A Flight of Broken Wings, page 34
part #1 of The Aeriel Chronicles Series
“He wasn’t perfect. Perhaps not even close. But whatever he did, even the mistakes he made, were born of love, and of an unceasing commitment to those whom he loved. A commitment that led him to sacrifice his own life for his country, his people. For the hope of a better future, and the promise of a vindicated past.
“If we remember nothing of the man who died to protect us all, I pray that we shall remember that love which led him to do it, and cherish it wherever it can be found.”
Later, he had a vague memory of thunderous applause, and the cheers that rang through the venue. Ashwin told him his address had been well received, extraordinarily so.
But all he really remembered was the press of charred flesh against his fingers and pain-dazed eyes gazing into his own. The taste of copper on his tongue and the bitterness in his throat as his uncle gasped out his broken apologies. And all Ruban could do was to hold him and pray for it to be over – too selfish to forgive the man he was too weak to condemn.
Rifles fired into the air as Subhas’s sifblade was placed upon his chest, his hands folded over the weapon one last time. Finally, followed by hundreds of mourners – most of whom were stopped at the gates by uniformed soldiers – his body was carried into the crematorium. Ruban followed the pallbearers out of the grounds, leaving Hiya in the care of the Vaz’s.
He was going to bid a final farewell to the doting uncle he had known all his life, not the traitor he had met less than a week ago in that nightmarish house.
It was past midnight by the time the place had finally cleared of mourners. Hiya was all but asleep on her feet, leaning heavily against Ashwin as they walked towards the cab together. Ruban couldn’t really say he felt much better himself, though he had far more practice at hiding his exhaustion.
It was a skill that came in handy at times like these. Ruban schooled his features into an expression of placid solemnity as a young man with a press card around his neck and a recorder in his hand intercepted them, moments before they had reached the waiting car.
“E-excuse me, sir.” The man wore large, thick-rimmed glasses. In the darkness, Ruban could just about make out the dark-circles under his owlish eyes. He looked tired and dishevelled, and less interested in Ruban than Ruban was in him. It quelled some of the instinctive anger that had flared in his breast at the sight of the intruder.
“Yes?” he raised an eyebrow. “How may I help you?”
“I-I just had a few questions, sir,” the youth stammered, apologetic, looking as though he wanted the earth to open up under his feet and swallow him whole. “If you could just give me a few minutes of your time…”
“Go ahead,” Ruban’s eyes found the press card dangling from his neck. “Mohit.” He wasn’t really in the mood, but a part of him felt bad for the boy. He was obviously a rookie, possibly some hapless intern plunged into the deep end by incompetent management. But another part of him was aware that he would have to do this, sooner or later. And better to get it over with here, with a cub reporter barely old enough to grow a beard, than face the likes of Casia Washi with her incessant, incisive cross-questioning in a studio full of analysts and seasoned newsmen.
The boy – Mohit – looked like he hadn’t expected the acquiescence, and fumbled for a few seconds trying to find his notes, mumbling incomprehensible apologies along the way. “I-um,” assembling the papers in his hands in what Ruban supposed was the proper order; “I mean to say, I’d like to ask you sir, now that Tauheen is dead and her followers have scattered, has the IAW recovered the missing formula? Or if not, do they have any knowledge of where Tauheen might have hidden it?”
“Not to my knowledge, no. We didn’t find it when we killed her. And I am not actively involved in any of the further investigation, so I am perhaps not the best person to answer your question. But so far as my knowledge is concerned,” he said, his tone grave. “The reinforced sifblade formula stolen by Tauheen from the SifCo facility is yet to be found. Of course, I am sure that even as we speak, the IAW is doing everything in its power to get it back.”
Mohit nodded, scribbling something on a piece of paper. “Could it have been…” he paused, as if searching for the right words. “Is it possible that the formula might have been destroyed during your, ah, your battle with the Aeriel Queen?”
Ruban nodded. “It is very possible. Indeed, I would say it’s the likeliest possibility. Tauheen, after all, would not have kept something as precious, as dangerous as the sifblade formula lying around while she wandered the country. It’s very possible that she had the disk on her person when she arrived at the villa. And as I’m sure you know, the battle that finally killed her, killed my uncle…it was very destructive. She nearly burned the house down before she died. The fire destroyed what was left of her body, and half the hall. I wouldn’t be surprised at all, if the disk was destroyed in that fire. Though, of course,” he went on, just in case he had been too enthusiastic about the prospect, “I hope as much as anyone else that it’s still intact and will soon be recovered.”
Mohit didn’t seem to care one way or the other and was scribbling away with an abandon that amused Ruban. “Anything else?” he prompted gently. Thunder sounded in the distance and Ruban felt a few drops of rain hit his face. They needed to get back home.
“Umm, just one more thing, sir,” the boy said, his voice gaining in confidence. “How will the IAW deal with the recent revelations of the murders, abductions and other atrocities carried out by Tauheen and her confederates in their bid to coerce and influence high-ranking officials and lawmakers? And how will they investigate the allegations of corruption within their own ranks?”
“Well, Tauheen is dead. She has paid for her crimes in the only way she could. And as for the rest,” he sighed, feeling fatigue creep into every fibre of his body. “We have a long way to go yet, it’s true. But we won’t get there by being afraid of the journey. We took one step today. Tomorrow, we’ll take another. It’s not much, but it’s all that I can promise you.” He held out his hand. “And for now, we better get going before we end up getting ourselves stuck in a thunderstorm.”
“Why did you lie to him?” Ashwin asked once they were all inside the cab, the rain-drenched city rushing by them at a hundred kilometres per hour.
Ruban adjusted the sleeping Hiya more comfortably by his side, then tapped the driver on the shoulder. The man raised the partition between them, giving his passengers what little privacy could be had within the confines of the vehicle. “I didn’t really,” he said, looking out at the pouring rain. “The formula really hasn’t been recovered. And to the best of my knowledge, the IAW doesn’t have the faintest idea where to find it.”
“Why don’t you tell them, then?”
Ruban shrugged. “There’d be no point. It’s gone.”
“Excuse me?” Ashwin’s eyes widened.
Ruban smirked. It wasn’t every day you got an opportunity to surprise the Aeriel prince, after all. “I burned it with your mother’s body back at the villa.”
“You…what? Why?”
“To avoid unemployment? Sifblades that efficient would make half the Hunter Corps redundant. Not all of us have royal coffers to draw from in a pinch, you know.”
Ashwin looked like the only thing keeping him from swatting Ruban across the head was Hiya, who was curled up comfortably between them, snoring softly.
The Hunter sighed. “What do you want me to say, Ashwin? I was wrong, I know that now. Not all Aeriels deserve killing – though I’m still conflicted about a certain annoying princeling.” The princeling in question glared. Ruban ignored him. “And not all humans deserve the life they have. But that’s not gonna matter once people have that powerful a weapon in their hands.
“It’s been six hundred years since anybody’s seen an Aeriel that wasn’t trying to kill them. The world barely remembers a time when things weren’t the way they are now, when we weren’t all trying to kill each other. Once they have the power, humans are going to wipe the earth clean of Aeriels, and they’re going to be indiscriminate about it. And not that most of your earthbound kinsmen don’t deserve a good stabbing; but not all of them do. It took me a long time to realise that, but I do realise it now.
“And that too would be the lesser of two evils. The other possibility is that some of Tauheen’s lackeys would take it upon themselves to finish what she started. If Tauheen could get my uncle to back her in her war against Vaan…well, what’s to say there aren’t others who could be manipulated the way he was? Considering the hostility most humans feel for Aeriels at present; if they had the means, somebody somewhere would inevitably think that waging war was a good idea. And the absolute last thing we need now is a war between earth and Vaan.”
Leaning back into the leather backrest, Ashwin grinned. “My hero! I hope you realise, though, that whatever reprieve you’ve bought us by this act of uncharacteristic brilliance, it’s at best temporary. It wouldn’t take them very long to reassemble the formula and start work on it again.”
“It’ll take them long enough. A few years, at least. If Dr. Visht was right, the formula is stored in fragmented pieces around the country. For the next few months, they’ll invest all their energies in trying to find the original. When that doesn’t work, they’ll start the reassembly effort, which if we’re lucky will cost them a few years at the very least. And besides that, there’s the question of raw material. Enhanced sif isn’t easy to manufacture; or cheap, for that matter. And Tauheen’s little conspiracy depleted quite a bit of their stock. Precious ore that they’re never getting back again.
“Restocking, reassembly and all the rest of it should keep them busy for half a decade at least. And call me an irredeemable optimist, but I was kind of hoping your sister could be prevailed upon to invest in some public relations efforts in the meantime. You know, just to make sure that she doesn’t have an unwinnable war on her hands so soon after being finally rid of Tauheen.”
The Aeriel giggled. “If only Safaa could hear you talk. Well, my friend, it looks like you’ve saved me the trouble of having to steal the formula again. Which is very nice, because after everything, that would have been awkward.”
“What?” It was Ruban’s turn to gape.
“You didn’t think my sister ever intended to allow the formula to be developed into a viable weapon, did you? That’s part of the reason I was sent to earth. Neutralise the formula, and flip mommy dearest the finger while doing it – that was the mission in a nutshell.”
“Well, you flipped her the finger all right. And what a finger it was, too.”
“One laced with enhanced sif, if I remember correctly,” Ashwin smirked. “But there’s no unmaking what has already been made. Not with humans, anyway. To the last man, you’re stubborn as mules.” He sighed, “All that remains to be done is to try and be friends again.”
“And an easy task that’s gonna be!”
“Well, to look on the bright side, my sister’s already made it her new agenda to improve relations with earth ASAP. And nothing deters Safaa once she has decided she really wants something. She’s like a bloodhound with a scent.”
“And you?” asked the Hunter, glancing sideways at his companion. “What do you plan to do? I suppose you want to go back home, now that the job’s done.”
Ashwin shrugged. “I haven’t decided yet, really. But I think I’d like to stay on a bit longer. Explore the planet; see the sights, so to speak. It’s sure been a while. Besides,” he grinned. “Vaan is nowhere near as exciting as earth.”
The taxi left them at the mouth of the lane leading up to their building. At this time of night, the city looked like a ghost-town: dark, deserted and utterly drenched. Far from abating, the rain had only gotten worse, and Ruban was almost up to his knees in water. The Aeriel, being shorter, was worse off, and was submerged to his waist in the muddy liquid. Only Hiya snored on peacefully in Ashwin’s arms.
Together, through the biting wind, they began the short walk home. The rain lashed down on them with a vengeance, and drenched to the bone, Ruban cursed himself for not thinking to bring an umbrella. The faint light of the outer gates beckoned to them with the promise of shelter and reprieve.
His wings folded protectively over the sleeping Hiya, sheltering her from the elements, Ashwin quickened his pace and all but ran the last few yards into the building, followed closely by a laughing Ruban. Moments later, soaked and panting, they stumbled into the flat.
They were home at last.
–––––THE END––––
Featured Fanart by Ritarekha Dutta
A Note to Readers
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Copyright © 2018 by Nupur Chowdhury Edited by Ritarekha Dutta and Ipshita Hazra
Cover Art by Priyanka Chandra
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Nupur Chowdhury, A Flight of Broken Wings
