Chapter 243

Chapter 324: Locus Discerned

Sucking her two fingers, Anarkali sat on the lowest step that led into the hapless Fortress pantry, as she watched Ram rummage through the crates for dinner edibles.

He had fished a wrapped slab of cheese and a loaf of bread so far but there was no sign of anything else.

He faintly remembered seeing an unopened crate of apples among them last night but it was nowhere to be found.

Those fat soldiers must have finished them overnight! he was inordinately certain.

Sufficed, he abandoned further search and picked Anarkali up.

Stepping out of the pantry, he scanned the area for any sign of the guard who had come with him.

Not finding him there, he smiled to himself.

That afternoon, when he had been allowed to hunt the pantry for lunch, the guard who had escorted him had left them to ransack the place by themselves.

Which led Ram to arrive at the happy conclusion: By two or three trips, he had convinced them that he could be trusted and that, as soon as he had finished with the food search, would promptly return before the permitted hour had ended.

In the afternoon, he had hence won the opportune freedom of not being scrutinized. This being so, he had spent the remaining half hour left for his return from the pantry, by searching the rooms on one of the floors.

None of those rooms had been open and, if they were locked with prisoners inside, no one responded from within when he knocked on them.

He wasn't sure how many floors there were in that Fortress but he had to try every one of them until he found the room where they kept Kushiji.

Thanks to there being only cheese and bread in the pantry, an estimate of forty-five minutes was left for him and he decided it was safe to set out on resuming his exploration.

Wedging the cheese slab and the bread loaf between Anarkali and him, he carried her across the corridor and headed for the stairs at the end.

Cautious to make no noise as his feet rushed about, he made down the stony flight of steps and into an unexplored floor.

Leaning against the corner wall, he peered from the edge and inspected for signs of guards.

Finding none, he turned down the unfamiliar corridor and made way through the dingy hallways.

He had barely turned the corner into the next corridor when he heard noises from the other end of it.

Hurriedly, he hid behind a wedge in the wall with Anarkali, and tried to listen closely to what the noise was about.

Some men, doubtless guards, were talking, but Ram wasn't able to pick any words at that distance.

Anarkali had begun gnawing the corner of the cheese and she smiled at him innocently when he caught her in the act.

He grinned in return and kissed her on the cheek, allowing her to continue with her gnawing.

Just then the ones who had been speaking at the end of the corridor where heard approaching the place where Ram hid with Anarkali.

Quickly, he shifted deeper into the shadowy niche of the wall. Anarkali too froze in wonder, sensing him tense.

Two guards were passing by, conversing in casual tones, their words getting clearer as they approached.

"I tell you, he hasn't touched a single morsel ever since we held him prisoner in that room," one was saying.

"I would rather die than be stubborn and risk missing my meals," remarked the other.

"Well, the Master doesn't care if the man eats or not. But the lady is important."

Ram perked up.

"Everyone seems to feel that," the other supported, "No wonder she's not been sent to the dungeon or chained to a wall."

"That dinning hall's the best standing room in this demolished hell house!"

The men continued their conversation but Ram wasn't paying attention.

The two truths that had excited his hopes echoed in his mind.

A man was held prisoner. A man who could only be someone who was given that verdict because he had come to save them. He would bet on his share of the bread and cheese that that man was none other than the First Lord.

But he was slightly doubtful about the premise of this hypothesis because Lord Arnav was not someone whom anyone could imprison or, least of all, put in chains.

Anyhow, what mattered was that someone had come to rescue them and, by some humour of ill-luck, had been captured and sealed in the very locus of the sought hostages.

And then there was the second disclosure: the whereabouts of Kushiji.

Ram felt like slapping his forehead at the laughable irony of the whole deal. He had spent every meal hour inspecting the rooms on all other floors for signs of Kushiji, while all along she had been right across the corridor from the pantry which was, understandably, where a dining room should be located... at a nippy walking distance from where the food comes.

Ram let out a sigh. His permitted hour was nearly in expiration. It would be treacherously risky if he let his exhilarated inspirations make headway of the hints he had obtained.

Holding Anarkali, he decided to return to his dungeon before the guards came searching for him.

As he turned the corner, he caught Anarkali's eye and he blinked at her. Tomorrow, you will be in Kushiji's arms. This I swear on my life.

Kushi was sleeping, weary at heart, when she sensed fingers caress her hair.

Startled, she awoke and sat up to find herself staring into the face of the man whose prisoner she was. His long hair still obscured one side of his visage but his green eye penetrated in its veneration of her.

Disgusted, she withdrew.

"Why do you shirk away from me?" he asked in a low, longing voice.

Kushi gritted her teeth, "Why should I not? You have tricked me, taken Anarkali and Ram, and have confined us all in this hell, keeping us away from our family."

The man leaned back nonchalantly, "What I do may make no sense to you but it will, in time."

Kushi eyed him disbelievingly, "What do you seek?"

His green eye glinted eagerly, "I seek the one I lost."

"And who is that?" Kushi asked in a note of caution, and then threw it to the wind with her next question, "Is it...I?"

His green eye shone amusedly and the corner of his thin lips curved slightly, "What a clever girl you are. You always had been..."

Kushi stared at him, realizing in all astonishing certainty that this man was referring to his memory of her in her past, a time that had turned obscure in her knowledge, a life before she had lost her real parents to the merciless waters...

The man saw it in her eyes and, leaning forward, he cupped her chin. His voice was suddenly warm and Kushi held her breath as he asked, "Where have you been all these years?"

Kushi could only blink. A moment later, she could hold her curiosity back no longer, "Are you... are you my father?"

The light vanished from his green eye and he stared at her as though she had badmouthed him. But instantly, his expression shifted to a kinder countenance, and he smiled, "I see you are eager to know all about your past but tell me first what brought you to Arhasia, many seas away from home."

Something about the reservation, which the man had hastily attempted to conceal, alerted Kushi's intuition and she veiled her curiosity with tact, "I will tell you about it myself, but first you need to let the children go."

His eyebrow dipped.

The manner in which they manoeuvred their negotiations, one would have assumed a chessboard were placed betwixt them.

"Would that it were so simple," he said, with a resigned look in his features.

"Let me at least visit them," she demanded.

He shook his head in response.

Kushi pursed her lips and exhaled deeply, "Then I have nothing more to speak with you."

The man eyed her for a long minute, a strange mixture of admiration and irritation in his regard of her.

Then, without another word, he left her to the solitude of her misery again.