Page 61 of The Legend of Meneka
We stare at each other.
His question sharpens the distance between us. Because in that moment, I don’t know how to answer. I don’t know if I know the answer at all.
Is this love at all? Am I even capable of it? I took away the choices of my other marks before, Tara, Ranjani, Nirjar, and countless other mortals. I broke my own sacred rule with Kaushika. I had so many chances to utter the truth to him—words of clarity, beyond theturmoil of emotion. Words that would show him who I was without a doubt, beyond the smoke of my power. He did not lie to me. He withheld and took his time trusting me, but what I did was a clear deception. Each time I chose to keep silent, I behaved like an apsara. And an apsara has always been a creature of illusions. Of duplicity and lust. Not love.
My hand rises in horror. My lips tremble.
He nods again. He understands.
Resignation covers his face. Kaushika’s voice is quiet. Sad. It breaks me. “Never return to the hermitage again if you value your life, Meneka,” he says.
Then he’s gone, and I am alone, my loneliness showing me who I really am.
CHAPTER 22
Idon’t know how long I stand there, stunned and grieving, unable to make sense of what has just occurred. Twice I attempt to move, to follow him and beg him to see my point of view, totalkto me, but any explanation I want to make seems hollow. I stand there as thoughIam the one cursed to become stone, my mind turbulent, reliving everything about the meadow, about Nanda’s fate and Kaushika’s words never to return, everything I’ve learned about myself.
It seems like hours pass. Perhaps it is only a few seconds.
My tether to Amaravati flames, and light grows in front of my eyes, and suddenly Rambha is back, just as she promised. I stagger, staring, momentarily forgetting my grief.
Rambha glows so luminous that she is almost blurry. I receive a startling sense that she is trying to hold her form. That she is so powerful her own body cannot contain her.
Then I blink, and the impression is gone. Rambha stands there, poised and beautiful, looking the same as she always has.
Still. Something is different. She has always been lovely—one of the most beautiful and seductive apsaras of Indra’s court. Now a whole different power radiates off her. Her onyx skin glows golden, a glitter that reminds me of Amaravati’s dust. Her sari, though wrapped around her sensuously, is no longer its usual green—a color Rambha prefers. Instead, it is bright blue, a favorite color of Lord Indra, reminiscent of the sky itself. The hues shift on it, clouds weaving in and out, each thread reminding me of a different mood of thelord. Even her jewelry is not part of an apsara’s attire. Her emerald bangles, the sapphire rings, the ruby nose pin—all of those are from Indra’s collection. The power in them sings to my own celestial magic, awakening it, even though I am not the one wearing them.
My heart sinks. These clothes are a sign. She has given herself over completely to Indra. No longer my friend but a handler.Hisagent.
A part of me still wants to go to her despite this, to search her eyes and beg her to make matters all right. I remain rooted to the spot instead, her magnificent power washing over me. There is an aloofness on her face I have never seen before. Her scent bewilders me. Once it was light, its star-anise delicate and insidious, the kind of scent that could carve a place in one’s heart without their knowledge. Now it is sharp, with a fire edging it, like lightning in a storm. It attacks me, and my palms grow sweaty. I try to take a deep breath.
“Meneka,” Rambha says, and her voice echoes. “Did you do as you were asked?”
I swallow. The timbre is as melodious as ever, but the words burrow under my skin. I want to submit to her. Please her. The compulsion grows in me, and I become slightly dizzy, the forest spinning in my vision. What is happening? What is she doing?
My voice comes out a croak. “Yes. I … I lay with him,” I whisper.
At this, Rambha’s mouth thins into a smile. “Then I must commend you. Though would it not have been better to do so from the very beginning, Meneka? If you did not think yourself better than your sisters?”
So much cruelty is laden into those questions that a spark of indignance flickers inside me. Kaushika and I lay together by this very pond. We worshiped each other. We loved. It was pure and sweet and true. I will not allow her to sully the memory.
I open my mouth to retort, but she is already shaking her head, past it. “Very well, then. You lay with him. What did that achieve?”
“No, it wasn’t—I didn’t—it was not for the mission—I wanted to—”
“You wanted to.”
“Yes. For devotion—not like yours for Indra—but—” My words catch in my throat, bony and brittle.
The heartache of the last few hours pounds inside my head. I try to inhale and clear it, but Rambha’s scent comes to me again, overpowering me, her magic so strong that I am slow in her presence. Her power is a subtle reminder. This is what Indra’s blessing can do for me too.
“For devotion,” Rambha says. “Then he is in love with you too? He is seduced?”
I stare at Rambha and try to remember her the way I saw her the last time. The ache for Amaravati, to finally return home after such a long internment in the mortal realm, blooms in me. Memories flash in my head—fruit-laden apsara groves, laughter and song, gandharvas with their music, and the sweet scent of cinnamon. Endless dance and gold mansions. Skies underneath my feet, chasing my footsteps. Hymns and solace and luxury. If I close my eyes, I can see it, the swarga where I belong, where I will live my immortal life. That is all I wanted.
But that wasbefore.
Before Kaushika.
