Chapter 14

Hey guys, here is your next looooooooooooong update as requested! I'll try to post another one for you tonight too!

Chapter 14:

Finally one and a half months since they had arrived in Banares, the day that Raj had been waiting for came. While he sat by the river in the evening a young beggar boy came and gave him a note, Raj gave him a coin in return.

The note was written in code, but Raj understood perfectly. She wanted him to meet her to the west of the city tonight at sunset. He went back to the ashram and collected his things, telling them that he was moving on to yet another pilgrimage town.

Raj wondered around the city for awhile, not wanting to arrive at the meeting point too early in case he attracted the wrong type of attention. Finally he arrived five minutes before sunset at the rendevous point to find Naina already there. The setting sun glinted off her white sari, giving her face and hair a tinted red colour. She was the most beautiful sight he had ever seen.

Naina looked relieved when she spotted him, and he hurried to meet her.

"We have to leave here quickly," she told him, "I was recognised by somebody."

"How did you find out?" he asks, it's lucky that she did or they would've been caught before they had even managed to achieve anything.

"Chaubey," she tells him, "He informed Alekh who passed the message on to me here. Now let's go before it's too late."

She walks off the roadside so that she is sheltered from view and turns her back to Raj. There in the light of the setting sun she unwraps her white sari, standing there in only the blouse and skirt. Quickly Naina bends down to take a blue sari out of her bag instead, and straightening up with the material in her hands she briefly catches the look on Raj's face.

He had been watching her with a hunger in his eyes, wanting badly to step forward and place his hands onto the exposed flesh of her waist. Ashamed at his own thoughts, and at Naina catching him staring at her, he quickly turns away, but the image is already burned into his mind.

Finally she taps him on the arm and he turns to face her, not able to meet her eyes. Naina simply passes him a change of clothes, a simple pair of pants and button up shirt, and then turns her back to change, which Raj does quickly. He unties the bandana from his head, knowing that his hair is now long enough to hide the scar above his eyebrow.

He turns back around to find that Naina has adorned her forehead with a bindi and has already marked a sindoor in her hair. She is struggling to do up the mangalsutra, her fingers not able to do up the clasp at the back.

"I'll help you," Raj tells her quietly, but stops at the shocked look in her eyes.

"I'll do it myself." She tells him and finally manages to close the clasp. It is only then that Raj realises exactly what he had offered to do. He can't believe that he had said it so unthinkingly. Even if she hadn't been engaged…

Stepping up to the road again, they hire an autorickshaw to take them to the next town. From there they take a bus to yet another town and by then it is night.

"We need to hurry if we're going to catch the train." Naina tells him, "We have to change our disguises again." In a back alley they once again change, this time Raj manages to resist the desire to turn around. When Naina is done she is already wearing a modest salwar kameez and holding a burqa in her hands, preparing to wear it. Raj is now dressed in a man's salwar kameez, with a tight prayer cap on his skull. Naina hands him his new ID.

"Your name is Rehan Ali Khan and mine is Fatima Khan," she informs him. "We're on our way back to Lucknow to visit my sick mother." Then she pulls the burqa on, struggling with it slightly as she tries to figure out how to wear it. Raj helps her, adjusting it where it has become caught.

"Let's go," he tells her, "I'll buy the tickets, you wait in the ladies room at the station for me."

Buying the tickets was a relatively easy process, Raj was glad that nobody asked any questions or seemed to look at him suspiciously. They had managed to get a seat with difficulty, all of the sleeping berths were full. The tickets in his hand, Raj stood outside the ladies room and made a sign to Naina, who quickly got up and joined him. They got on the train with only ten minutes to spare, and soon found their seats, Raj could barely make out the shape of Naina's face below her burqa. He settled her near the window before sitting down next to her, another older man sitting on his other side. Across from them there was a young family consisting of a mother, father and two children.

Raj leaned his head back against the wall, he was exhausted and knew that they wouldn't be arriving in Lucknow until the next day but he didn't want to fall asleep in case they needed to escape.

Naina was obviously thinking exactly the same thing, as she was sitting up straight in the seat despite the fact that her body was radiating tiredness.

"You go to sleep, jaan." Raj whispered, conscious of the other people watching them, He took her right hand in his and held it comfortingly. He could feel Naina relax and half an hour later she was asleep, her head resting on his shoulder. He didn't let go of her hand, knowing that this might be the only opportunity for a long time to come. Raj stayed awake, he watched for danger.

He would protect her from harm. No matter what.

**

Earlier the same day…

"Huda let's go, there's a meeting." Priya announced to him, "There's been a sighting."

Huda's heart leapt out of his chest and straight into his throat where it stayed stuck. He had been at headquarters for over a week now, and he had been dreading this moment.

"I'll be right there." He told Priya, and pretended that he needed to close down some files on his computer first. She shrugged and left. He didn't trust his partner, and the relationship between them had been frosty ever since the first day. He had warned Pooja that Priya might have been assigned to spy on them, and Pooja had promised to be careful about what she said.

The only person other than Abhimanyu that Huda knew at headquarters was Chaubey, which had puzzled him at first considering that the man used to be a cook at KMA. That was until Chaubey had explained to him that he had really been Captain Rajveer's assistant in his mission to catch the spy. However Bunty Chaubey was not on the task force, instead he was working for another division so Huda only saw him when they walked past each other in the halls.

Managing to calm himself down, Huda entered the briefing room, finding to his dismay that the only seat empty was one between Priya and Abhimanyu, exactly where he didn't want to be sitting. Colonel Bakshi entered the room and wasted no time in beginning the briefing.

"There's been a sighting of Naina Singh Ahluwalia in Banares." He informed them, "A local sepoy spotted her, he said that her face seemed familiar but he only realised who she was once he arrived back in headquarters and saw the poster with her face on the wall."

"So there was no spotting of Captain Rajveer, Sir?" Priya asked him.

"No there was not, so we don't know whether they're together or if they've split up. Until now we were assuming that they sticking together. Now we will make no such assumptions."

"So what now, Sir?" Abhimanyu asked Colonel Bakshi.

"Now we send an investigation team to find out whether the sighting is genuine or not. Lieutenant Huda and Lieutenant Kapoor will travel to Banares to see if they can find Ms Ahluwalia. The information we received from the sepoy is that she was dressed as a widow, so we can guess from that information that she may be staying in an ashram there. You will ask around and try to find out where she is."

Priya nodded sharply, Huda nodded hesitantly, but didn't say anything.

"Well if everything is understood then you should both leave immediately," Colonel Bakshi announced. The room cleared out as everybody left except Priya and Huda.

"I've been on this type of investigation before," she informed him. "We'll take a car and drive there as there's no flight until tomorrow anyway. It would be good if we both went back to our accommodation and packed some clothes, we might not be coming back for a few days. I'll meet you in front of my quarters in half an hour." She told him and left.

Huda was wandering down the corridor downcast when he bumped into Bunty Chaubey.

"Lieutenant Amardeep Huda," Chaubey addressed him smilingly, "Where are you wandering to looking so lost?"

"There's a problem Chaubey," Huda told him, happy that at least he could open his heart to somebody, "There's been a sighting of Naina in Benares, now I've got to go and investigate."

A strange look passed over Chaubey's face before he replied, patting Huda reassuringly on the shoulder, "Don't worry, everything will work out fine." He told him, and left.

Getting the keys to the car they were to be given, Huda drove it to his quarters and packed a bag of clothes and essentials before driving to the ladies quarters where Priya was already waiting.

"I left a note for Pooja," Priya told him, throwing her bag onto the back seat as she climbed into the car to sit beside him. "So that she knows where we've both gone." Huda just nodded, too tense to speak.

It took them the better part of the day to drive to Varanasi, for the most part in silence. Priya had learnt by now that any attempt she made to start up a conversation was sure to be rebuffed by Huda. She had had enough when they stopped for lunch and Huda simply grunted in answer to her comments about the food.

"Lieutenant Huda," she addressed him sternly, "What is your problem with me that you can't even speak one word to me properly?"

Huda was surprised, he hadn't expected her to confront him over it, but he was sick of playing this game too.

"Look here, Lieutenant Kapoor," he told her, "I'm not stupid, I know exactly what is going on here. And I'm not going to become a pawn in somebody's game."

"What exactly are you talking about?" she asked him, "What have I done to make you think I'm playing some sort of game? All I'm trying to do here is carry out my duty honestly."

"Honestly?" he asked her, "Is it honest to be spying on your so-called partner? And don't even try denying it. I know exactly what type of game they're playing. They assigned a pretty girl as my partner so I'd be overcome by her charms and not suspect her. But they went too far when they also made you Pooja's room mate." There was a fire in his eyes as he glared at her and she could tell that he was damn angry. "As I said, I'm not stupid. I know very well that you haven't just been assigned to be my partner."

Priya weighed up her options, wishing that it hadn't come to this so soon, then she decided that the best policy really was honesty.

"Alright," she told him "I admit it. When they assigned me to be your partner and made Pooja my room mate they did tell me to keep an eye on both of you. But I don't see what you're worried about if you've got nothing to hide."

"I don't have anything to hide." He told her, his tone surprised at her admission but still dangerously angry, "But do you really expect me to treat you as my partner when you've been assigned to spy on me?"

"Look Huda, whatever I might have been asked to do, I think of you as my partner." She looked him straight in the eye, wanting him to know how honest she was being with him, "And I believe that you really don't have any idea where Naina Singh Ahluwalia or Captain Shekawat are. Now you can make it hard for us to work together, or we can try to get along and get to know each other."

Huda considered the option she was giving him, it certainly wasn't pleasant to be constantly giving his partner the cold shoulder, but he betray his friends by helping her to find them. Then again, by becoming her friend perhaps he could benefit too. Perhaps it would help him to help Naina and Captain Rajveer from being caught…

"Fine," Huda replied, "You've got a deal. From today I'll really consider you to be my partner. We'll try to get along together." He stuck out his hand and Priya shook it.

Huda knew exactly what he was doing. He remembered Captain Rajveer's advice that you should always keep your enemies close, Priya might not be his enemy, but she wasn't exactly his friend either. If she was going to be watching him, then he was going to be watching her as well.

He knew how to play this game.