Rick Riordan Presents: A Drop of Venom

by Sajni Patel

Genres: YA Dark Fantasy

Synopsis

All monsters and heroes have beginnings. This is mine.

Sixteen-year-old Manisha is no stranger to monsters—she’s been running from them for years, from beasts who roam the jungle to the King’s army, who forced her people, the naga, to scatter to the ends of the earth. You might think that the kingdom’s famed holy temples atop the floating mountains, where Manisha is now a priestess, would be safe—but you would be wrong.

Seventeen-year-old Pratyush is a famed slayer of monsters, one of the King’s most prized warriors and a frequent visitor to the floating temples. For every monster the slayer kills, years are added to his life. You might think such a powerful warrior could do whatever he wants, but true power lies with the King. Tired after years of fighting, Pratyush wants nothing more than a peaceful, respectable life.

When Pratyush and Manisha meet, each sees in the other the possibility to chart a new path. Unfortunately, the kingdom’s powerful have other plans. A temple visitor sexually assaults Manisha and pushes her off the mountain into a pit of vipers. A month later, the King sends Pratyush off to kill one last monster (a powerful nagin who has been turning men to stone) before he’ll consider granting the slayer his freedom.

Except Manisha doesn’t die, despite the hundreds of snake bites covering her body and the venom running through her veins. She rises from the pit more powerful than ever before, with heightened senses, armor-like skin, and blood that can turn people to stone. And Pratyush doesn’t know it, but the “monster” he’s been sent to kill is none other than the girl he wants to marry.

Alternating between Manisha’s and Pratyush’s perspectives, Sajni Patel weaves together lush language, high stakes, and page-turning suspense, demanding an answer to the question “What does it truly mean to be a monster?”

 

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Release date: January 16, 2024

Publisher: Disney Hyperion

Print pages: 422

Sample

PROLOGUE

HERE, THERE WERE MONSTERS.

As integral to life as breathing. They prowled through the shadows all around. Eyes as cavernous as the Blood River. Talons sharper than winter-steel swords. Minds as adept as any human’s. Plotting behind dense foliage. Stalking from the jungle canopy. Lurking in the depths of calm waters.

Calculating, cunning, and deadly. Make no mistake. Monsters, contrary to popular belief, were intelligent.

These were tales as old as creation, of beings born from nightmares: those who crawled through dimensions, said to have no souls, preying on humans if only to wreak havoc and satiate their bloodlust. Legend said these monsters originated from the depths of the universe where light had never reached, born in inky shadows and drawn to this world to hunt weaker creatures: humans.

To bring balance, the vidyadhara gifted these weak mortals aid from their abode in the heavens—the floating mountains.

But mortal kings schemed to gain celestial knowledge from them, forbidden truths that could lead to unnatural things. They bided their time, and on the deathbed of the first king, his sons enslaved the vidyadhara, clipped their wings, and stole their wisdom. Anarchy ensued. Imbalance spread across the realm, stretching as far as the glistening sea, as deep as the shadowy chasms, and as high as the speckled night sky.

As humans evolved and villages joined other villages to rise in defense, something new was born. They were the slayers: warriors who trained from childhood to hunt and kill monsters. They were men of fame, adored by all, envied and desired, and lavishly celebrated by the kings of this new realm.

Their weapons gleamed as they razed the land like an angry scythe. Fires set the world ablaze, and venom rose from its ashes.

The slayers were said to be immortal: For every monster slain, a lifetime was added to their own. Monsters were said to be inherently evil—deserving of death upon first sight.

But that was the thing about myths and legends.

There was so much to get wrong, and so little one knew of their true origins.

 

ONE

MANISHA

(FIVE YEARS AGO)

All monsters and heroes have beginnings. This is mine.

Silt and cinder covered Manisha’s face, gray snowflakes burdening her lashes and sloughing from her feet as she scrambled up a tree. She wasn’t trying to flee or hide (nagin did not run); she searched for an opening to unleash a counterattack.

The roar of the Fire Wars was blistering and deafening. Chaos unfurled—meant to destroy, even when it couldn’t obliterate resilience. The realm sat on the brink of oblivion, crumbling at the hands of the men who had forged its beginnings. A world built in blood shall drown in blood. And so the Nightmare Realm flowed red, a waterway of slain bodies carving through its heart. But today was not the day Manisha and her family would be sent down the Blood River. Not if they could help it.

Her eldest sister, Eshani—the most levelheaded of the three—came crashing through the jungle ferns, half kneeling, half squatting on the back of her giant tiger, Lekha. Eshani plucked an arrow from her quiver and unleashed it into the thicket, earning screams from invading soldiers. Her arrows never missed, not when the winter-steel tips hungered for vengeance.

Lekha roared, flashing razor-edged teeth and a mighty jaw. The ground shuddered like thunderclaps threatening to smite all in their path, Lekha’s big paws pounding the ground like a battle drum.

Eshani backflipped off, landing on her haunches at the base of the tree her youngest sister climbed.

“Manisha!” Eshani called.

But Manisha was scampering higher, coughing as the sizzling air turned hotter by the minute and ignoring how every breath scorched her insides.

In the near distance, a row of the King’s army fought the remnants of the once-mighty naga. Manisha’s mother and aunts and second-eldest sister, Sithara, stood among the resistance. They were wild and wonderful, goddesses in their own right, wielding every weapon they could carry. Tridents and spears, swords and knives, arrows and axes.

The battle raged on, erupting with showers of arrows, clashing daggers, and a cacophony of wails. The blood of Manisha’s people splattered against the green and brown of the forest, dusted with ashes. Her eyes brimmed with tears. A scream trapped itself in her chest. They couldn’t die like this! They just wanted freedom. Why couldn’t the King leave them alone? Hadn’t he contributed enough bodies to the Blood River without adding theirs?

A soldier struck Mama. A vicious rage exploded through Manisha. She might’ve only been eleven, but she wasn’t a stranger to violence—or the need to defend her loved ones. Papa wasn’t here anymore to help protect Mama, so the sisters had to.

Manisha released an arrow. The one arrow split into three. Two hit the soldiers advancing on Mama. The third arrow careened into the main attacker’s forehead, slitting all the way through his skull. The squelching sound made her shudder. But better him than her mother.

Papa had said naga arrow tips were made from winter-steel, the strongest metal in the land. Razor sharp and dipped in the blood of their foremothers, said to be more poisonous than any cobra, the naga people’s namesake.

“What are you doing?” Eshani snapped, her hand suddenly on Manisha’s shoulder.

“I had to save her,” Manisha protested.

“She’d want you to save yourself first!” Eshani tugged her arm and, together, they darted across tree limbs.

A quake rocked the land. A shrill pierced the air, nearly knocking them from the canopy. A horde of giant, angry boars rushed through the battle, bigger than tigers, with skin too thick for even winter-steel to pierce. They bared sharp teeth and even sharper fangs. Their eyes bulged dark red like clotted blood. 

The boars gored soldiers with their two-foot-long tusks. Screams filled the air, already stifled by chaotic ruin. They ran off into the smoky distance, writhing soldiers impaled on carmine-stained tusks.

Manisha shook at the sight, but she couldn’t pity those sent to kill her family.

“Let’s go!” Eshani screamed as the branch broke beneath them.

Falling was always a thrilling moment, one that seemed to pass in slow motion. Manisha caught glimpses of the floating mountains through the jungle canopy. She used to jump from higher and higher ledges, pretending to fly. Legends said the ancient ones could fly. Manisha wondered if they ever fell. If they ever twisted ankles and bruised knees and scraped cheeks. If they ever fell on their sisters and trapped them against jagged tree limbs and crooked roots.

She moaned, rolling off Eshani, her back screaming in pain. She bit her lip to keep from crying. Warriors didn’t cry over a few sprains, she reminded herself.

Eshani groaned louder with every movement. “You weigh a thousand suns,” she mumbled.

“Oh no!” Manisha knelt beside her, helping her to sit up beneath a trio of weeping willow trees.

“It’s okay, little one,” Eshani grunted, even though she was only two years older than Manisha. She clutched her side. “Hide. Into the ditches.”

Manisha eyed the shallow graves before scuttling down and wrapping her dupatta around her face.

“Make sure you cover your entire head. Don’t move until someone digs you out, do you understand?” Eshani said, her words rushed.

“Yes,” Manisha whimpered, fighting instincts to lie in a curled position on the loose timber platform in the center. The grave was meant for a boy who’d died from his wounds. Nothing about this felt okay.

Eshani dropped banana leaves on top of her sister, long enough to cover her entire body, and then dirt.

As darkness descended around Manisha, her breathing turned ragged, harsh inside the cloth. The earth was hard and smelled of dirt and grass. The pocket of air was both cold from the clutches of the ground and warm from her labored breathing.

She stilled, ignoring the cramping in her legs and back, and clenched her eyes tight. Heat seeped into the ground as the fires raged. She took slow breaths, harnessing the meditation rites of her people to be anywhere except here. Her body went slack. Her mind drifted to a different plane, a place where she sat with her foremothers as they regaled her with the legend of the naga.

As Manisha listened to them drive off the distant, muffled sounds of war, she cradled her bangle to her chest. The band of four gold coils around an oval stone glowed in the dim. She brought it to

her face. The small amber stone pulsated as a tiny serpent writhed inside. She glanced up in bewilderment, a dozen questions sitting on her tongue. In the distance, shadows broke and came to life.

“You will not die here,” her ancestors told her. “You are the daughter of Padma, the grandchild of Padmavati. You have the blood of your foremothers in you, the will of great queens,” they hissed, their eyes turning into glinting diamonds, their forms changing into specters with long, winding tails, their hair frostbitten white.

They spoke of the naga legends in haunting whispers, of how their people were special, significant. But Manisha supposed everyone said that of their own kind.

One voice rose above the others, as clear as day when she spoke. “The naga are meant to be great and unifying, ruled by queens who will rise from morbid origins.”

Manisha frowned. She’d never believed in kismet and karma. How could she when her people didn’t deserve this fate?

Her foremothers swarmed around her in a rush of winds, spiraling higher and higher into a hooded cobra made from a mass of a hundred upon a hundred serpents.

“Heed our wisdom,” they hissed as one. “Retribution will come from resilience. A reckoning as inevitable as venom.”

***

MANISHA GASPED WHEN SHE CAME TO, PANIC WEDGED DEEP in her aching bones. But there was no room to thrash around, no place to escape.

“Hurry,” Sithara said, her voice distant and yet so close. “Is she all right?”

“She’s stronger than she knows,” their mother replied, prying through the darkness like a goddess of light.

Manisha rose from a grave of ashes, reaching out for the imploring hands of her sisters. Mama wept, clutching Manisha in her arms while her sisters embraced them.

She touched her mother’s face—gashes across her brows and cheeks, skin covered in dirt and ash, hair riddled with debris—and cried. Her mother, although she’d never admit it, must’ve been in so much pain. In a matter of years, she’d transformed from a gardener who merrily picked herbs, armed with a trowel and basket, to queen of the avenged, dripping in the blood of her enemies.

“Don’t cry, beta,” Mama said, wiping away Manisha’s tears. “War is the invention of the power-hungry and soulless. We are naga. We fight to our last breath. And even the grave cannot silence us. Our righteous fury will manifest in formidable cries, reaching our enemies from the Nightmare Realm itself. We will not be annihilated. Or forgotten.”

They trekked north, walking in solemnity, bodies aching and thoughts cluttered with grief, anger. They left death behind. Ash-ridden trees had turned into cylinders of cinder, the bodies of their people and wild animals burned in the fires like nightmarish sacrifices. Manisha wept for them all.

Eventually, the embers of dead jungle gave way to untouched vegetation as they crept closer to the floating mountains, a place war would never reach. The glint of their underbellies hovered high above like marbled stars, perfect and mysterious and perpetually unattainable.

At the river, Mama took Manisha by the shoulders, her dupatta slipping from her head. Her face was caked with blood and dirt. “You have to pretend that you are not part of the naga people, that you’re a lost village girl.”

“Why? What’s happening?” Manisha asked, terror surging through her.

“We have to send you away.”

Her sisters stood against a tree, annoyed, angry, anything but happy. Her lips quivered when she asked, “Did I do something wrong? I’m sorry if I did. Please don’t send me away.”

“Oh, my precious beta.” Mama hugged her tight and trembled, hiccupping on her next breath. “I have to keep you safe.”

“I’m safer with you.”

“No.” Mama glanced

up at the floating mountains, the behemoth in the clouds casting icy shadows over them. “It is safest where violence cannot reach.”

Manisha swallowed and shook her head, tears streaming down her face.

Eshani limped toward Manisha and knelt beside her with a softened grunt. She took her youngest sister’s hand in hers, her haunting jade eyes glistening, and explained, “They won’t take three sisters. Only one. I’m the eldest, and I have to protect you.” She glanced over her shoulder at her twin. “And Sithara is…too unruly.”

“Mama, please. I want to stay with you.”

Their mother caressed her cheek. “Listen to me and obey.”

Manisha whimpered.

“Do as you’re told, hah? I need you to live. I need you to survive.”

“Why do they want us dead? Just because we won’t live by their laws?”

“They’re men,” Mama replied bitterly. “They follow a cruel king who follows the cruelty set by kings before him. We’ll come for you. You must be a brave girl now, braver than ever.”

She cupped Manisha’s cheeks and kissed her forehead. “You must pretend to be a simple, lost girl from the kingdom villages.”

Manisha nodded, her body turning heavy and numb, but she wouldn’t cry. Warriors didn’t cry.

“You must pretend not to know anything about us, about the world. You must pretend not to be too smart. You must pretend not to know what a weapon is or how to wield one—but keep practicing in secrecy. You must pretend to be…submissive to the temple priestesses and kind to the men who go there,” she added with clenched teeth.

“I don’t understand, Mama.”

Eshani said, “You must act like them, okay? Act like you believe in their teachings. Act like you’re not sad. Pretend not to know about us, how our forefathers are brave naga, our foremothers great nagin.”

Manisha hiccupped, her lips trembling, her hands shaking. She wanted to plead, beg to stay with her mother and sisters.

Sithara pushed away from the tree she’d been leaning on. She flinched with every other step, held out her hand, and pulled Manisha to her feet. She pushed her little sister’s shoulders back and lifted her chin. Sithara tilted her head to the side, looking awfully formidable with the harsh lines of her cheeks and jaw, the fury in her brows, her emerald eyes glinting in the morning light.

“You are nagin,” she stated, “daughter of our mother, a sister to us. You have a lot to live up to, but you won’t have a chance to prove yourself if you die, will you?”

Manisha shook her head.

“We don’t come from mothers and sisters who cower and plead, do we?”

“No,” she said quietly.

“We are strong and fearless and adaptable. We do what needs to be done, don’t we?”

“Yes.”

Sithara touched a knuckle to Manisha’s chin. “We’re going to meet again one day when our time comes. When it’s safe. And you’re going to be fiercer than any of us, aren’t you?”

She smiled softly. “Yes.”

“Be brave, little one.”

“Be cunning,” added Eshani.

“Be strong,” concluded their mother.

Manisha blew out a breath, feeling the blood of her foremothers flow and burn in her veins like venom—powerful and present.

“Quickly now,” Mama said.

They rushed to bathe Manisha. Rose petals in her hair for fragrance. Kohl lining, made from soot, for her eyes. The blood of berries for her lips. A clean-as-could-be salwar kameez and a dupatta wrapped around her head for modesty.

“I’ll take her,” Eshani offered, and then looked to Manisha. “But that means you have to ride with me.”

“No fear,” Sithara reminded. “Besides, Lekha is just a big, soft cat.”

“A cat…” Manisha echoed.

Mama hugged Manisha to her chest, as if letting go might end her. “I love you, beta.”

“I love you, too, Mama,” Manisha said, holding back sobs and memorizing every facet of her mother’s features. She didn’t want them to ever fade away, but she knew they would.

Sithara hugged her next as Lekha emerged from the brush, one giant paw after another. She licked blood from her lips and snarled.

“Who’s a good girl?” Eshani said, petting the five-foot-tall golden tiger.

Lekha trained her honey eyes on Manisha and yawned.

The girls climbed onto the tiger’s back. Lekha rose.

Mama held her hands to her chest, tears cascading down her cheeks. Sithara gave a small but reassuring smile, a fist to her chest to ensure strength and heart in their journey. With a final farewell nod from Mama, Lekha took off, charging through the jungle faster than lightning, it seemed. And Manisha’s entire world and family faded behind her. She trapped sobs deep within her chest, her body convulsing.

Lekha slowed down, prowling toward turquoise waterfalls pouring from the floating mountains in broken streams. Above, a flat cliff protruded from the jungle canopy.

“Hurry,” Eshani said, dismounting and urging Manisha to walk faster toward

 the cliff. When two priestesses appeared, Eshani and Lekha hid, fading into the jungle.

Manisha approached them, resisting the urge to glance back at her sister, fighting the longing to run to her.

“Where did you come from?” the older woman asked, her poise so proper and elegant, her sari glimmering in threads of gold and scarlet.

“I’m lost,” Manisha replied.

The women regarded her. The second snickered. “Your parents?”

“I have no family,” Manisha responded, biting her tongue to keep the truth trapped. Lies tasted bitter.

“Head Priestess, we should sell her to the soldiers,” said the one who’d snickered, keeping her glare on Manisha.

“She looks very young, Sita,” the Head Priestess countered.

“Girls marry young. If nothing else, we can groom her and sell her to the highest bidder,” Sita replied.

The Head Priestess responded, “You were fourteen when I took you in. Would you rather have been married off or sold to soldiers?”

“No.”

“Where is your kindness, then?” She turned to Manisha and said, “You would be quite beautiful if we cleaned you up and taught you proper ways. Would you like to come with us and serve in the world’s most elite, most revered temple, high on the sacred floating mountains?”

No, she wouldn’t. But she nodded anyway.

“We shall give meaning to your life. We’ll pair you with Arya. She’s about your age and without family. Come…” She extended her hand and took Manisha to the platform, lifting the pleats of her sari to climb the stone steps.

Manisha went with them—these strangers, these enemies—to a foreign land, with an agonizing heaviness in her heart. It took everything in her not to look back.

She gulped when they reached the top, marveling at the flying peacocks—the fabled mayura. They were as large as rhinos and as fierce as tigers, yet too beautiful to gaze upon. They shuddered, with feathers made of emeralds and sapphires, gold and bronze.

The birds cawed into the heavens, shaking the ground beneath her feet. They spat fire as brilliant as rubies shimmering against the afternoon sun.

Manisha craned her head back to glimpse one of the massive creatures, shielding her eyes from the brilliance of its feathers. It turned its head to stare at her with deep onyx eyes, sending a stiff breeze.

Manisha stumbled back. Sita snickered. But the Head Priestess landed a gentle hand on Manisha’s shoulder, urging her forward. A much older girl in a dark-blue-and-gold salwar kameez smiled down at Manisha from atop the beast. She offered a hand.

Manisha took that hand. She took the ride of her life, her breath escaping in rapid pants as the bird soared into the air. She finally knew what it was like to fly, to see the jungle from above

, a mass of entangled green without regard for the beings who suffered within its clutches.

The air turned chilly and thin as they rose through low-lying clouds. She squinted from the sudden glare of the full breadth of the sun, warmth seeping into her skin. The surface of the floating mountains came into view, buildings like palaces, orchards dotted in pinks, meandering streams, and scattered clusters of women.

When she dismounted, she found her footing as quickly as she’d lost it and followed the Head Priestess toward the towering pillars of the greatest temple in the world.

“How do the mountains float?” Manisha asked. Her curiosity, ignited by the majesty around her, was outweighed only by grief.

“They’re strung by stars and sit on pillars made of moonlight,” said the Head Priestess.

“Who built these temples?”

“Why, the gods themselves. Here you must always be on your best behavior and heed the rules. The ancient ones roam freely, sometimes showing themselves to us if we’re special. They live all around as invisible beings, always watching. You must never bring shame.”

Manisha studied the intricately carved depictions on a pillar—magnificent peacocks and monstrous elephants, elegant snakes and mysterious turtles.

Images of winged people had been carved throughout the scenes. They floated along, grasping the stone cloth that ballooned above their heads, catching on an unseen wind.

“The vidyadhara,” the Head Priestess explained. “The gods of the kingdom. The ones you will now serve with your whole heart and soul.”

Manisha kept her mouth shut. She’d only ever heard about the vidyadhara as an ancient race of people who could fly—and who were later enslaved by the first king.

This temple, in all its beauty and finery, was a lie. Just like the kingdom was a lie. And the King a liar.

 

TWO

PRATYUSH

(NINE YEARS AGO)

All heroes and monsters have breaking points. This is mine.

“They say every sla—every man like me…has a breaking point,” Papa whispered to Ma. They sat before a crackling fire, Papa poking the embers. Sparks flew up into the chimney, as bright as tiny suns, darkening as they cooled and floating back down as ash.

Ma rubbed his back and hugged him from the side, soothing him like she did her children. Ma was a great woman, full of compassion and empathy, resilience and great strength. And even though Pratyush was young, he knew he wanted to be that way, too.

He crouched on the stairs, hidden in the shadows, and listened. He had his father’s blood, and with it inherited an unruly lineage and all its cursed blessings.

He didn’t understand why his father called these gifts a stain on their humanity. Thanks to them, he could use one ear to listen to his older sister’s breathing as she slept in her room at the top of the steps. With the other, he heard his parents’ hushed conversation as clear as a calm day. Despite the distance between them. Despite the storm raging outside.

Pratyush’s little fingers dug into the hem of his kurta as he leaned over, trying to make sense of what his father was saying.

“This is why we’ve remained hidden, is it not?” Ma asked, running her fingers through Papa’s hair.

“Hah,” he conceded.

“Is it not enough living in the borderlands? This far from the King, on the edge of civilization? Any farther and we’d be…in their territory.”

“We’re too close as it is. The beasts haven’t attacked because they don’t know what I am. Nor do they suspect Pratyush. But one inkling, one suspicion of the truth, and our lives here are done for.”

Ma sighed, her breath a heavy fog hitting the flames as she nestled deeper into the blanket around her shoulders. “When will you tell him?” she asked, her voice soft, sad.

Pratyush knitted his brows together. What did they mean? Tell him what?

Papa straightened his back and pushed out his chest. “It’s time. He must know, prepare.”

Ma clutched his arm. “But you said—”

“I know what I said. I thought we could hide, that all would be well. Perhaps that’s still the case. But kismet has a way of finding you, of dragging people to their destinies. Fate has a fury when you try to deny it. It’s better that he’s prepared when the time comes. He’s already eight and skilled in many things, but he’s far behind on proper training. And that is my fault.”

“I don’t like this for him,” Ma contested.

“We knew this could happen when we conceived. His blood is more precious than gold, his abilities more coveted than riches. Kingdoms are built on our backs. He must be strong, cunning. He must be prepared. Or the world will use him and leave him for dead.”

Ma released another sigh and nodded, wiping her tears.

A thunderclap roared across the sky, shaking the house. Pratyush jumped, his little heart palpitating.

Even Ma startled. But not his father. Papa was never afraid or caught off guard.

“What about our little girl?” Ma asked solemnly.

“Pritika will have to be highly protected. This is why my kind avoid marriage. Every loved one can be used against us.” He took her hand and kissed the back. “I apologize, my love. My words are harsh but true. I will never regret this life we’ve chosen together—or our children. I will do my best to protect you all.”

“I know,” she said. “But what I meant was…does she, too, carry the bloodline?”

“Possibly. I can’t tell if she’s a…” His voice drifted off, as if speaking that one last word was forbidden.

“What troubles you? Why are you suddenly so worried about being

found out?” she asked.

He closed his eyes and breathed. “The voices are building in my head. I can’t contain them. They get louder by the day, screaming, torturing. When I was in town a few weeks ago, men were chattering on about another…you know what. From a faraway place, under the King’s thumb, being worked to the bone.

“The Famed One, they called him. They said he went mad from the voices, from seeing the beasts he’d slain come back in his sleep. The townsmen made it sound like a haunting. They said his most recent kill appeared to him as she had in life. A withered woman in white, with long black hair covering her face, her neck perpetually bent downward. Her bony hands kept reaching for him, but he was always able to move in time. After all, one cannot be killed by something that has already been slain.

“Yet he was found dead. The King seemed perplexed. He tried to keep it hidden, maybe because we’re supposed to live a lifetime for every monster we slay, and the Famed One had killed plenty. People think we’re immortal, and the King prefers this myth to continue. It wouldn’t end well for anyone to know that we can be killed—perhaps not so easily, but still….

“The townsfolk said the Famed One went mad without sleep, peeling off his flesh as he lay in bed, dying by his own hands, the only way he could die. Others said the monster he killed returned and slit his throat while he was unable to move.”

Ma gasped, a hand to her mouth. “Do you think she escaped the Nightmare Realm, that the dead were able to come back for vengeance?”

He hushed her. “Do not speak about that god-awful hell. It’s probably nothing more than lore.”

She lowered her hand to touch his face. “But aren’t you lore, my love?”

Papa kissed her palm. “Nonetheless, he’s dead, and now the King will search harder for me to replace him.”

Pratyush shuddered, imagining what it had been like for the Famed One, to be awake but unable to move—and even worse with a monster coming at him!

A noise caught his attention. It wasn’t Pritika, who could obviously sleep through anything, but a faraway, muted disturbance. Something out of place in the thunderous storm, something with a different cadence than the pouring rain.

By the time Pratyush stood to check on Pritika, Papa was already at the window, pulling back the curtain and searching the darkness. Had he heard it, too?

“What is it?” Ma

asked.

“Get the children into the cellar,” Papa ordered, his stern, steady voice rippling across the frigid air.

Pratyush immediately rushed to his sister’s room, where a candle cast dancing shadows in the small space. He stilled, dragging his gaze across the room, his heart beating harder.

He took one step after another, looking everywhere: up, down across the wooden planks and boards, past the dresser, and to the cot where Pritika yawned awake and squinted up at him.

He let out a breath. She was okay. Even though she was two years older than him, he tried to take care of her the way he’d seen his father take care of her. He wanted to be just like him—smart, kind, funny, and, above all, a protector of the family. Pratyush was hardly ever scared when his father was around, and he wanted to be brave like him.

Something muttered to his right. His head jerked toward the sound, as if someone had whispered something right into his ear. But there wasn’t anyone else here.

He crept toward the window. Rain smashed so heavily against the glass that all he could see was serpentine rivulets of water.

A thunderclap hit like a roaring lion. Lightning struck, illuminating the entire world in startling shades of gray. A hand grabbed him.

Pratyush yelped.

“Shh,” his mother said, placing a trembling finger to her lips, bending to meet him at eye level. Her gaze whipped to the cot as his sister sat up and rubbed her eyes.

“Come. Quickly.” Ma reached out for her, wiggling her fingers.

Pritika didn’t ask questions. She didn’t hesitate. After all, they’d been trained for emergencies early on. She grabbed a coat and slipped it on as Ma rushed them out of the room.

Pratyush took Ma’s hand, her flesh cold and shivering. “What’s happening?” he asked, his voice timid.

“We must hide in the cellar, where it’s safe. Quite a storm out there,” she replied, smiling. But Pratyush made out the slight quiver in her lips and the unease of her stiff movements. He heard the pounding of her pulse at her temple, could see the beads of sweat pushing out of her pores, her skin turning warmer as blood rushed to the surface.

What was she so afraid of?

Ma released him so she could hold Pritika’s hand in her left hand and took a lantern in her right, hurrying them down the steps. They quickly slipped into shoes and were almost at the door when something crashed through the front wall, an explosion of splintered wood and shattered stone.

Ma screamed, moving the children behind her with her hip. She shoved the lantern up, as if light would ward off the attack.

“Get them out of here!” Papa ordered, sliding to the edge of the debris.

In his hands, he wielded his legendary parashu—a behemoth battle-axe said to be gifted by the gods. The gleam of its blade cut through the darkness like an angry shard. Rain pounded the ground, blown in by wind and wetting the house in a gush of water. Every few seconds, lightning and thunder paired up in a discord of shrieking.

And in those deafening, chilling moments, when the entire house sparked

to life in blazes of light, Pratyush saw it all.

His eyes went wide in disbelief, his body unyielding.

He’d heard the stories. Of monsters larger than buildings. With teeth as big as hands and as sharp as daggers. With toxic spit dripping like tar. Talons for hands and blades for nails. Taut muscles. And above all, the most dangerous thing—intelligence.

Papa said there were monsters, and that monsters were smart.

But even the wildest of stories hadn’t prepared him for this. Now one of those fabled monsters stood a few feet from him. Growling at Papa as if he’d come all this way in a storm just for him.

In the blink of an eye, Papa grunted and lunged for the beast. Pratyush flinched, holding his breath, but then slowly opened his eyes.

His father hadn’t died in one swift blow. His father…was fighting. Like a famed master. Swiping and dodging and attacking and gliding. Kicking with powerful blows and striking with precision. Inky blood gushed from the monster, dousing the furniture and walls and splintered wood with sickening, viscous fluid.

The smell of rain and metallic blood floated in the air, surging through Pratyush’s senses, and awakened a terrifying chill. Goose bumps skittered across his flesh, and the hairs on the back of his neck stood up as something more horrifying stepped into the room.

This beast was even bigger, its eyes crimson like the deepest-colored roses. It smashed down what remained of the wall. The entire house shook, and pieces of timber crumbled.

Ma yelped as she pushed the children out a side door clinging lifelessly to its hinges.

“What about Papa?” Pratyush asked, blood rushing through his veins like fire, heating his skin, telling him to turn back, to fight.

Rain slammed againts

them as soon as they were outside. In an instant, they were soaking wet.

“He knows what he’s doing. We have to make sure you two are safe!” Ma cried above the howling wind and pounding rain. “Come!”

A loud thunder rocked the skies, masking the crash of a tree trunk swinging through the house and hitting the porch pillars. One pillar snapped into three, falling onto Ma. She stumbled from the force, dropping the lantern and pushing the children forward as her face smashed against the slippery porch.

“Ma!” Pratyush cried, skidding to a stop in front of her as Pritika held on to his shirt.

Ma clenched her jaw and squirmed while Pratyush, crying, tried to move the pillar. “No!” she said, wincing and clutching her bleeding leg. “It’s gone through me. Don’t move it. Don’t waste your time! Take your sister and hide in the cellar!”

She offered herself like a sacrifice to cruel gods, struggling to get free but commanding them to run. Pratyush took Pritika’s icy hand, tugging her away. He pushed water-laden hair from his forehead. He grabbed the lantern, fear clawing up his throat, deadening his legs. But he willed himself to move, to run, to make it to the cellar.

He didn’t look back once, heaving and grunting and struggling and sloshing across a small field. He set the lantern beside the cellar as Pritika crouched and looked around. He gripped the handle of the cellar door and pulled. He tried and tried, tears streaming down his face, glancing at Pritika as she spat up water and clenched her eyes against the rain.

In the far distance, something new rumbled across the fields. Faint lights flickered in the storm. An army. Hope.

With his sister’s help, Pratyush yanked the door with all his might. It finally opened! He urged Pritika down first, following her with quick steps. He grabbed blankets from a basket in the corner and wrapped her up as their father would have.

“Sit here,” he said, moving her by her convulsing shoulders to sit in a chair. He brought over a sickle from the wall and placed it in her lap. Then he set the lantern nearby at her feet.

“Wh-where are you going?” she asked, her teeth chattering.

He kissed her forehead, muttering, “Everything will be all right. Stay here, okay?”

“But—”

Pratyush had already bounded up the cellar steps before Pritika could protest. All he could think about was how afraid his parents were that she would be found.

He slammed the door shut and ran toward the house just as the night sky lit up with fiery white lightning. He shielded his eyes, stumbling over rocks and slipping in mud when a bolt of lightning branched off and hit the house, setting it ablaze.

Pratyush screamed, frozen on the spot as flames came roaring to life. For a moment that felt like forever, his mind went blank. He…didn’t know what to do, where to go, how to react.

The army would be here soon. They’d help. They had to!

His mother’s screams cut through his thoughts. Without thinking, he ran for her, for the house, toward this heaving, fiery monster.

Heat incinerated pieces of his clothes, charred his shoes, but he didn’t feel it.

Flames lapped at his skin, brighter than the sun, but he wasn’t blinded by them.

Ma wasn’t where he’d left her. She’d been dragged inside, a trail of blood in her wake.

Pratyush leapt

into the fire, ducking into a pocket of air, and emerged in what was once the front room. The fire raged, greedily devouring the remnants of Pratyush’s home and sucking out the air.

To his right, one of the monsters lay in a pool of inky blood, its head dismantled and guts oozing from its stomach. Papa was heaving beside it, on one knee, his flesh torn to the bones. He gripped his battle-axe, grimy with dark blood, and dragged it toward the other beast.

To his left, the bigger monster had Ma by the hair as she frantically fought.

Pratyush went for her at the same time his father lunged for the beast. But Papa had seen him, his eyes widening, and for a moment, he lost focus.

A moment was all a monster needed. It lashed out into Papa’s already-open wounds. Its talons went straight for his throat.

In a few calculated strikes…his father collapsed.

“Run,” Papa gurgled through bloody lips.

“Run,” Ma uttered, her face pushed into the broken floorboards.

A boy as young as Pratyush should’ve run.

A boy with the blood of his father—roaring to life like a million sparks igniting in his bones—did not.

He went to his father, skidding on blood and water, and grabbed the parashu. The beast turned its back, stepping toward Ma, unthreatened by this small child.

Pratyush, filled with rage and confusion and loss and chaos, let out a cry as he ran for the monster. He hurled himself into the air, raising the battle-axe above his head and landing on the beast’s horn-spiked back. A strength he never knew he had ached through him.

Consumed by his bloodlines, engulfed by the silent, haunting wails of his slain parents, Pratyush slammed the battle-axe into the beast. Using his foot for leverage, he yanked the battle-axe out and carved it into the beast’s skull. Over and over. No matter how much his little body hurt. No matter how much the monster moved or tried to yank him from its back. No matter how much fire and rain and blood covered him.

He couldn’t stop, not until the monster was slain.

But as the beast crumpled beneath him, an uncanny stream of whispers flooded into his thoughts, driving him backward. He slipped off, bruising his elbows on jagged pieces of broken wood. He clutched his head, clenched his eyes, and seethed, keeping in a scream that rippled through his chest.

Pratyush rolled onto his side, his mind filled with torment and hatred and worry. He felt the final thoughts of the monster inside him, felt the final skull-splitting blows as if his own head were being torn apart.

He fought a mental battle, shoving the monster’s wails aside and into a trunk in the corner of his mind. As much as he wanted to lie there and cry, he couldn’t. Not with the fire growing.

“Ma!” he grunted, crawling toward his mother. He grabbed her scarred hand, crusted with burned flesh, but his grip was slippery.

She didn’t respond. She lay limp, motionless, even as Pratyush dragged her out of the house, fumbling with each step. He went back for Papa, pulling him out of the crumbling house, too.

With the heat of the fire singeing his back, Pratyush collapsed to his knees between his parents. They had been mutilated beyond recognition. The scourge of anger fled from him, leaving an overwhelming force of sadness as he dropped his head. He hugged his mother and lifted a hand to touch his father…and wept enough tears to last lifetimes. 

***

“WHERE’S MY SISTER?” PRATYUSH NERVOUSLY ASKED THE soldier ahead of him.

“She’s being taken care of. Don’t worry about her. You’re about to meet the King. Best get prepared for that instead,” the soldier replied, adjusting the sheath of his dagger at his waist.

Pratyush wiped his nose with the back of his sleeve and looked up at the towering ceiling of the palace, laced with gold and jewels and decadent murals. The place smelled like incense and roses and nutty sweets.

The doors opened to a giant room where a tall, finely dressed man grinned down at Pratyush.

The soldier nudged him and commanded, “Bow before your king.”

Pratyush bent at the waist.

“Have you enjoyed your food and bath and nice, new clothes, eh?” the King asked.

Pratyush nodded, rubbing the side of his leggings. His hands shook, his eyes flitting back and forth in this strange place with no signs of Pritika. He didn’t care about clothes and food. He just wanted to be with his sister.

The King studied him, his gaze lingering over Pratyush’s face and hands. “They said you were in the fire that destroyed your house, that you were covered in burns. Today, you stand before me without a trace of affliction. There’s no denying what you are. Come.”

Pratyush and the soldier followed him into a courtyard where dozens of soldiers sparred and practiced, metal clanking against metal.

The King smiled and said, “Show me what you can do.” He held out a hand and the soldiers on the field paused to witness him.

Pratyush fiddled with the hem of his beige-and-blue kurta, itchy and smelling nothing like his mother’s soaps.

When he didn’t respond, the King asked, “Are you mute?”

He shook his head.

“Then speak,” he growled.

“I—I don’t understand.”

“Show me how you fight.”

Pratyush glanced at trained soldiers, at full-grown men. “I don’t know how to fight.”

The King chuckled. “No? You’ve just slain a monster. You fight like…your father. Is that where he’s been hiding all this time?”

“Wh-what?” he asked, confused.

The King scowled. “Don’t you know what you are?”

Pratyush swallowed and shook his head. “A s-son to a—a farmer.”

The King chuckled again and then glanced at the soldier beside Pratyush before his smile slipped. He looked down at Pratyush and said, his voice deep and even, “You, my dear boy, are the greatest

gift to the kingdom after kings and queens. You are a slayer. And as far as I know, the slayer, last of your kind, and so you shall be called henceforth. That is your destiny, and you cannot escape it. It’s the only thing you’re meant for.”

Pratyush clenched and unclenched his fists at his sides, shivering in the afternoon sun. The word slayer echoed in his thoughts. The stuff of legends and lore. Monster hunters and killers of beasts. Famed warriors.

The King tilted his head to the side and flashed a smile. “Do you know what happened?”

Pratyush shook his head.

“I saved you. My men will train you. After all, slaying is all you’re good for, and we need to make sure you’re capable. I shall raise you as my own. You owe your life to me, your unfailing loyalty. Don’t you? As long as you listen to me, you and your sister will be taken care of.”

Pratyush’s trembling stilled as he gazed deep into the King’s narrow brown eyes. The black centers expanded. Sweat trickled across his royal brow in tiny beads pushed up from his skin. The vein in his thick neck, just above the jewel-encrusted coat, pulsated, the gush of blood as loud as morning birds.

The King was lying. ...