The Chaos Curse (Kiranmala and the Kingdom Beyond #3) - Sayantani DasGupta Page 0,52

busily putting away all the paddles and balls.

As I was trying to figure out what to say to take down the tension in the room, Tuni squawked, “Hey, Princess, what did Delaware?”

“I don’t know, Tuni, what did Delaware?” I asked, a little too loud and a little too happy. Neel gave me a look like he thought I’d lost it.

“A New Jersey!” Tuni bellowed, flying in a circle around Neel’s head.

I guffawed way too loud at the dumb bird, not knowing what else to do to make Neel feel better. For his part, Neel rolled his eyes, but I did see a hint of a smile on his lips.

“So are you going to tell me why you’re here or what?” I asked Neel. “Did Tiktiki One find you?”

“Yeah, the lizard passed on your message.” The prince stopped putting away the Ping-Pong stuff and gave a grimace. “That’s how I knew where you were. But I was already planning on coming because of the wedding invitation.”

“Wedding invitation?” I was relieved to hear Tiktiki One was okay, but at Neel’s mention of an invitation, I remembered Ned/Nidhoggr talking about someone getting married too. “What is this wedding I keep hearing about?”

“I knew I had to come find you as soon as I got it,” Neel went on, chewing on his nail.

“What kind of a wedding invitation could send you all the way across the dimensions to find me?” I looked from one face to another, but no one seemed to be willing to spit it out. The animals were suddenly eager to clean their whiskers and feathers, the scientists seemed busy staring at the ceiling and floor, and Lal looked just as clueless as I felt.

Without a word, Neel reached into a beat-up old leather shoulder bag and pulled out a bright red-and-gold wedding card. The outside of the folded card was decorated with the shapes of butterflies, fish, and peacocks—traditional wedding card fare. But there were also a number of twisting snakes weaving in and out of the other animals that gave me a little bit of a start. The address on the wedding invitation reminded me of a different letter in a different story.

When I opened the top and bottom folds of the card, I almost yelled at what I found inside. It was a beautifully decorated invitation, gold lettering on a red background:

It took me at least three times of reading the card to let all the information sink in. “My dad is marrying … Neel’s mom?” I finally sputtered.

“It sure looks like it,” squawked Tuni.

“How could this happen?” Lal was downright shocked. “Anyway, Just Kiran, isn’t Sesha still married to your mother, the moon?”

“I think her turning him to ashes with her moonbeams counted as some sort of divorce. She mentioned they weren’t married anymore.” I spoke slowly, still processing the news. “The last time they were together, Sesha was trying to kill Neel’s mom! How could they be getting married? Is this the rumor that Mati heard—about them allying with each other?”

Then something else occurred to me. “Wait a minute, if our parents are getting married, Neel, that’s gonna make you my … !”

“Stepbrother,” said Neel grimly.

At that, Tuni started singing the theme song from an old 2-D TV show about a blended family. Who knows where he learned it. “That’s the way they all became the Snaky Bunch!” the bird warbled, adding, “You guys can fight about bathroom time and get into funny hijinks with the family dog!”

The thought made me want to puke. I spit out the word more than said it. “Gross!”

“Super gross!” Neel nodded.

Well, at least we finally agreed on something.

Not willing to think about Neel and me living as happy-go-lucky stepsiblings, I turned my attention back to the invitation. I shook the envelope and out fell two more cards. One card inside the envelope was labeled Pre-Wedding Festivities:

There was also a small RSVP card that read:

“How could this be for real?” I sputtered. Was this another bizarro-parallel-dimension thing happening again? But I couldn’t imagine there being any dimension in the multiverse where Sesha and Neel’s mom actually loved each other.

“They hate each other,” Neel said, as if reading my mind.

“Maybe that hate has turned to true love!” chirped Tuni. He’d gotten a flower garland from who knows where—the kind that people exchange when they’re getting married in the Kingdom Beyond—and was humming a wedding song. “Mala badal hobe ei raate!”

“Could such a wedding be real?” Lal looked confusedly from me to Neel