The temple revealed itself not as a building, but as a ruse. From the outside, it was a skeletal thing—crumbling stone strangled by thick, sinuous vines, a monument to forgetting. The air around it was still, holding its breath. As Agni and Neer approached the massive, weather-beaten doors, the wood groaned and swung inward of its own accord, revealing a darkness that smelled of old incense and damp.
Agni moved instantly, a half-step that placed his body between Neer and the void beyond the threshold. A silent question passed between them—a raised brow from Neer, a slight, firm nod from Agni. I lead. Together, they crossed into the gloom.
The moment they were inside, the doors slammed shut with a finality that echoed in the bones. They turned. Where solid wood had been, there was now only seamless, ancient wall. No handle, no seam. They were not just inside; they were sealed in.
But the tomb-like darkness lasted only a heartbeat. Then, light bloomed—not from torches, but from the very air. The dilapidated shell fell away, revealing a hall of impossible grandeur. It was a symphony in gold and marble. Along the walls, statues of celestial musicians stood frozen in eternal performance, their instruments—veenas of polished jackwood, flutes of ivory, bells of silver—gleaming with an inner light. A soft, harmonious resonance hummed in the space, a single, sustained note that seemed to vibrate in the chest rather than the ear.
At the hall's heart lay a pool, its water so clear it was almost invisible, dotted with lotus blooms that glowed with a soft, bioluminescent light. And above it, suspended in the air as if resting on a pedestal of sunlight, was the bow.
It was not merely golden. It was light given the form of a weapon. Its unstrung curve was elegant, severe. Where the string should have been burned a line of pure, white-gold flame, silent and heatless. Resting upon its center was a small statue, a figurine of a dancer, equally radiant.
A voice poured into the hall. It was not a sound one heard with ears, but felt in the pulse, in the rhythm of one's own breath. It was melody given meaning.
"Stop."
They froze, not from command, but from the sheer, overwhelming beauty of it.
The golden figurine atop the bow shimmered, dissolved, and reshaped itself. Where it had been, now stood an apsara. Her beauty was not of this world—it was a concept given form. Her hair flowed like a river of night, her eyes were lined with stars, and her lips held the promise of every forgotten song. She was the guardian, and her presence was the trial.
"Greetings, princes of a fading age," her voice wove around them. "I am the echo of the first note. I am the guardian of this covenant."
Neer found his voice first, bowing deep from the waist. "Pranams, Divine One. We are seekers."
"I know what you seek," she said, her gaze resting on each of them with the weight of centuries. "Many have stood where you stand. Kings, sages, heroes draped in legend. They lie as dust in the corridors of memory. The bow chooses not the strong, but the understander. You will be tested not on strength of arm, but on clarity of soul."
Agni's chin lifted, his eyes reflecting the bow's flame. "We are ready."
"Then hear the first question," the apsara sang. "Who is strong? The one who shatters himself upon the rock of another's need, or the one who remains whole, an unyielding mountain?"
Neer glanced at Agni. The recent memory of the Vetala, of his own offered throat, was fresh. "The world calls the one who breaks… a fool," he said quietly.
Agni's response was immediate, soft but absolute. "No. The mountain is strong, but it is cold. The one who shatters… understands the strength of the pieces, and the love that demanded the breaking."
The apsara's starry eyes gleamed. "Second: Who is the master of fire? The one who turns his blaze upon his enemies, or the one who first lets it scour the impurities from his own heart?"
This time, Neer answered, thinking of Agni's controlled fury, the banked hearth of his spirit. "A fire that burns only others is a wildfire. Destructive. The master is the one who uses its heat to forge himself."
Agni gave a barely perceptible nod of agreement, his own philosophy mirrored and understood.
"Third," her voice became the sound of a bubbling spring. "What is the truth of water? To quench the raging fire, or to wear down the stubborn stone through patient persistence?"
"Salvation is in the quenching," Neer said, thinking of healing wounds, of protective shields. "To save what burns."
Agni's gaze was on the serene pool. "But the fire may need to burn. The greater truth is in the flow. In going around, under, over. In enduring. The stone does not argue; it is simply changed."
The apsara smiled, a curve of light. "And now, the final harmony. When the song of Dharma and the rhythm of the heart fall into discord—when to follow one is to break the other—which melody do you choose?"
The hall held its breath. This was the core of it all.
Neer did not look at Agni. He looked within, at the sheer, terrifying force of the bonds he had formed. "The heart… is the first truth. Before duty, before law, there is connection. To break that is to make a lie of the soul."
Agni's voice was different now. It held the iron of conviction, but also the ache of knowing the cost. "Dharma is the foundation. If the heart leads us to break that foundation, the entire temple collapses, burying the very love we sought to protect. Even if the heart shatters… Dharma must stand."
The silence that followed was profound. The apsara looked at them, her celestial gaze seeing not just their answers, but the paths that had led them here—Neer's instinctive, protective sacrifices, Agni's disciplined, often lonely adherence to a higher law.
"Neervrah," she said, her voice tender. "Your truth is the truth of the immediate embrace, of the wound stanched now. It is the truth of the protector, who values the life before him above all cosmic principles." She turned. "Agnivrat. Your truth is the truth of the horizon, of the structure that shelters generations. It is the truth of the guardian, who knows that sometimes, one must hold the line even against the cry of his own heart."
She floated closer to the pool, gesturing to the bow. "This is not a weapon of war. It is a measure. It responds to the clarity of purpose, the alignment of action with an unwavering truth. Agnivrat… your truth, while it carries the weight of solitude, is the one this bow recognizes. Your mastery is of the inner fire, not the outer blaze. The bow is yours."
There was no defeat in Neer's face. Only a deep, shining pride. He placed a hand on Agni's shoulder—a solid, warm pressure. "Go on," he said, his voice thick with an emotion too complex for joy alone. "It was always yours."
Agni searched his friend's eyes, looking for any shadow of resentment, and found only steadfast certainty. He nodded, a world of gratitude in the gesture.
He approached the pool. The water did not wet his feet as he stepped onto its surface, finding it solid as glass beneath him. He reached up. The bow's flame did not burn him. It pulsed, warm and welcoming, as his fingers closed around the golden curve. The flame-string ignited along its full length with a soft whoosh, then settled into a steady, brilliant glow. The weight of it in his hands was not physical; it was the weight of the answer he had given.
He turned and walked back to Neer, holding the bow out. "It is as much yours as mine."
Neer laughed, a real, free sound in the enchanted hall. "Don't be dense. I'd just drop the thing. It chose its warrior. Now let's go home."
The apsara was already fading, her form dissolving into motes of golden light that swirled around them once, a benediction, before winking out. As she vanished, a new doorway appeared in the wall, leading not back into the decaying forest, but onto a sunlit path where two magnificent horses, the color of dawn and dusk, stood waiting.
The journey back to the Gurukul was made in a companionable quiet, the bow a silent third passenger. The trials hung between them, not as a contest decided, but as a map of each other's soul now fully seen. Neer had learned the steel in Agni's duty. Agni had felt the depth of the love that motivated Neer's every sacrifice.
They returned not as boys who had fetched an artifact, but as men who had faced a mirror of their deepest selves. The golden bow was not their prize. The understanding was. And as the familiar gates of the Gurukul came into view, they knew this quiet between them was the true beginning of everything that would come next a harmony, tested and proven, ready for whatever discord the future might sing.
As they crossed the Gurukul gates, everything felt unchanged… yet something was not.
Behind them, far away in the silent forest, the ruined temple now empty and lifeless shivered.
For the briefest moment, the pool inside rippled, though no wind touched it.
A single lotus one that had not glowed for centuries flickered back to life.
And in the reflection upon that water…
a pair of eyes opened.
Watching them return.
Waiting.
Because the bow had chosen its bearer
but the trial was never meant for only one.