The Chaos Curse (Kiranmala and the Kingdom Beyond #3) - Sayantani DasGupta Page 0,69

toast up your liver and eat it like a crumpet! I’ll make a thorkari with your thyroid! I’ll use your toes to flavor my morning tea!”

“You bought us a little time with these baddies, but there are more where those came from,” Priya muttered, pulling at my arm. “Not to mention the ghost himself! We better get out of here before good ol’ Bhoot-Baba-ji remembers it was you who put him in that thermos!”

“But how? We’ve still got no rides!” said Neel, sounding seriously worried.

And then I felt him, Tiktiki One, clambering up my leg.

“What are you doing here?” As I grabbed the little gecko and put him on my shoulder, I saw who was flying through the air toward us.

“Naya!” I yelled with delight. “And you brought more air clan with you!”

“Hang on!” Naya’s black wings were beating strongly in the wind, and for the first time, I realized what a beautiful sight they were. Or maybe I was just grateful my friend was there saving our butts. She grabbed me under the armpits, and the other flying rakkhosh grabbed the rest of our team.

“I should have realized someone else would know the Trojan horse story!” I yelled to Naya. “Thank goodness you came for us! How did you know we were here?”

“I guessed …” Naya began, but then she choked out a little scream and she and I started to spiral unevenly through the air.

“Naya!” I yelled. I realized that one of the flying monkeys had punctured her wing with an arrow, making a giant gaping hole in the middle! We spun through the air, dropping down a few dozen feet. Naya’s usually happy-go-lucky face was twisted in pain, and when she gasped, she brought up a frothy mouthful of blood! “Help! Somebody help us!” I screamed.

I’m not sure anyone heard me, or even knew we were in trouble. Priya and the other fire rakkhosh, riding on the backs of two air clan, were still shooting flames in the direction of our pursuers. Two land clan rakkhosh, hanging on to the legs of their air clan rescuers, were throwing spears down to our enemies. From the back of his ride, Neel was beating off some green-faced witches who were trying to chase us on their brooms. The air was dark with smoke, as our enemies on the ground were sending up flaming arrows. I could still hear Stheno’s evil voice, shrieking for my meddling middle-school head.

But Naya and I were lurching through the air, her injured wing making it more and more impossible for her to fly. “Hang in there, Your Princessness,” gasped my sweet friend, worried about me even when it was she who was so badly hurt.

“We need help! Naya’s been shot!” I yelled as loud as I could. It was finally Neel who heard me. He turned his head, his eyes widening as he took in our plight. He shouted something I couldn’t hear, and within seconds, two flying rakkhosh swooped up next to Naya. One—a fierce green-skinned fellow with a scar splitting his face in two—grabbed me out of her hands, and the other—a rakkhoshi with needlelike black teeth—put a strong arm around a flailing Naya’s shoulder.

I yelped as I saw the needle-toothed rakkhoshi slap Naya’s almost-unconscious face with a merciless hand. Her words were equally strong and fierce. “Sister, we must flee and fly! Lean on me! I won’t let you die!”

It was chaos, with the shrieking villains below us and the flying villains behind us, but the entire time we were escaping, the only thing I could think was: If anything happened to Naya, it was entirely my fault!

I don’t know how the air clan rescue party lost the flying monkeys, green-faced witches, and other supervillains who were chasing us. But somehow they did. Back at PSS headquarters, we got a now-unconscious Naya in with the one physician Mati had found willing to treat hurt rakkhosh, Dr. Jhumpa Ahmed. Dangerously sick, my friend was rushed into surgery. The rest of us paced and fretted outside. Bunty, on hearing about what happened, let out an earsplitting roar. The accusing look the tiger gave me made me want to shrivel up and disappear. Bunty then planted themself outside of the surgery door, refusing to leave. Naya’s fellow clan members, the ones who had risked their own lives to come and get us, didn’t spare me any sympathy either.

“If our sister dies, it is on your head!” snapped the rakkhosh who had flown me home.