“I stayed by the lake for hours. I hunted for sticks, ate some berries, and found shelter under a peepul tree. I fell asleep there. I don’t know how much time passed before some voices woke me up. When I walked back to the lakeshore, I found”—he stops again and squeezes his eyes shut for a brief moment—“two men standing there. One of them was the man you saw earlier.”

“What did he do to you?” Ghufran asks, and we are surprised by her voice all over again.

“You see the stars in my eyes?” We nod. “Apparently the presence of the stars marks me as the Keeper of the Between.…” He scoffs.

“Is that why the Between was flooding you with light?” Paheli asks.

“I don’t know. I don’t know what a Keeper of the Between does or is. All these stars have given me is grief,” Taraana spits out. “I hate the Between.”

We exchange shocked glances. The place is like home to us.

“But why did Baarish want you? Or rather, why does he still want you?” Etsuko asks. When she sees Taraana flinch at the question, she grimaces and mutters, “Sorry.”

He shrugs away her apology and continues with the story we derailed him from. Baarish recognized Taraana by the stars in his eyes, something usually only visible to middle worlders, and bought him from his parents, who were only too happy to exchange one of their children for monetary compensation.

“Because I was human, my rights as an individual, as a living, breathing person, didn’t… don’t matter to the middle worlders. What happened with Baarish… Forgive me, I still can’t speak about it,” he whispers. “Those stars you wear in your palms? They are my tears. When I am in more pain than I can endure, I shed a tear that is the purest form of magic that can exist. They’re the reason Baarish wanted me. Wants me. If consumed, one tear can fuel a middle worlder clan for years. Baarish intended… intends to use me to harvest as many tears as he can before my body breaks and I die.”

The tea turns cold in the cups. None of us speak. None of us are able to.

Taraana tells us that the chance to escape came once. A little girl, a granddaughter of Baarish’s, felt sorry for him, so she set him free when the Dar wasn’t around. Taraana took the box of tears and ran.

“I didn’t think I would get away with it, but how could I not try?” That was the day he met Paheli. He tossed her the box right before he was recaptured because he was damned if he would let Baarish use the tears.

“Why didn’t you just escape into the Between?” Etsuko asks.