Aru Shah and the End of Time (Pandava Quartet #1)(13)

The makara frowned. “They look more like sisters—”

“That’s what I meant!” snapped Boo.

“Wait…I recognize you,” said the makara slowly, tilting its head as it considered Boo. “You don’t look the same.”

“Yes. Well, that happens when one has been…” Boo’s words ended in incoherent muttering. “The heroes are here to meet the Council and receive the details of their quest.”

“Ah! Another chance for the world to end! How delightful. I hope I get more visitors. I never get many visitors. Ooh! I don’t think I’ve opened up an entrance to a Claiming in…well, quite a while. I don’t know how many years it’s been. I was never very good with numbers,” said the makara sheepishly. “Every time I try to count, I get distracted. Even when I’m talking, sometimes it’s like…it’s like…” The makara blinked. “I’m rather hungry. Can I go now?”

“Makara,” growled Boo. The makara cringed and hunkered closer to the floor. “Open the door to the Court of the Sky.”

“Oh! Of course. Yes, I can do that!” said the makara. “First, I just have to see that they are who you say they are. Who are they again? Or what? You know, I’ve never actually seen a vole, and I read about them the other day in a book about animals. Are they voles?”

“Humans,” volunteered Aru.

“Rather tiny for humans. You’re certain you’re not a vole?”

“We’re not done growing yet,” said Mini. “But my pediatrician said I probably won’t get any taller than five foot two.”

“Five feet, you say?” asked the makara. He rolled onto his back and raised his stubby legs. “I really think four feet are much more useful. Five might throw you off-balance. But that’s just my opinion.”

The makara lifted his head, as if he could see beyond them. Something flashed in his prism eyes. Aru saw an image of herself opening the museum entrance to Poppy, Arielle, and Burton. She saw the lighter flame being lowered to the lip of the lamp.

Something else shimmered in the depths of the makara’s gaze….Aru watched Mini discovering her parents frozen on the couch. A movie was playing on the television screen. An older boy who might have been Mini’s brother was in the middle of tossing a basketball into the air.

At first Mini curled into a ball on the living room floor and cried and cried. After a few minutes she went upstairs and took out a backpack. She stared at herself in the mirror, reached for her mother’s eyeliner, and made violent swipes on her cheeks. Then Mini kissed her stiff parents, hugged her immobile brother, and went outside, prepared to face down whatever evil she was destined to defeat.

Mini, for all her worries about allergies and magical bees, was brave.

Aru’s face heated. Compared to Mini, she wasn’t brave at all.

“Well, they are who you say they are!” said the makara. “I hope the Council trusts me.”

“Me too,” Boo harrumphed. “I never lie.”

Aru could not say the same for herself.

Mini was staring at Aru. “You lit the lamp?”

Here comes the blame.

“I know it had to happen,” said Mini hurriedly, as if she’d offended Aru. “My mom told me that the Sleeper was always destined to try to fight us. Don’t worry, I’m not mad. There was no way you could’ve known what that lamp would do.”

That was true, but still…Aru had known that she wasn’t supposed to light it. The problem was, her mom had never told her why. So Aru had thought it was just one of those generic warnings parents gave to kids, like Don’t go outside without sunscreen or you’ll burn! Or, as the woman who ran the local Hindu temple’s summer day camp liked to remind Aru: Don’t go outside without sunscreen or you’ll get darker and won’t find a husband! Until it happened, who cared? Aru had never gotten sunburned, and she really didn’t need to find a husband at age twelve.

But there wasn’t any protective lotion when it came to demons. It all boiled down to one thing: she wasn’t supposed to light the lamp, and yet she had. The fact that it had been “destined” to happen didn’t really absolve her of blame. Aru’s guilt was beginning to roil in her stomach. To the point where she thought she might throw up.

A bright moth hovered in front of Aru and Mini and Boo. Its wings grew, and light curled through the air, like calligraphy made of starlight. The wings stretched and unfurled until the girls and bird were completely enfolded.

“Good-bye, inedible tiny humans and Subala!” called the makara, no longer visible to them. “May all the doors you face in life swing open and never smack you in the butt as they close!”

The moth faded away, and they found themselves in an open-air room. No wonder it was called the Court of the Sky. Above them, the sky was marbled with clouds. The walls were ribbons of shimmering light. Delicate music laced the air. The space had that deliciously ripe aroma of the earth right after a summer thunderstorm. Aru wished the world smelled like this all the time. Like honey and mint and bright green growing things.

Beside her, Mini groaned, clutching her stomach. “Did I ever tell you I have acrophobia?”

“You’re scared of spiders?”

“No! That’s arachnophobia. I’m scared of heights!”