: The Silent Meal
The silence in the royal family's private dining chamber was a living, suffocating entity.
It was not the comfortable quiet of shared contentment, but a thick, heavy blanket of unspoken words and unresolved fear. The only sounds were the soft, rhythmic clinks of silver spoons against polished porcelain bowls, the gentle slosh of water in crystal glasses, and the distant, mournful call of a night bird from the gardens below.
Moonlight streamed through the tall, arched windows, casting long, skeletal shadows across the lavishly set table. It illuminated the fine silver, the delicate china painted with scenes of peacocks and lotus flowers, and the faces of the Chandrapuri royal family, each locked in their own private turmoil.
Maharaja Rohit sat at the head of the table, his brow furrowed as he methodically worked his way through a bowl of dal. His gaze was fixed on his plate, but his mind was clearly leagues away, lost in the labyrinth of statecraft and a son he could no longer understand. Every few moments, his eyes would flicker upwards, towards his son, a question dying before it could be born.
Mrinal sat to his right. She ate with a soldier's efficiency, her movements sharp and precise. Her face was a carefully neutral mask, but the tension in her jaw was a dead giveaway. The wound from the council meeting was still fresh, a raw, bleeding gash hidden beneath the armor of her composure. She did not look at her brother.
And then there was Devansh.
He sat perfectly still, his posture unnervingly erect. He wasn't eating. His hands were folded in his lap, his gaze distant, fixed on some point beyond the stone wall, as if he were listening to a frequency only he could hear. His untouched bowl of saffron-infused rice and fragrant vegetable stew sat before him, growing cold. The serene prince who once found joy in the simple pleasure of a family meal was gone, replaced by a statue of cold intensity.
At the other end of the table, Maharani Revati watched it all. Her heart, a fragile vessel that had always overflowed with love for her children, felt like it was being slowly crushed in a vise. She saw her husband's worry, her daughter's hurt, and her son's terrifying absence. The silence was breaking her.
She tried. By the gods, she tried to weave a thread of normalcy into the oppressive gloom.
"Beta," she began, her voice soft, a tentative melody in the stark quiet. "The... the mangoes from the southern orchards arrived today. They are exceptionally sweet this season. I had the kitchens prepare your favorite aamras. Would you like some? It might... help with your appetite."
She gestured to the small silver bowl of pure, golden mango pulp near his plate, a peace offering, a mother's desperate attempt to nourish a son who seemed to be wasting away before her eyes.
Devansh did not respond. He didn't even blink.
Mrinal's spoon stilled. The Maharaja looked up, a spark of hope in his eyes.
Revati's smile wavered. She tried again, her voice laced with a tenderness that ached. "Devansh, my love, you must eat something. You've barely touched your food since you returned. You need your strength. Just a little... for me?"
It was the "for me" that did it. The gentle, emotional pull, the nagging concern of a mother—it was the wrong key, struck on a instrument whose strings were now tuned to a dissonant, violent scale.
Devansh's head snapped towards her. The movement was so sudden, so jarring, that Mrinal instinctively dropped her hand to where her dagger would usually be.
The air in the room grew cold.
"WHY DO YOU ALL KEEP NAGGING ME?"
The explosion was volcanic. It wasn't a shout; it was a raw, guttural roar that ripped through the serene silence, shattering it into a million sharp fragments. It was a sound that didn't belong to the Devansh they knew. It was a sound of something cornered, something feral.
He slammed his palms flat on the table. The fine china rattled, a spoon clattered to the floor, the sound obscenely loud. "This constant hovering! This endless clucking and worrying! Can you not see that your incessant, suffocating concern is a distraction I DO NOT NEED?"
His eyes blazed, but it wasn't with the fire of passion. It was a cold, malevolent fire. And for a horrifying second—a fleeting, terrifying glimpse—a faint, bloody crimson light seemed to flash deep within the blue of his irises, like a predator's eyes in the dark.
The Maharaja stood up, his chair scraping back. "Devansh! Control yourself! That is your mother!"
But Devansh was beyond hearing. His entire frame trembled with a rage that seemed to suck the oxygen from the room. "I am trying to focus on things you cannot possibly comprehend! I am trying to hold back a tide of darkness with my bare hands, and all you can do is ask me about MANGOES?"
His voice cracked on the last word, a mix of fury and a profound, soul-deep agony.
And then, his wild, furious gaze landed on his mother.
And he saw it.
A single, perfect tear had escaped the corner of Rani Revati's eye. It traced a slow, glistening path down her cheek, a silent testament to a pain so deep it had no sound. She didn't sob. She didn't cry out. She just sat there, her regal composure utterly shattered, looking at the stranger who wore her son's face, her heart breaking openly in the moonlight.
The sight of that tear was like a physical blow.
Inside Devansh, a war erupted.
For a single, seismic moment, the red haze parted. The cold, alien presence recoiled. And through the crack, the real Devansh—the boy who had run to his mother with scraped knees, the young man who had composed ragas just to see her smile—screamed.
Maa. Maa, I'm sorry. I'm so sorry. I don't know what's happening to me. Help me.
The internal scream was a wave of pure, unadulterated agony. It was him. It was him.
His face, contorted in rage, faltered. The fury drained away, replaced by a look of stark, bewildered horror. His eyes widened, the phantom crimson light vanishing, leaving only the familiar blue, now clouded with a dawning, terrified confusion. He looked at his mother's tear, and then down at his own hands, still pressed flat against the table as if he didn't recognize them.
He opened his mouth. A soft, choked sound, barely a whisper, escaped. "Maa..."
It was a plea. A recognition. A flicker of the son she knew, gasping for air in a drowning man.
And then, it was gone.
The crack slammed shut. The cold, red energy surged back, more powerful than before, a vengeful tide washing away the momentary weakness. The confusion on his face was smoothed over, replaced by a mask of icy contempt. The vulnerability was too dangerous, too painful. The corruption fed on his rage, not his remorse.
The moment of connection was severed, lasting less than three heartbeats.
He straightened up, his breathing ragged. He looked from his weeping mother to his stunned father to his sister, who was now standing, her body coiled like a spring, her eyes wide with a mixture of fury and fear.
Without another word, he turned on his heel. The silk of his angarkha whispered against the silence he had created. He walked out of the dining chamber, his footsteps echoing in the hall, leaving behind the wreckage of the meal, the silence, and his family.
The door closed with a soft, final click.
Maharani Revati finally broke. A quiet, shuddering sob escaped her, and she buried her face in her hands. The single tear had become a river.
Maharaja Rohit stood frozen, his face ashen, the King helpless before a enemy he could not fight with a sword.
Mrinal stared at the empty doorway, her own heart pounding. She had seen it. She had seen the flicker. The struggle. For a breathtaking second, her brother had been in there, fighting. And he had lost.
The corruption wasn't just changing him. It was at war with him. And in that moment, Mrinal knew with chilling certainty that their real battle was no longer to understand Devansh.
It was to rescue him from the thing that was devouring him from the inside out. The meal was over. The war for his soul had just begun.