CHAPTER THIRTEEN

Meera was not as confident the next morning.

She'd spent the night in Tara's room — a room that smelled of dried herbs and old books and the faintest ghost of sandalwood — and slept badly, her dreams a jumble of serpents and fire and a woman with her face who kept trying to tell her something but couldn't speak.

Now she sat at the dressing table while Kamla braided her hair, and the reality of what she'd committed to settled over her like a wet blanket.

She wasn't a detective. She was a mythology professor. She was good at research and footnotes and spotting patterns in ancient texts, but that wasn't exactly the same as solving a two-year-old murder in a parallel dimension where the suspects included princes, healers, shapeshifting snake gods, and literal fairies.

"What were you thinking, Meera?" she murmured.

Kamla paused in her braiding. "Did you say something, didi?"

"Just talking to myself."

You are anxious,* Takshak observed from wherever he was — she could feel him on the hilltop, basking in the grey light, his body coiled around the tower. *This is natural. You are in unfamiliar territory.

"Thank you, Captain Obvious," she muttered.

I do not know what that means.

"It means I appreciate the observation."

You are welcome.

A knock at the door.

It was Aisha, wearing a travelling cloak and leather boots, her hair braided back for action. "Good morning. I thought we'd start with the unicorns."

"The unicorns?"

"The Ashwini." Aisha corrected herself with a smile. "That's what they're called here — the Ashwini Kumaras, after the divine horsemen of your mythology. Though calling them horses is a good way to start a diplomatic incident."

Meera remembered something. "You said Tara loved riding with the Ashwini."

"She did. And their leader — Darius, the chief of the local blessing — was one of her closest allies. If anyone noticed something strange before Tara's death, it would be the Ashwini. They see everything."

"Then let's go."

---

The Ashwini meadow was a clearing in the forest about an hour's walk from the fortress — a wildflower-carpeted opening surrounded by ancient oaks and silver birches, dotted with bright tents that draped between the trees like fabric sails.

And in the clearing, the Ashwini.

They were not horses. Meera had known this intellectually — Ashwini Kumaras, divine horsemen, unicorns in the Western tradition — but seeing them was something else entirely. They were larger than any horse she'd ever seen, their bodies sleek and muscled, their coats ranging from pure white to deep gold to a rich chestnut that caught the light like polished wood. And from each broad forehead rose a single horn — spiralled, luminous, glowing with a faint light that seemed to pulse in time with the creature's breathing.

The clearing was alive with them — adults grazing in the tall grass, foals chasing each other with the reckless joy of children, and here and there, a figure in human form moving among them, their gold foreheads bearing the sigil of the horn.

A little girl spotted them first. She was perhaps five or six, brown-skinned and bright-eyed, with a cloud of curly hair and a gap-toothed grin.

"Didi!" She ran toward them with the confidence of a child who'd never met a stranger she didn't like. "Are you Tara-devi's sister? You look exactly like her!"

Meera knelt. "I'm Meera. What's your name?"

"Zara." The little girl beamed. "My baba saved a lady from a kelpie yesterday. Was that you?"

"It was me." Meera smiled. "Your baba is very brave."

"He's the bravest." Zara turned and shouted across the meadow with a volume that seemed physically impossible from such a small body. "BABA! Tara-devi's sister is here!"

A golden-brown Ashwini — the largest in the clearing — raised its head from the grass. A shimmer passed over its body, and where the unicorn had stood, a man appeared.

He was tall, broad-shouldered, with warm brown skin and hair that fell loose to his waist. He wore only a cream-coloured dhoti, and despite the cold, his skin showed not a single goose bump. On his forehead, where his horn had been, a gold sigil glowed — an intricate spiral pattern that caught the light.

"I am Darius," he said, his voice deep and resonant. "Guardian of the Moray blessing." He studied Meera. "Welcome, Meera of Prakash Lok."

"Thank you for saving my life."

"You saved my daughter's life first." His eyes were warm. "Our blessing owes you a debt. You are welcome among us."

"I need your help," Meera said. "I'm trying to find out what happened to Tara."

Darius's expression shifted — the warmth didn't leave, but something harder settled beneath it, like iron under velvet. "Come. Walk with me."

---

They walked along the edge of the meadow, Darius in human form, Meera beside him, Aisha trailing a few steps behind. Zara rode on a young Ashwini's back, her laughter carrying over the clearing like birdsong.

"I knew Tara well," Darius said. "She visited the blessing often. She had a gift for healing — not Ashwini healing, but the kind that comes from presence. The foals loved her."

"Did you notice anything strange before her death?"

"No." He frowned. "And that is what troubles me. The blessing is attuned to the land — we feel disturbances in the forest, shifts in magic, the presence of dark intent. We felt nothing before Tara died."

"Which means either the killer masked their intent or—"

"Or the killer was someone we trusted." Darius looked at Meera with ancient eyes. "Someone whose presence was so familiar that we didn't register them as a threat."

"An insider."

"Yes."

Meera thought about this. "How many people were close enough to Tara to be considered insiders?"

Darius counted on his fingers. "Arjun. The Maharaja and his queen. Aisha. Vikram, when he visited. The household staff — Kamla, the cooks, the servers." He paused. "And Regan."

"Who is Regan?"

Aisha answered from behind them, her voice careful. "My aunt. The queen of Suryanagar. She was Tara's stepmother."

"Tara had a stepmother?"

"Raja Devendra remarried after Tara's mother died. Regan is from Dakshin — the southern kingdom. She's a powerful woman with her own interests." Aisha's voice was neutral — too neutral, as if she was working hard to keep her tone flat. "She was at the feast."

"And her relationship with Tara?"

"Complicated." Aisha bit her lip. "Regan was fond of Tara in her own way, but she had a daughter of her own — my cousin Nisha. And Nisha was..." She trailed off.

"Jealous?" Meera suggested.

"Competitive." Aisha chose the word carefully. "Tara was Nag-Bandhu. She had power, prestige, the love of the court. Nisha had none of those things. It created... tension."

Darius's expression darkened. "The Ashwini blessing does not meddle in human politics. But I will tell you this — in the days before the feast, there was a visitor to the fortress. A Gandharva healer from the south, traveling with Regan's entourage. The blessing sensed something wrong about this healer."

"Wrong how?"

"The magic was... twisted. Like a river flowing backward. We warned the fortress guard, but nothing came of it." His jaw tightened. "Two days later, Tara was dead."

Meera's mind was already building the web — connections, suspects, motives. Regan. Nisha. A mysterious Gandharva healer. The missing cup. A poison designed to sever a Naga bond.

"Did the Gandharva healer leave after the feast?"

"Before the feast was over," Darius said. "Left the fortress that evening. We tracked them south, but once they crossed the Suryanagar border, we lost them."

"So they ran."

"They moved quickly. That is all I can say for certain."

Meera turned to Aisha. "Your aunt's Gandharva healer fled the fortress the same night Tara was poisoned?"

Aisha's face was pale. "I... I knew about the healer. I didn't know they left that night."

"Or you didn't want to know."

"That's not fair." Aisha's voice cracked. "Regan is my aunt. She raised my mother. I can't just accuse her without—"

"I'm not accusing anyone yet." Meera held up her hands. "I'm following threads. That's what researchers do."

Well done, Nag-Bandhu.* Takshak's voice was approving. *You think like a serpent — patient, methodical, circling closer.

"I'm going to take that as a compliment," she muttered.

It is the highest compliment a Naga can give.

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