Better Half

Summary : Agar duao mein sub miljaata toh har kissi ko rab miljaata... Maafi bhi yahaan kismat walon ko milti hai."

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The rain thins into a misty sprinkle in the evening wind. Cuddled in bruised clouds that promise more rainfall, a ripe red sun is sinking lower into the shapeless mass of greenery below.

From where they stood, at the cliff edge, one would get the illusion that one could hear the entire world in the wind. It sings in their ears, a powerful rumble which could either be a laughter or a lament.

In a distance the temple bells ring sharp - engaged in a futile battle with the wind.

Veer stares into the abyss below, clearly lost in a time gone. The distance between them is Chaar kadam, but his thoughts are too far from her reach.

When the tragedy of this place occurred Amrit might have been a happy baby in Lahore, blissfully ignorant of a circle of fate that would bring her here now, standing with the man who was the living monument of something devastating.

"Prem fell from here," he starts in a dead voice a hand stretched - fingers clasping over nothing.

"And I was the one who pushed him."

He chokes on the words on the memories. He wishes she would understand how difficult it was to put it into words. What he had witnessed, what he had done and the latter realization of guilt.

"Bohut hi chota tha woh, na samajh tha, kamzor tha."

"Chote toh aap bhi the," Amrit says softly.

Veer turns to her with bloodshot eyes that find and hold hers, begging silently.

The kid she talks about is still inside him, Amrit realizes with a wrenching heart. Still at the cliff edge, still trying to save a brother who had slipped from his fingers.

"Bachche the aap. You don't leave kids to watch after other kids Kuwar sahab, not in places like this."

The tortured inhale that Veer fills himself with is loud.

"All my life I have been shouting the same. Until my throat turned bloody. Ke koi waha kiyun nahi tha? Koi waha kyun nahi aaya!"

His voice rises and the wind carries it away. Veer collapses on his knees, hands fisting the sand.

"Par nahi," he says after a moment. "All my life they kept telling me that I can't use that as an excuse to my own sin. I killed my brother. Nothing pardons that."

"Sachche dil se maangni wali har cheez miljaati hai Kuwar sahab," Amrit tells him. Softly, cautiously she approaches and kneels beside him.

He has his head bowed, top of his hair glistening copper in the setting sun.

His frame shakes with supressed emotions. Again he reminds her of a wounded animal. Her hands tremble, yet she gathers him close.

The weight of all he bears, Amrit feels it upon her heart along with his head. Her fingers comb through his hair.

"Maafi bhi." She continues. "And no one should forgive you, it doesn't matter. You should forgive yourself."

Veer's breath, ragged and warm strirs against her collarbone. Amrit clutches at him tighter reflexively.

"Agar duao mein sub miljaata toh har kissi ko rab miljaata, Amrit. Maafi bhi yahaan kismat walon ko milti hai."

He pulls away, looks at her with tortured eyes.

"Dai ma," he says. "She is not my dai ma. She is Prem's. She loved him like a son, carried him all over the place even well after he had learned to walk and run. If she could - if she could - she'd have branded murderer on my forehead."

Amrit holds his face, makes him look at her.

"All those scars ..." she begins. "Was that her? Veer kya unhone aap ke saath -"

"Jaanvar hai na hum, she treated accordingly. Unhe Lagtha tha ke hum par koi bhoot preth ka saya hai."

Amrit draws in a hiss of an inhale.

"Aur Rani ma?"

"Humara chehera tak dekhna nahi chahathi thi. Theen saal- theen saal iss narak mein uss aurat ke saath rahe hum. It was Papa Sahab who got me out before I was completely ruined, damaged beyond everything. Das saal ke the hum, thab ke zakam abhi bhi taza hai." He swallows thickly.

"I'm afraid of that woman Amrit. My flesh crawls when I see her. Only, I'm not so weak or helpless anymore. I'm more afraid of myself. There is a beast inside me that thirsts her blood. The moment she provokes me - the moment my control snaps, I'm afraid I might do something horrible to her."

There is that pleading in his eyes once more.

"Humein jaanvar nahi banna biwi sahab."

This Amrit understands. This Amrit feels in the deepest core of her heart.

Veer was holding into the sanity of his life with skin of his teeth. He did not want to tumble into the abyss that waited below, he did not want it. But the circumstances, the people were not helping.

She thinks back to the maze and monster that she thought if when she first walked into this deal with him.

Here she was, right at the centre of that maze. Right in front of that monster. But the monster was not a monster as she was brought to believe.

The silk of his soul has been stolen, wings torn, he is left only with his teeth and claws. He reaches for her with hands caked in rain washed earth and eyes that beg.

He doesn't say the words, but she hears all the same - loud and clear.

"Aisa nahi honga," she tells him.

Without a thought she places her hands in his, Veer clings to those hands and rises them to touch his forehead to her knuckles.

"Main aisa hone nahi dungi." She promises him, then with a bitter fire of her own adds. "Not because that woman deserves any better - but because you don't deserve any more guilt."

Veer holds her hands for a moment, breathing deeply, gathering himself. Then he rises, pulling her along with him.

"Chaliyen."

"Kahaan?"

"To the temple. Tumhara kuch hain waha." He says mysteriously before lashing her towards the ancestral temple of Shrighar.

The bells are still ringing. Amrit let's the majestic presence of that holy place wash over her. There are buildings that surely aged back several generations, then there are caves carved in the same rock face that ended in the cliff. Even the air here was thick with reverent silence.

"Kuwar sahab," the priest greets them. "Kuwar Rani sahab."
He blesses them both but his eyes return to Veer.

"Janam din ki shubkamnaye humare aur se bhi sweekaar kijiyenga Kuwar sahab. It is once in a while now that you come here during your birthdays unlike when your daadi sahab was alive."

"Unhi ki kaam se aaye the," Veer says smoothly, not meeting Amrit's surprised expression.

Amrit did not know it was his birthday. He had not intended her to find out. But this old priest has been in the temple since the says of his lady grandmother and still had a very sharp memory.

Amrit watched him with renewed emotion. So today was that day of the year where he awaited his mother to come and wish him...how cruel was Rani Ma to choose that very day to publish her God forsaken article? Or did she even remember?

Veer takes her wrist gently tugging her inside those cave temples instead of the main one.

"Daadi sahab aksar humein layi karthithi yahaan. If after that incident  there was anyone who loved me even the slightest it was her...unki ghusarne ke baad Humne bhi yahaan aana chhod diya."

Even their bare feet make echoing sounds in the cave. The cold stone beneath her feet is so comforting that Amrit wishes to walk along that path forever.

"It is a temple made to some long gone lovers. A local legend from times of Akbar I think. Daadi sahab used to tell the story. I don't remember much. Just that it involved some battle and a bride who kept waiting for a soldier who would never return.

" They say her faith has such power that it grants one's heartfelt wishes.

Daadi sahab bohut maanthithi unhe. Kehethithi ke yahi shradda kissi aur janam mein unhe wapas dada sahab se milwayengi."

Veer pauses at the lone lamp flickering at the feet of a obscured idol.

The local goddess was a small stone carved one. But the faith that seemed to hang around her shrine was palpable. Amrit swallows when Veer turns and holds his gaze.

"Kya kissi ke intezaar mein itni shakti ho sakthi hai? Hum nahi maante." He shrugs, but still bows his head before that unnamed goddess, purely out of a habit his grandmother had drilled into him.

"Intezaar mein nahi," Amrit says slowly, joining him, fixing the wick of the lamp before paying her own respects. "Pyaar mein. Pyaar mein bohut shakti hoti hai. Pyaar karne wale na rahe, unke naam na rahe par woh pyaar rehe jaati hai."

"Daadi sahab hoti toh tumhe bohut pasand karti," Veer says thoughtfully. "Unki bhol bolti ho tum."

From where it is kept at the feet of the idol Veer picks up an elaborate box of carved gold.

"Daadi sahab chahathi thi ke unki baad, humare patni yeh pehene. Lo rakhlo," he makes her hold it and steps back. "Pasand aaye toh pehenlo."

Amrit opens it slowly to find an ornate mangalsutra inside. Each of its black pearls still gleam in the weak lamp light, the gold center piece carved into the most delicate lotus. Her hands tremble. Amrit slowly places the box back on the stone shrine.

"It's fine," Veer says, he has already withdrawn a step further into the shadows that she could no longer read his face.

"You can keep it even if you don't wear it."

"Kuwar sahab -" she begins.

"It's fine." He says again cutting her off. "I just remembered I had to give you this. There is no compulsion to wear it at all. I know you don't want to -"

"Veer!" Amrit surprises herself by raising her voice.

It drowns his incessant chatter, Veer stares at her. Now that he watches her with so much focus, Amrit could find no more words.

Instead she gathers her hair over one shoulder baring her neck and plucks the beaded chain from the box. Wordlessly she holds it out to him.

Veer reaches out from the shadows he had retreated to and takes it from her hand.

Tips of his fingers brush against hers. He swallows and brings the chain around her throat, the dark beads against that pale skin - he swallows again, rather thickly, feeling his heart picking up.

The clasp falls into place with a tick of finality and both of them exhales at once.

Mist of their exhales rise together in the rain chilled air and tangle, never again to part his breath from hers.

In some distance a few notes of a mantra resonates calling forth gods as their witnesses.

Mangalam bhagwan Vishnu...
...
...
Mangalaya thanno hari...

**
I have changed the year of Prem's fall from 1929 to 1931, the year Amrit was born. Making Veer 7 years at the time and Prem 5 years.

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