Chapter 6: Raspberry Revelations
Daksh couldn’t spot her anymore. What caught him in the middle of this was that he smelled a Naagin. He stopped. Dehek tried to flirt with him but that Naagin scent caught him out of the mood for any kind of flirting. He met up with Balwant.
“Bade papa, I can smell a Naagin. Some Naagin has entered the party.” Daksh told him.
“Must be that Adi-Naagin.” Balwant tried to brush off.
“Nahi, Bade papa. The Adi-Naagin doesn’t give off any scent. This one is different.” Daksh explained. Balwant got up alerted at that. Daksh couldn’t have mistaken this much. Daksh couldn’t understand what the hell was happening because the scent came and went. It was like a flickering tube light. “It is coming and going. Something is wrong, Bade papa.”
“Yeh kaise ho sakta hai, Daksh?” Balwant asked irritated.
“Why would I ask you if I understood? Wouldn’t I rather go catch on my own?” Daksh retorted. Balwant wanted to say something but decided against it. Daksh looked quite irritated and Balwant knew it had to be a reason for that. Balwant and Daksh took off in opposite directions to look for that Naagin scent.
"Sam, I can smell a Naagin. I want you to go around and look if you can spot a Naagin." Daksh told Samrat.
"I presume its not Bhabhi..." He pointed out.
"No, the weird thing is that the scent is flickering." Daksh explained. Colours on Samrat's face changed. There was only one Naagin who was capable of that. Samrat started going around the party. He spotted Ponky laughing with some woman and trying to warm up to her. He decided to go up to Ponky and warn him. More eyes means more possiblility of finding that Naagin.
Looking around, Daksh saw Jay snooping around in a suspicious manner. Daksh felt trouble. One, there was a new naagin around. Two, that familiar scent which he wasn’t being able to remember and now there was this dubious naag. Not that he was being able to find the naagin or that woman, so he decided to choose for the one he had an eye on. He followed Jay. He hid behind a tree to see what the hell was going on. That’s when he noticed someone attacking Bani. Bani was in her Naagin form. His body shook when he saw creature. His hands shook and he froze at spot. Bani was fighting it as it took Bani up in the air. It was a woman. Was it the Naagin scent he got? That scent of the creature registered in his mind. That didn’t match with that of the Naagin they were previously hunting. Jay was watching over as Bani was being attacked. He seemed to be cheering the creature.
‘Should I run or help Bani?’ Daksh wondered. Daksh knew that Veer loved her regardless of who she was. Daksh didn’t know what to do of it? Should he let his brother’s love be killed right there or should he let his own brother’s killer die? Daksh loved Monil but he never loved Veer any less. To avenge Monil’s killer, could he destroy Veer’s feelings? Also, Veer had made it clear that no one was to hurt Bani.
He stepped on a twig. Jay turned around and saw Daksh. Jay wasn’t going to risk Daksh opening his mouth to Bani. He turned into naag and proceeded towards Daksh. Daksh turned into a cheel but in the next second, he was forcefully shifted into a human. Daksh’s eyes met that creature’s in that one moment. He realized that the creature had done something. He was no longer being able to turn into a cheel. Panic over took Daksh. He dodged Jay’s attack as much as he could. But in a moment, Jay cornered him.
“Ab kaise bachega? Tu aur tere bhai bohot uchalte hai na. Cheel cheel kehke khud ko superhero samajhte ho. Ab batao.” Jay laughed like a maniac. Jay was about to attack Daksh but someone pulled him behind. He was pushed behind her so easily like his weight was nothing to her. Naagin scent. It was the same one he smelled in the party.
“Who the hell are you?” Daksh asked.
“Would you rather want me to save your life or would you want to interrogate me?” She asked, her attitude on point. Her eyes had changed into that of a Naagin.
“Main Adi-Naag hoon. Hat jaao raaste se. Yeh mera aadesh hai jo tum nahi kaat sakte.” Jay tried to assert his authority.
“Adi-Naag? Naag toh theek se ban nahi paaye aur Adi-Naag ki baat kar rahe ho.” The naagin taunted.
“Waah, ek naagin ek cheel ko defend kar rahi against her master?” Jay retorted.
“Master? Aur who bhi tum? Rehne do. Ek naagin sirf Bholenath, Adi-Naagin aur Naagrani ke saamne jhukti hai. Tum toh kuch bhi nahi ho.” She pointed out. Jay got really angry. “Kisi dagabaaz naag ke orders follow karne ki zaroorat mujhe nahi hai. Aur waise bhi abhi ke liye toh yeh cheel bhi nahi hai. Tumne use yeh shakti hi cheen li hai.”
She turned into her Naagin form. Her dark green scales flashed danger. She was swift. Her strike was fast like that of a viper and her aggression like that of a cobra. Lightning fast to dodge. Jay did his best to dodge her fast strikes. She stood as a naagin in her human form. Green and black clothing with silver jewellery.
“You’ll pay for this dearly.” Jay threatened.
“You should think about the result, Adi-Naag. You’ve betrayed your own clan. Aur dhokebaaz ko kahin jagah nahi milti.” She retorted. Jay was dumbfounded. How could another Naagin be more powerful than him? He was Adi-Naag. He was supposed to be powerful than all other naags. Only one above him was Adi-Naagin and Naagrani. Jay tried to attack Daksh but she instantly shielded Daksh and got bit herself.
Daksh couldn’t believe it. A naagin, after all a naagin had saved him from Jay. He knew what that was going to mean. She had gone against the order of Adi-Naag. It could technically mean she might be cast out from her clan.
She changed back into a human form. Back into that velvet green black dress. She picked up herself and started to leave.
“Listen, let me help y-” Daksh tried to offer but she signalled him to stop. She started leaving with that. Daksh had no idea how far can she manage to reach.
She somehow managed to reach the Shiv Temple. The panditayin spotted her. She fell right before the stairs. The sapera and panditayin quickly took her inside.
“Kon hai yeh?” Panditayin asked. She was changed into a naagin in human form.
“Ise ek naag ne dasa hai.” He pointed out.
“Us dagabaaz naag ke alwa aur kon aisa kar sakta hai?” She claimed.
“Iska zeher kaise kaatenge? Sirf Adi-Naagin ka zeher hi is zeher ko kaat sakta hai.” The panditayin proceeded to call Bani quickly but sapera knew the time was short. She might not survive till Adi-Naagin shows up at the temple.
“Yeh kya kar diya Adi-Naag.” He turned to the shivling. “Yeh kaisa Insaaf hai? Who Adi-Naag kisi ko bhi das jaaye aura aap bas dekh rahe hai?”
“Aap hai kon?” He heard Panditayin ask. He turned around and saw a little boy down checking up on the naagin. He was the most beautiful boy they had ever seen. He was around 17-18 years of age
“Vanshika…” He called her out. “Hamesha ki tarah. Pagal. Aggressive and thoughtless. Kabhi toh seekh lo.” He chided her like a brother chiding his sister.
“Aap jaante hai ise?” Sapera asked. They couldn’t understand how just any man could have showed up in the temple. He took out some herbs and mixed it with some potion. Mixing them together, he gave it to her. She instantly started coughing up. In that moment, Bani came in running. She saw her lying on the floor.
“Kya hua hai ise?” Bani asked the moment she got to her side.
“Zeher diya hai ise…” Sapera answered.
“Zeher toh bahar aa hi raha hai. Kisne help ki?” Bani asked. Panditayin and Sapera looked around but the boy was gone.
“Abhi toh who bacha yahi tha. Kahan chala gaya?” They asked.
“Konsa bacha?” Bani asked.
“Kuch 17-18 saal ka ladka tha yaha. Usi ne kuch jadibuti di ise aur yeh bach gayi…” Sapera asked. The Panditayin started looking around the temple but there was no sign of it. The other naagin started to wake up.
“Are you alright?” Bani asked. Bani felt she was weak. She broke into another fit of cough. “Just last bit of poison is coming out. It is going to be fine.” Bani caressed her back.
After a few moments, she seemed to regain her regularity.
“Adi-Naagin…” She greeted Bani. She was about to bow down to her but Bani stopped.
“It is okay. I understand. You’re giving me respect. I’ve accepted it. Right now, you need to sit down. What happened? Who are you?” Bani asked.
“Vanshika.” She started. “I am your cousin. Well… by blood. My mother and your father were siblings.”
Bani stood surprised. Her cousin? She couldn’t believe it. She assumed she had no living relatives. Here there was a Naagin standing and claiming she was her cousin.
“After mama and mami left Naaglok, maa tried to look for you all. Everyone who knew where you three were staying were getting killed. So, they kept changing their location. We didn’t know anything even though we tried to keep tracks. Your family would be long gone from there by the time we reached a location. After we found your father dead, we couldn’t trace you and your mother any longer. We all assumed that you two were dead. There were no traces of you and your mother at all. Seemed like a dead end to us. It up until a few months ago when, dadi said that she could sense you. Here, I am.” Vanshika explained. Bani was still trying to process all that information.
“I have a family?” Bani asked.
“Of course. That’s an odd question. If you’re born then you must have a family, right?” She answered with a tone which questioned Bani’s mental stability. “Is she broken?” She whispered to the sapera. His glare made her shift a bit away from him. “Wow… touchy much..”
“I…” Bani didn’t know what to say.
“What?” She asked. “Well, it would be a rather difficult situation if you now hate us thinking we didn’t look for you or something like that because rest assured we tried but we just couldn’t reach you.”
“No… no… I wasn’t going to say that. I just mean to say that it’s a bit of a shock. For the longest time, I thought no one from my original family was there and now you’re here saying you’re my cousin. A bit unbelievable.” Bani chuckled awkwardly. Vanshika sighed a relief.
“Thank God!! That can be dealt with. Anyway, are you alright?” Vanshika asked. “I saw that creature. What the hell is that?” She looked disgusted with that creature.
“Yes. I’m fine but I don’t know how far it would be well.” Bani confessed.
“Ask me about it. I almost had shrieked out loudly when I saw that creature. What the hell was that? I didn’t know icchadhari dragons existed too.” Vanshika commented. “That seemed more like an odd version of a chinese dragon. Like an uglier version of Chinese dragon. Aise hawa mein udta saanp kaafi ajeeb lag raha tha.”
Bani looked at her ‘new found’ cousin. Bani noted that her cousin was rather chatty. She had an expressive way of speaking.
“You can come with me to my house. I mean you can stay there.” Bani offered. Vanshika laughed.
“You’ll take me there?” Vanshika asked.
“Yes. Why not?” Bani was confused.
“Adi Naagin, your foster family has set their feet in that house and then your naag is also staying there. You bring one more person and Balwant Singhania might possibly lose his mind.” Vanshika laughed. "Though that would be hilarious to see. I'd pay a hundred thousand rupess to see that. With popcorn of course."
“I am sure I’ll find a way. Don’t worry about that.” Bani tried to assure her.
“Adi-Naagin, relax about that. Let me take care of that. I’ve done enough research about this Singhania Family. I know how to find my way into the house. Aap yeh sabh mat socho.” Vanshika said.
“You can call me Bani. After all, you’re my sister now.” Bani said with a faint smile.
“Oh. By the way… that naag of yours...” She was about tell Bani but seeing Bani’s reaction at that, she realized that Bani must have found out. “I guess you know.”
“Yes…” Bani answered.
Bani took a moment to look at her cousin. She gave out a strong aura of being powerful. Deep brown eyes with hint of green in them. In her naagin form, she wore green and silver outfit with silver and gold jewellry. Her hair was pretty shade of brown instead of the regular black. She bowed down before the Shivling. A beautiful smile on her face.
"Thank you meri help karne ke liye. Haan, I know I've been impulsive again. Aapko toh pata hai main kaisi hoon. Gussa mat hona mujhse. Waise bhi bohot saare logo ko pagal kar chuki hoon, I hope ki aapko bhi gussa na aa jaaye. As such I know you can't get angry at me because pata hai mujhe ki aap apni is bhakt se gussa nahi ho sakte. Koshish toh jaari hai meri. Ab jo bhi ho, Mahakaal ki iccha se ho." She prayed to him. Bani chuckled at her chatty-ness. She had never seen a Naagin of her kind.
The two exited the temple and they turned back into the attire they were in. Bani noted that she had a rather modern fashion. She was wearing a green dress with a silver mask that almost shined her eyes.
“I don’t know anything about my family, so I’m sort of curious…” Bani admitted. Vanshika smiled.
“Natural. Come, I’ll tell you about them while we’re going out of the forest.” Vanshika offered. Bani smiled. “Well, in our family, the head is Nani. She’s the angry bird kind. Trust me, I sort of blame her for my fuse blowing out and me reacting bad on her. I’ve inherited it from her. There’s Nana. He’s really sweet. He’s ideology is far away different from everyone else’s. He’s more of a peaceful kind of person. Rather enjoying a peaceful rest than all the violence. Your dad, Sarvesh mama was the eldest son. You’re his only child. Everyone says that he was a lot like nana. I don’t know him personally but all I know is what I’ve learnt from him. There’s Amar mama, the second son. His wife Aditi mami. Their two sons, Kartik and Rishi. Then there’s my mom Aishwarya, me, her only child. Finally, Lekha maasi, the youngest child and daughter. She lives with her husband Aditya here in Mumbai. Well, most of our family lives in Naaglok except Lekha maasi and Adi with their children. We spent quite some time here in Mumbai growing up with her. We as in, Kartik, Rishi and I.”
“What about my mother?” Bani asked.
“Diya mami. She died trying to keep you safe. Though I think somewhere nani never forgave her. She thinks that you were killed because mami didn’t listen to her. She told mami to stay in Naaglok since it was a safe place but she was adamant to bring you here to this temple and rest is history.”
“Where are all others now?”
“Well, Kartik and Rishi are still too young. They’re around 18 years. Annoying at another level. But as of now they’re in naaglok with the family. Things are kind of tough there for our family so they have orders from Naagrani to stay in Naaglok. They cannot leave without permission from her.”
“So, how did you set out to find me?”
“Well, that’s a story I’ll tell you some time. Well, I was supposed to stay in naaglok but as of now, I’m sort of kicked out from there. I don’t know if it is coincidence but maa kind of felt that you were still alive and told me to set out looking for you. Hence, I’m here.”
“What about your dad? And why were you kicked out from Naaglok?”
“That’s a long story. As of now, you don’t worry about me. Take a deep breath and relax. I’ll take care of the whole matter on how to get to Singhania Mansion. It is a typical naagin style.”
“You definitely cannot marry anyone from Singhania family.”
“Are you mad? I’m not going to marry anyone or anything. Especially not those cheel idiots. But no one said anything about being able to fool one of them. Pankaj Singhania. He’s the easiest bait. I’ve known the family for a long time. I’ve been in the same school as them. He’s the easiest to fool. Leave the rest to me. I know exactly how to bait him.”
“It is not really a child’s play, Vanshika. I don’t want you in trouble.”
“Bani… I’m going to be fine. Don’t worry. After all, someone needs to teach them a good lesson.”
“Vanshika, don’t take me wrong. That will be a risk. They’re all cheels. Not to mention now that markaat is there too. She’s no less dangerous. I’m Adi-Naagin and that is why I can survive there. The cheels are dangerous. They can hurt you.”
“You’re living because of Veeranshu Singhania. Don’t mind me but it is true. You’d be long out of the house if it wasn’t for Veeranshu. I know him. He’s not like his family. He’s different from them. Better than them, if I can dare say that. I used to be friends with him in school.”
“He’s older than you. Then how were you…?”
“He was my senior. Who says you can’t have seniors as friends? The only one out of Singhanias I could tolerate. I saw no reason to stay in contact with the lot after I left school so I didn’t know about them much afterwards. I presumed the maa must have found out you were alive because she got that energy signal from you. Every Naag-Naagin have certain signature energy. There’s only minute difference in each one of them but since you’re Adi-Naagin, yours is easily detectable out of everyone’s. That’s how all Naag-Naagins can tell that you’re Adi-Naagin. Maa felt that. She told me that and I assumed that it must be because you had transformed. I had come across Naina. She was requesting for someone to send help to her. Since, nani was once Naagrani, nani sent me a message to go contact Naina. I met Naina at Noor’s party. Noor was one of my classmates. We weren’t close or anything but simple acquaintances. So, I got an invite. I felt Naina’s presence there. Later Naina called and told me about Singhania boys she had seen killing Noor. Also the cops in the police station told me that some Bani Sharma had come to the police station with proof that Singhania Family was responsible for Noor's death. They told me that there were two eye witnesses. Naina contacted me later. She had seen that Ponky and Monil killed Noor with Arneesh and Nitin. I tried to help Naina but it was late. When I reached there, her husband was dead. I saw cheel feathers in the room and realized that they must have taken Naina. I followed her only to find Arneesh and Nitin dead with a naagin’s venom. I assumed it would be Naina. Naina called me to say that she had seen Adi-Naagin. I wanted to ask more but the call got cut. That's when I found myself digging up information about Singhania Family. I went to ask for Naina but she was announced dead. I realized that she had known you and came across you. I went to Silver Moon restaurant which was last time Naina was seen. There they told me, she had arrived there to meet you. She couldn’t have any other reason to meet you unless you were Adi-Naagin. It took a while to find out your address. You lived with a foster family. I met your foster father and he told me you were married to Veer. Trust me, that was one hell of a shock.”
“Well, the whole situation of that wasn’t very normal either. I had just found out about being a Naagin then. The next day, I remembered me being Adi-Naagin. Long story short, I thought that Veer had killed Jay who I was engaged to. I thought I killed Veer but it was Teer, his twin brother. Then Veer and I got married.”
“I couldn’t digest it for a few moments and almost thought I came up to wrong Bani Sharma. I mean, Adi-Naagin marrying a cheel. Not just any cheel but the high up proclaimed leader of cheels. He’s sort of their prince.” Vanshika broke into laughter at that. “And every says that I’m crazy.”
Bani didn't know what to say anymore. Would Vanshika be disgusted with her if she told her that she had a soft perspective about Veeranshu Singhania?
"Nani is going to have a field day when she finds out you married a Cheel." She teased laughingly. That didn't make Bani feel good but rather tumbled the worry on her conscience. It reminded her of Jay's reaction. Now, she had to come in terms with the truth that she had a Naag family who might take severe offense at her soft corner for a cheel.
comment:
p_commentcount