Chapter 1: The Scent of Petrichor and Rust
The iron gates of Megh-Nivas did not creak; they groaned, a low, metallic heave that sounded like a warning. Arjun stepped through them, his boots sinking slightly into the mud of the driveway, a sludge of red earth and decaying neem leaves. Above him, the sky of Kodaikanal was the color of a fresh bruise—purplish-grey and heavy with the promise of the afternoon deluge.
To anyone else, the house was a carcass. The white lime plaster was peeling away in jagged flakes, revealing the skeletal laterite bricks beneath. Ivy climbed the pillars of the wide veranda like strangler figs, and the roof tiles were slick with a moss so green it looked radioactive. But Arjun didn't see a ruin. He saw a sanctuary. He saw the only place in the world where the air didn't feel like it was laced with his mother's disapproval.
"We're home, Diya," he whispered, his voice barely a ripple in the humid air.
He adjusted the strap of his leather satchel. Inside were his tools—fine-tipped brushes, scalpels for scraping away decades of neglect, and a small, silver-framed photograph he hadn't looked at since he left the bus station. He didn't need to look at it. He could close his eyes and map the geometry of Diya's face: the slight asymmetry of her smile, the way her kohl-lined eyes seemed to hold the secrets of a thousand monsoons, and the tiny, defiant mole just above her upper lip.
The front door was a massive slab of Burmese teak. Arjun fumbled with the heavy brass key, his fingers trembling slightly. It wasn't the cold; it was the anticipation. When the lock finally gave way with a satisfying thunk, the scent hit him. It wasn't the smell of an abandoned house—musty and stale. Instead, it was the faint, impossible fragrance of crushed jasmine and sandalwood.
He froze on the threshold. "Diya?"
No answer. Only the distant, rhythmic thud-thud-thud of a woodpecker in the silver oaks nearby. He stepped into the foyer. The floor was laid with Chettinad tiles—ochre and deep red patterns that formed an infinite kaleidoscope. Dust motes danced in the thin shafts of light piercing through the cracked clerestory windows.
Arjun dropped his bags. The sound echoed through the hollow house, bouncing off the high ceilings. He began to walk through the rooms, his footsteps rhythmic and heavy. He reached the grand central courtyard, the u-shaped heart of the house that was open to the sky. A light drizzle had begun to fall, the water hitting the stone basin in the center with a sound like a thousand tiny glass beads shattering.
He remembered her here. Or rather, he imagined her here. He could almost see her standing by the pillar, her cotton sari damp at the edges, her hair escaping its braid in frantic, curly wisps. She would be laughing at him for his seriousness, for the way he treated every piece of wood like a holy relic.
"Arjun, it's just a house," she would say, her voice a melody of bells and mischief. "A house is just skin. It's the breath inside that matters."
He walked toward the kitchen, the most utilitarian part of the house, yet the most intimate. On the counter sat a small, brass diya. It was unlit, but the wick was charred at the tip. Arjun frowned. The caretaker, a silent man named Mani from the village below, was supposed to have cleaned the place, but he wasn't supposed to be inside the main quarters.
Next to the lamp, he noticed something that made his heart skip a beat. A small, circular stain of red powder—kumkum—on the granite. Beside it lay a single, fresh hibiscus flower. The petals were still turgid, the deep crimson vibrant against the grey stone.
"Mani?" Arjun called out, his voice sharper now. "Mani, are you here?"
He hurried to the back door, throwing it open to the rear garden. The overgrown weeds swayed in the wind, but there was no sign of the caretaker. The small outhouse where Mani was supposed to stay was locked from the outside.
Arjun returned to the kitchen, staring at the hibiscus. His mind raced. Kodaikanal was a place of mist and legends, of spirits that supposedly wandered the shola forests. But he was a man of science, of restoration, of physical facts. A fresh flower meant a hand had placed it there.
She's here, a voice whispered in the back of his mind. She beat you here.
He laughed, a dry, jagged sound. "Don't be a fool, Arjun," he muttered to the empty room. "The village girls probably come in here to pray. They think it's a shrine."
He spent the next few hours working, trying to drown out the silence. He unpacked his crates, setting up his workbench in the library. This room was a graveyard of leather-bound books, their spines cracked, their pages yellowed by the damp mountain air. He began the meticulous process of dusting, his movements practiced and slow.
As the sun began to set, casting long, orange shadows like grasping fingers across the floorboards, Arjun felt a sudden, inexplicable chill. The temperature had dropped as the mist rolled in, thick and white, swallowing the trees and the garden until the house felt like it was floating in a void.
He climbed the stairs to the master bedroom. This was the room he had dreamt of the most. It had a balcony that overlooked the valley, a view that Diya had once told him she wanted to wake up to every day of her life.
The door was heavy and resisted him. When he pushed it open, he stopped dead.
The bed, a massive four-poster frame without a mattress, wasn't empty. Laying across the wooden slats was a long, silk dupatta—a vibrant emerald green, the exact shade Diya had worn on the night they sat by the Yamuna in Delhi and promised to run away together.
Arjun's breath hitched. He walked toward it, his knees feeling weak. He reached out, his fingers brushing the fabric. It was soft, cool, and smelled unmistakably of the incense Diya used.
"Diya?" he whispered, his eyes stinging. "If this is a joke, it's a cruel one."
He spun around. The room was empty. The shadows in the corners seemed to stretch, mocking him. He ran to the balcony, looking out into the mist.
"Diya! I know you're here! Stop hiding!"
His voice was swallowed by the fog. Below, on the gravel path, he thought he saw a flicker of white—a figure moving toward the gates.
"Wait!"
He bolted out of the room, down the stairs, his boots thundering on the wood. He tore open the front door and ran into the rain, which was now falling in earnest. The cold water soaked through his shirt in seconds, but he didn't care. He reached the gate, looking up and down the winding mountain road.
There was no one. Only the tall eucalyptus trees swaying in the wind, their bark peeling like dead skin.
He stood there for a long time, the rain washing over him, shivering violently. He felt a hand on his shoulder.
He jumped, spinning around with a gasp. It was Mani, the caretaker. The old man was wrapped in a rough wool blanket, holding a dim kerosene lantern that flickered in the wind. His face was a map of deep wrinkles, his eyes clouded with cataracts.
"Babu? Why are you out in the rain?" Mani asked, his voice a raspy whisper.
"I saw someone, Mani," Arjun panted, clutching the old man's arm. "A woman. In a green dress. She was in the house. She left a flower in the kitchen and a scarf on the bed."
Mani stared at him for a long beat. The lantern light threw long, distorted shadows across the mud. The old man didn't look surprised. He looked... sad.
"There is no one here, Babu," Mani said softly. "The house has been locked since I got the telegram saying you were coming. I have the only other key."
"Then how do you explain the flower? The scarf?"
Mani sighed, a sound like dry leaves skittering on stone. "The mountains play tricks, Arjun Babu. The mist has a way of showing us what we hunger for. You have come here with a heavy heart. The house is just reflecting it back to you."
"I'm not crazy, Mani," Arjun snapped, pulling his arm away.
"I didn't say you were, Babu," Mani replied, turning toward his outhouse. "But this is Kodaikanal. Here, the line between what is gone and what remains is as thin as the mist. Go inside. Dry yourself. Tomorrow the sun will come, and the ghosts will hide."
Arjun watched him walk away. He went back inside, locking the door behind him. He didn't go back upstairs. He curled up on a small rug in the library, his back against the wall, a heavy blanket wrapped around his shivering frame.
He fell into a fitful sleep, chased by dreams of green silk and the sound of anklets.
In the middle of the night, a sound woke him. It wasn't the rain. It was a soft, rhythmic scraping coming from the floorboards above him. Scrape. Scrape. Scrape.
It sounded like someone was dragging a heavy trunk. Or a body.
And then, a voice. Faint, muffled by the wood, but clear enough to make the hair on his arms stand up. It wasn't Diya's voice. It was a low, melodic humming—a classical thumri she used to sing when she was happy.
Arjun sat frozen in the dark. He looked at the library door. Below the gap at the bottom of the door, a faint, flickering light appeared in the hallway. Not the white light of a flashlight, but the warm, pulsing glow of a candle.
He stood up, his heart hammering against his ribs like a trapped bird. He reached for the door handle.
"Diya?" he breathed.
As his hand touched the cold metal, the humming stopped. The light beneath the door vanished.
He threw the door open. The hallway was pitch black. The scent of jasmine was so strong it was almost nauseating.
He reached into his pocket and pulled out his lighter. The small flame illuminated the floor. There, in the dust of the hallway, were footprints. Small, bare footprints, leading away from his door and toward the stairs.
But as he watched, the footprints didn't just sit there. They began to fade, the dust settling back into place as if gravity itself was erasing the evidence of a visitor.
Arjun didn't scream. He didn't run. He sat down on the floor and began to cry. Because in that moment, he didn't care if he was losing his mind. If this was madness, it was a madness that smelled like her, and he wasn't ready to be sane just yet.
He didn't see the shadow standing at the top of the stairs, watching him. A shadow that didn't move, didn't breathe, and didn't belong to the living.