Page 80 of The Enduring Universe
She screamed, his name echoing around them, and the men and women turned back at the sound, their gazes silvery and emotionless. Ahilya knew that they were infected. The falcon was controlling them, warping their desires to its own, and in turn they were holding Iravan down, choking him with the same infection.
Iravan’s fingers on her throat twitched, pressing harder. She could see the will it took him to fight them in his silvery eyes. Tearsstreamed down his cheeks, and in that instant, he looked like he had always been, before he’d found the Resonance, before he’d become aware of the falcon-yaksha. She knew he held onto his lucidity by a fingernail. Any second these past lives would subsume him again, pushing their desire down his throat, choking him until all that he exhaled would be their command.
She trembled in both visions, watching this utter loss of himself when his journey was supposed to purify him. She knew she was seconds away from death.
It was too much. It was too horrifying. She and Iravan saw each other, and she tried to show him that she still loved him. That she understood. That she did not blame him.
Leaves rained down in her Etherium like a downpour of grief. Each one a memory, each one a thorn that had once impaled her.
A strong memory was essential to hold onto a sense of self.
For the architects, as for herself.
Ahilya jerked, seeking a strong memory of the both of them, and the vriksh responded. A single leaf fluttered toward her open palms, and within it she saw herself and Iravan embracing. Ahilya crushed the leaf and the flakes trembled in her hands. With all of her will, she released those flakes into the air again—and they soared toward Iravan, still held down by the ghosts of his past lives. Fragments drifted to him, and he inhaled them, ingested them. She saw his throat move in a swallow. His fingers loosened around her throat, but Ahilya gripped him, and inhaled the leaf-fragments too. Lights sparked behind her eyes, carrying her, and—
48
AHILYA
She came to herself suddenly.
She had been elsewhere, right? Something had happened to her, bright and inevitable and terrible. Ahilya looked into the mirror she was staring at, trying to remember what she’d seen, what she’d experienced. But it dissipated like a dream, and she blinked to the reality of her present.
She was in her home in Nakshar, the one she had grown up in. Tariya had married Bharavi and moved away to the architects’ quarters, and this place was Ahilya’s, now that their parents had left Nakshar. She stared at the rustling leaves of the walls, the soft sunlight streaming in through the windows. In her memory, she could hear the veiled disappointment from her parents that she and her sister had not been born with the power. Were they here, would they have been proud that both sisters were marrying architects? How strange to think that this house, with all its memories and grief and laughter, would be dissolved into the ashram when she left it today to go live with her new husband.
Ahilya smiled, thinking of the frantic days of the past, Iravan’snervous proposal in the library alcove, and how his head had been bowed, his hand held out in humble offering. She could see her giddy acceptance, while she slipped her fingers into his, pulling him up, stuttering her yes. He had caught her unaware with the proposal. She had been light-headed since then, moving in a trance of happiness.
“Ahilya?” his voice came, and she turned, still smiling. “Are you ready?”
She saw herself through his gaze, beautiful beyond anything she’d ever been. She was dressed in a stunning, embroidered sari, the color of a rosy glinting dawn, the thread glinting gold and tracing animals in a jungle, as though pulled out of one of her archeological books. Ahilya had gotten this sari specially made, an indulgence she would never have thought to put the weavers of Nakshar through—but if one couldn’t be sentimental about one’s wedding, what was the point of anything? She giggled at Iravan’s hungry gaze, barely recognizing the sound coming from her lips.
Iravan had never looked more handsome. He wore white, a shin-length kurta and narrow pajamas, reminiscent of a Senior Architect though he was still only a Maze Architect. It was a reminder of the bonds of marriage and their importance for the ashrams and all architects. When an architect married—any architect—they were allowed to wear the white of Senior Architects. Ahilya’s heart leapt in delighted premonition. This uniform… He wore it well.
Iravan glanced down at the himself, and gave a rueful shrug. “It feels unearned. But Airav-ve insisted.”
“He knows that you are bound to take a seat on the council next to him,” she said. “They can’t deny you that.” Ahilya reached forward, and ran her fingers over the brown rudra-beads hanging from his wrists. More hung around his neck, each of them earned, an indication of his responsibilities. The both of them knew thatshe was right. Airav had indicated it to Iravan in measured words, and Bharavi had confirmed it without ceremony. With Junain’s passing, the council needed another member, and Iravan’s study of consciousness was by far the most promising of all the candidates in serving the ashram.
“If it happens—” he began.
“When it happens,” she corrected.
“—I’ll want you by my side. The Senior Architect’s induction ceremony is only for architects, but I intend to change things. I won’t have you missing it.”
“I’ll be there,” she said. “Always.”
She tipped her head back, trying to freeze this moment in her mind. She wanted to remember him this way forever. His too-long jet-black hair curled around his ears. The darkness of his skin, healthy and glowing. The tilted smile on his lips, part-lazy, part-excited.
Iravan reached for her and sighed. “I would kiss you,” he said, “but I might ruin this lip paint.”
“Before today is over, we will have ruined each other in many ways,” she replied, grinning.
He threw his head back and laughed at that. “Is that a promise?” His fingers tucked an errant strand of hair behind her ear, and in the mirror she saw his desire had formed a jasmine on the nearby wall. He plucked it to place it over her ear—a fitting ornament. Then he was grasping her hand, and they strode side by side to the waiting attendees, coming together for their wedding day.
Faces of friends and well-wishers blinked at Ahilya. She could not focus on anything except this wonderful, wonderful man holding her hand. Bharavi grinned, Tariya wiped away her tears, and there were others too, architects Ahilya did not know the names of but who Iravan had invited.
And then they were facing each other by the small fire of purity. Iravan was so very handsome that she could cry.
“No second thoughts?” he murmured. “Now would be the time.”
