The entire palace had turned into a ghost house, filled with wails of agony every now and then that sent chills down the spine. Most of them came from the female members of the family and courts, sometimes from Queen Mother Bhanumati when she had the strength to voice her pain. Na'arvi had not wept at all; not a single tear escaped her eyes. The pain was a numbness in her, like a cold dagger.
There were whispers in the palace of her silence, that she had not cried because she had a heart of stone. Even she was surprised why she could not weep. Maybe she had shed all her tears when she was pleading Indra not to go to war against Shaktidev. Na'arvi had walled off the thorny words, the mean whispers, but the one that crept into her chest was the talk of the girl that Indra had wedded, and if rumors were to be believed, bedded, just before his capture.