But he was not looking at me, but at his sister.

"Don't go out of the palace till we come back. And that's not a suggestion but an order. No adventures behind my back, no matter how much others tempt you"

That last point he made looking directly at me. My jaw dropped down at the plain undeserved insult. I glared back at him with violent thoughts coming to my mind. My plans for not making any enemy while I was here were put on hold, as at that moment I didn't care to be insulted about purposely leading the girls into trouble.

Stranger or not, mysterious circumstances or not, he didn't have the right to insult me right on my face specially when an authoritative  lady like Mahadevi sa had put the stamp of approval on me by welcoming me into the folds of her family.

I turned my back at him , my whole body stiff with anger I was trying to contain and moved back towards the dining room, leaving the girls to follow.

"Lekha! Where are you going?" Vasundhara shouted. "The dining area is to the left"

As I turned back to follow them , I could see the irritating man smirking at me.

"I know where the dining area is , I was just exploring this side of the palace" I lied to save face, getting another knowing smirk from that man as he had caught on to my lie.

"Seems your friend has a deep interest in cooking that's why she was marching hurriedly towards the rasoda(kitchen) instead of the dinning room" I heard the irritating voice say  in a drawling tone.

Huge cooking utensils outside the Rasoda(kitchen)

Outside the Rasoda

To make the matters worse, both my so called dear friends of this world started giggling. I gave them a glare too. I turned back and joined them, not daring to look behind me.

As we moved forward another unknown voice called "Gayatri..." I rolled my eyes, what was this, some conspiracy by people to keep us hungry.

We turned around and saw Uday bhaisa with another boy of the same age. In my mind he had become my bhaisa too after Mahadevi sa had welcomed me to her family.

"Bhaisa "said both girls in unison, their eyes brightening up. This actually got me confused. I did my customary pranam to both the men irrespective of who the other person was.

"Bhaisa this is Lekha, a long lost niece of kakisa (father's younger brother's wife)" referring to Mahadevi sa as her aunt. This made me realize that the other person was the second brother of Gayatri.

He had a beautiful smile, I noticed as he smiled at me and said "Welcome to the family Lekha. Hope you enjoy your stay here. My name is Vikram". I nodded and smiled back at him. He seemed quite young around 18 yrs old and quite handsome with boy next door looks.

Vikram( Gayatri 's second brother)

He informed us that he was being left behind in the palace for the sake of protection and seemed to be quite dissatisfied with the arrangement. He cribbed about missing all the fun, but then again with a smile.

"But I will be having youu girls to keep an eye on ... and trouble you "he stage whispered giving us the most evil smile he could manage on his handsome face.

"Don't you dare make trouble for the girls or maasa is going to whip your backside with her famous whip. Remember why you are being left behind..." Uday bhaisa couldn't continue with his revelation as he was tackled on the floor by Vikram. We girls stood on the side laughing at their antics.

"Vikram... Uday... what's happening here?" again that now familiar commanding voice called leaving us all shocked and all the laughter left our faces. We had thought that he had left but actually he had not, but was standing and listening to our banter as the other boys had joined us.

"What kind of manners are u displaying in front of the guest. You boys don't seem to have learnt much discipline even after being trained in the army therefore are acting like buffoons, bringing shame to your trainer's name." he glared at them. 

The rebuke was enough to have them bend their heads in shame and slowly slither away with just a small nod towards us.

"Such a spoil sport" I muttered under my breathe in English forgetting my where I was. 

The suspicious look I got from the rude man was enough to make me realize my mistake, and I warily turned my face. He couldn't understand what I said, but that I thought was reason enough to suspect me even more. My friends had not heard me, but his alert soldier ears had picked up the words.

Still looking quizzically at me, he said" You girls I think should proceed towards the dining hall, before you faint from hunger". 

Both the girls smiled at his brand of humor, while I couldn't even make my lips twitch at this. We moved forward and just before we could round up the corner, I turned slightly to look back and felt awkward, as I saw that he had not moved from the place we had left him. He was staring intently right back at me. His eyes were unreadable, but sensing my eyes on him, he turned back and left hurriedly.

I was a bit apprehensive at his reaction but didn't say anything to the girls, as that would bring about counter questions and leave me in an awkward position.

Most of the people had already had their food and were leaving as we sat down. It being a marriage house full of numerous guests, there were no particular timings followed for the meals. I believe the dining hall was open for all, the whole day. It made me admire the efficiency of the administration and the staff, for providing food for so many people, with so much of variety and that too without the support of fridge or any other storage facilities we had in 2015.

We were again served the delicacies in the silver plates, making me wonder how much silver they actually had around here. Well what to do, I was a typical 2015 product, where seeing so much of silver being used just for eating, could have popped anyone's eyes out. 

Golden temple

I remembered the time I had gone to the Golden temple in Amritsar(the main Sikh temple of worship), with my parents once and was told that the dome of the gurudwara (general term used for a sikh temple)was made from real gold. I had gone berserk trying to get all angles with my camera. The donation boxes there were transparent and I had ogled at the amount of gold people actually had donated apart from the currency notes. There were some gold chattars (umbrella kind of structure) and even necklaces, bangles made of gold donated by the people.

This reminded me of my bag which had got tel-ported along with me to this century. I remembered to have charged my camera to full power the morning of my disappearance, the most precious gift from my parents.

"Vasundhara, have you seen the bag I had arrived here with. I seem to have misplaced it somewhere" I asked.

"Yes I have hidden your odd clothes,your shoes and your bag in my special box, which can be opened by me alone. I didn't want anyone to embarrass you by their questions. You can have them any time you want." She replied. 

I sighed with relief and smiled at her. It seems she had not looked through my bag , otherwise she would have been the first in line to question me, I smiled inwards.

"I will ask for it when I want it. Can you please keep it safe for me till then" I smiled and she nodded back.

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