Star Daughter(77)

“Wait! Can you give us a second alone, Beena?” Minal asked.

“Certainly,” Beena said. She’d been sorting through a box of bangles, and now she took it out onto the balcony.

“Padmini?” Minal moved toward her. Padmini frowned at the floor.

All Minal’s confidence must have flown out the door with Beena and the box, because she turned desperate eyes on Sheetal and mouthed, Do something!

Well, Sheetal figured, they had nothing to lose at this point. So she dropped the bombshell. “Someone hid Priyanka’s puppets under my bed. I just found them.”

“That certainly is a terrible thing to hear,” Padmini said stiffly.

“What’s with the freeze-out?” Sheetal asked sharply, fed up with her ice queen act. “Last night, you were giving us keys, and today you don’t know our names?”

Padmini finally looked her way. Her lush mouth was set, her otherworldly eyes impenetrable. “That was not the only thing to happen last night.” Indignity burned acidic in her words. “The Esteemed Patriarch approached me with the kindly reminder that all eyes are upon us. My obligation is to our house first and foremost, and I must take care not to fraternize too closely with any one mortal.”

Sheetal heard the implication: Or else. Oh, no. Had Nana really threatened Kaushal?

“I don’t understand,” Minal said. “I left the keys where you told me. Did someone else find them?”

“No, it’s your brother, isn’t it?” The words came out louder than Sheetal had meant. “Is he okay?”

Padmini made an irritated sound. “No, Lady Sheetal, he is not. Seeing you, listening to you, has roused his mortal memories.” Her voice feathered off into a whisper. “I had believed him to be past all that.”

Alarm bells went off in Sheetal’s brain. “Past what?”

Padmini held herself rigidly, as if she would break otherwise. “Kaushal is speaking of permanently returning to the mortal realm.”

What else could possibly go wrong? “I didn’t— He’s just confused.”

“That may be,” Padmini allowed. “Yet I cannot risk it. Should anyone learn of his daydreaming . . .”

“Padmini,” Minal pleaded, reaching for her, “you can’t think we’d ever let him do that. We’ll stay away from him after, I swear.” Her eyes glistened and her voice wobbled as Padmini pulled away, a chilly elegance in each step. “Please just help us get the marionettes back into Priyanka’s room.”

“I know we’re asking a lot,” Sheetal added, “but please just help us this one last time.” She kept talking, as if that would make a difference. “I’m shocked no one’s come barging in to ‘prove’ they’re here.”

“I am sorry, Lady Sheetal, but my brother is too dear to me.” Padmini opened the door. “I cannot endanger his fate for anyone. I will not.”

Then she was gone.





25


Sheetal stood outside the Hall of Mirrors, praying this was the right decision. She only had a few minutes while Minal distracted Beena with questions about their outfits for tonight.

Her stomach churned. If Padmini found out what Sheetal was up to, she’d never forgive either of them, any more than Sheetal would forgive someone putting Minal in danger.

Why did Nani and Nana have to make things like this? There was nothing wrong with being half human.

She consoled herself with the thought that she was working toward a future where Nani couldn’t blackmail half-stars anymore, because that stupid stigma just wouldn’t exist. Annihilated as part of her mother’s grand plans.

Before the convocation, Nani had said something about contacting Nana through the astral melody. Sheetal searched for Kaushal’s thread in the tapestry and gave it a good tug. Not uprooting it, like when she removed her own emotions, but just catching his attention. Hopefully that would work, and if not, well, at least it would give her a moment to check on Dad.

She floundered through the process two more times, then entered the hall to wait.

All the mirrors reflected a girl with soft, shimmering, flashing silver hair that fell to her waist, with unblemished brown skin so smooth it looked airbrushed, as if someone had taken a palette knife to it as she slept and smoothed away all the pores. Wait—had her eyes become larger? Yep, and they’d turned brown-silver, glimmering with the suggestion of a pewter flame.

Padmini had been right; this face didn’t need any extra enhancements.

Sheetal glanced down. Her ragged fingernails had grown into perfect ovals, and even the scab on her right thumb was nearly gone.

Something nettled her—the suspicion she’d tried to bury ever since the starsong first beckoned at Radhikafoi’s party. Ever since the dye had leached from her hair. Something huge, something that flooded her with horror and relief at the same time.

She was stellifying, catasterizing, just like the harp sisters had predicted.

For once, her mind was empty.

She stared at herself, at this stranger she’d become, until she couldn’t take it.

Dad, she thought, wishing she could reach out with her arms, not just her heart. Dad.

The mirror closest to her erased her image, replacing it with the now horribly familiar one of Dad comatose in the ICU bed. A nurse checked his vitals and recorded the results before leaving him all alone. But it was the most beautiful birthday gift Sheetal could’ve asked for.