Adya was in a state of bafflement as she peered out the windows of the room. White-painted walls, the dulcet beeping of machines, the strong effluvium of disinfectants, and the high priest gaping at her wordlessly for the last four hours were enough for her as it was. But the more time passed, the more the realization sank in. Her overly solicitous brother's words from the previous night flitted across her mind over and over again, each phrase scurrying to find one corner of her heart to conceal itself so that she would gloss over it and never bother. However, she was unable to not be troubled since her hyperactive brain was hell-bent on conjuring additional strings of worry for her.

"The princesses of the kingdom are cursed, Adya."

You are cursed, Adya.

"I didn't want you to panic or be morose about the future, Adya."

You have no future, Adya.

She had rolled her eyes when he first broached the topic, but the solemnity on his facade and the hints of moisture in his eyes conveyed how grave the situation was, how she was protected from the weight of the truth all her life, and how she was indeed the cursed princess of Suryagarh. All those idiotic fables about her town, all those preposterous anecdotes that fell on her ears—how true they were!

"We had an aunt. Papa's sister. Janhvi Chauhan. She passed away two months before her twenty-first birthday, Adya."

You are going to die, Adya. Just like Janhvi Chauhan did. Trampled by a speeding truck.

Now she knew why her entire palace had no portraits of princesses of the estate. She was always told Princess Adya was the first daughter born to the Chauhans in over three centuries. But those were lies. Sheer lies.

You are going to die, Adya.

Your brother will be left alone, Adya.

You are going to die, Adya.

Your brother will be left alone, Adya.

"Adya?"

She blinked the tears in her eyes when she heard her brother. "Hmmm?"

"Let's go home." He kissed the top of her hair. "The doctor said you are fine now. It was just a minor panic attack you were suffering from."

She sucked in the air and nodded.

"We are going to break the curse, Adya," he murmured.

"I don't fear dying," she muttered. Glimpsing up to find the melancholy and the anticipation in his eyes, she frowned. "I am not scared of death. I just can't leave you all by yourself." Her gaze hardened. So did her resolve. "And I am going to fight it out till my last breath."

***

The security had been tightened, both physically and magically. Reinforcements from the police and private security firms had arrived, and they were standing sentry around the fort, guarding every entry and exit point. The magical forms of security were strung together over the course of the afternoon by the high priest himself as he mumbled mantras and chanted spells from the confines of the old temple at the rear end of the fort. He was quite confident of the magical gates he had put up, and even if the immortal were to breach those, they were certainly going to break the curse and render him a pile of mud.

The tourists and the citizens had been requested to stay within the safety of the resort because there was going to be a townwide curfew due to the possibility of a potential serial killer on the loose. Well, that was the news propagated just to keep the populace and the guests out of harm's way. The employees had been warned to steer clear of the rest of the fort for the evening, and the shops and stores were rattled shut by dusk. In a state of semi-curfew, Suryagarh was immersed in the mellow radiance of the moon.

Once night fell, Shreya was ready to go to Agni Bhawan. Jagdish stopped by to request her to get ready for the ritual and that he was going to pick her up in half an hour. She also placed a counter request in front of the high priest. She would only go to Agni Bhawan if Aryan would be permitted to accompany her. She could tell the high priest was not happy with the injunction. The scowl on his face spoke volumes, but Shreya was a bit too adamant. Not because she didn't trust them enough but because she needed to show the conceited, arrogant, insolent prince that even she did not have any faith in him as far as her safety was concerned. She could also tell that for some weird reason, the man was hostile towards her best friend. Ergo, the demand! If she could irk him further before leaving Suryagarh for good, all the constriction in her heart would vanish in the blink of an eye.

Hence, she egressed the safety of Suryagarh Palace with a puzzled Aryan beside her and a very grave Jagdish leading the path. They reached the metal gates of the premises of Agni Bhawan, and Jagdish apprised the security guard near the closed ticketing office about the need for the royal family to utilize the courtyard after official hours had passed. The guard didn't ask any questions and allowed the three to head inside before retiring for the day.

The sandstone edifice was back in her line of vision but it was inundated in utter darkness while the lake on the other side had the surface of the water rippling with every draft of wind. The illumination from the moon and the stars created the glimmer and shimmer across the estuary. The damaged sculptures of apsaras in dancing postures stood on the embankments, and in front of each such idol lay a gleaming earthen lamp with the flames flickering and casting enough luminescence around.

She could see Aarush and Adya by the banks of the estuary, talking in hushed whispers with one another, and as soon as the three of them came into their line of vision, the temperature inside the premises dropped without a warning.

Aarush's gaze fell on the girl and his accompaniment, and a sheer burst of unadulterated fury combusted deep inside of him. "What are you doing here?" His voice boomed in the tranquillity of the spot.

Aryan gulped and exchanged a nervous glance with Shreya when he discerned that the anger was directed at him. "I..."

It was the girl who stood resolutely in front of the prince as she tilted her head and quirked her brows. "He came with me. Do you have a problem with it?"

He glowered at her. "I want him out of Agni Bhawan right this second." The vein on his forehead throbbed. The aggression was imprinted on his features, and he was moments away from losing his calm. More so because of the air of nonchalance around Shreya Awasthy. The girl in front of him had no clue who she kept messing with, and the only reason behind his peaceful attitude towards her stood next to him with her head bowed down. His sister. "Aryan Sethi," he gritted his teeth, "is not allowed inside Agni Bhawan. Do you get it?"

The steeliness, the frigidity, the cruelty of his stare—everything that prompted the antagonistic rush of tingles down her spine. Warning bells went off in her mind yet again. Aarush Chauhan was a dangerous man. He was just putting up a farce for the last four days. She didn't know the limits of his savagery, for she had seen for herself the brutality with which he nearly annihilated Balwant Singh. However, the strange recklessness returned to the fore like every other time, and she shrugged off the caution thrown by the wind. "I will not hurl the necklace into the fire if Aryan is not by my side." She took a deep breath. "Either he stays or both him and I leave. Right now."

The utter quietude that descended in the courtyard—with only him and her gaping at each other in complete and comprehensive silence. Deafening silence.

"What did you say?" he hissed as his eyes narrowed at her.

Even Adya had to snap her head in his direction due to the roughness with which he spoke. A shiver rushed down her spine when she perceived the vengeful hate in his eyes. Never before had she seen the otherwise jovial brother of hers possessing such a wrathful veneer, and the rays of frenzied infuriation radiating from every inch of his skin made her recoil too. She didn't really understand how the guest was so unruffled in the face of what seemed like the commencement of a gruesome tale of a very passionate conniption.

Shreya smiled wide. "I said, and don't make me repeat myself, he will stay with me. Otherwise, we are both leaving Suryagarh right now."

Aryan sensed the hastily dropping mercury, and he was concerned about the casual stance the girl took when standing in front of the royal. "Shreya," he whispered, "I will go back. Doesn't really matter."

"No," Shreya sang as a feeble smile tugged at the corners of her lips. She didn't bother taking her eyes off the raging prince. "You stay."

The menacing steps he took towards her, the embers of savagery swirling in his eyes—he would have acted out in the most rash way imaginable had no one else been standing. Somehow she also knew he was controlling himself because of who she was—the lookalike of Meera, carrying the essence of Meera.

But then he did stop an inch away from her, and his cold, steely grip harshly came around one of her forearms. "You are very lucky you are a woman, Shreya Awasthy."

"Aarush!"

"Bhai..."

He heard Jagdish's warning intonation and Adya's pleading cadence from behind him, and he shut his eyes in exasperation.

Shreya flipped her hair and quirked her brows at him, unfazed by his rough clasp.

His brows twitched, and he left her, stepping away in haste, turning his back to the girl and her friend.

Another spell of uncomfortable silence descended on the spot.

Adya shook her head in disapproval—a tad bit with her brother, a tad bit with her friend, but she was disappointed nonetheless.

Aryan let out a sigh of relief and exchanged nervous glances with Shreya while she could smile feebly and shrug in response.

"Let's focus on the task at hand," Jagdish whispered, going ahead to place a series of earthen lamps on the bottommost step of the stairwell leading up to the main edifice. He used a matchbox to strike a stick and bring the flames on the lamps to life.

Adya let out a ragged breath. "What all is needed for this ritual?"

"Well," Jagdish peeked at the full moon in the sky, "we just need Elder Woman to come here and conjure the Holy Fire before the moon is at its brightest. Then the moonbeams traverse through the air, get reflected on the surface of the water, and fall on the relic. Finally, Adya and Aarush's blood will be needed to sanctify the artefact. That's all. Shreya can hurl it into the fire, and the curse will be broken."

Adya licked her lips. "Why... these steps exactly?"

Jagdish chuckled. "The breaking of a curse entailing the darkest of magic involves reversing the steps performed when it was cast. We don't have a first-hand account of what ensued 500 years ago, but the detailed instructions had been noted and handed down by Aarush's ancestors. When the then Prince Adhyayan Singh Chauhan cast the curse, he invoked the power of a full moon and used the illumination falling on the waterbody behind us," he said, gesticulating towards the centuries-old estuary behind them. "Then he conjured fire using dark magic and finally locked the curse inside a relic that he had hidden in his palms. He used fire, water, and the moon to make sure the curse would live forever as no one can make the aforementioned natural occurrences disappear. That made the relic unbreakable in the mystical sense of the term. Furthermore, he tied his life force with the relic, too, making himself as unbreakable and resistant as the necklace."

"And how does one tie their life force to a relic?"

"By sacrificing their own blood in front of the fire altar. Ultimately, he slit the throat of a princess of the kingdom, consecrating her blood at the altar too. Thus, the curse was cast, its shadow falling on every princess ever to be born in the lineage."

Adya's palms flew to her throat. "Will you need to slit my throat too?"

Aarush clicked his tongue. "Don't joke pointlessly, Princess Adya."

The girl giggled. "Was just trying to lighten the mood. Everything became so stuffy here."

"Actually," Jagdish beamed, "my Princess has a very good question. But no, we don't need to slit your throat. We need a few drops of your blood. And Aarush's too because he is the indirect descendant of the man casting the curse and you, my Princess, are the indirect descendant of the first woman who faced the wrath of the curse."

"And why does," Adya shot a furtive glimpse at Shreya, "she need to throw it in the fire?"

Jagdish sighed. "Alas, Princess! We have reached the pinnacle of my knowledge. Perhaps Elder Woman might know why it needs to be Shreya, i.e., Meera's essence, but legend says the person who locates the artefact should be the one chucking it in the fire. And there can be only one girl to do so. The girl who bears the mark of a chalice on her back."

Shreya felt very suffocated at the mere mention of her birthmark. Jumbled memories from two nights ago shot through her muddled brain. His gentle touch. His words of affirmation. His boyish grin. His sharp cologne. The stinging at the back of her neck returned with a higher intensity than before, and the overwhelming need to get out of Suryagarh became more pronounced. She discreetly slipped her palm in Aryan's, clasping it tight, and he reciprocated with a reassuring smile on his face while ruffling her hair.

"Where is Elder Woman?" Adya said. "And how has she been? It has been three years since I saw her last."

"At your service, Princess."

The powerful, dominating, and assertive female voice boomed in the night air, and all heads turned towards the main gates of the palace. An old woman, her head full of grey hair and a limp in her gait, a black saree around her plump form, and wrinkles of age and wisdom decorating her forehead, sauntered up to the group. The genteel smile on her face spoke volumes about the pool of knowledge she held closer to her bosom, and the rosary of Rudraksh beads around her neck swung with each movement she made.

Aarush, Jagdish, and Adya went ahead to seek the woman's blessings while Shreya felt a strange tug of curiosity at the pit of her stomach.

Jagdish peered at the dumbfounded girl and her friend. "Shreya, Aryan," he gesticulated at the old lady, "meet Elder Woman. We fondly call her Radha Ma. Don't you want to seek her blessings?"

Shreya and Aryan moved ahead in tandem and touched the elderly lady's feet before taking a step back.

"Not you!" Radha's commandeering voice echoed in the air as her sharp gaze landed on Shreya. "You come forward, girl."

Shreya gulped, exchanged another nervous glance with Aryan, and edged closer to the octogenarian. The blazing eyes of the old woman flickered alive, and she did not allow her gaze to waver in another direction. The intense manner of scrutiny was making Shreya highly uncomfortable, and she was not certain if she should look away or peek at her shoes, tuck her hair behind her ears or let out the breath she was cautiously holding.

"My my!" Radha susurrated. "Don't you look exactly like her?"

Once again, a snarky jibe was at the tip of Shreya's tongue, but she held it back owing to the lady's age and importance in the Chauhan aristocracy. She just pursed her lips and nodded her head. "I look like Meera."

A sharp laugh escaped Radha's mouth. "I was not talking about Meera."

Shreya's eyes widened in disbelief. "What do y—"

"An anomaly of nature. That's what you are."

"Excuse me, what do y—"

"Are you twenty-one yet, girl?"

Shreya shut her mouth and bobbed her head again.

"Good!" Radha chirped, focusing her attention on Jagdish instead. "Shall we begin?"

***

The crackling of the flames from the nearby earthen lamps was the only source of sound for a long time while Radha stood on the bank of the estuary encircled by the Chauhan siblings, the high priest, and the key to breaking the curse. Aryan was asked to step out of the circle owing to his uselessness in the entire procedure as Aarush very crudely reminded. But the others were in rapt attention with their gazes locked on the old lady while she had her eyes shut as she meditated, twirling the rosary of Rudraksh beads in her hands.

Even Aryan didn't make any movement. It was his first time witnessing anything remotely akin to what was happening in front of his eyes, and he didn't wish to miss any of it. Much to his chagrin, the shudders down the length of his spine didn't wish to miss him either.

Finally, after a long duration of complete quietude, Radha's eyes snapped open, and her lips began moving. Steadily, the chants became more and more audible as her decibels rose up. So did the goosebumps rising on Shreya's arms. But the hums and the chants of Radha's mantras weren't the only buzzing in her ears. She could hear the same drones the previous evening that had rattled her to the point of screaming her lungs out. This evening, the buzzing returned again, but this time, it was mellow. She could not fathom clearly what they were saying, but the snippets of their conversation in a foreign language were somewhat comprehensible to her.

"It's not whole," she blurted out. "We need to discover it entirely."

Radha didn't pay any attention to the girl and continued with the ritual while a shooting glare from Aarush silenced Shreya altogether.

Understanding the gravity of the situation, Shreya didn't argue with him but still couldn't shake off the feeling that something was amiss in the ritual. The buzzing in her ears was reminding her of the same, but she was just not sure what it meant.

Radha's chanting grew in frequency and power, and her head fell back on her shoulders. Her powerful voice resonated in the stillness of the night as her arms rose up in the air, stretching outward, her palms turned to the sky while the spells from her mouth clattered against the howling of the winds, flooding the surroundings in a mystifying aura of purity and enigma. The otherwise impenetrable darkness that always kept Agni Bhawan immersed in itself steadily receded, and the glow of the magician threw the nebulousness back and well inside the confines of the edifice.

Finally, flames burst into life inside Radha's palms, and the raucous crackling drowned the gasps of Aryan and Shreya. Radha's spells and chants grew in frequency all the more as her arms came down to her sides, and she upturned her palms. The two flames cascaded downward in an agonizingly slow fashion, dropping onto the ground in quick succession, each integrating with the other, leading to a roaring conflagration to spring up.

Radha halted the magic she was casting, opened her eyes, and peered at the fire in front of her. The flames licking the ground and lapping with each other provided more than enough illumination to the spot, and shadows ruffled the silhouettes of the people present. She dusted the ash on her hands with her saree. "Holy Fire. Opposite of what he conjured using dark magic."

Jagdish checked his watch. "Ten minutes until the moon is at its brightest," he whispered and extricated the relic from his pockets. Forwarding it to Shreya, he said, "Throw it in the fire at my command."

The quivering arms of the girl went ahead to hold the artefact. Her legs buckled. Her fingers trembled. Her lips did too. She was an anxious mess. Yet she managed to have a firm grasp over the piece of ancient jewellery.

Before anyone could exchange a word or a glimpse with one another, a discordant rumble reverberated in the air at a distance, and the ground under their feet shuddered. They had to dig their heels in the mud to ensure they wouldn't fall while successive shrieks and screams pierced the silence. A series of booms went off one by one before the distinct sound of gunshots percolated the serenity.

Jagdish was the first to come out of the stupor. "We are under attack. They are already inside the fort."