The Star-Touched Queen (The Star-Touched Queen #1)(27)

When I opened my eyes, my cheeks were wet with tears.

“Was what I saw real?”

“Yes and no,” said Amar softly. “It’s a fate hanging in the ether, merely an option and a thread that’s already run its course.”

“And this outcome of”—I hesitated, remembering the people strewn on the battlefields, the ones bearing my father’s symbol—“… peace … only happens if his mother slips into the Otherworld?”

“Not if. When.”

“When?” I echoed.

Amar lifted my hand and spun me in a quick circle. I blinked and found myself facing an entirely different landscape. Before me lay a village razed to the ground. I recognized the landscape; I had seen it in the tomes of the palace archives a hundred times. This was part of Bharata’s territory. Unattended fires dotted the horizon. My hand flew to my nose, but nothing softened the stench of war. A sharp sound caught my attention and I turned to see the same boy, now grown up, pushing his horse at a breakneck speed over the burning land, rallying the surviving villagers together and spearing Ujijain’s flag into the charred soil.

The vision sped up. Bharata was no more. Hammers were taken to its parapets. Sledges to its ancient monuments. It was like my father’s reign had never existed. Everything had been swallowed up by the grown boy and the blazing war. Yet … even with my father’s legacy completely erased, there was one thing I noticed: no bodies.

The scores of dead from the previous vision were gone. They had survived. Revulsion twisted in my stomach. I saw the choice before me, only it didn’t feel like a choice at all. Either way I looked, it was an execution. No matter what, Bharata would pay the price.

“In this fate, the boy becomes a mercenary. The king never raises him. Instead, he must fight to survive. But the peace he fought so hard for in the other life is much more easily accomplished in this outcome.”

I closed my eyes, watching this version of the boy’s life unwind behind my eyes. Instead of words to unite a kingdom, he used war. He had his peace, but it was a fragile thing, born of blood and at the cost of an entire country’s legacy.

“And his mother?”

“She slips into the Otherworld a mere year later.”

“Why isn’t there an option where she avoids the Otherworld altogether?”

“There are some pulls of fate that no one can alter,” said Amar, his voice worn. “While our kingdom has great power, some fates are fixed. All we can do is move in the spaces left ambiguous. Thankfully, fate leaves most things ambiguous.”

The village fire heated my face and I turned away from the flames.

“Get me away from here,” I said hoarsely.

My throat tightened. So this is what maintaining the borders of the realms meant. It was a cruel duty. Amar’s cloak fell across my eyes. I breathed deeply, letting the black silk cut off my sight.

When I opened my eyes, we were standing in the throne room. Amar drew the cloak away slowly, his fingers grazing my arms so lightly it might have been unintentional. That familiar warmth jolted in my stomach and I stepped back.

Beside me, the tapestry was dormant. Although it unfurled into beautiful pictures of the sky, sea and land, my eyes kept returning to its torn seam. It looked like a wound.

“What happened there?” I asked, pointing at the tear.

He stilled, refusing to turn in the tear’s direction. Finally, he spoke.

“Sometimes, a great trauma in the worlds can untether the threads. Hopefully, the tear will never concern us again.” His voice was quiet, dream-like, as if the tapestry were a sleeping thing he couldn’t bear to awaken. “But enough of that. Only one of the boy’s thread outcomes may survive. It is your decision.”

“Does the mother die when she enters the Otherworld?”

I pictured the Dharma Raja, the lord of justice in the Afterlife, riding toward the boy’s mother, swinging his noose to collect her soul and taking her to his bleak kingdom to await reincarnation.

Amar’s lips pressed into a thin line. “No one really dies. Death is just another state of life.”

“What’s the boy’s name?”

“Why do you ask?”

“Why wouldn’t I?” I said. “Each thread has a color and each color belongs to a person. If I’m going to make such a decision, I don’t want a nameless person on my conscience.”

“Wouldn’t it be easier keep your victim faceless?”

I shuddered. “Not a victim.”

“What else do you call one hemmed in by fate?”

“Human,” I said, bitterness creeping into my voice.

“What about guilt, then? Why open yourself to pain?”

“Guilt is what makes you accountable.”

Amar smiled and I sensed that I had passed some test. “His name is Vikram.” I repeated the name in my head. “You need not make your decisions now. That moment takes practice. But if the time comes and you cannot perform—”

“No,” I said, a little too quickly. This was what I had wanted all these years, hadn’t I? The chance to demonstrate that I was worthy of power? I couldn’t back down now. “I can do it.”

“I never doubted you.”

My anger wilted.

“Last night, I told you I would test you,” said Amar, stretching his hands. “Consider this our first lesson.”