Then, in an unreadable voice, Malini said, “If you say so. Perhaps this will be more palatable to you: I want to understand the world I live in, strange though it may be. I need to understand, in order to survive it. I learned young the importance of understanding the nature of those around me, but also the need to understand greater things: religion. Military strategy. Politics, and all its many games. Your magic is no different from any of that.”
That was better. Easier to handle. It made Priya’s heart feel less open, less bruised.
“There is a river beneath the Hirana,” said Priya, into the velvet quiet of humming insects, of Malini’s uneven breath. “Your nursemaid was right about that. But it isn’t accessible to just anyone. I think if General Vikram or any imperial soldier tried to hack their way through the stone to it they would have found nothing. It’s… magic. And living, and it let me find it because of what I am.
“All rituals are in three parts in Ahiranya,” continued Priya. “I don’t know if it’s the same in Parijat or any other place, but we always knew as children that we’d have to pass through those waters three times, if we wanted the gifts of the yaksa. Since the founding of Parijatdvipa, the ritual has only given our elders the smallest gifts. Power to control the Hirana. No more. But we traveled through the waters, me and my siblings, at the festival of the dark of the moon, and… suddenly, we were as the elders had once been, in the Age of Flowers.
“The ones like me, who were passing through for the first time, we were changed. But the ones who were passing through the second time, or the third…” Priya shook her head. “It was as if a seed had been planted the first time, and it had been growing inside them until that moment. Something that had been growing in the waters, perhaps for years, bloomed in us. Our elders, they… they should have been pleased. But they were not. Because they thought…” Priya swallowed. Should she admit this? The terrible suspicion they’d had, of her siblings, of her? “The rot arrived when our powers did,” she said eventually. “It was smaller then, weaker, but they were afraid. They thought we were the cause. And that we were monstrous. We were too strong. So they killed us. Died with us.”
Priya propped herself up on her elbows. The green beneath her was soft. Soothing.
“I’ve been seeking the waters again,” said Priya. “Seeking the way. And I found it. But the finding—it has a price. And I’m paying it.”
Malini made a choked noise. But Priya did not look at her. “I don’t want pity,” she said, still staring at the green.
“What were you hoping to accomplish?” Malini said after several heartbeats, her voice low.
“I was trying to find… myself. After the others died, I… I think my mind tried to protect me. I forgot so much. I couldn’t use even the gifts I already had any longer.”
“And have you found yourself, Priya?”
Priya shook her head. “I don’t know what it means to be a temple child anymore. Maybe it means being useful to people who seek power,” she said, finally looking at Malini. “Maybe it means being monstrous. Sometimes it feels like it. But maybe… maybe it means something else. The children and I, we could control the Hirana. Control nature. Someone once told me that the strongest of us could even control the rot. Maybe what it means to be me is to… to be a cure.”
It was a hope she’d only started to consider now that she could feel the power fading out of her, ebbing and flowing. Now that she’d felt the heady sweetness of it. Could her magic really be monstrous, if it felt this sweet?
“You think you may have the power to end the rot?” Malini asked.
“Maybe,” said Priya. “It’s all—everything is maybe. I don’t know. It doesn’t matter now, does it? I’m not going to survive to test my strength.”
The tree roots on the surface of the forest floor gave a little flutter, shivering, creaking their way across the soil as they reached for Priya.
“Should I beat them away?” Malini asked in a strange, dry voice. “Or are you calling them?”
Priya sighed, suddenly weary. “Leave me. Go to that Lord Rajan of yours. Go to your brother. Do—exactly what you’d hoped to. I know you want to. Don’t pretend you care what happens to me.”
“You saved my life,” Malini said. “You saved it more than once.”
“And you still don’t care,” said Priya. “I know that. So go.”