“I was telling Govind ji that Siya needs a horse of her own if she intends to keep up with me.”
Gul. Or Siya, as she’s calling herself these days, the sun reflecting in her eyes. Our gazes lock, slide away. I rise to my feet. I’m not thinking about how perfectly her new clothes fit. Or wondering if the skin on her bare waist is as smooth as it looks. Next to us, Malti is arguing with Govind again—an argument that I know she’ll lose.
“Rajkumari, you aren’t permitted to race Dhoop,” Govind is saying patiently. “Your mother’s orders, remember? A light canter is occasionally allowed, but a gallop is considered unladylike. Cavas will lead him for you, and your serving girl will accompany you. On foot.”
It’s against protocol for servants to ride the horses, and Govind conveys this in a voice that is both gentle and firm.
“I wanted to ride today! Properly!” Malti’s small face puffs up—the beginnings of a royal tantrum.
“A walk will be so much nicer, Rajkumari,” Gul cuts in with a smile. “We can enjoy the cool air, breathe in the smell of the rain. The garden is so green today. Certainly, it seems like it will rain again. Perhaps even the River Aloksha will begin flowing.”
An optimistic thought. Ambar’s only river, which originates in a glacier in Prithvi’s mountains, hasn’t flowed since the Great War. Unless Prithvi’s king lowers his magical wall, I doubt the Aloksha will ever flow again.
Gul isn’t wrong when she says the palace grounds and the garden are green—thanks to the magic perpetually infused into the soil by the gardeners. But magic isn’t endless, and it always comes at a cost. Govind tells me that more palace gardeners have depleted themselves and retired early during King Lohar’s reign than during any other.
Their only relief comes in the form of the rain now scenting the air, brought forth by clouds that can be seen slowly gathering in the west, a patch of gray in a distant blue sky.
“Siiiyaaaaaaaa,” Malti complains.
“Rajkumari Maltiiiiiiii,” Gul chides in the same singsongy way.
Govind’s mouth narrows with disapproval, but Malti bursts out laughing. I feel myself smile.
I sense Gul watching me, but by the time I turn to look, she’s already fussing with the princess’s small dupatta, tying it around her waist and carefully tucking it in.
Dhoop, like his name, is pure sunshine during the day, his yellow coat gleaming like butter. Foaled by a sturdy Ambari mare, the pony has strong legs and enough enthusiasm to kick up a whole pathway through the grass if we let him. I feel him tugging at the rope when I lead him out, as excited to see Malti as she is to see him. To my surprise, the pony also nuzzles Gul’s cheek, and she strokes his nose, smiling.
“You’re a funny one,” she says under her breath, her voice soft, meant for the pony alone.
I turn away. Only a whisperer and her magic. What difference does that make?
But it does make a difference. Controlling Dhoop can be difficult, and I need to be firm from the outset that this is a walk and not a run. Today, however, he’s relatively placid, and part of this, I believe, is due to Gul’s presence, walking alongside us, chatting with Princess Malti, her hand brushing the pony’s coat from time to time.
The earth gets drier the farther we walk from the stables, cracks visible in the surface. I keep a lookout for snakes as I lead Dhoop up a particularly steep curve and then down, where the path gently descends and then plateaus—a fairly flat patch of land cordoned off by a ring of sharp rocks. Beyond the ring, the thick wall surrounding the palace rises, locking us in.
Here, away from Govind’s stern eye, I finally let go of Dhoop’s reins. “Please be careful, Rajkumari. No climbing the rocks. Stick to the—”
“—rock circle as much as possible,” Malti interrupts. She gives me a wide grin. “I know, Cavas. I promise I won’t get you into any trouble.”
She makes a clicking sound, and soon enough Dhoop’s walk turns into a light canter and then a full gallop.
Gul turns to me, her eyebrows raised. “Whatever happened to her mother’s orders?”
“As far as I’m concerned, not being able to ride a horse is a lot worse than being unladylike. Govind agrees with me. He just can’t admit it publicly. Besides, Malti is a natural on horseback.”
Gul laughs. “Now I see why she likes you so much.” For a few moments, we both watch Malti race around the circle formed by the rocks.
“Dhoop seems to like you,” I say at last.
“We had horses at ho—where I come from.”
“Many magi homes do. Not all magi seem to really like them, though.” Even Govind, who can control the wildest of stallions, sees it as more of a duty than a pleasure. “And the horses, too, rarely respond like that to strangers unless they know them well.”
She shrugs. “I like animals.”
“Fireflies, too?”
Her body stiffens in response, but after a pause, she answers. “Fireflies, too.”
A black-tailed shvetpanchhi circles overhead, perching on a stone jutting from the pink sandstone wall. A white feather floats briefly in the sky before settling on a rock a few feet from us.
“My father told me that shvetpanchhi feathers look like snow,” she says. “All white and gleaming in the sun.”
I watch the feather, try to visualize a thousand more falling from the sky. “I’ve never seen snow before.”
“Neither have I,” she says. “But Papa had been to Prithvi as a boy. He said it snows all the time over there and gets especially heavy around this time of the year. Those who hate the snow call it the Month of Dandruff instead of the Month of Tears.”
A laugh spills out of me, almost involuntarily. “You mean the way people here call Tears the Month of Piss?” Her horrified face makes me smile. “What? You didn’t know?”
“I didn’t—and it reminded me of Javeribad’s
