Page 47 of The Surviving Sky
Even though Iravan wore no translucent architect robes, he wasIravan, Senior Architect and one of the most admired councilors of Nakshar. Ahilya was a nobody, and that was apparent at a glance. She felt like a child again, appraised by her own parents and their friends for being born without the ability to traject. More and more people had been born with the power recently, yetshehad not, and a buried shame gripped her; she could not help its rise under her skin.
But she could help her response.
Ahilya dropped her wrist, stood up straighter, and stared boldly back at the architects.You’re doing this for Oam, she reminded herself.For Oam and Dhruv and a nomination that will force the architects to rethink their disdain. Gritting her teeth, she followed Iravan to one of the wide corridors lining the quadrangle.
Unlike the other parts of the city that had appeared cramped, the Architects’ Academy was exquisite. Not a single tree was gnarled; instead, all of the trunks along the courtyard were evenly spaced and symmetrical. Sunlight danced through the foliage, showers of delicate blossoms drifting down from the canopy. The floor was no ordinary grass; gold and blue flowers grew in a lush mosaic, and soft moss cushioned Ahilya’s boots. Even the railings along the corridors were delicate. Patterns winked out of wood carved by artistic trajection.
Iravan stopped outside a dimly lit classroom. Inside, young beginner architects in their gray uniforms stood in a circle around tall thorny weeds. He moved discreetly to a side of the doorway, but Naila, who was teaching the class, noticed them, and then everyone was bowing. Some of the boys and girls twittered and nudged each other. Iravan smiled and waved at them to carry on.
“They like you,” Ahilya observed.
“They’re infatuated,” he muttered. “Some of them.”
“But they like you. All of them do. You haven’t taught here for so long, but I suppose it doesn’t wear off.”
“It hasn’tbeenso long,” he said, his voice guarded. “I was here briefly, during the last earthrage, whenI…”
When he hadn’t visitedher.
Ahilya’s chest tightened in anger and hurt, but she said nothing. Those seven months were not the first time she and Iravan had been so distant after an argument. Once, long before, they’d had a similar fight that had kept them away from each other.
They’d been courting a full year then, and Nakshar had made history by opening its council to sungineers for the first time. The city had been decorated lavishly, flower bursts at every corner and glowglobes twinkling within every bush. The two of them had celebrated with Iravan’s last bottle of rasa from Yeikshar, but afterward, Iravan had turned to Ahilya and suggested she become a sungineer.
“It’s become a promising career,” he’d said, throwing his arm out lazily, his head on her lap. “Perhaps you should consider it. You could change the world.”
Ahilya had frozen, midway through detangling his hair. Somewhere, a lightcracker exploded, filling the sky with pinpricks of radiance. “I’ll change the world with archeology,” she’d said carefully. “It will have its time.”
“Yes, but look to where the seeds are flying. Ahilya, if you gazed forward instead of back, you could do so much!”
The statement had been so callous that Ahilya had abruptly pushed him off her, maddened. “Why are we talking about me?”
“I’mjust—”
“I want to change thingsthisway.Myway. Why don’t you believe in me?”
Irritation had flashed on Iravan’s features. “I believe in you, but you make things harder for yourself as an archeologist. Why not try abetter—”
“Better?Iravan, why is sungineeringbettersimply because the architects have finally deemed it so? Why would you think archeology is lesser? You’re supposed to be on my side.”
They’d both been so furious with each other, they’d spent the next two months apart. Then Ahilya had returned home one day to see her walls full of jasmines. A contrite Iravan had been waiting with a rare book from the architects’ archives that had helped her with expanding her theories.
She glanced at her husband now, her anger wavering. Iravan’s apology for abandoning her now had hardly been better than the one all those years back, but did shewanta false apology? They had always been able to disagree. It was what made them strong, to be themselves and still bethem, to always return. What had happened? She couldn’t see back to when things had deteriorated, but she knew that at the heart of it was both their pride. Yet Iravan had come to her today, no matter his reasons. He was trying, despite his feelings, despite his obligations to the council. Ahilya turned back to the classroom, attempting to focus.
One by one, the children in the classroom began to glow blue-green, their skins lighting up. As Naila called out more instructions, some students stopped glowing while others blazed brighter.
“What are they doing?” Ahilya asked.
“They’re learning to enter the Moment,” Iravan said. “It’swhen—”
“I know what it is,” she said, then offered a small smile to take the heat out of her voice. “Ihavebeen married to a Senior Architect for over ten years.”
“I didn’t think you’d remember.”
“Not all our memories are bad.”
“N-no,” Iravan said, glancing at her, stammering in his surprise. “Not all.”
Ahilya nodded her head toward the children, feeling the flush rise in her as he watched her, still surprised. “It seems pretty easy.”
