The Chaos Curse (Kiranmala and the Kingdom Beyond #3) - Sayantani DasGupta Page 0,85
been waiting for my words. They picked Sesha up as easily as if he were the tiny insect, and they the mighty prince. And like that, with him squirming and crying and carrying on, they carried him up out of the cage, along the length of the banyan tree clearing, and finally, out into the now-starry night.
The first to become unfrozen after this remarkable sight was Surpanakha, the demon headmistress.
“Who did you say you are, child?” she asked me, grabbing my chin with hard fingers. Her face was outraged, her fangs glistening and sharp. The place where her nose should have been began twitching, and she was drooling, as if despite not having a nose, she could smell me and my smell had suddenly changed from rakkhosh-kind to something far more edible and tempting.
I realized that just as the butterflies had revealed Sesha’s true form as every evil father, every cruel king, every power-hungry wizard from every fairy tale I had ever read, they were revealing Neel’s and my true forms as well.
“No more disguises,” breathed Neel, pointing at my face.
“No more disguises,” I confirmed, looking at his familiar one.
The rakkhosh students and faculty, who had been distracted by Sesha’s flight with the butterflies, now started to react to Neel’s and my real appearance.
“They’re not rakkhosh!” someone shrieked. “Who are they? It was a trick! They let the prisoner go!”
The entire rakkhosh student body burst into confused shouts and exclamations. Now Pinki whirled on us too, claws out and fangs glowing. Neel wrestled Einstein-ji’s book from my backpack and opened it at random. There, lo and behold, was a story I’d never noticed before. A story called “There’s No Place Like Home.”
“Don’t ever marry that snaky scumbucket!” Neel said to Pinki in a rush. “Mother, no matter what, it’s not worth it!”
“Mother?” shrieked Pinki. Horror, but also a strange sense of recognition, was etched on her face.
“Your Highness, hate, not love, makes difference end!” I shouted. “Sesha will try to marry you again in the future—but he won’t have learned his lesson! He still wants to take your power!”
“Who are these students?” sputtered the headmistress. “Why do I not recognize them? Jackals!”
But even as Surpanakha and her jackal minions leaped toward us, Ai-Ma shot out a gangly arm—growing it in a flash into a long but strong hose-like barrier. The headmistress and animals bumped against it and fell backward with loud shrieks and howls.
“Good-bye, dear dung dumplings! Good luck, my beetle bums!” The old rakkhoshi waved with her other, normal-sized arm.
“Good-bye, Ai-Ma! Thank you!” I called.
“We love you!” yelled Neel. “Remember how much we love you!”
“Stop!” shrieked Pinki. “Who are you? How dare you?”
But we weren’t stopping, and we did dare. Together, we started reading the words of the story that would take us home. Rushing through sentences, our voices tripping over the paragraphs and phrases, we read our way out of danger. Together, Neel and I read our way to safety. Together, Neel and I read our way out of the stories of our pasts, launching forward into a future story of our own making.
Our first concern when we got back was getting the antidote to Naya. I didn’t want to waste time running, so I borrowed a skateboard from one of the passing PSS girls and rushed the flowers I’d picked over to the hospital.
As we waited for Dr. Ahmed to send word on if the antidote worked, we went to tell Mati what had happened.
“You idiots!” my cousin yelled as soon as she heard about our adventures. “You could have been killed! Of all the callous, irresponsible stunts! Will you two never learn?”
Neel and I both looked sheepishly at the ground, not wanting to argue with her. She had a lot on her shoulders, I realized, and we hadn’t been making it any easier for her.
It was Tuni, who had been with Mati when we found her, who defused the situation. “They may be idiots, but they brought back the antidote for Naya’s poison,” Tuni chirped. “Isn’t that the most important thing?”
I shot the little yellow bird a grateful smile. He flew over and landed on my shoulder.
“We’re still waiting to hear from Dr. Ahmed if it worked,” Neel said in a soft voice.
“I’m sorry, I know you’ve been under a lot of strain,” I added. “But since we’ve been gone, haven’t things gotten better?”
“No!” Mati wailed. “If anything, since you two disappeared, the rate of story collapsing has gotten worse, not better! It’s a nightmare! I