Avinash, a hotel IT expert, is caught in the midst of a preternatural sandstorm in the hotel in which he works. Time also seems to have stopped. He has been guided by the mental presence of an ancient queen who has taught him how to manipulate the lives of others and who has apparently granted him the ability to conjure natural phenomena. Six hundred years ago, the queen’s palace stood where the hotel now exists. She met a tragic end, falling from her balcony

As he observes the effects of the sandstorm and the stoppage of time, he realizes the queen’s voice is gone from his mind. Everyone in the hotel is apparently frozen, and Avinash is alone. He suddenly hears someone working on a computer in his room. He finds the odd-jobs boy, Raju, unfrozen and at his seat. He learns that the boy had been looking at his records of the Queens’s Game, or the people whose lives he influences at her behest. Avinash collects information on the hotel’s guests, workers, and prospective visitors, sending notes and exposing evidence to advance the stories the queen desires. Raju helps Avinash in his machinations but does not know of the queen who controls his mind.

Felipe Encina Amaru is the queen’s other instrument. He is a poet who has lost his inspiration until he meets an ornithologist, Lalita, in the Thar desert when her jeep breaks down. Her work is on The Great Indian Bustard, a bird with the Indian name Kharchal. He asks Lalita for any additional legends about the Kharchal. She tells him of the hotel built on the ruins of her dwelling and how the most famous of legends about the Kharchal are associated with it.

The legend is one of love and magic. The queen was once a magician and healer who caught the eye of the king. He asked to make her his wife, and while she consented, she had could not remain constantly with her new husband, and while he did not like the qualification, he accepted nonetheless. The first time she leaves, she enters her room and shuts the door. Stepping onto a nearby balcony, the king watches as she stands on her balcony and transforms into a kharchal, flying away. The bird lets out a beautiful cry, moving the king emotionally.

She returns to the king, but he doesn’t reveal his discoveries about her. His other wives become jealous of his devotion to her and spread rumors of her infidelity. Despite himself, the king subscribes to these lies and confronts the queen, demanding that she stop leaving him. She responds by saying that if he means to cage her, she must leave for good. She runs to her room with the king on her heels, and as she transforms, he yanks a feather from her. At that, the queen transforms back into a woman and falls to her death. Despair and illness befell the city after her death, and the cry of the Kharcal could be heard long after her death. Lalita and Felipe arrive in Jaipur, where they part ways without exchanging contact information. She tells him she will see him again during the next sandstorm. Felipe tries to track her down after they part to no avail. Once he has the funds, he travels to the hotel she told him of. Eventually, he enlists Avinash’s help at Raju’s recommendation. Raju then arrives at his room, telling Felipe that Avinash is looking for him. Felipe follows him to what was the king’s royal storeroom centuries ago, where Lalita is waiting with Avinash, who stands before a fragmented stone wall in the room. Within the wall, there is a box with a Kharchal on it. Inside, there is a single white feather. At the queen’s behest, Avinash gives Lalita the feather and she transforms into a Kharchal. Avinash tries to grab the bird once he realizes the queen’s voice has gone silent in his mind, but Raju prevents him. Overcome, he throws himself from the room’s balcony.

Time resumes and the storm arrives in a fury. Raju and Felipe try to help during the chaos, but there are further causalities. Felipe loses his voice and can only whisper. One day, he arrives at a railway station and thinks he feels Avinash’s presence in his mind, though the spirit feels like a young version of the man Felipe has known. He accepts Avinash as a resident in his mind just as Avinash did for the queen.

Felipe resolves to find Lalita and to become a liaison between the Kharchal and the human race. Boarding a bus, he begins his search, and overwhelmed with the inspiration of his experiences, he begins to write.