The Burning Wake

Prologue - The Author
As a child, my mother would tell me stories at bed-time. Sometimes, she would tell me grand, great epics, of strong heroes vanquishing evil from the world. But, other times it would tell me a scary story, of monsters and terrifying places, of nightmares and fears that ran deep. Unlike the heroic epics, where the hero is skilled and unafraid of danger, the scary stories’ protagonists were at their wit’s end, afraid, constantly on the verge of loss. I asked her, once, why she would tell such frightening tales to me and she told me, “We make up horrors to help us with real ones”.
I never truly appreciated what she meant then. I always thought, when it was time for me to tell the story, I would be the hero, defeat any monster, threat or danger I could conjure up from my imagination. Unfortunately, my imagination ran much deeper and much, much darker than I realized at the time. I’m a writer, but this story isn’t really about me.
There was a dream I had, after my mother lulled me into sleep, that felt more real than any dream I had before. So, yes, as you probably suspected, this starts with a dream…or does it?
Like most terrible nightmares, it began with no explanation, no prelude, just a vague, desperate situation that only the dreamer, in the brief moment of the dream, could fully grasp.

The chariot jostled, left and right, as it sped along the dirt path, the coastal road that snaked parallel to the ocean, rocks and debris flying from its churning wheels. Nevertheless, the charioteer urged the tired horses forward, hollering them to move faster, vigorously, approaching recklessly. There were a number of times when the chariot tripped precariously to one side, then the other, before returning to even kneel.
The single passenger, a tall, thin woman, dressed in a pure white sari, within the chariot gripped the sides, preventing herself from being slammed into the chariot’s walls. However, even when the chariot rode smoothly, the passenger couldn’t relax. Her eyes remained locked ahead of her, looking, but not seeing, her eyes on a point in the distance neither the charioteer nor the horses could see.

The woman was anxious, worried. She sat straight up, despite the chariot’s dips and turns and leans. In her thoughts, in her feeble prayers, she wished for the chariot to reach her destination faster. The woman’s hands were not idle: one hand, one finger was tracing a dark flower that was strung around her throat.

There was a sudden *CRASH* followed by a horse’s cry and a series of *thuds* from beneath the chariot, which came to a swift and sudden stop. Gasped as she alighted from the chariot to assess the situation. There were four lanterns, one at each corner of the chariot, providing a pool of orange light around it.
The charioteer was with her, trying to calm the terrified horses, whose eyes were rolling in their sockets, wide and terrified as naying cries pierce the night.
“What happened?” she asked the charioteer as the man gripped the horses’ reins. The man’s face was gray, sweat mixing with ocean mists on his brow. He looked as equally fear-struck as the horse charges, but somehow managed to swallow past the lump in his throat.
“Back there,” he said, nodding his head in the direction they had traveled. “My lady. I’m sorry. I didn’t see him. He came out of nowhere. Out of the dark…”

But the woman ignored the charioteer’s stammering and looked in the direction he indicated. There was a body in the middle of the road, a man. From its trampled condition and its utter stillness, the woman knew the man was dead, having been run over by the horse and the chariot. She gripped the side of the chariot, leaned her head on her knuckles. She wouldn’t usually show such a visible demonstration of frustration and worry, but she was scared that the city’s guards, upon discovering the accident, would arrest her and she would never make it to where she was going.

She looked back to the charioteer, who seemed to finally be able to calm the panicking horses.
“Let’s continue. We don’t have much time left,” she told him.
Before the man could reply, the lights on the chariot were suddenly extinguished, plunging the charioteer, the woman, and the chariot and horses into darkness. A howling ghastly wind seemed to erupt from nowhere, like some unseen banshee. Instantly, the horses panicked once more, threatening to tear free of the chariot and run free.
The woman didn’t hesitate. “Quickly! Hold the horses! I’ll light the lanterns again!”
“The flint and steel is under my seat!” replied the man trying to be helpful.
And, yet, the woman paid no heed, instead wordlessly to the first lantern and lifted a hand inside of it. Suddenly, light bloomed inside and soon the woman did the same with the remaining lanterns, the charioteer blinking in surprise. Soon the small pool of light was restored around the chariot. Once she did, the strange, foreboding wind ceased immediately.
That should have been a victory in itself, but then the charioteer looked behind the chariot and gasped, with the woman following his gaze.

The dead man had vanished with not even the slightest trace that he even existed at all.

“My lady,” the charioteer exclaimed, his terror plain to see. “I can’t…the horses…they might bolt…it’s too dangerous-”

The charioteer had clearly lost his nerve, nor would it be safe to continue in the chariot with the horse liable to bolt at any moment. The woman looked into his eyes, steady gray eyes into wide black beady ones.

“Stay here,” she said, turning back to the chariot as the man struggled to keep the horses steady. She reached within the chariot, gathering the few items she had brought with her: a bow and quiver, the latter of which she tied to her wrist; a saber in its scabbard, which she tied opposite to the quiver; and one strange lantern, completely enclosed, except for a round protrusion on one side, containing a lens.

The woman, now armed, gazed down the road. Her destination was in sight: a large tower on the coast, precariously positioned on rock with a fire, burning at the top: a lighthouse. She looked at the lighthouse like a man in a desert looked at water with nothing, but thick fog blocking the road.

“Stay here,” she repeated. “Stay here and stay in the light. Always stay in the light.”
“But, my lady-”
But the woman was already moving past the pools of light ringing the chariot into the darkness beyond.
“My lady!” cried out the charioteer after her, still struggling to prevent the naying horses from bolting, too frightened to follow. “My lady, stay in the light!”
But the woman ignored him, walking along the road. In truth, there was plenty of light on the street, oil lamps shining brightly from poles on the side of the road. They showed the path to the lighthouse. At least, it would have shown the path, but just around the corner from the chariot, was a wooden bridge, completely collapsed.

This time, anger rose in her, enough to eclipse the fear welling inside of her. There was no mistaking it now, her path was being deliberately blocked. Or, maybe, she realized, separating her from the chariot was the goal all along. Regardless, she must continue…

Next to the bridge, there was a dirt path that also led to the lighthouse, but it was a longer way to go, going through a nearby forest with fewer oil lamps showing the path, creating long gaps of darkness between circles of light. With little choice, the woman left the road and followed the footpath.

The woman didn’t get far on the trail when she heard a noise behind her. There was a fearful shout, the sound of thudding horse hoofs, and she knew the chariot and the horses had bolted, leaving her behind. She stopped under the pool of lamp-fueled light and turned to look. The sound of screeching wind had returned, filling the air around her. And at the start of the footpath, in the shadow between lamp posts, where the light can not reach, was the man her chariot had run down. Standing on his unhurt two legs, alive and intact. Or so it seemed. And in each of his hands was an ax.

The man suddenly appeared in front of the woman, outside her circle of light. All the previous oil lamps on the path suddenly went out, creating a sea of darkness between the light where she was and the road.
“Finally,” the man chuckled, an ugly laugh.
This close to the woman, the man’s features should have been distinguishable. But beyond the tunic, pants, and the pakol he wore, the man was completely covered in darkness. In fact, the darkness clung to him, oozing off him and dissipating into the air. As though he was made of darkness, a void that was alive.
“Do you even recognize me, Empress?” The shadowy man’s tone was mocking. “You send men to fight and die in your battles and reap the benefits.” He raised one of the axes, a smaller blade. Threw it. It struck the oil lamp directly, shattering the glass, extinguishing the light. The woman’s only sanctuary. “You think you’re a god now?! Think you can play with people’s lives and throw them away to serve your own ends?!”

The man was swinging his last ax wildly, almost without thought, as he threateningly approached the woman. The title he mockingly gave her meant nothing to her, an empty shell she had discarded long ago, but the ax was a very real threat. The woman took a step back, then another. It wasn’t that she was unafraid, not really, but she was familiar with danger. She kept her eyes on the strange, frightening man while she also kept her distance.

The man’s ax struck the pole the lamp was hung on and, in a single blow, snapped the pole in half, sending it crashing onto the ground. The woman gasped. One blow would surely kill her. She ran. The man was one step behind her, still swinging madly.
“Maybe I should bow, give you a little curtsy! Maybe then you’ll show me some respect! Or maybe it's time for you to suffer for a change!”

The woman ran, scrambling for the safety of a nearby oil lamp, only for it to suddenly shatter, its light flickering and dying in the darkness. The woman left the trail, running toward a ledge. Desperate, she threw herself off the edge. Fortunately, the footpath continued under the ledge and caught her, but only after she crashed against rock and bush, scraping her skin, dirtying the white of her sari.

The woman quickly rose to standing as the shadow man appeared on the ledge above her.
“What a joke! Without an army, or a throne, you’re nothing! No one would give you the day of time, much less a country to rule. When I’m done with you, no one will think of you. No one will care.”
The man’s speech was changing, oscillating, speaking regularly then changing into a deep voice and back again.
“You’re in my story now and I’m going to kill you!”
The man turned around and disappeared from the edge, leaving the woman alone in the unnatural darkness around her.

The woman took a calming breath, then took stock of herself. She still had her saber, her bow and quiver, her lantern, all intact. Her sari was ripped, dirtied, but that didn’t matter. All that mattered was reaching the lighthouse. She unhooked the strange, unlit lantern from her waist and opened the hinged side. Took a breath, then another. Then reached inside the lantern, like she did to the ones around the chariot.
“Please, brother. Just one small light,” she whispered. The lantern shone to life under her fingertips.

The woman closed the lantern’s side, latched it shut, and turned the round protrusion on the front. A beam of light, wide and dim, projecting from the lantern through the protrusion. The woman adjusted the protrusion, like a dial, narrowing the beam until it was thin and bright.
The light the lantern provided wasn’t as widespread or protective as the oil lamps, but the lantern was far more durable and casted a brighter light. It will have to do.
The woman began running again, a measurable jog, down the footpath and down the cliff face. The lighthouse was out of sight, but before the woman, among that path, was a small cabin, light glowing from its windows. The woman made for it. But there was a wooden gate in the way.

The gate shuddered, darkness bleeding from its wood. And from that darkness…
“Die!” the shadowy man, ax in hand, strolling swiftly toward her, weapon raised, ready to cut.

The woman waited…and waited…and waited when the man was almost upon her, then ducked left. The ax swung over her head, mere inches away. The man’s momentum carried him forward, creating a distance between them.

The woman knew her chance had arrived. She would not get another one.

The woman turned, raised a lantern, and shone the lantern’s light at the man. There was a low screech, slowly growing in intensity, as sparks flew from where the light struck the man. He staggered, then tried to block the beam of light with his arms, his hands, the ax. But the light was merciless, fraying the darkness from the man’s flesh. With an almost animalistic growl, the man tried to approach her again, but his movements were slowed, clumsy.

The screech grew to a crescendo, the man mere feet from her, when finally the darkness dispersed from the man’s skin. He stumbled back, ax loose in his grip, but the woman could see the dark in his eyes, his iris nothing more than white pricks in a void. The darkness had him. He couldn’t be saved.

Swiftly, the woman lowered the lantern, raised her bow, nocked an arrow, and shot the man.

She remembered how to use a bow, from the time before this life, before what she was now.

The woman shot the man once, then again, then another time. His body twitched and convulsed each time an arrow struck him, stumbling back with each impact. Three arrows, each striking a critical, vital organ.

Her teacher, a guardswoman, would have commended her for her accuracy.
“Shot true,” she would have said. “Shot true, Empress.”

And yet, the man was once again regaining his balance, approaching her again. Any normal human would have been long dead if shot as he had been. The woman coolly raised the bow again and shot him clean through the chest. The man’s feet left the ground as if struck by an elephant, a death cry leaving his lips. As it twisted through the air, the man’s body became light, empty of features, before fading away, leaving nothing behind.

The woman doubled over, winded and exhausted. There was sweat on her brow, borne of terror and exertion. She sucked in a breath. Another. She was weak, tired. She had been here, in this place, far too long, fighting shadows, and now…it wouldn’t matter. The lighthouse was close. She could make it.

The woman rose to standing, then froze. Turned.
“I can keep this up forever!”
The shadowy man had returned, behind her and the ghastly wind was whirling around him, forming a vortex of dark energy, ripping trees, boulders, oil lamps, anything and everything in his path. The woman didn’t hesitate; she ran.
She jolted forward, through the gate, through a grassy yard, and entered the cabin. She slammed the log cabin’s door shut, latched the lock closed, slammed the wood bar down, and backed away. Not a second later, a great force crashed upon the cabin, sending pieces of the ceiling crashing to the floor.
The cabin was sparse: multiple lanterns hung from the walls, a table and chairs, fireplace to cook and warm, and a cot. There was nothing she could conceivably use as a weapon, if there was a way to kill the thing currently destroying her feeble sanctuary. But, there was a back door…
Rushing over to it, the woman paused at the door. Beyond it, through the cracks between planks of wood, the whirling, twisting darkness was waiting to swallow her whole.
The cabin took another hit, part of the building collapsed, pulling down one of the precious lanterns with it. The darkness was literally leaking in. She couldn’t stay here much longer.

The woman pressed her hand to the door, closed her eyes, and reached for a power that was hers - and not hers. Something gifted to her by someone precious to her. Something bought at a terrible price. A thorn blade to the heart.
“Show me a way to the lighthouse,” she whispered. “Show me a path.”
A bright light began shining from the other side of the door, the sounds of the whistling darkness fading from that side of the door. The cabin took another punishing blow, this time the front half of the building was entirely gone, torn away. The last remaining lanterns were beginning to flicker, nearly extinguished. It was now or never.
The woman tore open the door and rushed through it and…

She stood in a glade, a cool breeze blowing through nearby trees. To her right was the end of the road her chariot was traveling on. To her front, there were the remains of the rope bridge, nothing but the stringy broken rope and four posts, two on each side of a gaping chasm that separate the outcropping the lighthouse stood on and mainland she stood upon. Clearly the work of sabotage. Whoever, or whatever, destroyed the bridge had no intention of allowing anyone on or off the lighthouse’s small outcropping of rock.
The woman looked behind. Nothing. No cabin, no wailing, clutching darkness. Just quiet. But not still.
All around her, leaves, trees, flowers were twisting, turning, leaning in toward her, almost as if they were welcoming her.

This, too, was another burrowed gift of hers. She coaxed the plants, the flowers, and the green around her to grow. Short logs became planks. The vines interlaced with one another, forming ropes. Roots anchoring the leaves and wood and all the green into the ground. Soon, a green and brown bridge had bloomed, budding with golds and purples and reds of flowers along its length. Her path to the lighthouse was clear.

Suddenly, there was an enormous crash behind her. The woman turned around. The dark vortex was sweeping out of the forest, making a beeline for her. Trees, rocks, wood from the cabin, even poor animals that caught up into the vortex were falling all around her. The woman didn’t hesitate. She ran across the bridge she created.

The bridge twisted and writhe under her, buffeted by approaching vortex and the stray collisions. She could feel the magic in the bridge stretch and fray, on the verge of breaking. But she made it completely across before the vines were torn out and the green bridge crashed into the dark cavern below.

However, the dark vortex was still following her, so she ran toward the lighthouse, to the illuminated door that led to the inside. Oil lamps that lit the path were snuffed out as she approached. It was impossible to run, unbearably difficult to walk with the vortex so near.

She fought for each step in front of the other, grabbing anything of any purchase: the bushes, the oil lamp poles, even the ground. She even forced green shoots, flower stems to grow out of the ground and hold her feet to the ground, anchoring her.

Finally, after what seemed ages, the woman reached the door. The rusty handle squeaked under her hand. The vortex was almost upon her. There was no one else to run. She wretched the door open and, with mighty effort, slammed it shut closed, bolting the lock.
Immediately, the sound of the vortex outside died away. The woman took a breath and stepped away from the door. She was inside the tower of the lighthouse, a hollow interior with a spiral staircase to the very top.

Standing at the bottom of the staircase, the woman could hear a strange, metallic tapping from the room above. The noise was coming from the top of the lighthouse, near the tower's flame itself. The light was so bright, it even made it all the way downstairs where she was. For the first time in a long time, the woman was visibly relaxed. She had made it!
I’m almost home, she thought. Wait, my love. I’m coming.
With a sudden gust, the flame of the lighthouse went out. All sounds had ceased. The darkness that surrounded her was heavy and suffocating, choking her. It was a trick! A lie! She was drowning in the darkest of shadows. She reached out, with her hands, with her mind, her heart. Reaching across a vast ocean of cold, distant stars and waters deep and dark and strange. Imploring with every ounce of her wavering strength, one last desperate cry!
“Priya!” she shouted, with voice and mind, “I’m sorry! I failed you. Forgive me!”
And then, her world went dark…

Chapter 1: Arrival - Malini
A character in a mystery or horror story, no matter who they are or what backstory they have written for themselves, is like the audience: unaware of what the mystery or horror is or its shape. Hell, the characters might even know less than the audience; most readers are expecting a mystery or a horror while the characters are expecting another ordinary day to wake up to.

Malini woke with a gasp, sitting upright. In the short period of waking and awareness, she didn’t know if she was still dreaming or truly awake. The situation was not helped by the pounding inside her skull, a pressure behind her forehead. Honestly, that was the least surprising, considering she rested her head against the hard surface of the side of the chariot, hardly the best comforting place.
Gradually, eventually, her equilibrium and memory returned to her. She shielded her eyes from the bright, afternoon sun, a fire rising high in the sky, streaming through the windows, and filling the chariot with light and heat. Threw was hardly a cloud in the bright blue sky to protect her from the glaring rays.
It had been a long and nearly unbearable journey by boat, rolling and pitching with the waves, with little in the way of personal space or privacy. Her cabin on the ship wasn't especially cramped or uncomfortable, but there wasn't a voyage she was especially looking forward to retaking on the journey back. That said, she had to admit, she enjoyed the view of the sea as they sailed on it. So vast, so deep. An seemingly endless liquid plain that seemed to go on forever, to one horizon to the next. She never thought she would be so captivated by the sight.
It helped soothe the otherwise monotonous journey, helped by the presence of-
She stopped. Looked around. The chariot was empty, with the exception of her. That wasn't what disturbed her. It was the utter stillness and quiet that surrounded her. No voices, no sound of guards mumbling or checking their weapons. Nothing. The only noise was the slight creaking of the chariot's open door, swinging softly in the light breeze. There should be sound, some sort of noise. Where was everyone?
"Hello?" she said, but no reply.
She rose, inching her way toward the door. Outside, she could make out trees swaying in the cool sea breeze. The leaves rustling, the occasional branch breaking as animals scurry from tree to tree.
She was almost to the door of the chariot when a dark figure appeared at the door frame, cloaked in shadow. Malini flinched back, gasping. For one wild moment, Malini was back in her dreams, her nightmares, taking on flesh before her. But then...
"Oh, scared you, did I?" chuckled the figure, light and teasing. Malini blinked as her vision came into focus. She recognized that voice
"Narina?" she gasped, trying to catch her breath and her frantic heartbeat.
"Of course, silly," Malini's lady-in-waiting laughed, "Who else were you expecting?"
Narina, arched eyebrows and a teasing gleam in her eye, her mouth was soaked, head to toe.
“I’m sorry,” Malini said, her pulse returning to normal. “I was dreaming.” She looked at Narina up and down, soaked-through sari, hair, and all. “What on earth happened to you?”
“We took a dip into the bay,” Narina replied casually. “We would have brought you too, but we didn’t want to wake you.”
“I would think not,” came a stern voice from behind Narina. Both her and Malini glanced in the voice’s direction.
“Lady Pramila,” Malini said, watching the approaching figure, struggling mightily not to guffaw loudly at the sight. “What on earth happened to you?”
Lady Pramila, unsmiling, a severe scowl etched permanently, it seemed, on her face, was, like her daughter, soaked head in toe. Fun, feisty, free-spirited Narina? Sure, Malini could see her taking a dip, sari and all. But strict and disciplined Pramila?
Pramila frown somehow deepened even further, “My daughter thought it would be fun to play a prank on me at the bay?”
“As if it was my fault mother doesn’t know how to balance herself on a piece of driftwood?”
Whack!
“Ouch!”
Pramila brought her copy of the Book of Mothers down on Narina’s head.
“Honestly, Narina. This isn't how someone of your station behaves. I’m just glad that Princess Malini wasn’t awake to partake in your foolishness. What an embarrassment it would be if the Princess would show up at the Raj’s palace soaked through to the bone. The scandal…”
“At least the water was refreshing,” said a quiet voice. Appearing behind Pramila, came another person. While Narina was loud and boisterous, this girl was small and quiet. Alori. The only daughter of the king of Alor and Malini’s second attendant. “We might not get another opportunity when we arrive at the Raj’s palace. Not while Pramila is watching us.”
Pramila was still in the middle of berating Narina while the rest of Malini's entourage of guards and assistants began trickling in from the direction of the bay. Amid complaints of the constant sea mist and erratic, passing storms, they begin to prepare the chariots for the last leg of the journey.
“Do you think we’ll have this much excitement at the palace?” Narina asked when her mother was safely out of hearing, asking the head charioteer details for the remaining journey. Narina had emerged from behind a screen, where she and Alori were changing in drier clothing while Malini leaned against the chariot, glad to let her feet stretch.
“I doubt it,” Malini whispered back. “Your mother seems hell-bent on this meeting with the Raj going perfectly.”
“Maybe my father should have just sent her by herself,” Malini jested, “since she wants to play the ambassador.”
“Oh, I don’t know about that,” Narina countered, the corners of her lips tugging upward. “If she was here on her own, she would demand the Raj’s submission to Parijatdvipa’s loving authority and embrace the faith of the Mothers.”
“Hmm, so we’re the peace-keepers on this mission, here to ensure the harmonious diplomatic exchange between the Parijatdvipa and the Kingdom of Andhera,” Malini replied. A smile unfurled on her lips. “Quite a far cry from Dwarali traders, aren’t we now?”
“Thick cloaks aren’t exactly fashionable here, I’m afraid,” Alori interjected, emerging from behind the screen, fanning herself in the heat of the mid-afternoon.
Both Malini and Narina let out a laugh at Alori’s call-back to the roles they used to play-pretend in the imperial mahal’s garden as children.
It was a moment of pure joy for Malini, one that she should enjoy with full bliss, but-
The sickle moon scar on the back of Malini’s neck twinged, a reminder that turned the sweet memory bitter.
Malini bit the inside of her cheek, drawing out the ting of iron in her mouth. It was one of those days when Malini and her friends were playing pretend that Chandra found them and taught how easy to cut joy out of a person's life with the busy end of a knife. In truth, it had been a blessing in disguise to be able to leave the imperial court and Chandra and his cruel, unloving eyes behind.
Alori must have noticed her silence and deduced the reason behind it because she next said, in her quiet voice, “You know, he can’t hurt you now.”
There was no need to elaborate on who “he” was.
“We wouldn’t let him,” Narina interjected, catching on quickly to what, and whom, they were talking about, “even if he was here.”
Malini let herself this moment of weakness, this rush of gratefulness, to wash herself, before taking a deep breath.
“Thank you,” she managed to say to her two heart sisters.
“Enough of this idle chit-chat,” came Pramila’s hard voice, cracking through their bubble of happiness like a whip through the air. “We’re returning to the road. According to the page the Raj had sent, we should arrive at the Raj’s palace before sundown. Narina, enough of that pout. Let’s go.”
They begin to fill back into their chariot, one after the other, Malini last in line. She had gripped the edge of the chariot and was about to pull herself inside when a peculiar feeling gripped her in turn. She stopped. Turned.
Malini saw, through the haze of sea mist and sun glare, the large, imposing tower in the distance, jutting from a cliff’s edge. In the brightness of the day, the lighthouse was a dark abyss as if the rays of the afternoon sun couldn’t reach the naked stone of the tower. It was as if it was an empty space in the world, absent of light, a dark hollow to the world.
Got to it! I must reach it! came the sudden thought. Got to it!
Malini felt a strange pull toward the foreboding lighthouse, almost like gravity. The pitch-black tower couldn’t be more foreboding, uninviting, but Malini was half the mind of ordering her chariot to turn around and rush toward it. It was completely irrational, a feeling bordering on insanity, but she couldn’t deny the sensation pulsing beneath her breastbone.
By the Mothers, she thought, what is wrong with me?
“Princess Malini!” Pramila’s steel-taunt voice snapped through Malini’s reverie. Malini turned. Lady Pramila, Narina, and Alori had boarded the chariot and took their seats and were staring back at her, expectantly. “Are you getting in or not?”
Malini blinked, looking between the chariot’s occupants and the lighthouse. The strange pull toward the structure, the sudden madness, has vanished just as abrupt as it had arrived, leaving her bewildered. With no explanation forthcoming, Malini doubled her grip on the chariot, grounding herself, and pulled herself inside.
She was taking her seat when her foot struck something, something thin, slight.
“What’s this?” Malini said, reaching down to grab the object.
It was the binding for a book, the front and back cover, but without the pages in the middle.
Pramila frowned, looking around the chariot. “How the…how did that get here? Guard!”
The guardsman quickly appeared at the chariot’s door. “What’s the problem, my ladies?”
Pramila gestured to the remains of the book in Malini’s hand. “You were guarding the Princess while we were away. Did someone leave this here?”
The man looked as perplexed by the book coverings and bindings as any of them. “No, ma’am. The only sound or noises we heard was when the Princess woke and, by then, you and the other ladies were already returning from the bay.”
Pramila snorted her acknowledgement. “Fine. We’re ready to go. You may leave.” When the man left, she turned to Malini. “Throw it out, will you, Princess? It is useless without its pages, anyway.”
But Malini ignored Pramila, fascinated by this odd book binding. She turned it over, so she could read the name on its front cover-and a single piece of paper fluttered out, a lone survivor of whoever or whatever tore out the other pages.
“Oh, look at this,” Alori said, lifting the bright white piece of paper and handing it to Malini. “Not much of a story to be told with only one page in a book.”
Malini took the page. “Oh, who knows? They might be the greatest words ever dedicated to paper.”
“Oh, really?” Narina interjected, a challenge in her eye. “Then, what does it say? Go on, read it.”
Malini gazed down at the page and quickly read it:

Malini felt a strange pull toward the foreboding lighthouse, almost like gravity. The pitch-black tower couldn’t be more foreboding, uninviting, but Malini was half the mind of ordering her chariot to turn around and rush toward it. It was completely irrational, a feeling bordering on insanity, but she couldn’t deny the sensation pulsing beneath her breastbone.
By the Mothers, she thought, what is wrong with me?

Malini stared at the words on the page. She blinked. Then blinked again. The words didn’t change.
Wha…what is this? The words. They were a perfect description of Malini’s own thoughts and feelings, captured on parchment, not even a moment ago. But how?
As nonchalantly as she could muster, she chanced a glance out of the windows on the chariot. But, even as she considered the possibility of a spy, she dismissed immediately. Even if someone was watching her, they wouldn’t be able to read the contents of her mind. Much less record a spontaneous, random thought that entered her head, write it on parchment, and then somehow slip it into her chariot without her, her companions, or any of the guards noticing.
Noticing Narina, Alori, and Pamila watching her, Malini folded both the paper and the mystery away for another, more private time, sliding the parchment into a pocket.
“It’s nothing,” she said, hoping her voice was even, “nothing at all. It’s a shame really. I was hoping to learn the name of the author.”
Narina was looking at her with a knowing look in her eye. Malini would have to explain what she had discovered to her and Alori later, when they were away from Pramila’s prying eyes.
“Wasn’t there a name on the covers?” Alori asked, looking at the empty coverings in Malini’s hand.
Malini turned the covers over. Indeed, there was something written on the front cover: a title and a name. Whatever this book is, or was, it was titled simply: Adrift. And in the bottom, right-hand corner: Aahan Wakim.
Malini memorized the name. She could tell she was going to have a very interesting conversation with this Aahan Wakim, whenever they met.
The chariot jolted alive beneath them. They were on their way.