“Shall we see some dresses, Shani?” Siya said.
“Again?” Young Ashani asked. “Did we not just visit the other day? You said their selection was lacking!”
“I know… But didn’t you hear? There’s a new line of dresses by Lady Vera herself! I can’t wait to see you in them, Shani!”
“Me? Why me?” Ashani replied. “Why not you?”
“Because you’re pretty, Shani! And those prana patterns are just so delightful, don’t you think? I feel like I could stare at them all day long.”
“Yes, yes, princess. Whatever you desire.”
“I’m not a rajni!”
“You’re my rajni, rajni,” young Ashani whispered, nearly inaudible, but Siya’s cheeks flushed, anyway.
The scene sped forward as Siya and the young Ashani made their way to the dress shop.
“Janak left a hole in her life,” Ashani said. “A hole I so desperately tried to fill. If Siya could be so strong in the face of her illness, how could I wallow in sadness? I did everything I could. I became the sister she never had… But there was no replacing Janak. Entire weeks went by without her seeing him. Precious time that Janak would never recover.”
“Shani, quick! Make me presentable!” Siya said, moving her hands weakly. The pair still hadn’t reached the dress shop, but Siya had brought her floating chair to a hard stop.
“What is it, my dear?” Young Ashani asked, bending next to the girl.
Siya tugged on the sleeve of Ashani’s golden dress. “Look! It’s Amar!” she said, face flushing red.
“He’s coming over! He’s going to see me!”
“You look fine, Siya. More than fine. Be confident. You are perfect as you are!” Young Ashani whispered before righting herself and stepping back.
“A fine day to you, Siya!” Amar said, approaching. Around the same age as Siya, he wore the same golden garments as everyone else, though even Vir could tell the man would grow up to be handsome. Even now, as a child, he cut an impressive figure.
“I-I-I, good!” Siya stuttered.
Amar cocked a brow in amusement. “’Tis good that you are well!”
“How, um. H-how…”
“I am fine, Siya,” Amar replied with a chuckle. “I’ve been meaning to ask you… About the upcoming ball…”
Siya waited patiently for Amar to continue, and Vir could almost hear the heavy beats of her heart.
“Y-yes?” she asked, when the boy slowly turned away from her.
Siya looked absolutely stricken, and young Ashani squeezed her arm in consolation.
“What is that?” Amar asked, pointing to the central spire that rose in the distance.
Vir followed the boy’s gaze and found a column of white clouds enveloping the spire.
“Oho!” Siya said, clapping her hands together. “A demonstration? How surprising. Isn’t it wonderful, Amar?”
“N-no, Siya. That isn’t—”
Like a drum, a deep sound thundered in their chests. Vir felt it as well.
A siren blared, and a disembodied voice commanded all to return to their homes. “The weather control dome has failed. Please seek shelter. The weather control dome has—”
There was no warning. Buildings ruptured like waterskins filled with too much liquid. Prana Barriers flared to life, but were immediately extinguished by some unseen force. A colossal force that eradicated all that it touched.
Inscriptions, previously invisible, lit up on all the nearby buildings. They held… for a moment.
Flakes of material crumbled away, and then all failed.
Amar’s body flew like a rag doll. Siya’s floating chair tumbled end over end, ejecting the paralyzed girl.
Young Ashani leaped up to cradle the falling Siya, but the roads under her undulated, like fabric swaying in the wind.
Streets cracked, buildings crumbled. A heatwave hit, and the shockwave followed.
Vir watched in horror as all of Imperium creation was vaporized in the instant before the world turned white.
33
THE STORY OF US (PART THREE)
Ayoung Ashani threw off a boulder-sized piece of road that had crushed her, emerging from beneath the rubble to a destroyed, blackened world. The Mahādi of the present day, with its lightning storms and ashen rain.
The sight came with a profound revelation. One that threatened to overload Vir’s mind.
The Ashen Realm hasn’t always existed… Vir thought, struggling to comprehend the implications.
Logically, it made some sense, of course. The Ash had been continuously expanding, which meant it had to start from somewhere. It hardly seemed like a normal phenomenon, so it must have been created, somehow.
But it was one thing to reason about the origin of the world, and another entirely to experience it firsthand. To feel it for himself.
This was where it started, all those millennia ago. Vir wasn’t merely watching the end of the Prime Imperium. He was witnessing the birth of the Ashen Realm.
Beasts screamed, clawing at each other while others ravaged the few corpses that hadn’t been vaporized by the blast. A colossal Wyrm shrieked in the sky, circling around the central spire of Mahādi. It might’ve been Vir’s imagination, but he sensed pain in its shriek—as if it was writhing in agony.
“When I came to,” present-day Ashani narrated, “there was nobody left. Self-preservation inscriptions had restored the buildings, but they’d reformed twisted. Blackened and warped into strange dark spires. As if whatever had scorched the skies and blighted the creatures had also tainted the city itself.”
Vir watched as a young Ashani stumbled dazedly, screaming Siya’s name. The girl’s floating chair lay ruined some distance away, buried amidst rubble.
Ashani smashed away boulder-sized debris with her white rod, hurling them aside as if they were pebbles. Those too durable to be smashed, Ashani lifted with her bare hands, tossing them away.
Vir could feel her desperation, and his heart went out to her. He knew how this story ended. He knew the tragedy that lay in store for the young Automaton.
Ashani’s misery was almost palpable as she frantically clawed her way through the rubble, calling for Siya over and over. Each call growing more desperate. Each call filled with ever more grief.
Yet there was no sign of her precious friend amidst the rubble. Her search ended when she found a golden necklace. Siya’s necklace—the one she’d been wearing.
Young Ashani clutched the memento to her chest. Her rod slipped from her fingers, clanging against the road. She collapsed to her knees, weeping uncontrollably.
“Where are you, Janak?” Ashani half-screamed, half-sobbed at the falling ash. “I need you! She needs you!”
“I never learned what became of Siya,” Ashani said softly, staring at her younger self. “For years, I cleared rubble, desperate to find something. Anything that might bring me closure. I never did.”
Young Ashani’s sobs were broken by the twitching of a nearby corpse. She spun, only to jolt back in horror as the body began to rise. Except what stood was no man. Limbs grew out of the man’s back as he steadily transformed into a monster the likes of which Vir had never seen.
The man-beast shambled toward Ashani, who stood stock-still, too terrified to move.
Deafening thunder boomed, and the world flashed white. When it was gone, the man slumped to the ground.
Young Ashani stood a short distance away, her lightning rod aimed at the abomination. Her body shivered, and she watched the man with a face full of horror.
“Janak created me not only to be Siya’s companion, but also her guardian. An entirely frivolous and unnecessary gesture in Imperium society—our magic guaranteed Siya’s safety—but a doting father is never assuaged.”