I call out Kali’s name again, but my voice echoes in the empty room. I fall back against pillows that are nearly as soft as those in Rani Mahal. They make me forget where I am, my body shocked into a state of semiwakefulness that is nearly as awful as sleep. Now that I’m awake, all I can do is relive what happened at the palace. Shayla killing my attendant and King Lohar. Cavas’s father dying. Juhi fighting with Alizeh, giving us time to run. Amira’s scream of pain.
A soft knock on the door makes me look up. A tall, muscular girl of perhaps Amira and Kali’s age stands at the threshold, a plate of food in her hands. Her fine black curls are held back in a bun, her bronze skin tattooed exactly like Esther’s, with silver-and-black stars over the forehead. She’s dressed like the older woman as well—in a short blue tunic and billowing trousers that cinch at the ankles.
“You’re awake,” she says, and I’m surprised by how soft her voice is. “I can’t tell you how long I’ve waited—how long we’ve all waited—for you.”
“What d-do you mean?”
She walks into the room slowly, holds up the plate like an offering. “You’re the One. The girl the prophecy foretold.”
I want to deny this. To tell her that I’m no Star Warrior and that I didn’t even kill the king. But something about her expression gives me pause. It has been so long since someone has looked at me without any calculation or dislike. I take the plate from her hands. Warm, fragrant roti. Small bowls of cool yogurt and steaming black lentils. A whole pink onion, the outer shell removed.
“I know it isn’t much,” she says, sounding embarrassed. “Not like what you’re probably used to—”
“It’s m-more than what I’m used t-to,” I say slowly, carefully enunciating each word. And I’m not just talking about the food. I rip into the roti and shovel a morsel of the lentils into my mouth. Without even thinking about it, I take a bite out of the onion and then grimace at the sweet and pungent taste. My disgust makes the girl laugh. I find myself smiling back.
“I’m Sami,” she says.
“I’m Gul.”
She grins again, and I realize she probably already knows who I am. “He’s handsome. Your neela chand.”
Neela chand. The Vani phrase for blue moon. Or mate. I begin sputtering. “C-cavas? He’s not m-my neela—he’s not my mate.”
In fact, I’m pretty sure he regrets that I’m still alive. From the startled look on Sami’s face, I realize I’ve spoken that thought out loud.
“Sami!” a voice calls from outside the room. Esther. “Where are you?”
“Coming, Esther Didi!” Sami looks guilty, as if she has been caught doing something she shouldn’t be. She clasps my left wrist and gives it a squeeze. “I don’t know much about love and things like that. They brought me here shortly after I was born. But he called for you when he was asleep. When I told Esther Didi you had woken from your dust dream, he tried to follow her outside.”
She leaves me there, staring into space, with a hope that I have no right to feel blooming in my chest.
It takes three more days before the grogginess subsides and Esther declares I’m fit to leave the room.
Sami holds out her hand to help, but I shake my head. I don’t want to appear weaker than I already am.
“Burdens lessen when shared, Gul ji,” Sami says softly.
“I wish you’d call me Gul,” I tell her. I don’t deserve any honorific after my name. In fact, Sami’s words remind me so much of Cavas, it’s painful. My heart races with the knowledge that I will see him today. Esther said she wants to speak to both of us first in the courtyard outside.
Though my room has windows, there’s a vast difference between looking out at the courtyard from here and stepping into the open and feeling the ground under my sandaled feet. A pair of girls dressed in blue tunics and trousers pass us by. Their foreheads are tattooed like Sami’s, and they gape when they see me dressed exactly the way they are, except with a bare face.
“Move on!” Sami’s voice, so soft while speaking to me, sharpens while addressing them. “Get to training!”
After the girls leave, I turn to Sami again and finally ask the question I’d been too hesitant to over the past three days. “Sami, your tattoos. What do they mean?”
Sami smiles with a touch of pride. “The tattoos mean we are the Legion of the Star Warrior. It was Esther Didi’s idea. We’ve been training for the past twenty years. Well, I’ve only been training for fourteen. We all knew you would come someday.”
“The Legion of the Star Warrior?” The words make me feel queasy. Does she mean what I think she means? “Are you an army?”
“Yes,” Sami says patiently. “But we’re not just any army. We’re your army. Ready to fight at your command.”
Overhead, I hear voices rising and falling in a chant: The sky has fallen! A star will rise! The familiar clack of sticks rattles the air, making my skin break out in goose bumps.
I wonder what Sami will say if I tell her that I didn’t kill the king. Or that the king’s death has only unleashed the sort of chaos I didn’t even imagine. But before I can open my mouth and reveal any of this, a pair of figures emerges from the building behind us. Kali, followed by Cavas, who walks with a slight limp. My eyes take in everything: the dark-red angrakha that fits him like a glove, the loose white trousers, his head bare of its usual orange turban, silky black locks falling over his forehead. My hands itch to push them aside. The scar on his face has healed well; in a few days, barely a trace will remain.
Cavas is studying me in a similar fashion. A
