Description: I sketched out the finer details of the Asura that Ashwini was fighting. He was a dragon demon, like the one the god Indra had defeated in one of the myths, and he was the size of a horse, with enormous black wings, slit nostrils that breathed smoke, a spiky scarlet tongue, and shiny black jewels for scales. I inked over the pale pencil lines and reached for my box of colored pencils. Sweeping black lines and blocks of rich color transformed the white paper into something alive. Soon, the battle felt so real that I could almost feel the hiss of the Asura''s breath on my face. My bed gave a jerk beneath me. I jerked, too, startled. "Hello?" I said foolishly. Funnily enough, no one answered. I shrugged it off and went back to my sketch. I gave the Asura''s tail a wicked curve. "Ow!" I dropped the pencil and snatched my hands back. It had been a quick, sudden burst of pain, like an electric shock. I could have sworn it had come from my sketchbook! After a moment of hesitation, I put one hand back down on the page, ready to snatch it away if I needed to. Nothing happened. It was just paper. My paper, as much a part of me as my own skin. I was probably just tired. It had been a while since I''d had more than five or six hours of sleep at night, and while it was definitely more fun to stay up and draw than it was to stay up wondering if I needed to double-check the downstairs windows, I knew I''d be useless at school tomorrow if I didn''t at least try to sleep. I put my sketchbook and pencils back on my desk, got under my warm, cuddly blanket, and flicked my lamp off. When I woke up, my desk was in flames and there was a demon in my bedroom. I had bad dreams just like everybody else, of course, but it seemed a little unfair that this dream involved a demon and a fire. Just one of the two would have been more than enough, thanks. I stayed calm. I sat up, blinked at the demon, and tried to ignore how real the heat from the flames felt. The Asura regarded me silently. He was exactly like the one I had drawn before I fell sleep. Black-jewel scales, slit nostrils with curls of smoke, and malevolent eyes. I swallowed. It was fine to be a little scared at this point, right? Even if you knew it wasn''t real? "Can I help you?" I asked politely. The Asura narrowed those eyes. "What is this place?" he demanded. His voice was a low snarl. Tiny beads of sweat formed on the tip of my nose. The room had become hot and smoky. "This is London," I said. "Lun-din," the Asura repeated, testing the syllables in his mouth. "Not Mysore?" "No . . . ?" "Then he did it," the Asura rumbled. Was that wonder in his voice? "Mahishasura has found a way home at last." This didn''t sound like good news to me. "Kiki? What''s all that noise down there?" The Asura whipped around at the sound of Mum''s voice from her bedroom in the loft above us. As he did, his wickedly sharp tail hit my leg, where blood bloomed immediately. "Ow!" This was the second time I had said that tonight. I stared at the blood, while the flames from the desk spread to the window curtains, and I felt a sudden, horrible terror. This wasn''t a dream, was it? I did not stay calm. Even as my brain rejected the possibility that this was real, my body started to panic. My heart pounded. My curtains were on fire, my desk was on fire, the sketchbook on my desk was on fire. And the Asura was gone. I heard a crash from downstairs as the front door slammed open. He had escaped. Great. There was a demon loose in London. "What was that?" I could hear Mum shifting in bed. She would be downstairs any minute now. "Was that the door?" There was literally no way I could answer that honestly, so I lied. "I didn''t hear anything!" I squeaked. What was I supposed to deal with first? Fire or demon? Demon or fire? Well, one of the two was still in my house with my mother, so that settled things. Holding my breath and scrunching up my eyes to block out as much smoke as I could, I dragged my blankets off my bed, smacked at the curtains with them, and then threw them over the desk to smother the remaining flames. Then I turned and ran, barefoot, out of my room, down the stairs, and out of the open front door. I had absolutely no idea what I planned to do when I found the Asura, who was an impressively ferocious dragony demony thing while I was just a kid in her favorite pajamas, but I couldn''t just let him get away, either. After all, I was the one who had somehow set him loose. Not to mention the fact that he was the only one who could explain to me how he had become so, you know, real . So I ran down the street and turned the corner. My feet did not approve of the cracked, uneven pavement and my decision to venture forth without shoes, but they would just have to put up with it. By the time I found the Asura, he was causing quite a stir at the bus stop. The bus had actually stopped, which is more unusual than you would think at a bus stop, and the few people who had been on it had abandoned it because the Asura got on board. He stomped up and down the aisle, puffing smoke and snarling at the driver, who mostly sighed and looked very put-upon. "It''s way too late for this, mate," I heard him say. "Save the costume for the West End. Just buy a ticket so we can all go home, yeah?" "Costume?" the Asura roared. " Costume ? Do you not know who I am? I am an Asura! I am a warrior in the great Mahishasura''s army! And I will help him return to this world!" "Ticket," the bus driver replied, unmoved, "or get off." This couldn''t possibly end well. I had to do something before someone ended up eaten or barbecued or both. I looked around desperately for inspiration, but there wasn''t even a convenient stick lying around that I could hit the Asura with (not that a stick would have done much against a demon, but said stick could have at least had the courtesy to make itself available). Then, just as I considered falling back on the noble, timeless technique of screaming very loudly, something astonishing happened. A girl ran past me. With a sword. She paused before she jumped onto the bus, looked back at me over her shoulder, and winked. Winked . Then she leaped on board and faced down the Asura. She was barely older than I was, but she was ferocious, all sharp lines and elbows and edges, the sword as much a part of her as her hands. I watched in awe as she looked the demon in the eye and didn''t even tremble. "You," the Asura spat the word, punctuated by a puff of smoke, "you''re here. You are relentless." The girl smiled, but it was the least friendly smile I had ever seen. "Did you really think I wouldn''t follow you? Go back to Mysore, Asura. Go back and tell your king we won''t let him return to this world." The Asura growled and sprang at her. The girl darted out of the way. She dragged the bleating bus driver out of his seat and pushed him out of the bus. The doors hissed shut, cutting us off from both girl and demon. "Oy!" the bus driver shouted. "I''ll call the police, don''t think I won''t!" I ignored his shouts, and the flurry of phone-camera flashes, and ran to the bus. I pressed my hands to the glass of the doors, my heart like thunder in my ears. I wanted to help, but I didn''t know how. All I could do was watch as a demon and a girl fought a battle inside a red London bus. They moved so fast that sometimes they weren''t much more than a blur. The only way I could make sense of it was by holding individual moments still, like sketches on a page. Her sword met the blade of his tail. His teeth snapped a hair''s breadth from her face. White snakes of his smoke wrapped around them. His scales gleamed too bright in the harsh lights of the bus. And the girl, somehow, held her own against the Asura. More than that, even. She was glorious. She faced him like she had been born to fight demons. Like she had been born to fight demons. I stared at her. At the brown skin. At the shiny dark hair cut in a sharp bob below her chin. At the brown eyes that glittered with joy and mischief I had put there. I knew that face. I knew her. She hadn''t been born , had she? She had come from the same place the Asura had. My sketchbook. I had made her. The Asura lashed out with the jagged tail I had given him. The girl dodged and danced from seat to aisle to seat, always just out of his reach. The Asura snarled and leaped right over the seats. He swiped a powerful, clawed foreleg at her and knocked her onto the floor. I gasped as he loomed over her, his smoke darkening to crimson as he prepared to breathe fire. I pounded my fists on the doors. "No!" I shouted. "Stop! Please!" The sound made the Asura look around. It wasn''t much of a distraction, but it was all the girl needed. She plunged her sword right

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