The grand hall shimmered in golden light as laughter and chatter filled the air. Diyas flickered like stars, their glow dancing across sequined sarees and embroidered sherwanis. The air was alive with music, the crackle of fireworks outside blending with the pulse of drums inside.
Yug, ever the life of the party, grabbed the remote with a mischievous grin.
"Alright, everyone," he declared, his voice rising over the hum of conversation, "enough talking — it's showtime!"
The crowd cheered as the music roared to life —
🎶
"Pretty lady, pretty lady, pretty lady,
Can't take my eyes off you…
Pretty lady, pretty lady, pretty lady…"
🎶
Yug spun around dramatically, pointing toward Charvi, who rolled her eyes but couldn't suppress a smile. Gauri clapped her hands to the rhythm, while Vihaan joined in with his usual composed charm, matching Yug's playful moves with effortless grace.
Raani jumped into the middle of the dance floor, twirling her lehenga as the beat picked up — her laughter contagious.
🎶
"Raebareli mein tu beech bazari jab
Husan dikhane jayegi…"
🎶
The group burst into synchronized steps — Gauri and Charvi on one side, Vihaan, Yug, and Raani on the other — teasing, spinning, and laughing as the lyrics carried them into a whirl of celebration.
Yug danced toward Charvi, feigning a dramatic bow. "Pretty lady, this verse was written for you!"
Charvi laughed, pushing him away playfully. "Dream on, Mr. Overconfident!"
Vihaan twirled Gauri by the waist, their chemistry unmistakable as the lights shimmered around them.
🎶
"Are pehen ke itna jewar gehna
Tez hawa se bach ke rehna
Gir jaaye to phir na kehna—
Jhumka gira re!"
🎶
Confetti burst from above just as Raani lifted her hands dramatically, lip-syncing the famous line. "Haaye jhumka, oye jhumka!" she sang, while Yug pretended to search the floor for a missing earring, sending everyone into fits of laughter.
The chorus built up again, and everyone joined, spinning in circles, the rhythm taking over —
🎶
"What jhumka? What jhumka?
Aaye haaye haaye, what jhumka?"
🎶
The hall erupted in cheers as Vihaan pulled Gauri close for the final beat, while Yug lifted Charvi in a playful twirl. Raani clapped along, her bangles chiming like tiny bells.
As the last notes faded, they all collapsed into laughter, catching their breath amid the glittering lights.
Gauri smiled, looking around at her family — radiant, alive, and blissfully unaware of the storm that loomed beyond the golden night.
Outside the Kothari mansion — where laughter and music still echoed through the night — another world stirred awake.
Far from the lights and colors of Diwali, beneath a sliver of a pale moon, Veer walked silently through the iron gates of an old cemetery. The air was cold and damp, the kind that carried whispers of the forgotten. Each step he took crunched against dry leaves and brittle soil.
He stopped at the center of the graveyard — before an ancient banyan tree whose twisted roots crawled across cracked tombstones. A faint smirk curled across his lips.
"The Kotharis celebrate light," he murmured, his voice low and venomous, "but light only shines when there's shadow. And I… I am that shadow."
Veer spread his arms slowly, the moonlight glinting against the scars that lined his body — marks of every battle, every ritual, every dark encounter he had survived.
"I am a Naashak," he said with pride, his tone sharpening. "Forged in pain, tempered in darkness. I've hunted demons, witches, and cursed beings… and each time, I took a piece of their power."
He closed his eyes, his expression hardening.
"Now, those powers live in me. And with them… I will cast my shadow over the light of the Kotharis."
The ground beneath him began to tremble. The air thickened, turning colder. Veer's hand rose sideways — fingers spreading as he whispered an incantation under his breath.
From the cracks between the gravestones, a dense, inky fog began to seep out, slithering like serpents across the ground. It crawled up his boots, swirling around him, growing thicker with every passing second. The fog hissed, carrying faint echoes — voices of the dead long buried, now waking at his call.
The tombstones rattled. The wind howled.
Veer's eyes snapped open — glowing faintly crimson.
"Let the darkness rise," he whispered, his smirk deepening. "Tonight, the festival of light becomes the night of shadows."
And as the dark fog spread through the cemetery like a living storm, the glow of the diyas in the distance flickered — one by one — as though something unseen had begun to smother the light.