THE RUINS
It was fifteen past eleven in the night when Phulwa woke up in a very composed manner.
She had cried and slept the whole day and even Tai Ji hadn't disturbed her.
Phulwa went to the basin to wash her face and looked into the mirror. Her face was bereaved of any emotion, her eyes stoned.
She looked over her shoulder over Tai Ji's bed and it was not slept in and Tai Ji nowhere to be seen.
Phulwa walked over to her bed and crouched to get her steel trunk from under her bed in which she stored her belongings. She untied the key from her pajama rope and opened the lock on the trunk.
Among the freshly washed collection of colorful dresses she had, the black Satin one stood out on the top. She brushed her hand over the black dress and offered a sad, contemptuous smile.
She bundled the cloth in her fist and threw it on her bed, exposing a wooden sickle lying underneath. It was a very peculiar sickle, its handle was wooden like the most sickles but the arced steel blade had sharp steeled teeth on its bulging perimeter and the convex edge was so sharp it glinted off any amount of light falling on it, like a semi circular ring sun forms during an eclipse.
She wrapped the sickle in the black dress and shoved it in a plastic carry bag. She locked back her trunk and pushed it under her bed. She took a notice of a brass box on Tai Ji's bed right beside hers and walked up to open it. She ate the Roti (chapati) and Bhindi (lady finger) in the box Tai Ji had left her and upon having finished it she gulped down a tower-glass of water.
She took her plastic bag and walked into the angan (courtyard) that held the servant's only premise.
The angan was an open area surrounded by boundary of four walls. The floor was tiled a few years back only when Tai Ji's new apprentice fell on the muddy floor of that angan.
There was an elongated plant pot right in the middle of the ground, with Tulsi plant in it as Tai Ji liked to worship the plant. Phulwa walked up to the north wall and pulled a wooden table to stand on it and jumped the wall.
Once on the other side into the brazen field, she put on her black dress. It was long cloak that had sleeves and a hood. It was long enough to hide the entire body and face and still cause no problem if the wearer had to run.
Once the hood was on, she looked up at the roof of the haveli, the guards were standing with their backs to this side.
Holding the sickle in her hand, she took a run.
The thump of her feet was so calculated, bats would have thought twice before concluding if it was human running. She ran and ran, ran across the brazen field into another fenced field, having rice crop swaying to the wind up to her shoulder length.
She jumped in and looked around. There was no sign of any animal or human being, and the only silence breaker was constant trilling of grasshoppers.
She knew what she had to do. She raised her head and let out a sharp bird whistle. Once. Twice. And all of a sudden ten to fifteen dark figures rose up from the rice field, now their hoods visible from above the shoulders where rice crop ended. And together they raised their heads to let out the similar bird cry into the sky.
At once, as highly trained soldiers they turned and all faced in the direction ahead and took a run. Together they ran through the thick rice fields like the wilderness was their home and the night their slave. They looked like a formation of black heads darting through a yellow canvas, enough to drive the bravest of a man crazy with fear.
When they emerged the rice fields, into an open, yet another brazen field, they let out their sickles to cut through the air. All of them had similar sickle, toothy on the convex and bladed in the concave.
After every other interval of their running, they let out the same sharp cry in unison without abating their speed.
They seemed near to their destination as they entered the woods that further extended and ended into another town. The forest was thick enough to accommodate a town of its own. Now the black hooded figures floated through the woods, their sickles inside once again.
They came to a halt before a channel of trees, maybe eucalyptus. They resumed their movement after the halt but this time it was a humble saunter. They walked through the channel and into the ruin.
The Ruin was an old haveli of Thakur's long-ago ancestry, obviously now ruined, popular and feared in the town by the name The Ruin.
They entered through the creaking wooden door and entered the open yard, surrounded by the boundary of worn out brick wall. There ran a staircase of same worn out brick from every side of the brick wall.
As they entered, several figures rose against the starless night on the walls. Some stood on the stairs and a gang of three came from the door inside The Ruin into the open yard where Phulwa and her gang stood.
The figures on the walls and roofs had no hood or overalls on , but their regular dresses - the dress meant for them - on.
The three who came from inside removed their hoods and the Phulwa and her gang half bowed. They removed their hoods as well. The three were women of stark brown skin before them in their mid forties. Their hair was tied into a bun above their heads and the moon aligned behind them in to the clear night sky.
The one in the middle, the one with her nose pierced and her brown cheeks mounted, came forward, "What is it Spy Sisters? What is the emergency of calling the council at this time of the night?"
"I thought night was our time, mother Kali. And if it hadn't been important, I wouldn't have sent you my delegate for The Calling!"
Phulwa gave the woman standing by the pillar in the hood a nod and the woman in the hood returned the nod.
"Why couldn't you have sent the message with your delegate herself?" The one on the left side said. She was shorter than mother Kali but she was one heck of a fighter.
Phulwa refused to answer that. Instead, she turned to her gang and made herself free to walk so as to face the entire Sisterhood, the ones on the walls, the roofs, the stairs and by the pillars.
"Sisters, the Almighty has dawned upon us the misery of lifetime. It has left us orphans," Phulwa announced.
Mother Kali sprinted towards Phulwa, holding her by arm, "What did you say?" Kali's expression was stiff, the red appearing on her brown cheeks. "How is Amma Ji? Did she say anything about the harvesting festival?" Phulwa could feel the escalation in mother Kali's breathing.
Phulwa shook her head, pursing her lips together, letting the tears roll down her cheeks. The hooded woman standing by the pillar rushed towards Phulwa, holding her from behind.
Phulwa held herself and lifted her chin to face them, "She's dead." Then she nodded frantically.
There were several gasps from all over and Phulwa watched mother Kali going down, her mouth open, struggling for air. The hooded woman holding Phulwa now crouched down to mother Kali and the other two who stood with mother Kali joined her too, they themselves in utter horror.
There was, eventually, a certain song of wailing reverberating through the walls of The Ruins and filling the forest. It was as if the whole forest cried, the winds cried as they blew through and the moon watching above cried. Mother Kali's cry dominated all, like she was the lead in the song of death and rest were chorus.
As the standing women fell to their respective positions, Phulwa pulled herself together to be the last one standing.
The hooded woman, from where she was holding mother Kali, removed her hood to look at Phulwa's face. Tai Ji stared deep into Phulwa's eyes, exchanging the grief and offering whatever consolation her eyes could offer.
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