"It is believed," Kaveri said, "that the one who goes first, forms the strongest bond with the wife."
"Ohh, interesting."
Divya was impressed.
"This is fascinating. Right?"
She continued and looked at me with a smile.
" The men here patiently wait for their turn with their wives.
They must have remarkable self-control and genuine affection for them."
She turned towards Kaveri.
"You know, in Delhpur, many women end up resenting their husbands after a few years of marriage."
Divya said it with utmost respect for the people of the Khano tribe.
Kaveri rose with a composed smile, sliding the chair neatly back into place.
"Well, women whose husbands visit the mansion frequently have similar stories in the Khano tribe too."
I looked at Divya. Her expression carried the same confusion.
"Mansion?
Which mansion?"
I asked.
At first, I assumed she meant moving to a larger house, but it quickly became clear that "mansion" was a word every wife here seemed to despise.
Kaveri's eyes widened.
"You don't know about the mansion?"
Divya and I shook our heads.
"You're not joking, are you?" she pressed.
"No… Oh God, you're scaring me, Kaveri," I said, my hand instinctively moving to my chest.
She pulled back the chair, sat on it in a second, and leaned forward.
"Sometimes…" she began, glancing around to ensure no one was listening. Her voice dropped to a whisper.
"When a husband's needs aren't met, they go to the mansion… to satisfy their desires," she whispered.
"By needs — do you mean physical?"
It was obvious what Kaveri meant, but Diya still wanted to confirm.
"Is there a prostitute in the mansion?"
I asked cautiously.
She looked at Divya. "Yes."
Then she looked at me. "Not a prostitute — prostitutes."
Prostitution may not be legal, but it exists in almost every country.
"Kaveri, even in a place like Delhpur, we do have cases where men and women are caught and jailed," I said.
"So it's obvious to find it here too."
"Oh, but the difference is they aren't jailed here."
I thought people involved in it were hard to catch. But what she said next was difficult for me to digest — and even more difficult for Divya.
"Here it's legal.
They are paid by husbands from the Khano tribe.
They earn well, and sometimes they are even listed among the highest taxpayers of the year."
Kaveri said it with an expression that suggested she knew it would shock us both.
"What?" Disbelief flickered in Divya's eyes.
But Divya wasn't married in this tribe. I was.
Everything inside me went still.
Why?
Why were my parents so desperate to marry me into a place like this?
Do they hate me?
An anger began to rise inside me — not explosive, not wild, but slow and non-reactive.
The kind that does not scream but turns your heart into stone.
For the first time, it made me realise something I had never allowed myself to think:
Parents are not always well-wishers.
And from this moment onward, my life was mine to take charge of.
"So now am I supposed to sleep with three men who sleep with other women and invite sexually transmitted diseases into my body?"
I looked at Divya, searching for answers, hoping for some advice. There was no anger inside me, no sadness in my tone. I had stopped feeling. I only wanted a way to survive the next three years.
"Don't worry. Not everyone visits the mansion," Kaveri said quickly. But something in her tone and expression contradicted what she was saying.
"Generally, those who have been married for a long time go there. Not newly married men."
Kaveri was trying to do damage control after bombing us with this uncomfortable news the very next day of my marriage.
"I thought this system was supposed to be empowering to women," Divya laughed.
Then her voice hardened.
"I forgot — it's a male-dominated world. No matter the system, men always seem to end up on the better side of the deal."
It became absolutely evident to me that I am not going to spend my entire life here. But I still had to fool my parents into believing that I am trying my best to keep my husbands happy.
My plan?
To live happily.
To do what a wife would do.
Not get emotionally attached, and then pack my suitcases without saying a word.
I stretched my hand, placed it over hers, and said, "Divya, men would never surrender this much power without compensation."
I looked at Kaveri, and I noticed her lips move to one side, as though she had understood this decades ago.
"Kaveri, it's obvious that a woman can't love multiple men equally, so they might sneak out. But does it change anything for the wife?"
I had to ask how it would impact me. It was better to know in advance.
Well, a woman has to maintain the image that she has control over her household — that her husbands listen to her, that she loves them all equally and without bias.
And when a husband visits the mansion, it quietly reveals what no one openly admits: who stands lowest in the wife's affections, and who may eventually seek emotional and physical intimacy elsewhere.
"I am really sorry, Aayna. I was the happiest, the most excited one at your marriage, but now I realise I should have tried to stop this from happening."
The sadness in Divya's eyes was impossible to miss.
I wished I could tell her that even if she had realised this sooner, it would not have changed the way my parents think.
"Know your rights, ma'am. That's very important. You might end up having a great relationship with all of them, but you are so unprepared for a marriage like this that it would be easy to fool you."
My mother should have told me these things. She should have prepared me. But instead, a servant was the one telling me all this.
"Listen to these rules carefully," Kaveri said.
"Men aren't allowed to leave their houses for the mansion before 10 pm.
Men can't leave for the mansion if their wife is with them in the room.
And it is their legal right to go to the mansion, so you can't stop them from going there."
A voice drifted in from outside. "Kaveri, get this cleaned up."
"Aaaaagggghhh!"
It startled all three of us. We were so lost in our conversation that we had forgotten other people also lived in the house.
It was Varun.
Did he overhear us?
I whispered in Divya's ears.
He came inside and leaned against the doorframe, resting one arm on it.
"Did I scare you?" he asked.