In a lull where her thoughts pause and senses hum the roughened tips of his fingers trailed across her cheeks in a slow caress. Greed, it has a beauty of its own, the greed to be loved in a way neither of them had ever received makes them cling to it with trembling fingers, tingling lips. There's a favour that burns her, running through her veins like liquid fire. Yet he kisses her slow, with lingering touches that sear itself into her conscious, unhurried fingers that trace their way across her jaw, down her throat. Words of an unfamiliar tongue writes itself across her conscious, they rise and vanish a music wispy and wistful - a scattered fragment of a thought that did not belong to her.
"What?" She mutters as they broke apart, the word melts away, the last - last wispy thought.
"Hmm?" He rests his forehead against hers, trying to smooth his uneven breath. His hands remain cupping her jaw, a touch so tender that she laments to step back from.
"Lumiere? Isn't that what you just said? What does it mean?"
"I didn't say it," Sanskar replies, "but yes it occurred to me. It was a thought that you read on my mind."
"You think in a different tongue," Swara mutters to herself, as his hands slip away. For a moment it had felt surreal, for a moment she had forgotten that neither of them belonged with the other. When that moment would come, they would find each other on the opposite ends of Asanikshetra battle field. It breaks her heart, the possibility of the bloodshed, the inevitable.
Sanskar sees the moment the shadows darken her golden eyes, sees the moment she allows the darkness of uncertainty looming over them overtake her heart.
"Swara," he takes her hand in his, bringing her knuckles to his lips. "Light - it means light. It means you are the brightest thing I've ever seen."
There are flakes of hazel swimming in the dusky green of his eyes, ripples of brilliant colour that makes her feel warm. He reaches for her again, placing the hand he took against his own face. "You make me feel things that have no words for in the language we share. I'd like you to hear them all - I'd like you to know."
His breath fans her face, fluttering her lashes. He searches her eyes for a moment - the green against the gold. Her hands move on their own accord, knotting themselves into his hair bringing him closer and allowing the thoughts - the wispy words to sing.
"Breathe me in," he mutters against her lips before capturing them again.
**
"I saw something in Keshav's memories," Swara tells him much later, when they are walking back to the designated point they had previously agreed to meet with Megha. The sun is sinking down into a array of splattered colors and the dusk bled at the corners of the sky. She had no more thoughts of bothering with rose - scented candles or Suvanna's listless eyes. Instead greedily she clings to the warmth pulsing inside her heart, her fingers laced with his as they walk the deserted grounds. "I think he meant me to see it. Parjanya -"
Sanskar halts abruptly, his hold on her hand tightening.
"Megha's mother?"
"She was one of the ladies in waiting - one of the noble ladies who could have been a possible match for the king."
"How does Keshav know her?"
"He was her guard - it was her family that had condemned him into the emulations, because he had failed to protect her. He - he thinks she died." She swallows when she notices the look on his face, his brows drawn together and his lips pursed. For a moment he no longer looks like the torn and vulnerable young man who had kissed her in the lotus garden, but instead the future king of the Vajras. The transformation with it brings a certain allure, but also a cold intimidation. He feels distant and she does not savour the feeling. "What - are you thinking?" She presses instead.
He shakes his head slowly, as if dispelling a certain string of thought and caresses her face with the back of his hand. "Don't say it's nothing - what - you think he lied?"
"The world isn't made of black and white," he drops his hand and smiles at her. "I don't think he lied but I don't think it's that simple either. You see - Swara - a smart man would deceive you into believing a lie - a genius would tell you the truth but still make it so that what comes out of your lips is the lie that he wants."
"But -"
"We both know Megha's mother died only recently. Therefore Keshav is wrong to believe he is responsible for her death all those years ago. But see what a good job they did - they made him believe it until his dying moment, made me atone half his life for a mistake he never committed."
"But why?"
He grins at her suddenly.
"An absolutely crazy thought just occurred to me -" he says shaking his head. "You said she was a lady in waiting? One of the prospective brides of the king?"
"Yes."
"Swara, is it possible for you to arrange a meeting with your lady aunt?"
"Huh?"
"Your lady aunt - the queen? Pratula's wife?" He drops his voice dramatically when he utters the incriminating name of the Anjani king. His eyes are no longer green, but for a passing glance she catches the flakes of dusky emerald dancing around his pupils - mischief - she thinks - it lights him from within.
"You mean Suvanna's mother. I think she is not entertaining guests - her condition is rather poor recently. Everybody knows the queen is dying."
"All the more reason for you to see her," he presses insistently. "Swara - there is something you must ask her."
"You think she would tell me?"
His touch is distracting, the lazy strokes of his thumb as he draws patterns on the back of her palm. Instead she focuses on him, on those eyes that she cannot read.
"You have ways of knowing things that aren't spoken of."
"Yuvraj sa," she drawls out, pretending to be surprised. "What you are suggesting is treason."
"Oh?" He raises an eyebrow. "One cannot commit treason against a nation that is not their own - lady Kalyaani - your political knowledge is lacking." He chuckles but soon the mirth vanishes from his face and his voice grows serious. "The intended brides who are not chosen by the prince becomes ladies in waiting for the new consort - it is the way of court. If Parjanya was an intended of the prince it is natural that she was a lady in waiting for the queen. The queen must know more than Keshav does."
The silence drowns them as she considers his words. She looks around hurriedly. There are no traces of Megha still. Swara frowns sightly. It is very unlike him.
"Where is he?" Sanskar asks, following her line of sight.
"I - don't -" her words trail off as she notices the fleck of black in the horizon. Turning, she notices that Sanskar had already noticed it and the sharp line his jaw had clenched into. He holds out a hand for the hawk that swoops down and its talons grace against is skin as it finds its perch. The dark bird turns its ruby eyes on her and makes a threatening sound - making her jump away.
"Hush," Sanskar admonishes the bird, running a finger along its spine - murmuring words she doesn't understand. He turns to her then. "Go," he says softly. "Don't wait for him - it's rather late already and soon the patrols will start." When she doesn't move he sighs. "Go on - I'll come to find you later."
**
Lakshya watched her leave, his insides burning with a fire fueled by pain. The bitterness he had tried to swallow rises in a adamant swirl - creeping around his soul, tangling his thoughts.
"Bhai!" The word escapes before he had found his ground, sharp and furious that it makes Sanskar turn abruptly. The hawk makes an strangled sound before rising from its perch on his arm, it circles his head once and takes flight towards sky throwing a scathing look towards the new intruder.
The bitterness coils, twists and tightens.
"You are using her," he accuses, as he approaches. "How could you - bhai?"
Sanskar's silence only riles him up further, Lakshya clenches his fists. He could feel the Aithne pulse from where it hangs at the side of his hip, eager - thirsty. He tries to clear his mind of the haze of blood - lust the devil of a blade conjures.
"It makes sense now. Why you were interested in her. I wondered earlier."
"You did?" Sanskar responds at last, his tone clipped and his jaw clenched. It seems like a reply of an earlier conversation at the cruse.
"You knew her link to the Anjani royals," Lakshya concludes. "That poor girl is still a stranger to her own family and you will use her as a political pawn - Bhai?"
"That poor girl," Sanskar repeats, "could make her own protests - dear brother. She is in no need of a champion to her cause and if you have time, I'd rather advise you to watch over your own interests."
"She is my - friend!" He changes course mid sentence. "Her interests are mine."
Sanskar doesn't reply for a moment, instead his eyes take in the furious face of Lakshya - his reddened eyes, his uneven breath. There is a hint of green to his eyes, not the pools of lake green that they were before with Swara, but the sharp cool hazel.
"Draw your sword," he says with a tilt of his head. Lakshya pauses for a moment, bewildered with the strange turn to their conversation. "Draw it!"
The hilt of Aithne pulses under his palm and Lakshya swallows at the ripple of fury washing over him. He draws out the blade and almost drops it in shock. The Aithne glints red, as if it had been stoved in fire and heated until red -hot.
"I'd reflect on that if I were you." Sanskar tells him smoothly. "Of all the fury inside you - what part is your own and what is induced by other things. At least lady Kalyaani is her own person - you - my dear brother - need help more than she does."
He turns, giving Lakshya the very older - brother - ish vibe that makes him realize that he was done with kids for the day, Sanskar leaves. He takes the corner at the edge of Lakshya's vision where the sandstone wall of a building cuts him from view and walks straight into a waiting sword - pointed at his heart.
The man whose hand grips the hilt offers him a flash of yellow teeth. Sanskar knows that face from the recent emulations. This man had dealt Keshav that deadly blow - this man who was supposed to fight him instead. His brows frown at the explicit threat of the cold blade at his heart and more men - of varying sizes and weapons materialize circling them. Intent flashes in their eyes.
"Time to go - Kuwar sa," the first attacker with his flashing yellow teeth says as he performs a mock bow.