She heard the hopefulness in the palace’s voice.
“I wanted to bring the others, too, but the rules are very strict about need and such. Although the youngest Pandava has managed to visit me in my dreams, and that is very nice. A welcome break from my nightmares about white picket fences. I hate those.”
Aru laughed a little. As usual, the palace sensed what she needed and before long a mug of steaming tea appeared on the table. She dropped the necklace, earring, anklet, claw, and bangle onto the table, where they clattered loudly. Then Aru gripped the mug of tea in both hands and inhaled deeply. Truthfully, Aru didn’t care for tea—it was literally leaves in boiled water—but she did like the warmth of the cup, the steam clouding her face, and the ritual of waiting for something to cool.
Aru focused on the steam.
It would be nice, she thought, to stay here awhile. To rest. To sit in silence. But she couldn’t leave the world waiting.
“I have something to do, don’t I?” she asked, exhaling.
“Eventually, yes,” admitted the palace.
Aru curled a little more into the seat, staring at the tokens on the table. As a Pandava, her duty was to end the war, and she had vowed to try her best to do that….But now that the moment had come, it didn’t seem like a win.
Why did everyone want to be immortal, anyway? What was the big draw? Eventually, you’d get bored!
And what if it was like one of those cautionary stories where someone wished for eternal life but got stuck with eternal adolescence and ended up shriveling in eternal embarrassment?
If she gave the nectar of immortality to the devas, the jar would be moved somewhere else. Within another labyrinth. And there’d be more seething anger in those who had been denied it. There would still be too much power in one place, and too much temptation in the world, because it wasn’t as though the nectar itself could be destroyed….
Aru inhaled sharply.
“But what if…” she said quietly, her hands clasped in her lap as she stared down at all the mementos she’d gathered over the past ten days. “What if there was some other way?”
Aru thought of the poison maiden’s grief and longing for a different life; the bear king growing old and dreaming of his former conquests; the apsara recoiling at her legacy and desperate not to be hurt; the princess who had sacrificed all her dreams and could not even claim to live in someone’s memory; and then, of course, Suyodhana. His deepest desire had been to live in a world where he could be with his family.
Maybe what most people wanted wasn’t immortality and fame, but the reassurance that their existence had meant something. No matter how long…or how brief. Maybe being eternal meant becoming a story worth telling.
“I know that look!” said the palace excitedly. “That’s a sneaky look! Arjuna always looked like that when he had a good idea. Do you have a good idea?”
Aru sighed. “Well, I don’t have any better ones?”
The palace was silent for a moment. “I guess that’s better than nothing!”
“I have to go back now,” said Aru, setting down the mug and patting the arm of the chair. “Thank you, palace. You were wonderful.”
The lights in the palace brightened happily. “Really? Maybe next time you can stay longer! Although I hope you never need a next time….Now I feel very confused. Good-bye, Aru Shah. I am happy I could shelter you once again….”
Back on the battlefield, Aru’s ears filled with shouts. Her shoulder ached from where it had bumped the metal kalash. When she stood, the necklace, earring, bangle, claw, and anklet spilled onto the ground.
Vajra twisted in her hands as ropes of electricity converged and fused into the shape of a pointed spear. Aru felt the glow of the amrita on her skin. She closed her eyes and inhaled. She recalled the ghostly brush of Urmila’s ankle, the scrape of Menaka’s fingernails as she’d dropped the earring into Aru’s palm, the warmth of Jambavan’s fur when he’d held out his claw, the green tinge of Aleesa’s poisonous skin, and last…the mismatched colors of the Sleeper’s eyes. One brown, one blue. She exhaled.
As the breath left her lungs, Aru Shah hurled her lightning bolt at the nectar of immortality.
At the first shot of lightning, a long crack appeared in the middle of the pot holding the nectar. Golden liquid seeped from the fissure. The sky darkened as if some cosmic switch had been flipped. A bracing wind swept through the sanctum being protected by the Nairrata soldiers, and moments later, the kalash zoomed high into the air.
“WHAT ARE YOU DOING?” demanded Brynne. She alighted on the ground beside Aru, her wind mace angled up at the pot. Brynne had moved it out of reach.
“I know how this looks—” started Aru.
“Do you?” demanded Brynne.
“Aru…” said Mini, materializing next to them with a trail of faint purple sparks. Above them, the iridescent protective shield she had cast flickered as if with uncertainty. Her gaze flew up to the leaking pot of amrita. “What have you done?”
Aru took a deep breath. “Our duty.”
Brynne frowned. “What?”
“What do you mean?” asked Mini.
Before she could answer, Nikita and Sheila winked into existence. They had someone with them—Kara, only dimly aglow.
Aru kept going with her explanation. “Our duty was to end the war,” she said, gesturing around them. “If we shatter that kalash…if we share the nectar to the point where everyone has a drop, then there’ll be nothing left to fight over! I mean, yeah, there’s always going to be fights, but this specific, never-ending war over who gets the nectar of immortality? Over who gets to be immortal? Over who gets to be, I don’t know, remembered? Well, this”—she flailed a hand toward the pot—“is the answer.”
Aru took a moment to catch her breath. “We end the war, not by winning immortality for one side, but by sharing it with everyone.”
Aru searched her sisters’ faces for a reaction. In a way, she’d always known this moment was coming. She had pictured it a thousand different ways, a thousand different times. It had been the backdrop of a thousand nightmares ever since the Sleeper had shown it to her years ago:
Aru, with her lightning bolt in her hand, staring at the five girls who had become family to her. Her on one side; them in a half circle on the other, wearing matching expressions of shock and disbelief. A cold wind blew around Brynne. Violet light sparked around Mini’s silhouette. Vines coiled beneath Nikita, like an agitated snake unsure who to bite.
“Pretty sneaky, Aru,” said Sheela. But she was smiling.
Aru’s eyes went back to her other sisters, but she couldn’t read what they were thinking. Did they hate her? Would they cast her out?
Mini drew back her hand, her gaze still fixed on Aru. In a single, smooth motion, she hurled her Death Danda as if it were a boomerang. It thudded with a metallic thwack! against the side of the kalash. More cracks appeared, glowing like rivulets of gold.
“My turn!” said Nikita, stringing a bow of rose canes before shooting an arrow. “Sheela? Wanna go?”
Sheela nodded and picked up a nearby rock. She aimed and let it fly. Moments later, a warm breeze surrounded them. Gently, the kalash floated back to the ground, landing within their circle. Within it, the nectar of immortality bubbled, as if agitated.