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"The Rakshana have not been there, so how can they possibly know what is to be trusted?" Pippa's warning seems suddenly very good to me. "I know nothing about your brotherhood. Why should I trust them? Why should I trust you? Honestly, you sneak into my room and hide behind my dressing screen. You follow me about. You're constantly barking orders at me: Close your mind! No, dreadfully sorry--open your mind! Help us find the Temple! Bind the magic!"
"I've told you what I know," he says. "You don't know very much, do you?" I snap. "I know my brother was Rakshana. I know that he died trying to protect your mother, and that she died trying to protect you."
There it is. The ugly sorrow that joins us. I feel as if the breath has been knocked from me.
"Don't," I warn. "Don't what?"
"Don't change the subject. I think I shall give the orders for a while. You want me to find the Temple. I want something from you."
"Are you blackmailing me?" he asks.
"You can call it what you like. But I won't tell you anything further until you answer my questions."
I sit on Ann's bed. He sits on mine, opposite me. Here we are, a couple of dogs ready to bite if provoked.
"Ask," he says.
"I'll ask when I'm ready," I say.
"Very well, don't ask." He stands to leave.
"Tell me about the Rakshana!" I blurt out.
Kartik sighs and looks up to the ceiling. "The Brotherhood of the Rakshana has existed for as long as the Order. They rose in the East but were joined by others along the way. Charlemagne was Rakshana, as were many of the Knights Templar. They were the guardians of the realms and its borders, sworn to protect the Order. Their emblem is the sword and the skull." He says this in a rush, like a history lesson recited for the benefit of a teacher.
"That was serviceable," I say, irritated.
He holds up a finger."But informative."
I ignore his jibe.
"How did you come to be part of the Rakshana?" He shrugs."I have always been with them."
"Not always, surely. You must have had a mother and a father."
"Yes. But I never really knew them. I left them when I was six."
"Oh," I say, shocked. I'd never thought of Kartik as a little boy leaving his mother's arms."I am sorry."
He won't meet my eyes. "There is nothing to be sorry for. It was understood that I would be trained for the Rakshana, like my brother, Amar, before me. It was a great honor for my family. I was taken into the fold and schooled in mathematics, languages, weapons, fighting. And cricket." He smiles. "I'm quite good at cricket."
"What else?"
"I was taught how to survive in the woods. How to track things. Thievery."
I raise my eyebrows at this.
"Whatever it takes to survive. One never knows when picking a man's pocket will buy a day's food or create a distraction at just the right moment."
I think of my own mother, gone for good now, and how deeply I feel her loss."Didn't you miss your family terribly?"
His voice, when it comes, is very quiet. "In the beginning, I looked for my mother on every street, in every market, always hoping I would see her. But I had Amar, at least."
"How terrible. You had no say in it."
"It was my fate. I accept it. The Rakshana have been very good to me. I have been trained for an elite brotherhood. What would I have done in India? Herded cows? Gone hungry? Lived in the shadow of the English, forced to smile while serving their food or grooming their horses?"
"I didn't mean to upset you. . . ."
