The Dawn's Knights

3. The Light Realm

"What was that?" I asked General Reya, who walked ahead. I stole eyes from people on the road gawking at me. I wasn't wearing any shirt, just the torn jeans around my waist.

The street was lined with fruit and vegetable vendors, screaming into one huge bustle of indistinct voices.

"A Nightling," General Reya said as she stopped by the side of a bigger road with all the cars and trucks. She held out a hand for a taxi.

I just tried my best to ignore all the eyes on us. It was on me because I wore nothing up my waist, but more on the general because she wore too much.

"Not the creature. But how come we're in India?" I asked with a palpable frown on my face.

She pointed to the gemstones in her hand. "Through the Quantum Quarters...the one we stayed in. It's supposed to be a safe house, but apparently, not anymore."

"What's a Nightling?" I asked as a white taxi stopped before us.

"The creatures of the Night. There's a lot you don't know about the Light and the Night. You'll learn it all once we reach the University," she said before she filed into the backseat.

"Why did it attack us there? It left you when it saw me. It wanted me. I could tell," I whispered to her on our way to the University.

She just stared at me, hard and nonchalantly, before staring out the window without a response.

***

The taxi took us through the city and emerged onto a dirt road with trees on either side, away from the hustle and bustle of the city. When it reached the end of the road, it stopped before an enormous structure. A looming ancient building, its stained glass windows playing with the reflection of the sun from the lake right on the opposite side of the road.

The taxi driver asked, "Are you sure this is the right address, madam?"

Reya didn't say anything, just reached into her smoke and tar-covered white tunic, came with a few rupee notes, and handed it to the driver.

I asked the driver while getting out, "Why do you think so?"

"Nothing. Just that I've never had anyone bring me here, or this part of the city. This building is mostly occupied by drug addicts and prostitutes," he said, looking at me through the rearview mirror.

Reya looked back at me from the building's door and gestured for me to hurry. I exited the car and followed her inside the old building that still seemed too gorgeous to argue about its nature.

As she pushed in the large wooden door with a loud creak, I asked her, "This doesn't look like a religious building. Or like a drug den like that driver claimed. It looks like some billionaire's summer retreat."

But as soon as I was inside the building, what the driver had claimed made sense. The inside of the building was dark, save for the light streaming in vibrant colours through the huge stained glass windows.

Cobwebs and dust were prominent. The wooden balustrades by the mezzanine to the right were broken, and the furniture was shambles.

"Religious?" General Reya turned to me, closing the door behind her. "Is that what you think is happening here?"

I nodded. I was very religious, and like my father and mother, I also believed that prayers worked and the gods watched over us.

A smile swept across her face. Batting her eyes, she said with a hand over her nose against the dust, "You're on a dimension above gods, Aarush."

That made no sense to me. It was scary to hear those words. Above gods! It felt blasphemous even to think so. I shook my head, "What are you saying? Even if multiple dimensions existed, it's all under God's domain."