Yet still I lay in bed, once again unable to sleep, reality as I knew it warring with curiosity over this strange world, even if it was of my own creation. I turned from one side to the other, trying to find a position that would allow me to relax, but I could not remove from my mind the possibility that this was real. My skin itched, and my limbs felt restless.
Finally, I decided, I would test it out just once more. I whispered the mantra all in a rush, almost hoping that it wouldn’t work. But there the strings appeared again. I could find the red one I had originally associated with Manthara, more vivid and glowing than the others.
Breathlessly, I waved my shaking fingers through the strings, but once again, they shimmered around my skin, allowing my hand to pass through.
I focused instead on Manthara’s strand and imagined plucking it like the string on a veena. It leapt up, vibrating as though I had touched it.
Excitement thrummed through me. I got out of bed, lit a small lamp, and pulled the Binding Plane scroll from beneath my cot. “Seek out the threads that connect you,” it said. I pondered this. Perhaps from those words, thread and connect, I had convinced myself that this mantra showed me the connections between myself and others?
Suddenly, the door swung open. The strings disappeared and I dropped the scroll, nudging it behind me as Manthara hurried in. “Are you okay?” she asked.
I hastily snuffed the candle. “Yes?” I ventured after a moment. “Are you?”
Manthara had never come into my room this late at night before, but now she stood before me in a simple shift, her hair in a long braid down her back, breathing hard. “I’m sorry to disturb you. I was lying in my room when suddenly I grew so worried about you. I just had to check—” She seemed to notice then that I was out of bed with a lamp in my hand. “What were you doing up?” she asked suspiciously.
I stayed silent for a moment, considering her words. A few minutes ago, I had pulled on the rope that I imagined connected me to Manthara, and now she was here before me. Could it be that these threads were not made up at all—that I had somehow summoned her here?
I thought the mantra to myself and gave the red rope a light brush with my mind.
Manthara took two steps forward and wrapped her arms around me. “Are you sure you’re all right?” she whispered in my hair. She smelled of mint leaves and crisp cotton, warm and comforting.
I hugged her back. “Yes, of course,” I said. But my mind was reeling. My hands were shaking, so I clasped them together, pulling back from her. “I was only looking for some sweets,” I lied. I resolved in that moment to never tell Manthara the truth of whatever I had discovered. She would think me mad, and I could not lose her.
Even in the darkness, Manthara’s squint was evident. “You had the lamp lit. Were you trying to sneak out?”
“No!” I protested, casting about for some explanation that wouldn’t involve admitting to the stolen scrolls. Nothing came to mind. “I really was just hungry.”
In the Binding Plane, the thread between us jumped of its own accord. Did it know I was lying? Or was this due to Manthara’s skepticism? I reached out with my mind to calm it. Please let her believe me. And somehow, as if by magic, the thread quieted.
Why had I done that? Had I harmed her? It had happened so instinctively.
I studied her anxiously, but she appeared to be fine. She merely sighed and said, “I suppose you must not have had an appetite at dinner, with all that has happened. But you need to rest. I will sit here until you fall asleep.”
I did not think I could possibly sleep, knowing these threads existed—that I had somehow brought them into existence with my words and my mind. But I hadn’t anticipated the power of Manthara’s hand stroking my hair, smoothing away the emotional turmoil of the day, and the heartsick ache that filled me when I thought of my mother. Sleep pulled me under before I could stop it.
CHAPTER THREE
YUDHAJIT CAME EARLY TO my room the next morning, hoping to pull me into a rematch of hide and catch. But I was tired and irritable, and by the time I joined him outside, I didn’t want to run around. The day was beautiful, the sky cloudless and a vivid blue. I settled myself on the grass and grabbed a pebble instead, hoping to play a contest where we threw it up into the air and tried to clap as many times as possible instead.
Yudhajit groaned. “No, Kaikeyi. That is such a boring game.”
“Well, I think your game is boring,” I argued. He remained standing stubbornly before me, arms crossed.
I frowned in return. Normally, he would complain until he got his way. But today, I thought of the previous night and how I had summoned Manthara.