“Now what?” I pulled out Ma’s moving map and studied it through the python jewel. I was leaning against some pink grass that felt like cotton candy on my skin. Well, cotton candy minus the stickiness.
“I’m not sure.” Neel peered at the map over my shoulder. “What was the next part of Tuni’s stupid poem?”
I looked around to ask the bird, but he wasn’t there. “Tuni?” The violet-colored trees had some kind of fluffy fruit hanging from them, and there were bushes with polka-dot magenta-and-orange leaves. But no bird.
Where was he? Our diminutive yellow companion was nowhere to be seen.
Neel and I walked down a steep hill, all the while calling Tuntuni’s name. The swirling mist was thick around our feet. To my surprise, it also sparkled and made squeaking noises.
From a distance, we heard an odd little song,
“Ev-ry-thing
Is connected to
Ev-ry-thing,
But how?”
We followed Tuntuni’s voice until we came upon sort of a valley, with folds of multicolored mist all around it. We floated, more than walked, through the silky atmosphere. There were shimmering lights everywhere—silver, yellow, hot red, intense blue. My body felt light and airy, like I had turned into cotton candy myself.
Then Tuni came into view, hanging from the branch of a nearby tree.
“What in blessed bison jewels is he going on about?” Neel muttered. Then he paused. “Are you seeing what I’m seeing?”
I caught my breath. The yellow bird was sitting on a sparkly branch that looked like it was covered in—could it be?—diamonds.
“On a diamond branch the golden bird must sing a blessed tune,” I quoted.
“Actually, I don’t think those are diamonds on that branch.” Neel’s wide, dark eyes turned to mine. “I think they’re stars!”
Say what?
I took in the scenery around me—the swirling mist, the colors, the sparkling lights. I had a sudden flash to a video that Shady Sadie had shown on her science program about the Andromeda Nebula.
“Where are we?” I whispered.
A different voice, not Tuntuni’s, but a man’s, answered from very nearby.
“Why, it’s a star nursery of course, young lady. Ze birthplace of baby stars.”
Who said that? I saw no one. Then I looked up and realized Tuntuni wasn’t alone after all. An old man with a turban and a white moustache sat cross-legged on a branch just above the bird’s head. Or to be more accurate, the man levitated off the branch above Tuni’s head.
“Your Brilliance!” Neel bowed. “It’s an honor to finally meet you.”
“The famous half-demon prince,” said the man. “And this must be Princess Kiranmala!”
Tuntuni chirped in agreement. “Yes, Smartie-ji. This is them!”
I stared at Tuntuni, then at Neel. They knew this guy? And somehow, this floating stranger knew us?
The mist swirled around him, obscuring his features, but I couldn’t shake the feeling that there was something really familiar about him. What was he, like, a yogi with ESP? A wise man, at least, from the way that Neel and Tuni were addressing him.
Not wanting to seem rude, I dropped an ungraceful curtsy. “Uh, hello, sir-ji.”
“Can you help us, Your Brilliance? We need to find Kiran’s parents and rescue my brother and friend”—here he indicated the gold and silver spheres hanging from his sling—“who are trapped by a curse.”
But the wise man just smiled, adding even more crinkles to his already wrinkly face. “You arrived just in time for my next class. Find a seat! Find a seat! Quick now!” He clapped his hands gleefully, like our presence was the best treat he could receive.
From who knows where, there appeared a number of little colorful chairs attatched to desks, like the contents of a kindergarten classroom. From somewhere in the distance, a bell rang, and suddenly almost all of the seats filled up with sparkling orbs of light: little giggling, wiggling star-babies.
“Good morning, mein star pupils!” The wise man’s singsong European accent made him seem familiar, but I couldn’t place where I knew him from.
“Good mowning, pwofessor,” the infant stars chorused back as Neel and I found the only two empty seats, near the back of the floating classroom. The chairs were ridiculously small, and the two of us barely squeezed ourselves into them, our knees all splayed out in awkward ways.
“Now let us say our morning pledge together,” said the mysterious professor from his position on the branch. All the glowing star-children seemed to place their little hands over their unidentified middles. Even Tuntuni placed a yellow wing over his chest.
“We pledge allegiance to the element hydrogen, and also its partner, helium,” chanted the little star-lings.
Neel and I giggled from the back row like we were the classroom delinquents. Luckily, no one seemed to hear us, and the stars kept pledging allegiance.
“And to the principle of nuclear fusion. Luminous light, born from dust, nebula to stars, red giants to supernova, white dwarf, neutron star, or black hole!”
“Very good, students! Gold stars for everyone!” The floating wise man clapped his hands again. The force of his pleasure turned him upside down, so that now he hung suspended, folded legs above, moustache and turban below.
From this awkward position, the teacher pulled down a rolling chart from the middle of the air. It showed a diagram illustrating the pupils’ pledge—the life cycle of a star. He cleared his throat and waggled his bushy white eyebrows in my direction.
“Your parents, Princess, will soon be in danger of being swallowed forever by what you know as a black hole.” The upside-down professor pointed with a yardstick at the end of the diagram.
“How do I save them?” I begged.
“Shall we tell her, pupils?” the professor singsonged as he spun himself right side up once again.
The baby stars laughed and shimmered. Pushing their chairs aside, they joined what I supposed were their hands and began dancing in a circle. Like a game of intersteller Ring Around the Rosie. Then they started singing:
“Red, red, red are all my clothes
Red, red, red, is all that I have
Why do I love all that is red?
Because my brother is a red giant.”
The teacher waved his fingers in the air like he was conducting the music. “A nursery rhyme from my own youth!” he said.
“Lal?” Neel’s voice rose suddenly in alarm, and I noticed, just as he did, that the golden sphere—Lal’s sphere—was beginning to glow. It now looked far more red than golden. Red like his name. Red like the red giant a star becomes when it is in the process of dying.
“Your Brilliance,” I began, but the wise man just shook his head, indicating that the stars were about to start singing again. They whirled in the other direction, faster than before, their bodies a dizzying display of light and energy against the multicolor backdrop of the nebula.
“White, white, white are all my clothes
White, white, white is all that I have
Why do I love all that is white?
Because my sister is a white dwarf.”
“Mati!” And sure enough, the silver sphere in Neel’s makeshift sling was now glowing with a bright white light. Both spheres were also pulsing strangely, the red-gold one looking like it was growing and the silver one like it was shrinking.