The Star-Touched Queen (The Star-Touched Queen #1)(56)

Kamala reared onto her hind legs and broke into a run. My hair, still damp from Kamala’s mouth, whipped about my face. I flattened against her back and tried to glimpse our surroundings, but all I saw was a blur of valleys that looked more dead than alive. A strange smell filled my senses, of sulfur and water.

“Where are we going?” I managed to choke out.

“You want to cross into the land of the Otherworld, but it is a guarded thing, full of anger,” responded Kamala. “To do anything, you must receive the permission of its guardian. We must get to the ocean.”

Ocean? My eyes widened.

Lashing wind burned my eyes. Eventually, we began to climb over a gray valley before arriving at the rim of a great ocean. My legs ached as I dismounted and my lungs filled with the briny air of the sea. Tall waves rolled toward us like watery giants, white crests like crowns. A split sky stretched over the ocean—half-night, half-day.

Kamala nudged a conch shell toward me. “Make no sound, merely hold it to your lips.”

I did as I was told and the crashing waves froze.





20

THE CLOUD BRIDGE

Something dark appeared beneath the surface of the waves. The waves crashed over the spot repeatedly, unearthing two pale mounds in the water.

“What is that?” I asked, trying to keep my voice still.

Hadn’t I had enough of monsters? I was already standing next to a flesh-eating demon.

“Airavata,” said Kamala. “Tricky elephant. He likes to knit.”

“What does he knit?”

“Clouds.”

“Oh.”

Kamala ignored me and stared with her milky eyes at the white piles in the sea. I followed her gaze, my mouth nearly dropping open. What I had thought were small hillocks of stone were Airavata’s gigantic white ears. He rose out of the waves, water trailing through his wrinkled trunk and pooling along the dents of his back. I had never seen an elephant like Airavata. Across his tusks lay a thin cloud and in his trunk he carried an ivory comb. As Airavata combed the cloud, out drifted dark puffs of air that glinted with lightning. His eyes were filled with warmth and he flapped his ears in greeting. Artfully looping his trunk around the cloud, he unhooked it from his tusks and placed the comb and cloud onto his back.

“And what is this?” asked Airavata, leaning forward. His voice was rich and deep, streaked with friendliness and a wizened timber. “A demon near my waters and someone who smells of secrets.”

Kamala turned to me, whispering, “Which one am I?”

“The person full of secrets,” I muttered.

Kamala whinnied. “Oh, I hope you are a queen. You are funny. Funny, funny. What does funny taste like?” She paused. “Maybe I hope you are not a queen. I would like to taste funny.”

“I am certain you do.” I smirked before turning to Airavata. “We seek passage to the Otherworld, to the Night Bazaar.”

“Strange place. Stranger still, with chaos alive and angry.”

I swallowed nervously, my thoughts jumping to Amar. Where was he? Was he safe?

“What do you mean?”

“It means that I am spinning storm clouds of late,” said Airavata slowly. He waved his trunk toward a dark cloud that darted around his legs.

“Will you let me pass? I have to get there.”

Airavata stared, before bowing his head. “No.”

“No?” I repeated dumbly. “You don’t understand, I need to be there. I need to speak with the Dharma Raja. I need to get back to—”

“It does not matter to me how or why you must get back. I am merely a spinner of clouds. Not a diviner. I cannot augur your heartbreak like entrails any more than I can speak the language of faraway stars.”

“Why won’t you let me in?”

Kamala turned sightless on me. I thought I saw hunger in her gaze. Not today, I murmured in my head. I will not be demon feed.

“I demand that you let me in,” I repeated.

Airavata only batted his ears. “You see, that is why. You can only enter the Otherworld by invitation, self-worth or sacrifice. Or by standing beneath a double-rainbow with a belly full of cold, cold sapphires. And I have not seen a double-rainbow in five hundred years. And I know you have no invitation, for your name is on no list. The way you seek before me now is the way of self-worth, and that you have not earned.”

“There are demons inside the Otherworld. Flesh-eating bhuts and wraiths the size of whole countries and you’re telling me that I have to prove myself to join them?”

“I never said it had to be good self-worth. You could slay a million children. Maybe then you could come. But in your current state, your soul cannot handle the Otherworld.”

“But I was let in before!” I protested, thinking back to my wedding day, and the hours spent with my arms around Amar’s waist while we walked through jungles, our bodies close. I thought of his promise, his palm welling with blood. His assurances. His kiss. “Why is now any different?”

“It is different because you are different.”

“And when I ‘prove’ myself, I’ll somehow find my way back in?”

Airavata nodded.

“Isn’t there something I can give you?” I asked, furiously thinking back to the head of hair that Kamala had eaten off. “Something you want?”