Of light and shadow, p.1
Of Light and Shadow, page 1
PRAISE FOR
TANAZ BHATHENA
PRAISE FOR THE WRATH OF AMBAR DUOLOGY
“A breath of fresh air in the fantasy adventure genre…Readers will be mesmerized by Bhathena’s vivid storytelling and the deeply felt connection between the two main characters. This fantasy adventure featuring protagonists of color will be enjoyed by fans of the Legacy of Orïsha and Ember in the Ashes series.”
—School Library Journal, starred review, on Hunted by the Sky
“A novel of palace intrigue, supplication and resistance, romance, and betrayal. Bhathena takes her time unfolding the story, allowing the reader full immersion not only in the richly drawn characters but the world itself—a world inspired by medieval India. The result is an intoxicating novel that is at once leisurely and keenly enthralling.”
—Quill & Quire, starred review, on Hunted by the Sky
“A compelling mythology-based fantasy.”
—Kirkus Reviews on Rising Like a Storm
“A thrilling start to an exciting new series set in a fresh, magical new world…I couldn’t put it down!”
—S. A. Chakraborty, author of The City of Brass and The Kingdom of Copper, on Hunted by the Sky
“Perfect for fans of thoughtful world-building and fantastical mirrors to our own reality. A whirlwind of heartfelt storytelling.”
—Jodi Meadows, New York Times–bestselling coauthor of My Plain Jane and author of the Fallen Isles trilogy, on Hunted by the Sky
“Lush and well-researched, Bhathena brings her series to a satisfying close as Gul and Cavas resist tyranny as they work to build a more just world.”
—Teen Vogue on Rising Like a Storm
“With stellar characters, epic battles, and exploration of power, this spectacular duology comes to a roaring end.”
—BuzzFeed on Rising Like a Storm
PRAISE FOR THE BEAUTY OF THE MOMENT
“Fans of Nicola Yoon’s The Sun Is Also a Star will enjoy this bicultural romance. A strong purchase for most YA collections, especially where contemporary romance is in demand.”
—School Library Journal
“This dramatic romance, told from Susan and Malcolm’s alternating viewpoints, authentically traces the teens’ gradual changes as they come to terms with mistakes they’ve made and who they want to be.”
—Publishers Weekly
PRAISE FOR A GIRL LIKE THAT
“Bhathena makes an impressive debut with this eye-opening novel…Should spur heated discussions about sexist double standards and the ways societies restrict, control, and punish women and girls.”
—Publishers Weekly, starred review
“Bhathena’s lithe prose effortlessly wends between past and present…A powerful debut.”
—School Library Journal, starred review
ALSO BY TANAZ BHATHENA
Hunted by the Sky
Rising Like a Storm
The Beauty of the Moment
A Girl Like That
Text copyright © 2023 by Tanaz Bhathena
Cover art copyright © 2023 by Johnny Tarajosu
Map copyright © 2023 by Jared Blando
Book design by Samira Iravani and Maria Williams, adapted for ebook
Cover design by Samira Iravani
Penguin Teen Canada, an imprint of Tundra Book Group, a division of Penguin Random House of Canada Limited
All rights reserved. The use of any part of this publication reproduced, transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, or stored in a retrieval system, without the prior written consent of the publisher—or, in case of photocopying or other reprographic copying, a license from the Canadian Copyright Licensing Agency—is an infringement of the copyright law.
Publisher’s note: This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
Simultaneously published in the United States by Farrar Straus Giroux Books for Young Readers, an imprint of Macmillan Publishing Group, LLC
Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication
Title: Of light and shadow / Tanaz Bhathena.
Names: Bhathena, Tanaz, author.
Identifiers: Canadiana (print) 20210350342 | Canadiana (ebook) 20210350369 | ISBN 9780735271432 (hardcover) | ISBN 9780735271449 (EPUB)
Classification: LCC PS8603.H385 O3 2023 | DDC jC813/.6—dc23
We acknowledge the support of the Canada Council for the Arts
www.penguinrandomhouse.ca
a_prh_6.0_143680506_c0_r0
Contents
Cover
Also by Tanaz Bhathena
Title Page
Copyright
Dedication
Map
Fate and Folly: Along the River Behrambodh in the kingdom of Jwala
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Firestones and Fathers: The city of Prabha
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Demons, Old and New: The ravines of Ashvamaidan
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Chapter 39
Chapter 40
Chapter 41
Chapter 42
Chapter 43
Chapter 44
Chapter 45
Chapter 46
Chapter 47
Chapter 48
Chapter 49
Chapter 50
Chapter 51
An Unfinished Song: Prabha Central Prison
Chapter 52
Glossary
Author’s Note
Acknowledgments
About the Author
In loving memory of Homai D. Bhathena
Map left
Map right
With the blessings of our Goddess of Fire and Light, we bring you
THE
JWALA KHABRI
THE ORIGINAL
Voice of the Kingdom
Day 16 Drought, 39 Bhairavi Kāl
MINISTER OF TREASURE BEMOANS DAUGHTER’S BROKEN ENGAGEMENT
In an extraordinary turn of events, the much-celebrated binding proposal of Kumari Damini of Clan Tej (also daughter of Minister Manoharlal of the kingdom treasury) to Jwala’s royal heartthrob and resident heartbreaker, Rajkumar Navin, now appears to be off.
While Kiran Mahal has remained mum about the cause of the broken engagement (as the palace normally does during scandals about either of the two princes), reliable sources say that a sobbing Damini was spotted last night without her maids and retinue along the capital’s pleasure strip, where her betrothed was found in a passionate embrace with a tavern boy.
Unlike his daughter, who refused to answer our hawks, the Minister of Treasure was much more forthcoming about the scandal.
“If I see that aiyaash lout anywhere near my daughter again, I will make a murga of him!” Manoharlal threatened.
The minister did not clarify if he did, indeed, intend to turn Jwala’s Peri Prince into a cockerel or if the murga in question simply referred to the punishment ladled out by irate school-masters to young children.
FRESH HORROR IN ASHVAMAIDAN VALLEY
Barely a month after the death of Bhim Chaya, leader of the infamous Shadow Clan, the western province of Ashvamaidan faces fresh resurgence of banditry. A new, terrorizing Shadow Bandit—rumored to be Bhim’s daughter—broke into the Ministry of Treasure in the city of Surag, looting as much as fifteen hundred gold mohurs, eight hundred silver sikkas, and a hundred copper dām.
An anonymous masked figure, the Shadow Clan’s new leader is rumored to use healing magic in abominable ways, her favored technique of murder being strangulation.
THE MORNING OF THE RAID SUNHERI HUNG FULL AND BRASSY in the sky, dappling the black water with a trail of gold. The blue moon, Neel, was invisible and would remain so until the night of the moon festival next year—a small blessing as far as Roshan Chaya was concerned. The light of one moon was bad enough; two moons together would have likely given away her position by the riverbank, along with every other member of the Shadow Clan.
Her breath fogged the air before her; nights were chilly here in Jwala’s westernmost province, no matter the time of year. But tonight, Roshan barely felt the cold. She watched the vessel emerge from the darkness, a large cargo dhow slowly making its way across the gleaming river, its sails rolled up. The carved figurehead of the fire goddess gleamed eerily on the bow, protective enchantments lending it a dull blue sheen.
Roshan whistled: a passable imitation of a bulbul in a tree. An owl hooted back perfectly: confirmation that Governor Yazad Aspa’s weekly shipment of grain was on its way to the capital city of Prabha. Smack-dab in the middle of the river.
Completely out of reach.
Another hoot followed and Chotu rose into the air, small and wingless, his slender form slowly blending in with the sky. He would soon be invisible to everyone, except for Roshan, who knew exactly where to look. If she didn’t love the little boy with her whole heart, Roshan would have been envious of Chotu’s gifts. Levitation was hard enough magic without adding a reflector spell to the mix. Now she watched him float toward the dhow, his body but a blur against a scene that would have appeared tranquil—if not for the bloated corpse of a ruddy shelduck floating in the water nearby, its sour, peaty odor lingering in the air.
Without thinking, Roshan reached up to touch the amulet between her collarbones. Made of firebloom wood, it was a perfect, flat square embossed with a tree, the remnant of parents she had never known. That is…if it had been her parents who’d gifted her the one object that best amplified her magic—before abandoning her as a newborn eighteen years ago.
Do not dwell on the past, bitiya, Baba had told her whenever she’d asked him questions about them. It is best left behind.
It had been difficult for Roshan to drink in her bitterness. To leave thoughts of her parents behind. But for Baba, she’d done her best. Baba, who’d called her his bitiya, even though he wasn’t her father. Baba, who took her in, taught her to pick locks without magic, to fight. To kill, if necessary—and only if necessary.
After Baba’s death a year ago, Roshan had had no choice but to kill. As Bandit Bhim Chaya’s adoptee and favored successor, she had known that someday she would have to prove herself, even fight for the clan’s leadership. She had not expected a battle to the death mere hours after Baba was killed. Roshan still remembered the way her hands had locked around her rival’s throat. How she’d blocked his arteries with a magic normally used to fix broken bones, smooth bruised skin, and knit torn flesh. The world classified life magic and death magic as two separate things—the first wielded by healers and the second by warriors. But healers like Roshan knew that those who breathed life into a body or extended it with magic could also take it away.
Last year was the only time Roshan had used her life magic against a member of the Shadow Clan—an act that had earned her its leadership and also cleaved it in two.
She could hear some of the bandits behind her now: viperous susurrations followed by loud giggles, an intentional violation of her order for silence on this raid. Roshan hadn’t taken the bait before. And she wouldn’t tonight.
“When they don’t give us our birthright, we steal it,” she whispered the Shadow Clan’s motto to steady herself.
Baba had bellowed the same words when he was last alive, his coat as bright as flame, his atashban glowing with death magic. He’d been shot in the back by four Brights—gold-armored brutes from Governor Yazad’s private army. Ultimately, though, it had been the leader of the Brights—the governor’s son, Shera Aspa—who had killed Baba, severing his head from his body and then levitating it onto a pike for all throughout Ashvamaidan valley to see.
“Bhim Chaya is dead!” Shera had cried out. “And we’ll kill his witch of a daughter next!”
A jagged streak of light interrupted her reverie: Chotu had shot the first atashgola at the blue shield. A gong sounded all the way to the coast, the small grenade ricocheting off the enchantments, shooting fragments of clay and fireworks into the sky. But that was not the end of it.
Not even close.
Chotu launched more atashgolas at the dhow’s barrier, gongs erupting like a frenzied devotee ringing the bell at a temple, invoking the fire goddess herself.
“Wake uuuuuup, you gold-plated bastards!” a voice sang out next to Roshan. Lalit winked from over the top of the black cloth masking his face, strands of coppery hair sticking to his pale forehead from under a tightly wrapped black turban. He was Roshan’s right hand and one of the few people in the world she would trust with her life.
Roshan smiled under her own mask. “If they aren’t awake already, they certainly will be now,” she said.
She hoped they would try to shoot Chotu—a feat that could be accomplished only if the dhow’s protective barrier was raised. It was risky, certainly. Chotu could die. Or the Brights could ignore them entirely, causing their mission to fail. Yet Roshan and the clan were used to risks like these. Used to teetering on the edge between life and death, their laughs masking their fear.
Also, the Brights had been turning complacent recently. Falling asleep on watches at the governor’s warehouses. Using shortcuts like simple blue deflector shields that, when hit correctly, completely disappeared on impact. Chotu shot yet another atashgola, and this time, instead of a gong, Roshan heard a resounding boom and watched an enormous blue star explode in the dark sky. She waited until the shield surrounding the dhow vanished, allowing the enemy to shoot a couple of red spells into the air.
“Now,” she commanded.
Lalit’s hands glowed red on the grip of his Lohar-era atashban, an old but powerful magical crossbow, and he shot a spell that split into a dozen flaming arrows from its tip, piercing holes in the ship’s hull, right at the waterline.
That would get them moving in a hurry.
“Arms at the ready,” she called out.
“Haan, Sardar!” a few voices chorused in acknowledgment.
It felt odd at times to wear Baba’s former title the way she did his old red jama, the silk coat magically shrunk and cleverly altered to fit her smaller form. But not now. Right now, Roshan’s skin thrummed with excitement, and her face warmed the way it did whenever a raid went exactly how she planned.
To avoid sinking, the dhow rapidly changed course, curving toward the beach, its trajectory leading right to where Roshan stood, in a space between two large rocks. A web of yellow light cast out like a fishing net; a few yards away, the clan’s best conjurer, Vijali Fui, was drawing the dhow to shore with wrinkled hands, faster than the lightning she was named for, her braid like old gold in the dim light.
There would likely be enough grain inside that dhow to feed the clan and at least four of the five villages in the valley they’d allied with. Most of the villages had barely survived the governor’s blood tithes last year. The tithes—tax collection sprees—usually ended in farmers’ deaths or left families on the brink of starvation. No amount of earth magic could regrow three months’ worth of bajra and sorghum in a week’s time. And magically conjured food, Roshan knew from experience, had little nutrition, often tasting like dirt in the mouth.
The sky lightened from midnight to slate blue. Sunheri was now the color of a fading orange ember and would soon disappear completely. They had little time to spare. In an hour or so, constables from a neighboring village would likely begin patrolling the coast and raise an alarm.
But, again, Vijali Fui was quicker. Within moments she’d raised the rocks by the coast, summoning a pathway that led right to the dhow’s deck, anchoring it to the shore.
“Let’s go!” Roshan said.
As one, the forty-four clan members stormed the dhow, their spells and ancient sabers clashing with gleaming new-era atashbans and the Brights’ gold armor. Roshan got nicked in the arm by a stray dagger, rolled out of the way of another fiery red spell. A hard arm began curling around her throat, seconds before it trembled and let go. She ignored the squelch that always came when she withdrew her katar from human flesh, the grunt of the Bright who fell dead, his blood now trailing down its short, triangular blade.
