Aru Shah and the End of Time (Pandava Quartet #1)(67)

“So I will not be alone.”

“All of them?” asked Mini. “Can I just give you all the bad ones? Last week, my backpack strap got caught in an escalator and—”

“All of them,” interrupted Shukra.

“Why do you even bother staying here?” asked Aru. “Why not just go on to the next life? You could be free of all—”

“Free?” Shukra laughed. “Where is the freedom, little ones, in moving on to the next life?” he asked. “Do you not know that these things chase you past the doors of death? The ills of one life will affect you in the next.”

There it was. Karma. That idea Aru just couldn’t wrap her head around. What goes around comes around and all that maybe-nonsense. Aru thought it seemed like a scaredy-cat thing to do: decide not to move on just because it was bound to be hard. To her it didn’t make much sense for him to stay here. All alone forever.

She stood up. Mini had a more difficult time. Her chair seemed to have grown fond of her and kept trying to twine around her legs.

“Do we get our memories back once we cross the bridge?” asked Aru.

“No.”

Aru’s hands formed twin fists at her side. “Then you’re not getting any memories from me.”

“Or—Ouch, get off!” said Mini, finally freeing herself from the chair. It made a soft whining sound. “Me neither!”

“That is a pity,” said Shukra. “For you could have always made new ones.”

He glanced at each of the mirrors that pressed close to him. They weren’t supposed to remind him of beauty at all, realized Aru. They were supposed to remind him of pain. Loss. And he had no choice but to see it every single day.

“If you insist, I will let you die. Go ahead and try to cross,” he said. “You will fail.”

They scooted past Shukra and were soon standing at the edge of the cliff. They could still see the outline of the bridge ahead, but a foot away from their feet there was nothing but a steep drop. No platform, no step, no anything. Was the bridge invisible? Was it even solid?

“The bridge will build itself,” said Shukra. He hadn’t moved from his spot. “The question is, can you cross it quickly enough? Judging by your ages, I doubt you’ll make it farther than a few steps. You have had fewer memories than most.”

The memory-stealing snow—which had been suspended in the air—began to fall again. This time, when the snow landed on Aru, it stung. Because it was taking. With every flake, another memory was ripped from her.

There! Gone in a flash, the memory of her eighth birthday, when her mother…her mother did something.

Something she could no longer recall.

“I offered you help,” said Shukra. “A life of weightlessness, free of pain. But you rejected my proposition.”

The bridge was slowly cobbled together with the girls’ stolen memories. Aru lost the taste of chocolate. It was one of her most favorite things in the world, and yet she couldn’t for the life of her remember how it tasted, or even how you spelled…spelled what? What had she been thinking about?

Beside her, Mini was tugging at her hair. “Stop this!” she cried.

Aru reached for the golden ball. But why she did, she wasn’t sure. It’s not as if it had ever done much more than glow. It wasn’t like Mini’s compact that could see through illusions or make some of its own. And now she couldn’t even remember where she’d gotten the ball in the first place.

“You cannot escape pain in life,” said Shukra. “For that I am sorry. I wanted to grant you a different ending, to let you leave without pain.”

The snowfall grew faster and heavier. Aru could barely see through it. She turned to look at Shukra and she noticed something. The snow was landing everywhere except on him.

Her eyes narrowed. Something about Shukra’s mirrors must be protecting him.

At that moment, a snowflake stamped her arm. Once, Atlanta had gotten two inches of snow, so, naturally, the city had gone into a panic and shut down. Her mother’s flight out had been cancelled, and they’d spent the whole day inside, snuggled together on the couch. They’d eaten ramen while watching a Bollywood film where everyone got fake-slapped at least once, and—

The beloved memory vanished.

Aru could feel the hole it left behind in her heart. And even though she couldn’t remember it now, she wanted to weep. Those memories were everything. They were what she held close when she had to spend a night without her mother at home. They were what she returned to whenever she was scared.

She couldn’t lose them.

She needed to loosen Shukra’s control of the memory-stealing snow….

“The snow is hungry,” said Shukra. “It will feed.”

He turned his back to them, walking farther and farther away, as if he couldn’t bear to see what would happen next.

But Aru had a plan—

Mini grabbed her around the wrist. “No, Aru.” Her eyes were wide, and Aru knew that Mini had guessed what she was going to do. “There has to be some other way.”

“If we don’t break his mirrors, we won’t remember anything, Mini.”

“It’s not right! He has those mirrors because he feels bad—”

“He killed his wife. Why should I feel sorry for him?”