The Serpent's Secret (Kiranmala and the Kingdom Beyond #1)(65)

“Do you have a problem with that?” The Queen crossed her taloned hands over her chest, her nostrils spewing flames. “Have I raised some kind of demonic sexist? A purveyor of rakkhosh patriarchy?”

Huh. Maybe I liked Neel’s mother more than I realized.

Behind the Queen, Bogli stuck her giant thumb in her even more giant mouth. “Big Bwother!” she bellowed.

Neel shook his head. “Enough stupid tricks.” He pointed his sword at his mother’s throat. “You tell us how to turn Lal and Mati back. You tell us now!”

“They’re still trapped?” The Demon Queen belly-laughed hard and long, only stopping when she burped. “Vah! Some big demon prince you turned out to be—you haven’t even figured that out yet?”

“Tell us, Ma!”

The rakkhoshi rolled her eyes, “Oh, come on, Moon Moon Sen, you haven’t the faintest idea?”

“Well.” I looked apologetically at Neel. “I did have one thought …”

“Let’s have it, then!” the demoness urged.

Neel pulled me aside. “Are you seriously having this conversation? Did you forget she tried to eat my brother and Mati?”

“Well, she didn’t kill them, did she? And don’t you want to know how to bring them back?”

I turned again to the demoness. “Well, Your Highness …”

The Queen puffed up, raising one hairy eyebrow in her son’s direction. “At least some people know how to show respect, eh?”

Neel snarled, still clutching his sword.

I ignored him. “That line in the poem—” I started.

“Poem?” the Queen interrupted.

“Tuntuni’s poem … it said—”

“That interfering birdbrain of a minister? Is he still up to his tricks?”

I heard a faint squawk from the peacock barge behind us. I hoped that one of my parents had sat on the bird to keep him quiet.

“Are you going to let her talk or not?” Neel snapped.

“Fine, fine.” The demoness waved her hands at me. “Go on, Stella Luna.”

“ ‘Let golden branch grow from the silver tree,’ ” I quoted. “So I was thinking: Prince Lal is golden—of royal blood. The stable master’s daughter—though loyal and honorable—is not. How could a golden branch grow from a silver tree?”

Now that she was in her mother’s care, Bogli seemed to have all the bite—and intelligence—of a trained house pet. She clapped happily for my efforts. “Mean girl smart!”

“I don’t get it,” interrupted Neel.

“Such a disappointment!” the demoness moaned, rubbing her stomach. “Oh, my reflux! My kingdom for an antacid!”

Neel was looking murderously at his mother. I jumped in to distract him. “Lal’s the golden branch, but he needs Mati, the silver tree, around him to grow into his full potential as a ruler.”

“Okaaay,” Neel said slowly. “It’s true. Lal and Mati are friends and she is a good influence on his confidence, or whatever. He’s definitely less flaky when he’s around her.”

“Right, but the Raja and the queens will never allow Lal and Mati to continue to be friends, right? Not now that he’s the crown prince. Not as they get older.”

“No way, chickie!” The Rakkhoshi Queen cackled.

“Since they’ve been spheres, they’ve been so happy. Humming and buzzing and hanging out together. But once they become human again, then Mati goes back to the stables and Lal to the palace.”

“I guess.”

“So we’ve got to convince the Raja otherwise.”

Neel looked at me, the truth dawning in his eyes. “So we have to take them home again.”

I nodded.

“Everything is connected to everything,” drawled the Demon Queen in a bored voice.

Neel and I both snapped around to face her.

She arched a wicked eyebrow. “Haven’t you figured out the how part yet?”

I shook my head. To which she belched. Then, rolling her eyes, she shouted, “By love, you morons, by love!”

We stared at her. She moved her gruesome head side to side, cracking her neck with a gesture that reminded me of her son.

“You’re lucky you have Loonie-Moonie here.” She pointed a talon at Neel. “I for one am going to try to raise a real rakkhosh this time!”

As we talked, Bogli had fallen asleep right on her mother’s foot. The Queen shook her off, and the baby demon woke up, bawling. The Queen slapped her hand to her forehead.

“Am I to be forever cursed with imbecilic offspring?” the Rakkhoshi Queen snapped, and the two demons were gone in a puff of smelly darkness.

Her voice cackled through the vapor. “Don’t call me, dum-dums, and I won’t call you!”





The Raja wanted to banish Neel.

“We told you not to come home without your brother!” he bellowed.

“Well, that’s just too bad,” Neel snapped. “Because half rakkhosh or not, I’m still your son too.”

I was proud of Neel for saying that and not just stomping out of the throne room in a huff. I wasn’t quite as proud of the shouting match the father and son then had.