So Bhumika had found out, then.
Maybe Rukh’s presence was a punishment. A punishment for Rukh—or a punishment for Priya, for bringing him into the mahal. But such viciousness didn’t seem like something Bhumika would willingly choose, so Priya was not sure she could believe it.
“I do want to see him,” Priya said. “Please.”
Sima nodded. Then she said, “Just. Prepare yourself, Priya. He’s not like he once was.”
And indeed he’d grown so much worse. All of his hair had the texture of leaves now, dark as ink. His veins stood out, a strange green against his skin. There were rings like the secret heart of bark, inked along his arms. Even the shadows beneath his eyes were more wood than flesh. He’d been sitting a little apart from the rest of Bhumika’s retinue, wrapped in a blanket beneath the cover of a tree. When she approached, he stood and let the blanket puddle at his feet.
He looked at her. She looked at him.
“Rukh,” she said. “Won’t you greet me?”
“Are you sure you want me to?” he asked.
She could have told him the rot had never scared her. She could have assured him in a dozen different ways.
Instead she walked over to him, bent down, and hugged him carefully. It was the first time she’d done it, and she wanted him to know he could push her away. But he didn’t. He stayed very still.
“I’m so glad to see you again,” she said.
She felt the tension in him. The way he held himself, wound tight with his fists clenched, ready for anything that could be thrown at him. She felt it break.
“I’m sorry,” he gasped out. “I’m sorry.”
She held him tighter then, fiercely, as if she had the power in nothing but her arms to keep him safe.
“I’m sorry I joined the rebels,” he said. “I’m sorry I wasn’t loyal. But I am now. I’m staying here, with you and Sima and Lady Bhumika, I made a promise, and I’m sorry.”
“It doesn’t matter,” she told him. “None of it matters. You’re okay.”
“I told Lady Bhumika what I was. I told Gauri. I…” He trailed off, as if he couldn’t explain himself to her. As if he didn’t have the words for why his heart had changed. Why he wanted to remain with her, with Bhumika.
“It’s different,” she said. “Having a home. Isn’t it?”
He pursed his mouth to stop his lip from trembling. Nodded.
“You’re okay,” she said gently. “We’re both okay. You have nothing to apologize for, Rukh, nothing at all.” She hugged him again, pressing her head to the leaves and curls on his head. “I’m sorry I’m hugging you while covered in blood.”
“That’s fine,” Rukh said, muffled, sounding calmer now. He sniffled a little. “I don’t care. It doesn’t smell great, though.”
“I bet it doesn’t.”
She let him go then, before either of them could begin to feel awkward. Rukh smoothed down his clothes. Rubbed his eyes dry.
“There’s a lot that’s happened in Hiranaprastha since I left,” said Priya. “Will you both tell me everything you can?”
Some of that awful guilt finally dimmed from Rukh’s face. Sima drew in closer, and the two of them began to weave the tale as Priya thought of the deathless waters. The promise of them. The hope.
She thought of her dead siblings. The thrice-born, like Sanjana, who could manipulate the rot. She thought of what she might be able to do to save Rukh, if she had the same kind of power.
She could make something of what she was—of what she and Ashok and Bhumika were—that wasn’t only monstrous or cursed. She could make something good. She could save him.
Cure. Not curse.
Perhaps.
ASHOK
They began to die. One, then two. Then a third.
“Thrice-dead,” he murmured, as he closed eyes. Felt silent wrists. If only there were a magic in this, as there was in surviving the waters. But death was a failure, and the deathless waters granted nothing in return for their due.
He listened to labored, water-laden lungs heaving for breath around him, and felt the tightness in his own. He felt the tremor of his own strength beginning to seep out of him.
They kept on walking. He could feel Priya and Bhumika. He could follow the pulse of their presence in the sangam and the green of the soil until he found them once more, and then he would take Priya’s knowledge, by trickery or violence or if it came to it, by pleading at her feet.
Then Ashok began to grow more ill: blood rising in his sweat, in his eyes.