Page 121 of The Surviving Sky
The sungineer shook his head. “It’s why you became an archeologist. You could have been a sungineer or a mathematician or anything else. But you needed something that wasyours—wholly,fully, truly yours. Something that couldn’t be touched by anything or anyone else. And so, you found the deadest field in the world.”
Ahilya watched the councilors. Kiana and Laksiya were silent, but Chaiyya was shaking her head, pressing Airav’s arm, evidently begging him to reconsider.
“I never did like him, you know?” Dhruv went on, and Ahilya knew he was talking about Iravan. “Even when you first started courting him. He was arrogant and high-handed and so damned aware of his own charm that he used it ruthlessly like a weapon. But he did one thing with you that no one has. He didn’t enable your selfishness.”
Ahilya’s eyes met Dhruv’s. She couldn’t think of a single thing to say.
“Do you think,” Dhruv asked softly, “he’d want you to do what you’re doing right now?”
They stared at each other. She knew he wasright—aboutIravan, abouther. A chill went through Ahilya. Iravan against the world. That’s what her choices had come down to. That, in the end, was the price of survival.Don’t leave me, he had said, but he would have asked her to stay had he known this.Hewould have stayed to protect Nakshar, given the same choices; done what was right, overcome the pull of his bonds to her for his bonds to the ashram, no matter how much it hurt.
But she couldn’t.Shecouldn’t.
Dhruv patted her hand with his. “You two deserve each other.”
His words were like a slap on her face. Ahilya grew cold. She rose to her feet mechanically as Airav waved at them. Dhruv joined her, and they approached the bench and sat down again, neither of them speaking.
“We’ll do it,” Airav said without preamble. “Do you want us to make a healbranch promise?”
“No,” Ahilya whispered. “I trust you.”
“Then tell us your information. And if it’s sound, we’ll find a way to take you to Iravan.”
Ahilya didn’t dare glance at Dhruv. Guilt weighed her down, shaking her resolve. Quietly, her voice dull, she told them everything she and her husband had worked out right before the attack, about the yakshas being sentient beings, about their habitat in the jungle, about the real reason behind the earthrages. They listened, spellbound, as she told them how she and Iravan had connected the missing pieces within the architects’ records, how they had decoded the historical fear of the jungle, how they’d thought proof lay in the evolution of spiralweed. When Ahilya reached the part about yakshas trajecting, Chaiyya let out a startled exclamation.
“It makes sense,” the Senior Architect breathed, her hand around her pregnant belly. “The suddenness of the attack, and why the third quadrant was destroyed. This was why none of our battle trajection worked against the creature.”
“How is this possible?” Kiana asked. “Yakshas haveneverattacked humans before. What could prompt this, even if we are to believe they can traject?”
“It’s not trajection,” Ahilya said wearily. Iravan had been silent only about one thing while navigating the conversation, but Ahilya had worked it out for herself. “It’s Energy X. It’s the same as Ecstatic trajection. Dhruv has already engineered something that uses Ecstasy. You want an alternate source of energy to replace trajection? Find a way to harness a yaksha. That’s why the elephant-yaksha’s tracker remained charged for the last five years. This is probably why Iravan’s tracker right now is working. The falcon-yaksha must be trajecting Ecstatically. For us to be able to pick up thesignal—thefalcon and Iravan, they must be close enough to reach.”
The others turned their gaze to Dhruv. He didn’t meet their eyes, but his shoulders trembled.
“The yakshas are neither predator nor prey,” Ahilya said. “At least, they haven’t been,before—eventhe histories agree to that. But something triggered the falcon-yaksha to attack. I don’t know what, but its eyes had a pattern I’ve only noticed once before on the elephant-yaksha during the last expedition. I can draw it for you, but I suspect that those patterns work the same as an architect’s tattoos. They only appear when the yaksha is trajecting. This is all Iknow—Iswear it. And now it’s your turn to fulfill your end of the bargain.”
“We can never get close enough to a yaksha if this is true,” Laksiya said, turning to Chaiyya. “How does this help us?”
“It’s still information we can relay to the others,” Chaiyya replied. “Not everyone’s situation is as desperate as ours.”
“But the implications of this,” Gaurav said, leaning in. “If we’re not the only trajectors in theworld…if our histories are so incomplete, what else is being kept from us?”
“I think you’re all forgetting the ethical implications,” Kiana said quietly. “Are we suggesting we want to drain a harmless creature and enslave it for our own existence?”
“It’s hardlyharmless—”
“This is exactly why normal citizens don’t likeus—”
Someone touched Ahilya’s shoulder. Airav had risen and approached her. He extended his hand, and she stood up and left the arguments of the council. Airav and Dhruv followed her. Ahilya still couldn’t meet Dhruv’s gaze, and Airav seemed lost in thought. The three walked silently until they reached the shrunken rudra tree.
Then the Senior Architect turned to her. “I can’t claim to understand your thinking. But you have helped, and I will honor our agreement.”
“You’ll take the ashram to Iravan, then?” Ahilya asked, hope rising in her chest.
“No. But I will sendyouto him.”
She frowned, glanced at Dhruv, then back again at the Senior Architect. “How?”
“You’ll see. But it behooves me to tell you this, Ahilya-ve,” the Senior Architect said. “This attempt is suicidal. You will most likely crash into the earthrage. We don’t know if our idea will work, or if the architecture will last long enough for you to track Iravan down. You don’t rightly even know where he is, and Dhruv has told me that Iravan’s tracker could die any moment. You’ll be flying out in the dark alone, and even if you find Iravan, how do you intend to rescue him if the falcon-yaksha can traject Ecstatically?”
