Page 61 of The Enduring Universe
“Am I changing it?” she challenged. “Or am I clarifying it? Iravan, do you want to destroy the Virohi, or make amends? You are conflating the two, and therein is the root of your problem. That is the only thing I am trying to affect—the only thing I have from the start.”
The words were so close to the disturbing thoughts Iravan had about his conflict with material bonds that his suspicion grew tenfold. “My capital desire is for me to decide,” he spat. “If the planetrage is so dangerous, then destroy the Virohi like your council desires you to. Give them to me, and letmedestroy them, if the thought makes you so queasy. I will help you with this planetrage after we’ve done this. Andthatwill be my making of amends.”
“It will be too late then,” she said. “You saw how the planetrage affected you, and if you are injured in your ridiculous battle with the Virohi, then it will be all for nothing. You almost died already when the Virohi attacked you after you bombed them, and—”
Sudden sounds of commotion rose, drowning out the rest of what she was saying. The three of them whipped around to face the class they had all but forgotten. Somewhere, Reyla was shouting, and Naila wore the same grim expression from the fight between Darsh and Kush, as though preparing to break up another altercation.
Then Reyla’s words grew clearer.
“No,” the little girl was shrieking. “No—that’s not—you shouldn’t—What are you doing?”
Iravan saw his confusion and alarm on his wife’s face, and then they were both running behind Naila, pushing through the crowd. Iravan stopped, blinded momentarily. Light flooded his vision. He could barely discern the shape, but it appeared like a slim, spiraling vortex. Ahilya clutched his arm; only she touched him this way.
The both of them recognized what it meant. They’d seen it before, the only two here who had ever seen something like this before.
This was a vortex of unification.
Someone was uniting with their yaksha.
33
AHILYA
The nightmare of the last vortex flashed in her head. Iravan walking into the column of silver as though hypnotized. The way she had run after him, the both of them tumbling into it together. Lights everywhere, and being suspended mid-air, the falcon’s gigantic wings surrounding them.
The unity with the falcon had saved Iravan, but it had ended him too. It had changed him beyond recognition, the falcon’s intent poisoning the man she had loved. Neither of them had known it back then. Hard to believe it had occurred in this same habitat, when it looked so different now.
Iravan’s capital event had manifested in a terrible justification of genocide. It had brought the fifty sister ashrams crashing down from the skies, erasing a thousand-year-old history, condemning the sister ashrams to become the last survivors of the human species. What would the merging of another Ecstatic and yaksha do? How would anyone survive this? Ahilya’s arm still clutched Iravan’s. She didn’t know if it was because she wanted him to do something, or so she wouldn’t simply fall.
Iravan released her grip gently then cleaved through the press. Ahilya tried to follow, but other bodies had closed the gap. She remained standing where she was, able to see the radiant vortex only through flashes between moving people.
Someone nudged her, and she turned to see Naila standing on her tiptoes beside her to see past the others. “It’s Darsh,” the architect reported grimly. “I don’t think there is an actual yaksha—not like you said Iravan-ve had with the falcon. And it doesn’t look like a full vortex that you described, either.”
Ahilya swallowed a few times to clear the dryness in her throat. “An incorporeal yaksha, then,” she croaked out. “The others haven’t been seen for a while. Not even by Iravan. We don’t know where they are.”
“Does it matter if the yaksha is incorporeal?”
“I don’t know. I haven’t learned anything more about them for months.” How could she? She’d forgotten she was an archeologist. She had become a councilor, and then… whatever this was.
Naila gripped Ahilya’s hand, and together they moved through the crowd, weaving their way to the front. “Last time you said the Virohi attacked you when Iravan-ve united with his falcon,” Naila said.
The memory still terrified Ahilya. She had stood as a shield when the cosmic creature had begun unravelling Iravan. She had protected him with her consciousness, wrapping him in a cocoon that the Virohi had been unable to pierce. But she had not returned from it unscathed. Her body had shed her unborn child because of her time in the vortex. Her mind had opened her Etherium to Iravan’s. And she had made the Virohi aware of her presence. It was one reason all the Virohi had gravitated toward her after the Conclave had landed, attackingher, sensingheras a threat. It was the reason she had become such an active player in this cosmicgame. Iravan had been right—she should never have been involved to this extent, but the choice had been made for her by her actions.
Ahilya could feel the cosmic creatures spreading through her chest and neck, a connection that resembled the core tree, an entangled root ball extending its branches, a growing amalgamation of the two entities forming within her, seeping into her brain and consciousness. The creatures were quiescent now, as though sleeping after being drained, and it startled her, to think of them in such a way. Did Virohi sleep? Iravan had accused her of humanizing them, but that seemed to be occurring on its own.
“They won’t interfere this time,” she replied to Naila. “They have no reason to.”
Only one Virohi had attacked her and Iravan back then, but that was because they had tried to stop that creature from splitting. This time, all the cosmic creatures were trapped in the vriksh. What would be the point of them doing anything? They were already where they wanted to be. In the tree, and in her mind. The conversation with Basav and the others about overwriting returned to Ahilya, but she did not fear the Virohi in the way the others did. No, what she feared were the yakshas and the Ecstatics. She feared this vortex.
Naila’s hand squeezed hers sensing her terror. “Steady, Ahilya-ve,” she said. “I’m right here. You’re not alone.”
The words were reminiscent of her healing litany, but unlike with Chaiyya, Ahilya did not question it from Naila. She squeezed back and didn’t let go.
“So what do we do?” Naila asked.
“I’m not sure we need to do anything,” Ahilya replied. “Except…”
She trailed off. The unification of a broken cosmic creature was a merging of an architect and a yaksha—two halves that built. It was a unification of construction, but one of destruction too. Iravanhad found himself after the unity, but he’d lost parts of himself too. After he had united with the falcon, the rest of the corporeal yakshas that had once lived in the habitat had disappeared, never to be seen again. The entire habitat had reshaped itself. She had woken up to incredible change. Would such a thing happen again? She could not account for Darsh, who was going through the unity now, but the Garden? Ahilya glanced around at the swirling foliage so like an airborne ashram, and the slim trunks of trees, waving slightly in the breeze. It was calm. Too calm. The hairs on her neck rose. This place would not remain the same. She knew it.
