After dinner, the children finally settled into their room. Chandra sprang onto the bed beside the window, while Ipsha curled up on the one opposite him.
"You!" Aniket pointed at him. "You were laughing the loudest!"
Chandra gasped dramatically. "S-Sir, my name is Aniket Rai," he stammered, mockingly bowing with exaggerated nervousness.
Aniket lunged forward with a playful growl and jumped onto the bed. The two boys tumbled across the mattress in a clumsy wrestling match, laughing and grunting.
Ipsha lay on her side, already half-asleep, watching them through heavy-lidded eyes.
"Stop it," she murmured. "You'll both end up hurting yourselves."
Chandra squirmed under Aniket's grip.
"Alright, alright! I surrender! Get off before I throw up!"
Aniket froze. A flash of genuine worry crossed his face.
"…You wouldn't."
"I would."
Aniket rolled away instantly. Chandra exhaled in relief.
Ipsha let out a soft laugh. After a quiet moment, she spoke again, her voice dreamy.
"I wonder what the festivals outside are like…"
The boys went still.
"Different," Chandra said, staring at the ceiling. "Stalls everywhere. Bright clothes. Wax bangles that glow in the sunlight. And more sweets than you can count."
"And the hunting competition," Aniket added eagerly. "Didn't you say people fight for the Gor?"
Chandra nodded.
"Yes. Warriors and even merchants come from distant kingdoms. I saw it once when I was small."
Ipsha turned onto her back, eyes distant as she imagined it.
"It must be beautiful."
"It is," Chandra replied softly. "Tomorrow you'll see."
Aniket folded his arms with mock seriousness.
"If someone doesn't snore all night."
"I don't snore," Ipsha snapped, narrowing her eyes.
"You do."
"I do not!" She grabbed a pillow and hurled it at him.
Aniket caught it mid-air, grinning.
"You do."
"Both of you, enough," Chandra sighed. "We have to leave before dawn. So, sleep already."
The room fell quiet.
A moment later, Chandra murmured, eyes already half-closed, "Aniket?"
"Hmm?"
"If you fart, I'm pushing you off the bed."
"…Sleep."
Gradually, their breathing evened out. Outside, the wind whispered against the fortress walls.
***
In a shadowed chamber, two figures argued in hushed, urgent voices. Nearby, two young boys slept — one just over five years old, the other barely a year.
"I will speak to the King. He will surely listen."
"He won't. And even if he isn't involved, the guards will never let you near him. You have to run."
"But I did nothing wrong. I only studied the grimoire because the Queen asked me to."
"I know, my love." The man's voice dropped. "I know. But they're accusing you of dark arts. No one will believe you. You must take the children and go."
"Please — just let me speak to her. She will understand."
"No one is going to speak for you." His voice cracked. "I beg you. Take the children and go. I'll stay and face them."
A silence.
"Then you go."
"No." He steadied himself. "Dhritiman may understand one day, but Divankar—he is still so young. They need you—their mother."
The boy, who had been awake for some time, listened silently. He didn't understand everything, but he could sense the fear in their voices.
Something was terribly wrong.
The couple spoke on, but their words no longer reached him. Only the shape of their voices — low, urgent, breaking at the edges.
...
Then his mother was before him, pressing something into his hands — a book, wrapped in cloth, still warm from wherever she had kept it hidden.
The two boys stood at the edge of the forest, unable to move. The dark between the trees felt like a living thing.
Their mother looked at them for a long moment. Then, as if something in her gave way, she pulled them close — both of them, together — and held on. Her tears fell into Dhritiman's hair.
She had wished, in that moment, for time to stop. But the orange glow beyond the treeline was growing.
She let them go.
Steeling herself in the only way she could, she pressed her trembling hands against their backs and pushed them gently toward the dark.
"Run as far as you can," she whispered. "And don't look back."
Her lips pressed into a bittersweet smile.
Dhritiman ran, carrying his younger brother in his arms. But he kept looking back — at the path, at the light, at the shape of her still standing at the edge of the trees.
Then the flames rose.
And with them, her screams.
***
Dhritiman woke with a sharp gasp, chest heaving.
"…After all these years," he muttered, swallowing hard.
After slowly steadying his breath, he sat up and reached for the water jug on the table, his hand trembling slightly. As he drank, he glanced out the window. The sky beyond the towering mountains glowed with the first reddish-gold light of dawn.
He sat on the edge of the bed for some time, gazing into the dark. Only the silence accompanied him, and the distant chirping of birds.
He rose and left the room. Striding straight to the entrance, he summoned a guard and ordered him to prepare the chariot.
Soon, a sturdy chariot pulled by two powerful bulls stood ready. While the old steward oversaw the final preparations for the King's journey, time slipped forward.
Moments later, Chogyal Hi'um arrived, the three children trailing behind him, the night not quite done with them.
Dhritiman looked them over briefly. Aniket was alert, if only out of pride. Ipsha was blinking at the bulls with the slow gravity of someone still deciding whether morning was real. Chandra had his arms folded.
Dhritiman's gaze lingered on him for a moment.
[Whose hands do you think are stained with their blood?]
Lingpa's words crossed his mind.
He quickly shifted his gaze away.
"We're not late, are we?"
"No, my liege. You are exactly on time," Dhritiman replied. "Sir Tushnim will accompany you on the journey. He will meet you at the bridge."
"Alright. Then we leave now," Hi'um said, gesturing toward the children.
"Can I sit up front?" Aniket asked.
"No," said Dhritiman, as he casually lifted Aniket and set him inside the chariot.
"It will be cold out there on the way, so for now sleep some more. You may sit there later," he continued.
Hi'um let out a soft chuckle at the sight before patting Chandra on the back and urging him to move along. Ipsha quietly followed, holding Hi'um's finger with her tiny hands.
As the children settled inside the chariot, Chogyal Hi'um turned to Dhritiman with a small nod.
The chariot rolled into the darkness, slowly gathering pace over the uneven road.
Inside, the children and Hi'um took their seats. Ipsha rested her head against the side of the chariot, eyes already closing. Aniket and Chandra slouched back, their heads leaning against the seat, the rumble of wheels beneath them doing the rest. Chogyal Hi'um watched them quietly. The way they shifted and resettled themselves, finding comfort even on the uneven road, brought a faint smile to his lips.
For a while, the only sounds were the dull thud of hooves, the creak of the wheels, and the wind moving through the trees on either side.
As time passed, the chariot continued along the uneven path. The darkness slowly gave way, and the sky shifted from black to deep blue before the sun finally crept over the mountain ridges, painting the slopes in soft gold. The birds took to the air, and the mist over the lower forest began to lift.
The chariot rolled on.
Soon, the path ended.
The charioteer brought the bulls to a slow halt where the track gave way to a steep edge, the ground dropping away into the gorge below.
"My lord, you will have to continue on foot from here," he called from outside.
Hi'um stepped down and turned to wake the children. Aniket took the longest to respond.
"Are we there already?" he asked, blinking and squinting against the sunlight.
"Not yet," Chandra muttered, rubbing his eyes.
"We still have more than half the way to go," Hi'um added.
"My lord." A figure stepped forward from beneath the trees. It was Tushnim, already waiting. "I have a ride prepared at the far end of the bridge."
The bridge lay just ahead — unlike anything the children had seen before. Thick roots and branches, twisted and grown into one another over decades, stretched across the gorge. Leaves and dust had settled between them over the years, and moss had made itself at home across every surface.
Beneath it, the river ran fast and cold, pushing against the boulders far below. Occasional gusts rising from the gorge carried fine droplets of water upward, showering those standing at the edge.
The children stood at the cliff's edge, their eyes moving between the bridge and the drop beneath it.
"We're crossing that?" Aniket asked, swallowing hard.
"Yes," said Hi'um.
"Are you scared?" Chandra asked, a playful grin spreading across his face.
"No. Who said I'm scared?!"
"Hehe. Don't lie."
"You're the one who's scared, not me."
Chandra took a second glance at the void ahead and gulped.
"I'm not scared."
"Really? Then let's race to the other side."
"Fine. You'll lose as always."
The two boys sprinted onto the bridge. Beneath their feet, it swayed and shuddered in the wind.
"Be careful," Hi'um sighed from behind.
He turned to Ipsha. "Go on. You need to cross too."
But the little girl could not bring herself to take a step forward. The sudden gusts of wind and the roar rising from the gorge below only made her tighten her grip around Hi'um's finger.
Hi'um let out a soft chuckle, took the lead, and guided her across. She chose each step carefully, eyes down, one foot at a time.
In a few moments, they were on the other side of the bridge.
There, a sturdy cart stood waiting on the narrow path, two bulls shifting lazily against their harnesses.
The children climbed into the cart. Aniket immediately moved toward the front.
"Can I sit up here?"
"It won't be a good idea," Hi'um said.
"Why not? I want to see the road."
Seeing the boy refuse to budge, Hi'um finally relented.
"Alright, just be careful, the path will get rougher ahead"
The forest closed around them almost immediately. The trees here grew older and taller, their canopies weaving together overhead until only broken pieces of morning sky remained.
Gradually, the forest thinned. The path curved between the trees, and before long another gorge opened around them.
It happened gradually at first — the ground rising on either side, the rock face creeping upward — and then all at once the walls were towering above them, so high that the sky between them had narrowed to a pale ribbon. The stone walls were dark and ancient, deep green with moss and streaked where water had traced the same paths down the rock face for longer than anyone could remember.
Chandra leaned out, tilting his head back to follow the walls upward.
Then Ipsha, more carefully, gripping the edge with both hands.
The cart moved deeper between the cliffs. Shallow puddles from the occasional mountain streams feeding the Dihang were scattered across the path.
One wheel rolled straight through a shallow pool.
Splash!
A spray of freezing water struck Aniket squarely across the face.
"Ahh!"
He jerked back, sputtering.
Chandra burst out laughing. Ipsha covered her mouth — and failed entirely.
Hi'um turned his head away, his shoulders shaking slightly.
[I did warn him.]
"Now, now," he said once he had composed himself. "It's alright. It happened to me too when I was young."