Flashback continued
"How much time do you think you need for this?" Dharitri asked him finally in a calm manner.
"It shouldn't take more than a month. The girl is like a ripe fruit, impatiently waiting to be plucked," Ganak replied in a coarse manner.
Katyayani's mind and feet seemed to have been thrown in an ice cellar. Holding an iron pot in her hand, she crushed it with all her might. The pot remained unaffected but her palms bore the brunt.
She was still in a daze when the two of them walked past her, one after another.
Ganak seemed to be in a good mood and was whistling when his shoulders nearly touched her on his way out.
Katyayani didn't know how she made it back to Mrigtrishna's entrance. She was shivering and almost delirious when Eka found her sitting on the front steps of the music hall.
"I told you not to go galavanting around. Look at your condition now," she scolded the girl in a concerned voice.
Katyayani suddenly looked up at the kind woman crouching in front of her. "I am sorry… I am really sorry. It was really my fault. I shouldn't have..."
Looking at the sobbing, heartbroken girl in front of her, Eka was stunned.
"Young Miss… Katyayani, what happened? Are you in too much pain? Come, let's go inside," she said and helped the shivering girl stand up.
That night, Katyayani developed a high fever which didn't go down for a week. Everyone, including the wounded Trini, came down to Dima, worried about their mistress.
Katyayani slipped in and out of consciousness during those seven days. On the eighth day, the fever finally broke and Katyayani regained control over her mind.
A fortnight later, Mandodari came to Katyayani and handed her a glass of kesar* milk. "I have brewed it for a few hours. It has all your favourite nuts and honey. You better drink it while it's hot."
"Dai Maa, why did my mother ask me to cover my looks in front of the family and everyone else?" Katyayani asked her out of the blue.
She had thought really hard during the past few days of her illness.
Had she not been deliberately 'plain looking', would the lowly groom have dared to approach her in such a manner?
Moreover, her eldest sister clearly had a grudge against her. But she hadn't done anything bad to her during these years to have her carry malice against her and such a severe one where she wanted her heart to be shattered.
Why the grudge then?
The irony was Ganak probably believed that it was due to her lack of confidence, which stemmed from her being 'ugly' that she responded to his overtures.
Would he laugh if he found out that it was due to her starving for friendship and affection that made her break out of her restraints and respond to him so eagerly?
Mandodari was taken aback at the question. In the past, Katyayani had never shown any inquisitiveness towards her mother's last set of instructions.
"I think Young Miss is old enough now to understand the truth, Mandodari didi," Dvi pushed the beaded curtain and entered the chamber.
All this while, Chatvari had alternated between Trini and Katyayani's rooms, helping them both recuperate. While Eka had taken care of the meals, it was Dvi who held the near comatose young girl's hand through those seven burning days.
During this period, her mistress spouted a lot of gibberish, some of which was related to her deceased parents but a lot was about some friend who had deceived her. Dvi had tried to think of all the people whom Young Miss knew but couldn't come up with a probable candidate as this potential friend.
After all, Young Miss hardly interacted with anyone apart from the four of them and even if there were any other acquaintances, none of them were close to her age.
Thinking about it for sometime, Dvi decided not to mention her suspicions to anyone. But Katyayani's sudden question this afternoon made Dvi instinctively feel that she should no longer be kept in the dark about matters of the past.
Truth would help her grow up better, stronger!
"That year… at that time, your mother was injured badly. She got hurt, trying to save this lowly, undeserving servant. In a wounded state, she accidentally met your father who was in Adra for a project assigned to him by the emperor of Mandhaar. Since he was a part of Mandhaar's foreign office, he enjoyed a certain level of power in Adra as a foreign diplomat. When no one in Adra was willing to help your mother, it was your father who extended timely support and helped her recuperate. It was also due to him, that her painful wish of leaving her motherland was realised," Mandodari's hoarse voice rang in the otherwise quiet room.
Knowingly or otherwise, Dvi's hand slipped into Katyayani's cold palm and stayed there.
Katyayani was aware of the circumstances under which her mother had to leave the country of her origin.
"Bringing her to Mandhaar wasn't easy and your father had to use every connection and goodwill, which he had earned up to that point, to pull in the favour to build a fake identity around your mother. After all, her pursuers wouldn't give up on her trail," Mandodari's grim words echoed in the room quietly.
After a long pause, she picked up the narrative again. "Your grandfather, Kirtidev, was quite a powerful person in the capital at that time. After a lot of persuasion by his favourite son, he agreed to provide shelter to his 'future daughter-in law'. Her new identity was that of a poor distant niece of the Bali family. Even though your mother kept a low profile and tried to minimise her presence in the household, she caught the fancy of the eldest son of the Bali clan, Rudradev."
Mandodari didn't like anyone from the Bali clan, except for Katyayani's father and didn't bother using honorable titles for the rest of the members.
Moreover, Mandodari owed her life to Kadambari, her mistress, and till date she was regretful about the matters of the past. Had it not been for her own wounded state, Mandodari would have helped her prevent the situation where she was dependent upon a stranger, Hridaydev, for her survival.
*Kesar - Saffron