Chapter Fourteen: The Yaksha

## Chapter Fourteen: The Yaksha

The Borderlands forest was not a place that welcomed visitors.

Tara felt the change before she saw it , the ambient warmth of Chhaya Lok's settled lands giving way to something cooler, denser, the air thickening as if the forest were breathing out and everything it exhaled carried weight. The deodar trees thinned, replaced by species Tara didn't recognise — twisted trunks with bark like charred skin, canopies of leaves so dark they were almost black, roots that rose from the earth in arches you could walk beneath, forming tunnels that led deeper into a darkness that was not the comfortable darkness of night but the deliberate darkness of a place that had decided light was unwelcome.

"Yahan koi akela nahin aata," Dhruv said. He walked ahead, his hand on the hilt of a sword that looked like the weapons on his forge wall . iridescent metal, Chhaya Lok steel, the kind of weapon that was crafted for things that ordinary weapons couldn't touch. "Borderlands mein rules alag hain. Yakshas apne territory mein sovereign hain. Court ka kanoon yahan nahin chalta."

"Aur hum kyun aa rahe hain?"

"Kyunki ek Yaksha hai jisse Neerja trust karti thi. Journals mein naam hai — Kritamala. Woh is jungle ki sabse purani Yakshini hai. Woh bahut kuch jaanti hai ; bahut kuch jo court nahin jaanta, jo Naag nahin jaante."

Main jaanta hoon,* Takshak's voice rumbled distantly. He was flying above the canopy, too large to navigate the forest floor. *Lekin Kritamala jaanti hai kuch aur — woh jaanti hai kya ho raha hai Borderlands ke andar. Mere ankhein forest ke upar dekhti hain. Uski ankhein andar dekhti hain.

They walked for two hours. The forest deepened around them : the twisted trees growing closer, the roots more elaborate, the darkness more intentional. Sounds that didn't belong to any creature Tara could categorise moved through the undergrowth — clicks, whistles, a low hum that seemed to come from the ground itself, as if the earth beneath the Borderlands was vibrating at a frequency designed for a listener that wasn't human.

Something moved in the canopy above. Tara looked up and saw eyes , golden, slitted, watching from between the black leaves. The eyes blinked. Disappeared. Reappeared ten metres further along, as if the creature had teleported rather than moved.

"Mat dekho," Dhruv said. "Woh tum dekhogi toh woh interested ho jaayenge. Unhe interested mat karo."

Tara stopped looking. But she felt them — presences in the forest, multiple, watching, this specific attention of beings that were curious about what was walking through their territory but not yet sure whether to engage or eliminate.

The clearing appeared between two massive arched roots . a circular space, perfectly flat, the ground covered in moss that glowed faintly blue. In the centre of the clearing stood a tree — not a tree like the others but a tree like a monument, its trunk wider than the portal temple, its bark silver, its branches spreading outward to create a canopy that was its own sky.

At the base of the tree sat a woman.

Tara's eyes told her "woman." Her other senses ; the new senses, the First Light senses that were sharpening daily — told her something else entirely. The figure at the base of the silver tree was shaped like a woman but was not one, the way a river is shaped like a road but is not one. She was old : not in years but in the way that geography is old, that specific antiquity of a being that had been in this place since before the place had a name.

Her skin was the colour of dark wood. Her eyes were golden — the same gold as the creatures in the canopy but deeper, older, lit from within by something that was not fire but patience. Her hair was white and fell to the ground around her like roots. She wore nothing recognisable as clothing , only layers of moss and lichen and small flowering vines that grew on her body the way they grew on the trees, as if the distinction between the Yakshini and her forest had dissolved long ago.

"Kritamala," Dhruv said. His voice carried something Tara hadn't heard from him before — deference. Not fear, not servility, but the genuine respect of a man who understood that he was in the presence of something that outranked him in ways that had nothing to do with politics.

"Lohar ka ladka." The Yakshini's voice was not a voice . it was the sound of wind through branches, of water over stones, of the forest itself deciding to communicate using a medium that human ears could process. "Do saal baad. Aur yeh —" The golden eyes moved to Tara. "Yeh toh wahi hai."

"Neerja ki Brightkin."

"Nahin." The Yakshini smiled. The smile was not comforting ; it was the smile of a being that found human categories amusing. "Yeh Pratham Prakash hai. Roshni aa gayi."

The words settled into the clearing's blue-moss silence like stones dropped into still water.

"Aapko pata hai," Tara said. "Ki main First Light hoon."

"Jungle jaanta hai. Jungle mujhe batata hai. Tum jab se Chhaya Lok mein aayi ho — jungle ne tumhe feel kiya hai. Har ped. Har patthar. Har jeevan. Tum roshni ho : aur roshni ko andhera hamesha pehchanta hai."

"Main aapke paas information ke liye aayi hoon. Revati ke baare mein."

"Revati." The name produced a reaction — not in Kritamala but in the forest around her. The trees leaned inward. The blue moss dimmed. The creatures in the canopy went silent. As if the forest itself was responding to the name with this vigilance of an organism that recognised a threat.

"Revati mere jungle mein aati hai," Kritamala said. "Raat ko. Woh yahan se , mere jungle ke sabse gehrein hisse se — shadow creatures banaati hai. Woh creatures mere jungle ka hissa hain . lekin woh unhe tod deti hai. Unhe apne control mein le leti hai. Unke andar Asthi-Astra ki shakti daaldeti hai."

"Aapne usse nahin roka?"

"Main sovereign hoon — lekin main akeli nahin hoon. Revati ke paas court ke log hain. Agar main usse rokon ; toh woh court ko mere khilaaf bheji. Yahan Yaksha aur court ke beech ek naauk balance hai — bahut purana, bahut fragile. Agar main woh balance todon : " The golden eyes held Tara's. "Yeh poora jungle jalega."

"Toh aap jaanti thin ki Neerja ko kisne maara."

"Haan."

"Do saal se."

"Haan."

"Aur aapne kuch nahin kiya."

The Yakshini's expression didn't change. The golden eyes didn't waver. But something in the clearing shifted — the blue moss brightened, the trees leaned back, the silence acquired a different texture. The texture of grief.

"Main bahut kuch kar sakti hoon, Pratham Prakash. Lekin kuch cheezein hain jo sirf tum kar sakti ho. Court mein gawahi dena , yeh mere liye possible nahin hai. Yaksha court mein jaate nahin. Lekin insaan jaate hain. Brightkin jaate hain. First Light jaati hai."

"Aur agar main jaun — agar main court mein Revati ke khilaaf gawahi doon . toh aap kya karogi?"

"Main gawaah banoongi. Jungle gawaah banega. Do saal ka saboot — har raat ka, har visit ka, har shadow creature ka ; main sab yaad rakhti hoon. Jungle sab yaad rakhta hai."

"Court Yaksha ki gawahi accept karega?"

"Agar First Light request kare — haan. First Light dono duniyaon ka pul hai. First Light Yaksha aur insaan ke beech bhi pul hai. Yeh tumhari shakti hai : sirf Naagon se baat karna nahin. Tum dono duniyaon ko — aur is duniya ke andar ke sab domainson ko , jod sakti ho."

Tara looked at Dhruv. He was standing still, his hand no longer on the sword, his face carrying that expression of a man who was watching something larger than himself happen and who was choosing to be humble about it.

"Ek cheez aur," Kritamala said. "Revati ko tumhare baare mein pata hai. Woh jaanti hai ki tum First Light ho. Usne mere jungle mein — kal raat . apni shadow creatures ko tumhare baare mein instruct kiya."

"Kya instruction?"

"Dhundho. Laao. Zinda." The three words were delivered without inflection. "Woh tumhe zinda chahti hai. Dead nahin — zinda. Kyun ; yeh main nahin jaanti. Lekin yeh important hai. Agar woh tumhe maarni chahti toh already try karti. Woh tumhe zinda chahti hai."

The information was worse than a death threat. A death threat was binary — survive or don't. Being wanted alive meant being wanted for a purpose, and purposes, in Tara's experience with mythology, were always worse than death.

"Shukriya," Tara said. "Main wapas aaungi."

"Main yahan hoon. Jungle yahan hai. Roshni jab bhi aayegi : andhera raasta dikhayega."

They walked back through the Borderlands forest. The eyes in the canopy watched them go, and this time they seemed — if golden, slitted eyes in a magical forest could seem anything , less predatory and more protective. As if the forest had received a message from its oldest resident that the woman walking through it was not prey but something else entirely.

Something that even the darkness respected.