“She knew this was the only way to save lives. She did the right thing.”
Something else had occurred to Asha, though. “She knew enough to put her Seer ring in my harp, which she must have sent with you, if everything in the house burned.” Asha heard the anger in her voice, but she couldn't control it. “She knew enough that she should've gotten out with us, before my father got back.”
BapuJi placed his hands on her trembling shoulders and squeezed until she raised her eyes to his.
“And leave Balraj to step into a trap alone?” He met her eyes for the first time. “Would you leave Aquila if you thought he was in danger?”
Asha shook her head, dropping her gaze to the sand.
“Why haven't I heard of this holy fire thing?” She said, changing the subject. Aquila's death wasn't something Asha could bear to imagine. “It's not in any of the books either…”
“Giovanna's father invented it,” BapuJi said. “Your grandfather never meant for it to be used in that way. After his daughter died, he destroyed everything related to it. He moved to Panama when we went to Miami. A year later, he was killed in a confrontation with Asura. But the truth is, he died of a broken heart that night.”
Asha turned to him. “And you, BapuJi? What about your heart?”
He wrapped his arms around her, pulling her close, and Asha sobbed. “My heart is made of stronger stuff, I guess.”
“So much death.” Asha couldn't stop her tears.
BapuJi wiped her face as if she were a little girl again, and shushed her in Punjabi. “Death is a natural result of life, inevitable for us all,” he said. “Not a negative thing.”
Asha blinked. His heart really was made of something extraordinary.
“Your parents would be very proud of you, Asha.” He pinched her cheeks, smacking them once, like he used to when she was little, and Asha winced. “I know that without any doubt. They would have been very happy to see you married tomorrow. I think, if they were here, we would be witnessing a new level of happiness never seen in our realm before, come tomorrow evening.” He hugged her again. “As it is, you'll just have to be happy enough for the both of them.”
She looked up at him then, and saw that BapuJi had tears in his eyes even as he smiled.
“No more tears, okay? The past is the past.” He actually laughed then, wrapping an arm around Asha's still shivering shoulders as he moved along the beach. “I think it's time to go watch our boys teach those shiny Upperworlders a thing or two.”
Asha thought of how BapuJi would react if he knew Zaiden was Lexi's soulmate, and laughed through her tears.
She wondered why they weren't turning around to go back, but then the sounds of cheering were in front of her, and Asha realized they had walked around the entire island. She could see the glow of the bonfire, and as they got closer, what looked like a field hockey game. Except the hockey sticks seemed to be actual tree branches, and the ball was some sort of sack.
Squeezing her shoulders a final time, BapuJi split away from her to join Dhevan and Uma. Aquila and Ursala weren't far away, but Asha lingered in the shadows.
All of Asha's female friends, including Lexi, appeared to have switched team allegiance as they screamed for Zaiden's sister Sashi, the only woman on the field, to score. The green Upperworlder was radiant in the firelight, all flowing silk and grace as she dodged and ducked. Her laugh reached Asha as she spun around Kenda, hitting the strange ball between his legs and over the line in the sand. It must have been the winning goal, because the three triplets immediately raised their sticks in unison and shouted “Rematch!” followed by loud boos from every female on the beach.
The Upperworlders were too busy celebrating to respond. Asha watched Zaiden slap his raised hands against Satish's, whose rainbow-colored hair glowed in shades of orange and purple in the firelight, then wrap Dinesh in a fierce hug. He looked like some kind of god carved from gold, and when Asha looked for her, she wasn't surprised to find that Lexi had disappeared from the beach.
What did surprise her was seeing Sashi embrace Kenda. She'd never seen the Upperworlder Healer act anything but grouchy, but now she was whispering something in the Guard's ear as she tugged on his long hair. He smacked her feather wing with the stick he still held, laughing as his brothers shouted at him in a language Asha couldn't understand.
Aquila and Ursala looked at Kelakha with matching frowns of disappointment, and Asha surprised herself by bursting into laughter.
Maybe a part of her mind had always known what her mother had done, recognized on some subconscious level that of course her mother had sacrificed her life to keep Asha safe.
What was that you were saying about kicking Upperworlder ass?
Aquila's eyes found hers, and a smile twitched along his perfect lips. The vomit-tinged Sashi used her feminine charms on Kenda, who apparently can't resist fancy feathers and a bossy attitude. Plus, who would've guessed Upperworlders are so good at ndashdilka?
Chapter 9
Zaiden woke up at noon and couldn't fall asleep again, even though it had only been a few short hours. He decided to go for a run around the island, possibly followed by a swim. He wanted to exercise his body into a state of exhaustion. Maybe that would also numb his mind.
But as soon as he left his bungalow, Satish and Dinesh fell into step on either side of him.
“You guys don't have to guard me here, you know,” Zaiden said, speaking in their own language since there was no one around. The island felt deserted this time of day, each of the nocturnal Guard members sound asleep through the bright hours of the day.
Dinesh snorted, a very Satya realm sound. “Of course we do, Your Highness.”
“How would we live with ourselves if you were, say, stabbed by a certain someone with a penchant for violence?” Satish said. “I can see it now. ‘His Roya
l Highness, Prince Zaiden Tavish Kartikeya Agurzil, leader of the fearless and breathtakingly handsome Tapas realm Yodhaka, viciously hacked to pieces by a blonde psychopath just as he emerged from the previously-thought-to-be-peaceful gardens of an unknown Satya island. The prince was there to attend a wedding party at the request of a Seer no one can say no to’.” He lowered his voice. “The mourning would last a year, at least, and we'd be more bored than ever.”
Zaiden checked him with his shoulder, and Satish stumbled.
“Don't talk about her like that,” he said, and started jogging down the beach.
“Like what?” Satish caught up easily, exaggerating the innocence in his voice.
“She wouldn't hurt me,” Zaiden said, and now both body-guard-brothers snorted. “She won't come close enough to me to hurt me, for one thing.” He glared at Satish. “And why am I talking about this with you two? Speaking of heartache, how about I tell Kai how you feel about him?”
Satish's golden skin paled. “You wouldn't.”
“Wouldn't I?”
“He knows anyway,” Dinesh snapped. “What? Did you think he's stupid?”
They jogged in silence then, Satish and Dinesh falling a step behind Zaiden as they circled the island, once, twice, three times.
Finally, Zaiden slowed. “Why don't you two get some rest before tonight? All I'm gonna do is shower and eat something, then try to sleep. Really. I'm fine.” He spread his arms wide, indicating the paradise that surrounded them. “There's no danger here, okay? Not from blonde martial artists or anything else.”
Dinesh hesitated, then turned to leave. “The wedding is being held on the west beach. We'll meet you there.”
“And you know you're singing, right?” Satish added with a salute, following Dinesh. “Silas said so.”
Zaiden groaned at the sky. “Why does everyone think I'm a singer?”
