278 Risky games

Himprayag

"Please tell me that this is a joke," Shaurya's tone was scathing and filled with incredulity.

"Are you implying that in entire Himprayag, you can't find a man better qualified and suited than an insignificant outsider? Kindly excuse me as I find that hard to believe," his voice was outrightly jeering now.

Since the things had reached upto this stage, he didn't see any need to keep up the pretence and gave it off to her. This was definitely not the time to be polite.

Ahilya paled when his sarcastic words hit her but she recovered quickly and replied, "I don't have to explain my choice or the reason behind it to you. All you need to know is that in order for the alliance between Chandragarh and Himprayag to go through, you will be the tipping factor."

Shaurya froze at her words and whispered, "You would jeopardise such an important agreement just to fulfill a whim? No wonder your father thinks that you aren't suited for the position."

Ahilya flinched as if slapped.

But she ignored the hurtful words and said indifferently, "If I don't have a groom, the alliance won't hold any meaning in my father's eyes. Then why should I go ahead with it? Chandragarh was the one who came to me, looking to form a partnership, not the other way around."

Shaurya felt as if he had fallen into some sort of a badly written play and he was the poor female lead being led to the altar forcibly by the horrid villain. There was something horribly wrong with this image!

"No, I still do not agree," he replied in a resounding voice.

"You have misunderstood. I am not asking you, I am telling you," said Ahilya, matching his tone.

Eastern Zilla, Chandragarh

It was finally the second quarter of the night. Ramanujam had been waiting for this moment. He needed to enter the building above his hiding hole in order to get some answers. There was no other way. The conversation through the day had been mundane and non-informative. Since they had spoken about some sort of action to be taken in the next forty-eight hours, he knew that he didn't have much time left.

He opened the trapdoor cautiously and exited the basement. He had smeared his face with as much mud as he could, hoping that he won't be visible in the flickering lamps at this late hour. Stealthily, he made his way to the higher floor where Sharada had been conducting his meeting with his minions during the day.

He was hoping to find some sort of written information or plan which would give him a clue to the Eastern zilla head's future action and may also act as a proof against her. Not daring to light any lamp, Ramanujam opened the window partly to let the moonlight stream in for him to look through the room. Unfortunately, he couldn't find even a scrap of paper in the entire room after a thorough search. How was this possible? There should have been some sort of a record of what were they upto. Frustrated, he ran his fingers through his hair and took a deep breath in.

He really had run out of choices.

Ramanujam made his way back downstairs and crept towards the dorm where everyone was sleeping. Till now he hadn't encountered any guard. Maybe the chief had stationed them only on the external perimeter, deeming the inside of the building to be safe. Or maybe, he was walking into a trap.

Irrespective, he had to be ready for all possibilities. At least this time he had come prepared. He checked and realised that the door to the dorm was shut tightly but wasn't locked.

Ramanujam opened it centimetre by centimetre with his fingernails, praying that the door hinges won't protest and alert the enemy. It was pitch dark inside and that suited his purpose as of now.

After the door was opened wide to about six inches, he wedged his foot through it to stop it from shutting again. He quickly took out a black colored coil from his pocket and lit it. Holding his breath, he bent down and slid the coil as far as he could on the floor inside the room. Shutting the door quietly again, he started counting in his head.

There was something extremely satisfactory to pay back the enemy with the same coin. Sharada's people had done it enough number of times to Ramanujam in captivity. It was his turn now.

Even though five minutes had passed, he didn't take any risk and tiptoed into the room without any light in his hand. Ramanujam knew that he only had a few minutes to look through the room. He won't be able to hold his breath beyond that.

Going past the men who were lying prone on their beds, he took in whatever was visible in the pale moonlight. He counted about twenty men in the room at present. Sharada wasn't among them. But at the far end of the room, a bed had been put in the centre and there were people sleeping around it.

"This must be the child," thought Ramanujam.

If the child was important to Sharada, then taking him away could help Ramanujam buy sometime. With that thought, he walked towards the bed and peered as hard as he could, under the dim light. But he couldn't make out much due to the lack of light and the distance from where he was standing. Praying for the potency of the medicine to have held everyone in its grip, he leapt over one of the men who had been guarding the bed and now was slumped by the bedside.

"This… what the…" Ramanujam was stunned.

Gurukul, Capital

"How the hell did she get two votes?" the entire gang was sitting under a tree outside the Admin building, except for Yash who had gone to visit his mother.

Excluding Abhirath, everyone else was grumbling about the hot topic involving Vindhya and the favouritism shown to her. Even the normally cool Ganga seemed perturbed by it.