The call from Ganesh came not with panic, but with a solemn weight. "Bhai, a situation. In Goa. The only son of Rohan Malhotra. Taken from a beach club. The kidnappers... they are not professionals. They are hungry, and desperate men make mistakes."
Rohan Malhotra. Steel magnate. Kingmaker in Delhi. A man whose grief could move mountains, or break them.
I listened, my eyes on the small altar in the corner of my study. A simple diya flickered before an idol of Lord Krishna, the divine charioteer, who guided without force.
"This is not a matter for the police, Ganesh," I said softly. "Their methods are like thunder—loud, blunt, often striking the wrong tree. The boy would be lost in the noise."
"Then, Bhai... do we intervene?"
I closed my eyes. Not in calculation, but in seeking the thread. The dharma of it. A father's anguish was a sacred fire. To let it consume him and others would be an adharma—a cosmic imbalance. My tools were not of violence, but of order. Could they be used to mend, not break?
"Tell the father we have heard his prayer," I said. "We will bring his son home. Ask for no payment. Only his faith."
I did not command an assault. I began a sadhana, a discipline of attention.
Through MAKA, I asked not for soldiers, but for listeners. I had them seek the whispers in the flow:
The taxi driver who took three nervous men to a remote shack north of Morjim.
The grandmother who sold bandages and antiseptic to a stranger with fearful eyes.
The boat mechanic whose old dinghy was borrowed but not returned.
Each whisper was a petal offered to the divine. Each revealed a fragment of the path.
Within hours, we saw the shape of their despair. Four men. One was injured. They had nowhere to run, only a collapsing plan and a terrified boy.
Kapoor asked for coordinates. "We go in tonight. Quietly."
"No," I said, my voice gentle as the diya's flame. "You will not go to them. You will have prasad delivered."
"Prasad, Bhai?"
"Food. From the temple kitchen. Have it left near their door. Blessed, hearty food. Within it, a gentle sedative for the weary, and... a stronger one for the wounded man. Let them eat. Let them sleep."
It was done. That night, while the kidnappers slept a deep, dreamless sleep—a mercy they had not afforded their hostage—Kapoor's men, moving with the reverence of temple attendants, opened the door. They found the boy, bound but unharmed. They found the men, slumped in their chairs.
"Leave them," I instructed. "But ensure their location is known to the gang whose drug shipment they stole last month. Make the call from a stolen phone, then break it. Let karma find its own agents."
The next morning, the boy was found wandering on a beach, dazed but whole, speaking of "kind shadows" that untied him. By afternoon, news came of a bloody clash between rival gangs in a Morjim shack. No survivors.
Rohan Malhotra called the private number Ganesh had given him. His voice was broken with sobs of relief. "Who are you? Name your price. Anything."
"I am no one," I said, my tone soft, imbued with a compassion that was not feigned. "I am merely a passerby who heard a father's cry. Your duty is not to me, but to your son. Hold him close. Guide him with love, not fear. That is the only dakshina I seek."
I set the phone down. In the garden, Maa was teaching Huilan a bhajan. Their voices, hesitant and sweet, wove through the air.
Shanti called minutes later. Her voice was thin, a blade of ice. "Goa. The Malhotra boy. That was you."
"The boy is safe, Shanti. Is that not the important thing?"
"Men are dead, Rajendra!"
"Men who lived by violence died by the violence they sowed. The boy who lived by innocence is home by grace. The math of the universe balanced itself. I merely... swept the ashes from the altar."
She had no words. Only a silence that spoke of a gulf now too wide to bridge. She saw a monster performing miracles.
I looked at the idol of Krishna. The gentle flute player, who also served as the divine strategist on the field of Dharma.
I had not taken life. I had allowed consequence to flow where it would. I had not demanded tribute. I had asked for a father's love to be renewed.
The jalebi that morning tasted especially sweet. The garden seemed especially green. There was no victory in it. Only a quiet, profound satisfaction. A shepherd does not rejoice in the wolf's death, only in the safety of the flock.
To Shanti, it was villainy. To the father, it was divinity.
To me, it was simply duty. A gentle hand, guiding the fallen sparrow back to its nest, while the storm of its pursuers raged harmlessly away. The most efficient mercy is often the one that requires no blood on your own hands.