Page 109 of The Dragon's Promise

“Tie him? To the tree?” I repeated, appalled by the instruction. “I thought demons wouldn’t come to this house.”

“They won’t come in,” replied Oshli, with an edge to his tone. “But the one inside him may come out.”

“Is there any way to subdue Bandur?” Takkan asked evenly.

Takkan’s calm rivaled the shaman’s, and only I winced.

“Demons are immortal; only magic can kill them.” Oshli paused. “But we humans are not without defenses.” He circled the tree, his gaze never leaving Takkan. “I’ll return with incense and rope before sundown. Do as I bid you, and Tambu’s demons should let you alone. I cannot speak for the one within him.”

Sensing that his presence wasn’t entirely welcome, Takkan lingered by the tree. “I’ll wait here while you acquaint Shiori with the house.”

Before I could protest, he backed into the courtyard, leaving me alone with the dour-faced shaman.

Thanks a lot, Takkan, I grumbled in my thoughts.

Oshli entered the hut on our right. “You may stay in the kitchen tonight,” he said. “There’s a bed on the other side of the curtain, and some food left in the pantry for nourishment. Not much, but it should sustain you until I return.”

“I thought no one lived here anymore.”

“I come sometimes, to pay my respects.” The slightest flicker in his brow perturbed his calm.

“Who lived here?” I asked again.

A beat of hesitation. “The owner left many years ago for the capital,” he replied. “Only I come, sometimes, to bring offerings to the tree.”

That explained the food in the pantry. “Offerings to the tree?”

He wouldn’t look at me. “For the two sisters who once resided here.”

The hairs on the back of my neck rose. “What happened to them?”

“They were both lost to Tambu, but in very different ways.”

My eyes flew up to meet the shaman’s. Two sisters. “This was their house, wasn’t it? Vanna and…Channari’s.”

Channari. Every time I said the name, my heart gave a twinge. Channari was the name of my stepmother’s true self, a secret she had kept from everyone—even my father.

“This was their house,” I repeated. “You knew them.”

I’d finally broken the shaman’s composure, and he pursed his lips tightly. “Everyone knew them. The beauty and the snake.”

There was no malice in his reply, but I still flinched. “Were you friends?”

“Channari had no friends.” A pause. “But I knew Vanna.”

“What was she like?” I said.

The hard lines bracketing Oshli’s mouth softened, giving me a glimpse of the boy he’d once been. “She was kind and generous and gentle. She had the power to make anyone adore her—even her stern adah could never say no to her. The girls in the village used to fight over who could brush her hair, and the boys vied simply to touch it.”

“Softer than waterbird feathers,” I murmured, remembering Raikama’s hair.

“Yes.”

I regarded him, and the wistfulness on his face shuttered a beat too late.

“Were you in love with her?” I asked, surprised by my own brazenness.

To his credit, he did not falter. “We all were. Everyone worshiped her. They used to think the mysterious light in her chest was a gift from the gods. She was born with it, you know. When she laughed, it would emanate through her clothes like the sun. The Golden One, they used to call her.”

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