"I can't believe you!"

"You are overreacting."

"I AM OVERREACTING?"

"Uhh.. yes."

"YOU SAID YES!"

Karna sighed for what felt like the hundredth time as his arrow hit the mark of the bullseye perfectly and he lowered his bow to glance at his companion who was glaring daggers at him. 

"It is a casual invitation on a hunting trip. And remembering your hour long, highly melodramatic soliloquy of how you would rather die than hurt an animal for sport when I asked you the last time, I decided to go with the others."

Arjun threw his arms in the air pantomiming like a highly offended swan as the King of Anga nocked another arrow in his bow. He had been practising quietly in the arena when the Pandava had stormed inside unceremoniously and started yelling at him, completely unprovoked at that. 

"Duryodhan has organized this party! Do you even know what that means?", the swarthy prince shouted again, his curly hair bouncing with the sharp movement. 

"What...", Karna asked rolling his eyes. 

"Whatever my eldest cousin does, always has an ulterior motive behind it. It is not a simple hunting expedition."

"What is it then?"

"It is a carefully arranged ploy to garner support of the allies, for gaining ascension to the throne."

"Arjun, Yudhishtir has already been crowned heir apparent. Duryodhan can't..."

Arjun shook his head exasperated and started pacing like a panther in a cage. 

"That will not stop him from trying to get the crown. He thinks he deserves to be Emperor. And he will not stop from falling to any level for gaining what he wishes. He might even go as far as to kill my brother."

Karna whipped towards him, shock writ large in his amber gaze, the arrow nocked against his bow, forgotten in Arjun's sombre confession. 

"Now that is a very serious accusation, prince. Duryodhan had not been anything but utmost polite with everyone as far as I have observed. I think, you are misjudging him a little."

Arjun looked at him blankly. 

There was something haunted in the younger man's cerulean gaze which hit the son of Adhiratha instantly, making him doubt the veracity of his own inference. 

"You have no idea, Radheya. He... he has tried killing Bhrata Bheem before. Several times. And we were just kids then...", the ivory clad prince whispered, as if afraid that the breeze might hear him. 

"To be completely fair, I have heard, Bheem had been... what do you call it.. not exactly very friendly with Duryodhan and his brothers. There had been.. broken bones in every encounter? Maybe he was just an immature child then just like your older brother.... trying to defend himself and his siblings."

Arjun gaped at him first and then when the slightly guilty expression on Karna's face made the former reach an epiphanic realisation and outrage replaced the initial befuddlement soundly. 

"You have been talking to him!", he cried out. 

"Arjun---"

"You have been talking to Duryodhan, behind our back!", Arjun looked at him betrayed. 

"For God's sake! Yes. I have been talking to him but--"

"I thought we were....you know...", Arjun continued in an injured tone now. 

Karna had always possessed a rather short fuse and emotional conversations weren't very palatable to the sharp tongued son of Radha, most of the time. He would not lie to himself and say that Arjun's accusatory tone hadn't hurt him but then he would also not try to fool himself into thinking that he hadn't hurt his young friend too, by the secrecy. 

Though as always, offence had always been Karna's modus operandi for any conflict. 

Physical or verbal. 

"Now you are behaving like a fucking child! I am a grown ass man, Arjun. And much older to you. I can judge people and I do not have to give justification to you with regards to who I chose to spend time with."

Maybe he shouldn't have worded it so harshly but then Karna has never been much eloquent with words unless it was sarcasm. 

Arjun seemed bewildered at his sudden outburst and stared at him with wide eyes. 

It made him look even younger than he already was. 

"What the hell does that even mean?", the prince of the Kurus whispered finally. 

And the words were out of Karna's mouth, flying like his poison tipped and golden tufted arrows before he could take it back, somehow. 

"It means, I think you have confused our relationship. Our mentalities clearly don't match and I refuse to be a pawn in your political game. We are not friends! Get that in your thick skull."

Arjun flinched like he had been backhanded. 

The warm sunlight sparkled liquid in his shuttered eyes and he pressed his lips together till they were white against the ashen expression of his usually glowing dark skin. His knuckles cracked like an electric static in his balled fists and heavy clouds suddenly shaded the brightly glowing afternoon sun. 

Karna felt guilt gnaw inside his stomach like a coiled snake but no words materialised on his acerbic tongue. 

"My apologies, Angaraja. I will not offend you with my childish presence any longer. Be well."

Arjun turned around fast enough that it looked like he might have given himself whiplash and strode away as quickly as he could from the arena. 

Karna opened his mouth to call him back but no sound emerged from his rapidly drying throat. 

The arena had gone silent again and the rumbling thunder clouds overhead suddenly burst into a soft drizzle. It fell over the son of Surya like a comforting shower, melting away his violent irritation into a strange lassitude. 

He hadn't meant to hurt Arjun, damnit! 

---------------------------

"See that! You caught a fucking beast Angaraja!"

Dusashana's crowed words served to only flatter the already stoked pleasure in Karna's heart as the biggest tiger anyone had ever seen till date, fell over like a greatly heaving beast on the ground. 

"And with that, it is clear. You are the best archer I have ever seen!", Duryodhan laughed aloud and threw an arm around Karna's shoulder and the latter felt the praise settle uncomfortably at the pit of his stomach. 

He had been conversing with the Kuru prince for some months. And at the start, he had realised that maybe his initial opinion about Duryodhan was wrong and the latter had only been trying to befriend him during the party held during the induction of the Kuru princes into Hastinapur. 

Duryodhan had treated him with the utmost respect and a rather flattering camaraderie which had gratified Karna's ever prevalent insecurities and a rather bludgeoned ego quite some bit. 

He liked spending time with the Kaurava prince. 

'Then why were you hiding it from Arjun?'

His inner voice which almost always infallibly ended up sounding like Vrushali, asked him with the same sarcastic rancour with which he had attacked the third Pandava prince yesterday evening. That encounter had left Karna with a bitter aftertaste in his mouth and it had taken a lot of effort from Duryodhan and his brothers to make him fully engaged in their current activities. 

"Thank you", Karna replied quietly to his new friend and advanced towards the fallen animal to retrieve his arrow. 

On nearing the tiger, he bent down to pluck the arrow which had struck the beast straight to the heart and caught sight of his glazed eyes. He was a majestic specimen. Massive and striped a onyx black over a shinning golden vermillion. 

The laboured breathing in the animal proclaimed its end was very near yet the look in the dying beast's eyes rooted Karna to his spot. 

He seemed to be looking accusatorily at him. As if asking him the reason for this untimely demise. The son of Adhiratha had no idea that an animal can display a look of utter disappointment with their eyes as well. 

For a second it overlapped with that of Arjun's silver sapphiric ones from before and his stomach turned. 

Karna turned around and walked back towards his waiting stallion, much to Duryodhan's confusion. 

"What happened mitra? You look---"

"I am sorry prince. I need to go back to the palace."

With that he pulled the reigns of his horse and was off, galloping at full speed towards the Hastinapur palace, unbeknownst to the calculative frown which had graced the oldest Gandharinandan's face. 

------------------------------

"Excuse me, I am searching for Prince Arjun. Can you tell me, where he is?"

Karna asked the millionth attendant he came across in the past hour. The man shook his head in negative and the King of Anga barely restrained himself from lashing out. 

How can one not know the whereabouts of their own prince?

"Looking for Arjun, are you?"

The grave voice from his back made the gold decked warrior turn around with a start and he found himself come face to face with the Kuru patriarch. 

Gangaputra Bheeshma had a drawn out look on his usually effervescent face and his gaze seemed to bore into Karna with a piercing fervour. Karna usually disliked conversing with the centenarian but today, he will even ask the God of Death, where the dark skinned son of Kunti went.

"Yes, Maham mahim.. I was.."

"They left."

"What?", Karna asked confused.

Bheeshma let out a big sigh and gestured for them to walk while talking with a hand. Karna obliged and they strolled for some seconds till, they had reached a seemingly empty corridor when the son of Shantanu spoke again. 

"The Pandavas and Kunti have left for Varnavarta. The King had suggested them to spend some days there, as a...vacation per se before returning to Hastinapur for the.. coronation."

"You say, 'suggested'. Is that a euphemism for ordered?"

Bheeshma looked at him with a sharp glance and he resisted from fidgeting under the formidable warrior's hawk like eyes. 

"You are more perceptive than you care to show, Angaraja. I am sure you know exactly what I meant. What I want to know though, is where your loyalties lie. One cannot dangle in the middle of this like a directionless rudder."

Karna looked at his feet, deep in thought. His mind was filled with questions even as the strange unease which had filled in his heart since hearing about the unprompted and rather unexpected trip to Varnavarta, stopped him from taking offence to Bheeshma's suspicious tone. 

"I had no idea about this... trip", he said finally, choosing to not answer the Grandsire's question. 

"Neither did I."

"When are they going to return?", Karna asked. 

"A month after. Hopefully we will get our answers till then."

Karna did not say that he thought Bheeshma was way more perceptive than even he cared to show, but only because he did not want to converse with the old man more than absolutely required.

The strange tension which had assailed him refused to let go of his usually unfiltered words this time. 

Karna looked at the setting sun and wished he had not let the Arjun leave without clearing off the air at least. But it seemed like fate had other plans.