Princess Fighter: Search for the Throne
XXXVII
Fifteen minutes ago
"How can I get hurt in the neck?"
Shaurya recalls the event but cannot remember much.
He tried to sit down but found himself dizzy just by trying. Plonking back down, he took a deep breath to make the dizzy spell disappear. It was then that he recorded the voice coming from the hall next door.
Turning his neck, he peered outside and HE came into his sight. The corner from her bed gave her a clear view of Mriga working with full concentration as she cleaned the room and rearranged the belongings there.
"This girl really enjoys doing homework? Or is he someone who likes cleanliness?" she thought with a faint smile on her lips.
But after a few seconds he realized that his face was wearing a grim expression the entire time.
"Something pisses him off!" he thought to himself but his head started to hurt again and he closed his eyes to make his head stop spinning.
It was then that he entered his room and snuck up to his bedside. By the time her vision stabilized and turned around to tell her that she was awake, she covered her face with her hands and started.... CRYING??
His mind went crazy. He did not know the reason for the soft but heart-wrenching sobs that filled the room.
"Should I pretend to stay asleep? Otherwise he would be ashamed of my presence and I don't know what to say either" he told himself.
But his heart clearly did not get the order and before he realized it, he had extended his hand to his shoulder.
...****************...
Presently
With great effort, Shaurya lifted himself up and leaned against the bedpost. She waited anxiously while Mriga was in the bathroom.
"Why is he so long? Did she start crying again?" Shaurya is fed up with himself for not being able to get up and move.
"What's wrong with me? Why can't I remember the event that caused my injury?" thought agitated.
And suddenly it was like a switch had been turned on. Everything came back in the tidal wave.
Mriga returned to the room with an awkward expression on her face. He doesn't know how he's going to deal with it. He lifted his eyes and stopped ...
This guy...what is he trying to do?
"Shaurya, what's wrong with you? You can't wake up. You.." he started talking urgently and pressed his shoulders down as he tried to stand up.
He looked at her intensely and said,
"I need to find Prithvi guruji, now. It can't wait."
He accepted her urgency and said, "I'll go look for her and bring her here. But you have to promise me that you won't try to wake up. You'll only hurt yourself further."
He nodded his head and whispered, "Quick".
Mriga enters Prithvi's room through the stairs. At this hour, he did not expect anyone to be present in the Admin building and was shocked to cross paths with Ramanujam in the room.
"Guruji, Shaurya, he has woken up and asked Prithvi guruji, immediately," he gasps.
Ramanujam had bowed over some documents but his eyes became sharp when he heard his words.
"I'm going to Shaurya now. You go and tell Saraswati about contacting Guruji. He was sleeping in the pharmacy" he said rudely.
"And don't run. I don't want you to draw unwarranted attention to yourself this early. Do you understand?" he added, as he ran past.
Mriga turned around and lowered her head in gratitude before exiting the room with a measured step. Ramanujam opened the trapdoor and descended into the nearly pitch-black staircase.
"How are you feeling?" Ramanujam asked quietly as he entered Shaurya's room.
"That's a dancer. The merchant is a dancer." Shaurya said urgently.
"Let's start over, shall we? Your mission is to follow a small businessman in town, right?" start Ramanujam.
Shaurya slightly nodded and replied with a hoarse voice, "Guruji has told me that this person is suspected of being the latest wrench to sell the newly developed medicine in the capital. The drug is much more lethal and addictive than opium and is sold in large quantities as a white powder. When I shadowed the man for a few days, he seemed to follow a set pattern. Home to shop, shop to brothel, brothel to house. It was a pretty open routine. There is no changing this schedule on any day so I think the network is operating in the shadow of one of these three companies. I sent one of our girls as a maid to her house, and the other to propose to her shop. As for the brothel, I started visiting there every night, coinciding with the time he was there," Shaurya paused for a moment to catch his breath.
Sipping a mouthful of water Mriga left by her side, she continued, "After talking to Madam there, I learned that she was starting to take an interest in one of the new dancers who joined a few months ago. I managed to catch the dancer alone two days ago and pay her for her personal performance."
Ramanujam cuts, "This is the same night you came back with the poison?"
Sharuya nodded and continued.
"As usual, the head of the brothel sent me a plate of paan* that he knew I didn't like. That's the only time a dancer touches something I eat. Even though my eyes were fixed on him, I, no, I know how he could slip poison into it because now I am ninety percent sure that it is a paan that contains poison. Before I met him, I was suspicious of him. Nothing concrete until then. But before my body became paralyzed and I was carried out the window by the crony, I saw the look on his face. I know he's the one involved in this." Shaurya said with deep conviction.
"If you are poisoned and paralyzed, how can you walk up to Gurukul?" Ramanujam asked in surprise.
He smiled weakly and replied, "The two men who carried me, threw me into the thick bushes behind the unused alley in the market. They may have hoped to delay the discovery of my body and pass on the cause of my death as a matter of course, not murder. But they made a mistake. They let me lie sideways and unattached. I managed to turn my head and stick my mouth into one of the stems of the plant. My head started to fog but I gave everything to make sure the wooden stick went back down my throat, making me vomit again and again. I knew that I had no time to send a message and wait to be saved. So this is the only option."
Ramanujam smiled at the ingenuity of his student and gestured for him to continue.
"After there was nothing left to spit out, I began to regain a bit of control over my motor skills. But I feel very sleepy. To avoid falling asleep, I started biting my inner cheeks and tongue. After a while, I could feel the movement back into my body and I managed to walk back to Gurukul. I don't remember what happened after I got to campus," she frowned, trying to remember more.
Ramanujam patted him on the shoulder and said, "You did well. Mriga found you on the sports field back then. He brought you back and told us. Both he and Abhirath now know your bed and have taken turns in looking after you."
Talking all this time had been exhausting Sharuya. He closed his eyes as he accepted Ramanujam's words. Among the crazy thoughts in his head, a small part wondered – what Mrignayani did on the sports field late at night?
Footsteps were heard in the hall and before long, sleepy-looking Saraswati was followed by Mriga as they stormed into the room.
Shaurya raised his eyebrows towards Mriga and spoke in a low voice, "Is this what I have taught you? As a spy, the first rule is wisdom. You just made a fuss so I could hear your footsteps all the way from campus."
Ramanujam lets himself smile. His junior was just like him, the same thought.
Mriga was so relieved to look back on Shaurya's usual haughty nature that he smirked at her, forgiving her for her excessive rant.
"It looks like you're on your way to recovery" Saraswati said, taking Shaurya's unblinking gaze from Mriga's face.
"I told Guruji. He should be here soon. Mriga, why don't you go to the dining room and instruct the main chef there to prepare breakfast for the Admin department. He'll know what to do. After that, you and Abhirath can continue with your usual schoolwork" Saraswati told Mriga and told him to leave.
She frowned at him because of his unwelcome words, but before she could retaliate, Prithvi arrived there.
"Huh? Did you start walking to this place as soon as you saw the eagle?" Saraswati bowed and asked in surprise.
With her usual style, she did not bother to answer and instead focused her attention on one of her favorite mentees. Prithvi has big plans for this guy in the long run.
Ramanujam recounted everything Shaurya had said just a moment ago and Prithvi listened to him with full concentration. He stood beside the entrance and placed his fingers in front of him, daydreaming.
None of the others spoke in the room all this time. They knew this was Prithvi's process of assimilating information and reaching a conclusion. He has an uncanny ability to see patterns even in seemingly unrelated information.
"It looks like he knows about you and may have been waiting for you" he said after a silence.
Shaurya looked at her in fear and shook his head violently.
"That's impossible, Guruji. No one but the brothel owner knows my identity. I've worked with him for years. He would never betray me" he said with conviction.
"We tend to believe that our facade is fool proof but that's not always the case. There is always someone who can penetrate the fog we have created around us, Until now, the best thing is that we do not lose you to the enemy" Ramanujam said softly.
"Whether it's the brothel owner or someone else, you should stay away from here for a while. In the meantime, we'll try and figure out how far your cover has been uncovered. You concentrate on recovery for now and try to recall if there are any other details you might have missed during the time leading up to that night" Prithvi said, there was no emotion in his voice.
Shaurya's face became anxious. He knows that the life of a spy is only precious until he remains in the shadows. He would never have thought that such a situation would happen early in his career.
Ramanujam and Prithvi came out of the room, leaving him with his chaotic thoughts.
Saraswati looked at her disappointed face and felt sorry for her. At this moment, he looked like a lost nineteen-year-old. Unlike other kids her age who are thinking of wooing girls and worrying about their jobs, she has just returned from a near-death experience and no one is waiting for her.
Only if the girl's heart isn't engaged anywhere else!
He had seen how he had responded to his presence just a moment ago. In Saraswati's eyes, she was truly the type of girl who could fill this orphan's cold life with her gregarious laughter and warmth. Life is really unfair!
Unaware of his teacher's thoughts, Mriga walked towards the Dean's office after leaving instructions with the dining room kitchen for the Admin department. The face expression of the cook's head was cute when she conveyed Saraswati's orders to him.
"Full food? Any more? How much can two people eat." he murmured loudly before shouting orders to his junior.
It took Mriga a little to understand the reason for his grumbling. The Admin Department may never reveal how many of them were present in the building at one point in time and cause confusion about the number of people eating those foods.
Allowing himself a small smile, he tried to take his mind off the events from his personal life to take over but he failed.
When Saraswati told her she was no longer needed in Shaurya's room, she wanted to protest. The boat was leaving later that night and he did not want to spend the whole day repeating the events of the previous day.
Immersed in his thoughts, he found himself standing outside the dean's room without even realizing it.
He stood still, questioning himself once again about the decision he had made.
She knew that the students had the option to fill out an application to participate in the queen selection competition after returning from vacation.
But he wanted to give his name to it now. It was a signal to himself that he was determined to go down this path.
The consequences of withdrawing from the competition after submitting one's name, were severe and he knew that no matter what, he would never harm the prospects of his future generation.
With that thought, he knocked on the door and entered.
...****************...
Half an hour later
Mriga reached his dorm after sending a message to Abhirath with new instructions. Before he could climb the stairs, a hand came out and grabbed his wrist.
"Good morning beautiful!" she said.
Mriga's lips were pressed in a thin line as she turned to look at Yash and released her hand from her grasp.
"What are you doing here?" he asked without any change in his voice.
"Sleepers, we're talking about spending the last few hours together before we head off to each other's homes, remember?" he said with affection.
He raised his eyes to look at her.
"Unfortunately, I'm very busy right now. So, let's say goodbye here. Happy holidays" he said.
Yash looked at her and asked in fear, "What's wrong with you this morning? Why are you sulking again?"
He did not want to get involved in the conflict at that moment but also did not want to avoid it.
"I'm not sulking. I have to fill out the application for the Queen's competition and it will take a lot of time. Post that I need to help tidy up the hostel and then I have to arrange a list of the kids who will be traveling to north Zilla, because I'm the oldest in the group" she explained.
But Yash heard nothing after his first sentence.
Furrowing his brows, he asked, "What is this about entering the competition? You always say that this is not the way for you. Why you.. ah! Is it because of what I said yesterday? Yeah, no? she?"
He shook his head resignedly and said gently, "Mriga, why are you trying to compete with someone? You don't have to show or prove anything to anyone. I have promised you that I will handle this situation in the end. You don't have to force yourself to do such drastic things."
"Do you think he's the right candidate?" ask Mriga suddenly.
"Huh?" Yash got lost for a while before he understood.
"You mean Vindhya as Queen?" he clarified.
As he nodded, he said, "Yes, right. Did you know that he has been training for it since his childhood. He has worked very hard all this time, taking additional lessons in policy, administration and…"
"I don't agree" cut it again.
On her puzzled expression, she said with determination, "I don't think she is the right person to be Queen. I don't know about the others, but if Chandragarh chooses a Queen like her, it won't happen in line with the values this country stands for."
......................
*Paan – Beetle leaves with topping in them, eaten as digestion
