The Surviving Sky, page 32
“Perhaps for the second time in our history, we’re faced with the collapse of our species in such a sudden manner. The early architects found a way to traject plants to fly. Our challenge is no less significant. Any solution will change the course of our civilization forever. Whatever we decide to do, we need to do it quietly, swiftly, and without spreading panic. If the citizens learn about this, the ashram’s plants will react to their consciousness, to their fear, making trajection even harder.”
Airav stood up.
“Our course of action, then, is threefold. One, Chaiyya and I will lead the redesign of the ashram. Sacrifices will have to be made in all our lifestyles, and we must make ready the citizens without raising alarm. Two, Kiana and Laksiya will coordinate communication with the other ashrams. All ashrams are hanging by the same vine, even if our hold is the weakest. If we find no solution, then perhaps their architects will.
“And, three, Iravan, you will continue your investigation. Find out why the earthrages are getting longer and why this is affecting our trajection. We need answers.”
Airav tapped at one of his rudra bead bracelets. A hologram hovered over it, and he waved a hand. The same hologram reappeared over everyone’s citizen rings. Iravan glanced down at his; it was a list of people on various teams. His team shone with three names: Ahilya, Naila, and the sungineer Umit.
Iravan raised his eyebrows. He glanced at Ahilya, but she said nothing. The other councilors rose to their feet, and everyone else followed, gathering toward their leaders.
“Pardon, Airav-ve,” Dhruv said as he arose. “I think you’re overlooking something important. Why isn’t the council exploring how to stop dependence on trajection altogether?”
Ahilya turned to the sungineer and shook her head imperceptibly. Airav looked up from his muttered conversation with Chaiyya.
“Perhaps you didn’t hear me about the urgency of the situation,” he said mildly.
“I heard,” Dhruv said. “But Ahilya and I—well, mostly, I—have been working on a solution. On a battery. To reduce reliance on trajection. If she’s working with Senior Architect Iravan, then I should be on their team. They’ll need a sungineer.”
“They have Umit,” Kiana said, before Airav could reply. “And I would not spare you, Dhruv. You created a device that might charge itself over long ranges. That’s our biggest angle; it’s why you’re here. We’ll need to discuss that with the sungineers of the other ashrams, in case we need to use their energy to sustain Nakshar.” The Senior Sungineer glanced at Iravan. “No offense, Iravan, but what I have on my hands is more urgent and immediate.”
Dhruv sent a beseeching look toward Ahilya. She shook her head again. Iravan winced, remembering how he had flung away the sungineer’s work. I’d have decided to leave you even if none of this had happened.
“Allow him, Kiana,” he found himself saying. “If he finds anything relevant to your team, I’ll send him to you.”
Kiana frowned for a long moment, then nodded reluctantly. She, Laksiya, Dhruv, and Umit drew their heads together in urgent conference, no doubt discussing the logistics of this change. Airav’s team had already begun, their holograms floating above the mahogany table. Kiana would go to the lab. Iravan studied Ahilya and Naila.
“Where do we go?” he asked.
“The library?” Naila suggested. She still couldn’t meet his eyes. A dark, humorless laugh echoed in Iravan’s mind.
“No. Not private enough—and it’s in no shape after Bharavi’s Ecstasy.”
“Our—my home,” Ahilya said, in a low voice. “We can use that.”
Surprised, Iravan nodded. Someone touched his elbow, and he turned to see Kiana there. “Iravan? A word?”
He glanced back at Ahilya. He could see in his wife’s eyes—his wife still, and even that thought was mirrored in her—how neither of them had been distracted from their marriage by the things Airav had said.
Ahilya opened her mouth to speak, but Kiana was already leading him away toward a corner of the chamber where the other councilors were waiting.
“We need to talk about your recent transgressions,” Laksiya said, her voice cool.
“Does that really matter at a time like this?” he asked.
“It matters more than ever,” Chaiyya replied, a deep line creasing her forehead. “You brought a citizen into the sanctum, Iravan. You broke the healbranch vow you took as a Maze Architect. It has pierced you and begun poisoning you, hasn’t it? And you don’t even care. What’s to stop you from broadcasting everything we’ve discussed today to the rest of the ashram?”
“I won’t apologize, Chaiyya. I did all of those things knowing the consequences, so either pass a vote of no confidence or let it go.”
“You know we can’t release you from the council, not right now—”
“Then let. It. Go. If you thought I wouldn’t keep my mouth shut, you would never have put me in charge of one of the units. What is this truly about?”
“It’s about you and Ecstasy,” Laksiya snapped. “You’re still a danger.”
A blaze of anger stabbed at Iravan. “Are you serious?” he hissed. “You tested me not two days ago, and I passed—”
“You turned out ambiguous at best,” Laksiya said bluntly. “Under ordinary circumstances, we’d be doing another test right away, continuously, until we had a clear answer.”
Iravan opened his mouth to retort, but Chaiyya beat him to a reply.
“We can’t afford for you to be in Ecstasy,” the Senior Architect said, her voice breaking. “Please, Iravan—not after Bharavi—We need you—You can’t leave us to handle this alone—”
Her eyes filled with tears, and Airav put his arm around her, though he said nothing.
Iravan’s anger dissipated as soon as it had arisen. “I—Chaiyya—”
His gaze swept over them, the four councilors who had been preserving Nakshar while Bharavi had been consumed by Ecstasy, while Iravan himself had been distracted by his own troubles. Chaiyya was openly crying, but Kiana looked tired, the sparkle gone from her gray eyes. Laksiya’s anger was plain on her face, and Airav’s hand around Chaiyya’s shoulder shook.
“I won’t leave you, Chaiyya,” Iravan said, tiredly.
“Then come with us,” she said, wiping her face. “I will have to slow the poisoning of the healbranch, and there are details about our situation we need to discuss. You are still a Senior Architect and a councilor of Nakshar.”
34
AHILYA
Tariya was awake in the infirmary, silent tears trickling down her face, when Ahilya walked in.
Grown in the lowest tier of a giant neem tree, the infirmary had been reduced to a long, narrow hall crammed with healbranch beds. Ahilya remembered how it had once been: a five-story structure with private chambers for different kinds of patients. Now nearly a hundred beds were occupied, bodies rustling under thin linens while nurses walked from one to another, adjusting glass vials and bringing healing potions. Ahilya averted her gaze. The nurses were dressed in their everyday scrubs, but the clothing only reminded her of Oam. Even the conversation with the attendant in the front had been painful. Ahilya had been told that Kush was sent to the temple to speak to a Maze Architect. Her ten-year-old nephew had taken his baby brother with him. Deciding to check on them later, Ahilya strode to Tariya and sat down on the bed beside her sister.
Tariya’s beauty had dimmed like a flower closing. Her raven hair was knotted. Her skin appeared ashy. She no longer wore a bindi on her forehead, and on Tariya the absence of the red dot was striking. Ahilya had never kept to the old ways, and Iravan had cared little, but more than anything, this sign of widowhood on her sister startled Ahilya. She withdrew a comb from her pocket, adjusted herself, and silently began brushing Tariya’s hair.
Ought she to tell Tariya of what Iravan had said, of what he had done? What purpose would it serve? Besides, now, in the wake of the council meeting, this truth hardly mattered. She brushed her sister’s hair, unraveling one knot after another, her mind still gripped by the losses they both had suffered.
She could hear Iravan’s voice in her head: I didn’t just want a child, Ahilya. I wanted our child. She saw his jaw clench, saw him pace their apartment, declaring his love, declaring how he would be anyone she wanted him to be. She couldn’t fathom what had driven him to say those words. In that instant, Iravan hadn’t surrendered, no; he had abased himself out of an arbitrary terror. He had been willing to give her who he was blindly—now they’d both lost each other anyway. Ahilya’s eyes grew wet, and she put down the hairbrush.
Tariya dropped her head in her hands. “I miss her so much.”
“She—It should not have happened. Bharavi should never have died.”
Tariya shook her head, her body shuddering. “There was no other way. She was an Ecstatic. You don’t know… what excision does…” Tariya brushed her fingers to her eyes, but as her gaze met Ahilya’s, she paused. “You do know. How?” Her eyes traveled to Ahilya’s stomach. “Are you and Iravan—”
“We’re not pregnant,” Ahilya said hurriedly.
“But you know?”
Ahilya held her sister’s gaze. It’s only a matter of time before the secret is out. The spouses of architects don’t make a healbranch vow. She nodded slowly.
Tariya let out a bitter sound halfway between a laugh and a sob. “So, he did it. He finally did it. Always he rebelled against Bharavi. More than his healbranch vow, it was she who stood in his way of sharing excision’s secret. I can see that he wasted no time after her death.” Tariya wiped her nose, her voice vicious. “If you know about excision, then you know about their pact.”
Anger rippled through Ahilya, leaving her muscles weak. She had already worked it out, that Bharavi would have told Tariya of the pact—the two women had their children; Bharavi had no need for the secret Iravan had been forced to keep. Ahilya took a deep breath, trying to control her rage, but it simmered in her, the horror and anger from the last two days churning to the surface. She had not come there to the infirmary to fight with Tariya, but this blatant admission she could not dismiss.
“You knew,” she rasped, unable to keep the accusation out of her voice. “How could you let them do this? You who understand the need for healing. The power of life over death. You who have battled your own despair—how could you let it take them over—that they believed there was no other choice.”
“You think I didn’t try to stop Bharavi?” Tariya’s body shuddered. “This was her decision; there was nothing I could do about it. She didn’t want to live in that manner—”
“And you let Iravan make that choice, too. But you didn’t think to tell me?”
“Would you have let him go?” Tariya spat. “If their roles were reversed, if it was Iravan who was the Ecstatic, would you have allowed Bharavi to kill him?”
“I would have found another way! I would have torn the ashram asunder to find a different solution! I would never have let it come to this.”
“There is no other way. You think the architects haven’t searched for another solution? Bharavi studied Ecstasy, Ahilya. She knew how hard, how impossible rehabilitation would be. And you think you’d find the answer?” Tariya began to cry again. She covered her face with her fingers. “All you ever did was fight the architects. You wanted what they had so badly that you never truly saw what you had. And now Bharavi is dead while Iravan is alive. How could any of us tell you this? What would you understand of it?”
Ahilya stood up, shaking with anger. Her sister wept, convulsing, her head in her hands. Sobs wracked her body, the shudders painful to watch.
Ahilya’s fury left her as soon as it had come.
She dropped back on the bed and held her sister as she cried. Over and over again, she stroked Tariya’s head, murmuring to her.
Eventually, Tariya stopped. She pushed Ahilya away and turned on the bed, her back to her.
Ahilya rose slowly. How could any of us tell you this? What would you understand?
Iravan had told her. He’d known she’d understand.
What had her responsibility been—her own choices? She had no clear answer, no clear manner in which to think anymore. Her head dizzy, Ahilya walked away from the infirmary, her heart breaking into tiny pieces.
35
AHILYA
Dhruv and Naila were waiting for her outside her home by the time she arrived. Ahilya tapped at her citizen ring, and the leafy wall unfurled to reveal a doorway. The house had shrunk again since dawn, becoming a mere single chamber. Ahilya watched, her cheeks heating, as Dhruv and Naila took in the small circular table in the center, the bed in the corner, the simple kitchen.
“Bit modest for a Senior Architect, isn’t it?” Dhruv said, sitting on one of the chairs that grew around the table.
Naila pursed her lips at Dhruv’s comment. Ahilya tried to hold her shoulders straight. She busied herself in the kitchen, bringing clay mugs and a jar of water. In her mind, Tariya still sobbed. How could any of us tell you this? What would you understand? A knock sounded on the wall they’d entered through, and Ahilya tapped at her citizen ring again. Iravan strode in, filling the small chamber with his energy.
“Thank you, Ahilya,” he said, “for the use of your apartment.”
She nodded, her throat heavy. Dhruv glanced from her to Iravan. His expression changed, eyes widening in understanding. His mouth dropped open. He stared at Ahilya but she couldn’t meet his gaze. Had everything changed? Did Iravan want to salvage what was left? A few weeks ago, her husband had come to her to reconcile. They went round and round each other, star-crossed, tragic, disastrous. Ahilya’s lips twitched in dark irony.
Iravan sat down at the table, opposite Dhruv. As though that were permission, Naila sat down between them. Ahilya followed more slowly, sitting opposite Naila.
“So,” Iravan said, glancing at each of them in turn. “Our task is to discover why earthrages are getting longer, why lulls are becoming shorter, and how all of this affects trajection. If we discount everything that was an effect of Bharavi’s Ecstasy, what are we left with?”
He gazed at them expectantly. With his considering, rather jaded face, he looked almost like a teacher who knew the answers yet was waiting for his brightest students to arrive at them. Ahilya bit the inside of her cheeks; she had a sudden urge to grin, bordering on hysteria. He seemed so unaffected by what had happened to them, but she knew him too well for that. No matter how composed he looked, Iravan was holding on by a thread, just like she was.
“Well,” she said, trying to mirror his tone, “we know there’s something down there in the jungle that is blocking trajection. So, that’s one thing affecting trajection.”
Naila nodded, but Iravan looked at her curiously. “Will you explain that?”
As best as she could, Ahilya explained what she and Dhruv had discovered in the solar lab, but with every word out of her mouth, Dhruv fidgeted in his chair, shaking his head and wiping his glasses as though wanting to interrupt but trying to be polite.
“—implying,” Ahilya concluded, “it could potentially be interfering with the ashram’s trajection, too—”
“No, I’m sorry—Ahilya, no—It doesn’t imply that at all,” Dhruv burst out, clearly unable to contain himself any longer.
She glanced at him. “What?”
“I’m saying that everything we discussed in the solar lab is wrong. I don’t know what charged the tracker, after all—”
“You said it was the trajection from all the ashrams in flight—”
“Yes, but I’ve checked it since, and as it happens, it wasn’t trajection that was charging the tracker. It was—it must be—a whole different kind of energy, some—some Energy X.”
Iravan’s face grew very still. “What do you mean?”
Dhruv removed his glasses, wiped them on the edge of his kurta, and placed them back on his nose. “About five years ago, I engineered a transmitter-receiver pair. The transmitter became part of the elephant-yaksha’s tracker, but the receiver stayed in the lab. I thought I was replicating existing sungineering technology—even though all expeditionary equipment is experimental. But as it turns out, neither the receiver nor the tracker functioned off of trajection.” Dhruv’s plaintive gaze took all of them in. “I don’t know what I invented. I don’t know what it became.”
Naila uttered a soft snort. “Didn’t you run any tests when you created it?”
Dhruv let out an exasperated sigh. “Of course I did. And five years ago, all of it seemed to be working off of trajection. Once Ahilya tagged the elephant-yaksha and Nakshar flew away, I didn’t pay attention to the receiver because I didn’t expect a response from the transmitter. We’d flown too far from the yaksha. When the transmitter began signaling about three weeks ago, I thought it was because we were in range again. But I’ve run multiple tests since then. And neither the transmitter nor the receiver were being charged by trajection. They were being charged, as I said, by some mysterious Energy X.”
Ahilya drew in a sharp breath as something clicked in her mind. “This is why we didn’t sense the signal in the lab for all those years. For five years, we had been flying over the elephant-yaksha and the tracker was charging, but somehow, we didn’t receive a signal until a few weeks ago because the receiver was uncharged. It implies there’s a common link between the events. Something happened five years ago in Nakshar that happened again about three weeks ago. Something that sourced Energy X.”
“Something did,” Naila said, excitedly. “Ecstasy.”
A silence fell over the small table. Ahilya glanced at Iravan. He seemed not to be breathing, his eyes unfocused on a groove in the wood.
“What are you saying?” Dhruv asked, his voice strange.
“Five years before, there was an Ecstatic Architect in Nakshar,” Naila explained. “Senior Architect Manav-ve. And we know Bharavi-ve was in Ecstasy in the last few weeks before we landed. I’ll wager anything that if you look at the times for when the tracker charged, it’ll coincide with when one of them was trajecting in Ecstasy.”
