Like they were going to believe that.“No, I…I hit him.”
My parents glared, my father’s eyes in particular shooting green icicles.
“You all right, Jatin?” Maharaja Naupure reached out one long arm to his son. Jatin didn’t meet anyone’s eyes as he nodded at the ground.
“Sir, I cannot begin to apologize,” Mother said, turning to the maharaja.
“Adraa,” Father snapped.
“I’m sorry,” I whispered.
“Why did you hit him, Adraa?” Father’s voice was firm, and filled with warning.
“He…” I glanced at Jatin. He finally unglued his eyes from the floor. And they were anything but calm.
I dropped to my knees in front of Maharaja Naupure like my prayer position to the gods. “I’m sorry, Maharaja Naupure. It doesn’t matter what happened. I should not have hit Jatin.”
After a terrifying still minute, I peeked through my hair, which had curtained around my face. Maharaja Naupure was shaking, and I trembled. We were going to die. I had hit Jatin and now, as payback, my parents and I were going to be killed.
An abrupt snort broke the tension. The maharaja was…laughing.
Maharaja Naupure bent down and raised my chin so I met his gaze. He peered at me in a way that skewered me to the core. Then he smiled. “Strength is more than standing.” With my chin still in his hand, he looked up at my parents. “She is made to be a Naupure.”
It is morning when I hear the news I have been dreading for nine years. I’m eating upma, my mouth and heart functioning properly, when my father trips them both with a single question.
“Did you know Jatin is coming back home today?” He glances up from the mounds of reports that fan out in circular stacks like a topographical map of the northern rice fields. Refusing to choke, my mouth revolts, and I eject the porridge instead of breathing it in.
My sister, Prisha, drops her spoon into her bowl and it clangs. “Ew.”
Mother’s face tilts in disgust. “Adraa.”
I place a hand over my mouth to create a barrier so nothing else can escape as I cough. It feels like various organs have arisen in a coup. My heart, the leader, lurches, trying to make a break for it or at least to rip off the surrounding ropes of myarteries.
My father’s eyes seize mine as they hum with insinuation. “I’m guessing that’s a no.”
Nine words, one for each year I had not seen him; that’s all it takes to wash away my peace. After all this time, Jatin is coming home.
The sun has decided it’s going to play peekaboo with the clouds, so in cyclical intervals the dining room glistens with warmth and then dampens into gray hues. Of course it would be during a piercing blaze that the consistency of my life breaks apart. My mind tries to pick up each individual word my father uttered, but drops them like a clumsy toddler.
Jatin.
Coming.
Back.
Today.
“Today? As in like a few hours from now?” I cough.
“Yes, that is whattodaymeans.” Father sets aside a large report without looking at me.
“Maharaja Naupure didn’t tell you last time you visited?” Mother asks, clearly satisfied I won’t ruin the finely embroidered tablecloth.
“No,” I say. “I mean, he might have…” Since that first night years ago, Maharaja Naupure and I have developed a friendly relationship, beyond the role of future father- and daughter-in-law. It is upheld by my monthly deliveries of firelight, which we both use as an excuse to discuss everything—politics, economics, a special project I’m working on—anything besides his son. Sometimes he slips up and I then pretend my brain has slipped up. But I couldn’t have truly skimmed over this news, right? I’d be impressed with myself if anxiety wasn’t drowning out all other emotions. Ignoring the idea of Jatin and being his wife is a second job.
“Oh, Adraa,” Mother sighs.
“What? I haven’t been summoned or anything and I’m not scheduled to send my firelight today, so…so I’mnotgoing.” I wrap my voice in confidence so maybe they won’t push me. An unpleasant shiver runs down my spine. Going to the palace, being part of a welcome home parade I’m sure all of Naupure will attend, seeing the boy who would one day be my husband. My heart gags, one more tremor to note it isn’t done freaking out. After nine years of me being here, in Belwar, and Jatin a hundred miles away training at a fancy prep school in Agsa, the engagement was finally…real. Now only Mount Gandhak would separate us.
