The rhythmic, metallic clack-clack of the train over the iron tracks felt less like a journey and more like the ticking of a cruel, mocking clock. Every mile takes me closer to your final goodbye, Akka— my elder sister; Kaveri, and every mile takes me further from the boy you bled to protect. Everyone calls me a healer, a doctor now—but what use is this knowledge when I couldn't stitch your life back together? What use is this knowledge when I can't save you, when you were on the verge of death? What use is this knowledge when I can't save you from that fucking monster—your husband, Randhir? What exactly is the use of this knowledge, wealth, power, when I can't save a woman who meant everything to me, a woman who is more than my own life? My hands were meant to save, yet they only knew how to tremble as you breathed your last.

I sat in the dim light of the first-class coupe, the heavy velvet curtains drawn shut against the passing Indian countryside. The year was 1978, but inside my mind, time had stopped the night I lost her. My gaze remained fixed on the copper urn resting on the berth opposite mine. It was small. Too small to contain the fierce, unyielding soul of the woman who had been my entire world.

Akka. I leaned my head back against the leather seat, closing my eyes, but the darkness offered no refuge. It only served as a canvas for my memories. I am thirty years old, a respected doctor, the heir to the Ramaswami Zamindari of Kanyakumari—a name that commanded fear and respect in the South. But sitting here, breathing in the scent of soot and old Rexine, I was just a terrified boy again.

I remembered the cold, sprawling corridors of our ancestral mansion. To the world, our parents were royalty, respected owners who owned most of the land. But to us, they were monsters. I could still hear the sharp whistle of the cane slicing through the heavy, humid air, but the pain rarely found my skin. She was always there. My older sister, throwing her frail body over mine, absorbing the blows, her hands clutching my head to her chest. "Don't cry, Kannu," she would whisper, her voice trembling but her spirit unbreakable. "I've got you. I'll always have you." ''Your sister will always be with you, always will protect you, no matter what happens.'' '' Sister always loves her younger brother, right Kannu, you are my charm, my reason to smile, okay baccha, so please stop crying for your sister, otherwise your sister will also begin to cry, so tell me, do you want to see me cry? Huh, no na so stop crying'' while placing a kiss on my forehead.

The weight of your life shouldn't fit into a vessel this small, Akka. You were the shield that took every blow our father aimed at me. I remember the sting of father's cane, the coldness of mother's silence. You were just a girl yourself, barely older than I was, but you stood like a fortress between me and their rage. ''Don't touch him,'' you'd scream at them. You were just a girl, but you were a giant to me.

And when I was thirteen, the monsters finally died. An accident, everyone said. I felt no sorrow, no grief, only a hollow relief, that I don't even know why.

But their deaths unleashed a new kind of horror. When they died, and the vultures circled—those greedy relatives with their fake smiles and sharp knives, rival landlords, all looking to tear apart our inheritance, wealth, power, everything, to think that no one in this family can be capable of running our ownership. But they don't know that there is a girl who endured a living hell for the past 18 years, and once again, she stood in front of me. She didn't let a single shadow touch me. She became the matriarch overnight, a teenage girl battling grown men with teeth bared, guarding our wealth and my life with a ferocity that terrified them into submission.

She sent me away to become a man of respect who always helps others, while she stayed back to fight the demons of our lineage alone. She sacrificed her youth so I could have a bright future.

And how did I repay her?

My hands clenched into fists, my fingernails digging into my palms until I felt the sting of broken skin. I had left. I went to London to pursue my medical degree, drowning myself in books and labs while she stayed behind in the sprawling, lonely estate.

It was during those years that she met him.

A low, animalistic growl escaped my throat at the thought of the bastard who had ruined her, leaving her with nothing but vacuity. He had charmed her, married her when she was 23 years old, and after 1 year, when she was heavy with his children, he abandoned her for another woman. It should have ended there. She was strong. She had raised the twins beautifully without him. But 8 years later, he returned, spinning a web of lies, begging for forgiveness, playing on her one weakness: her immense, forgiving, and kind heart.

He didn't just break her heart. He took her life.

The memory hit me with the force of a physical blow. The frantic telegram. The agonizing flight back to India. Bursting through the doors of her home, only to find the floors slick with her blood. He had trapped her, butchered her mercilessly for the estate, but he underestimated a mother's instinct. She had fought long enough to lock the twins in the cellar.

"Kannan...," her dying breath still echoed in my ears, a ghostly whisper that haunted my every waking moment. Her blood-soaked hands were clutching my shirt, thrusting the terrified, crying eight-year-olds toward me.

"Please...fulfill my one request... please beta...Keep them safe. Promise me, Promise me Kannan..."

I couldn't save you, I screamed internally, the guilt a living, breathing creature gnawing at my ribs. I was learning to heal the world, and I couldn't save the only person who mattered the most.

I opened my eyes, staring intensely at the copper urn. "I swear it, Akka," I whispered into the empty compartment, my voice rough, broken. "I will protect those two with my last breath. I will raise them to be untouchable. I promise you." While saying this, I don't even realise when tears from my eyes fall on my cheeks.

The train lurched, the screech of the brakes pulling me forcefully from the nightmare. We had arrived. Prayagraj.

The morning mist over the Triveni Sangam was thick, chilling me to the bone, though I barely felt the cold. The holy city hummed with the prayers of thousands, the scent of sandalwood and wet earth filling the air.

I waded waist-deep into the freezing, sacred waters of the Ganges. The river was wild, churning with the weight of millions of sins and sorrows. With my trembling hands, I tipped the copper urn. The grey ashes cascaded into the dark water, instantly dissolving, carrying my sister away from me forever. Tears slipped down my cheek, hot, bitter, and uncontrollable. It was done. "Forgive me, Akka". This water is cold, but it is not as cold as the guilt in my chest. I am letting you go into the flow of the Ganga, but I am keeping your fire inside me. Rest now. Your brother is no longer the frightened boy you hid behind the curtains. "I swear on this holy river I am going to, no matter the cost of my own soul, I will be the shield you were for me. I will be their father, their protector, and their vengeance.", and I will burn the world before I let your children shed a single tear." I whisper to the ashes. "I have the children. I swear on my life, no shadow will touch them ever."

Just as the last of the grey dust vanishes into the current, and I turned back toward the shore, the heavy, wet fabric of my kurta was clinging to my skin. But as I trudged through the water, a sudden splash caught my attention. Downriver, where the currents grew violent and the crowds thinned, a flash of faded fabric broke the surface. I see it. A flash of white silk. A girl, moving into the deep water with a finality that chills my blood.

Without a second thought. I dove into the freezing water, my powerful strokes cutting through the harsh current. As I reached the spot, I saw her. It wasn't an accident. She wasn't fighting the water; she was letting it take her. She was sinking like a stone, surrendering to the depths, as if she were trying to end her life.

Not today, I roared in my mind. There has been enough death and without a single thought for my own life, I dived into the treacherous, churning waters, fighting the fierce tide with a frantic desperation driven entirely by a sudden, cosmic urge to save her.

The river roared like an unforgiving beast, its dark, swirling currents threatening to swallow everything in its path, but time seemed to freeze into slow motion the exact moment I spotted her. I grabbed a handful of her soaked clothing, hauling her against my chest. She was impossibly light, fragile like a porcelain doll, and when my arms finally locked around her slender waist, a strange, electric jolt shot through my veins, defying the freezing depths of the river. I fought the current with one arm, dragging us both back to the muddy banks, collapsing onto the wet sand, and tenderly cradling her head in my lap as if she were the most fragile treasure in the world. Panting, shivering, I carried her away from the prying eyes of the pilgrims, kicking open the wooden door of an abandoned, dusty cottage nearby that belonged to the boatmen.

I laid her down on a woven charpai (cot) in the center of the dim room. I quickly checked her vitals. Pulse: thready. Breathing: shallow. I turned her to the side, pressing firmly on her back until she coughed, violently expelling the river water from her lungs. She gasped, a ragged, desperate sound, before falling back into unconsciousness.

I grabbed a dry, rough shawl from my bag and wrapped it tightly around her shivering form. Striking a match, I lit the old kerosene lantern hanging from the ceiling beam.

Golden light flooded the small space, and for the first time, I truly looked at her.

My breath hitched in my throat. Everything within me, the roaring grief, the agonizing guilt, suddenly went dead silent.

She was... ethereal. Her skin was incredibly pale, almost translucent in the dim light, contrasting sharply with the pitch-black, wet strands of hair plastered against her delicate jawline. She had the high, aristocratic cheekbones of a forgotten queen, and lips that were slightly parted, shaped perfectly like a rosebud despite their bluish tint. There was a tragic, agonizing purity to her features.

I felt a sudden, violent pull in my chest. A dangerous kind of gravity. It was as if the universe had hollowed me out completely just hours ago, only to forcefully pour this stranger into the empty spaces of my soul.

I couldn't look away. I was completely mesmerized. My fingers itched with a sudden, overwhelming urge to capture her, to immortalize this strange, breathless moment. Sitting on the dirt floor beside the cot, the sounds of the world outside fading into nothingness, I find myself admiring her, capturing the curve of her closed eyelids, the fragile slope of her neck, I felt myself falling. It was terrifying. It was instantaneous. I was a man built on logic, respect, and cold vengeance, but looking at her, I felt a desperate, irrational need to lock her away from the world and never let anyone else see her. "She is a fallen star in a room full of shadows. I don't even know her name, yet I feel as though I've been waiting for this specific tragedy my entire life. If she wakes up and asks for a reason to live, I fear I will offer her myself."

Then, after some time.

Her eyelashes began to flutter. I froze.

Slowly, painfully, she opened her eyes. They were large, expressive, and the color of toasted honey. But as she looked at me, and then around the dark, dusty cottage, there was no fear of a stranger. There was only a terrifying, empty panic.

"Where..." her voice was a raspy whisper, like dry leaves scraping against stone. " Where am I...? Who are you...?. And...'' as soon as she tried to speak, I said, "Easy... don't try to move. You're safe. You're in a cottage near the ghats. I am a doctor. You were in the water... I pulled you out." She pushed herself up weakly, clutching the shawl to her chest. She looked down at her hands, then back at me, her chest heaving with sudden terror. "Who... who am I?"

What..., wait, wait, wait a minute, what did she just say?

I stared at her, my medical mind instantly diagnosing the sheer, unadulterated confusion in her eyes. Has she developed Amnesia? The trauma, the near-drowning, had it wiped her slate clean? Did she not remember her name? Did she not remember why she had tried to die? Did she belong to no one?

A dark, possessive thrill shot through my veins before I could suppress it.

"You're safe," I murmured, my deep voice softening as I slowly stood up, stepping closer to her. "You are..."

Before I could finish the sentence, a sudden, chaotic noise erupted outside. The heavy wooden door of the cottage rattled violently on its iron hinges.

"Is anyone in there?!" a gruff voice yelled in the local dialect. "We saw someone break the door! Come out!"

The girl flinched, shrinking back against the mud wall in terror.

My jaw clenched, a deadly calm washing over me as I stepped between her and the door. No one was going to touch her. Not today. Not ever.

The suffocating heat of Prayagraj was a cruel contrast to the crisp, pine-scented winds of my home in Kashmir. So different from the biting chill of my home in Kashmir.

But as I walk through these crowded ghats, I realize the cold isn't in the air—it's been inside my bones since the day my mother breathed her last. But as I dragged my feet through the crowded, dusty streets, the sweat clinging to my heavy cotton shalwar kameez, I realized the weather was the least of my agonies.

I am sixteen years old. A daughter of the wealthy, influential Razdan family of the valley. To the outside world, my life was woven with silk and gold. In reality, it was a cage built of rusted iron and dried blood. My blood.

I clutched the crumpled piece of paper in my hand, and the ink faded from my sweaty palms. It was an address.

My mother's dying breath had been spent whispering this location to me, begging me to find the people here if the torment ever became too much. "They will help you, Rumi, she had promised. They owe me their lives."

I winced as a passing cart jolted my shoulder. A sharp, searing pain shot down my back, a vicious reminder of why I was here.

I can still feel the ghost of my father's rings against my cheek, the way the skin split when I dared to say 'no.' Beneath the modest fabric of my clothes, my skin was a canvas of bruises, wounds, cuts, and angry, healing welts.

I closed my eyes, stumbling into an alleyway to catch my breath as the memories assaulted me. The grand halls of our estate are echoing with my screams.

My own father's cold, indifferent eyes as he watched my stepmother hand the heavy wooden cane to my stepbrother.

The agonizing sting as the wood met my fragile spine, again and again, until I tasted the metallic tang of my own blood on the floor. My stepmother was standing in the corner, laughing behind her manicured hand.

My step-siblings... they didn't see a sister. They saw a nuisance, a piece of meat to be traded to a forty-year-old man who looked at me with eyes that made me want to scrub my skin raw.

My crime? I had dared to say no.

They had finalized my marriage to a man older than my own father, a forty-year-old businessman with 3 wives, one of whom is old, and the other one is just like a servant, and one who died while giving birth to a 1 year old daughter.

It wa a marriage; it was a transaction. -a business deal to expand my father's empire, with my youth and innocence as the currency.

They beat me until my spirit shattered on the marble floor. Broken, bleeding, and gasping for air, I had finally nodded. I agreed to be sold to the monster just to seek a moment to run away from there.

And finally… finally, I was able to run from there with the help of my 2 twin stepsisters- Azizi and Zooni; only members in that cold estate that truly cared about me.

Who used to apply medicine to my wounds even when I used to refuse, but they still resisted.

Who used to offer her shoulder for me to cry on, even when I try to hide my tears, they still understand everything without even letting me say a single word.

They both were constrained by their own circumstances— which means they couldn’t go against our family members— yet they always looked after me, whether I was okay or not, and if not, then they both listened to everything from me patiently, understanding every ounce of my words.

If I eat or not, and if not,t then they both don’t leave until I eat the tiniest grain on my plate.

If I were sick and needed medicine, if I miss my mom and cry silently, but they both still know everything by reading in my eyes.

If i was again get afraid of darkness or blood, as I have SCOTOPHOBIA and HEMATOPHOBIA due to my past, they both calmly handle it.

They both always sleep beside me just to ensure that I am safe. They both know that I am always getting nightmares, so they both always hug me tightly while sleeping because of that, overwhelmed, or just like a real sister, even more than that.

Then suddenly,

I opened my eyes, the dusty alley of Prayagraj coming back into focus. I had risked everything to find this address. This was my escape. My salvation. My chance to be free. My sanity, my everything including my life.

Taking a deep breath, I approached the small, dilapidated shop at the end of the lane. An old man sat on a charpai, chewing paan.

"Excuse me, Uncle," my voice trembled, raspy and weak. I held out the crumpled paper. "I am looking for this family. The Kesarwanis. They used to live here."

The old man squinted at the paper, then looked up at me with hollow, pitying eyes. He spat a stream of red juice onto the dirt.

"The Kesarwanis? Beti, you are years too late. That house burned down five years ago. The whole family perished in the fire. There is no one left."

The world stopped spinning. The sounds of the bustling city faded into a deafening, high-pitched ring in my ears.

Dead. The paper slipped from my numb fingers, fluttering into the mud. My mother's promise, my last beacon of hope, turned to ash. I was entirely alone. I had nowhere to run.

If I went back to Kashmir, I would be traded and would be thrown into the bed of a monster, and for the fucking whole life, would be beaten mercilessly every day, raped by him every day; every night, a machine of reproducing children as many as he wants until his ego doesn’t satisfy, and a living hell even worse than that.

If I stayed here, I would starve on the streets. Every person who could have shielded me is dust. I am sixteen years old, and I have reached the end of the world.

There is no one left to call my name with love. Only the ghosts remain, and they are calling me from the water.

A heavy, suffocating blanket of despair wrapped around my throat. I couldn't do it anymore. I was so incredibly tired. Tired of fighting, tired of bleeding, tired of breathing in a world that only knew how to hurt me.

My feet moved on their own, carrying my hollow shell of a body toward the holy river.

The Triveni Sangam was vast, a majestic confluence of sacred waters. The sun was beginning to set, painting the sky in violent shades of orange and bruised purple. Pilgrims chanted in the distance, their prayers lifting to the heavens.

But God had never listened to my prayers in the dark corners of the Razdan estate. Why would he listen now?

I waded past the shallow banks, moving away from the crowded ghats and toward the deeper, treacherous currents where the water churned violently.

The icy chill of the river seeped through my clothes, biting into my wounds, but the physical pain was nothing compared to the gaping black hole in my chest.

The water reached my waist, then my chest. The current was terrifyingly strong, pulling at my clothes, eager to swallow me whole.

I looked up at the fading sky, tears finally spilling over my freezing cheeks, mingling with the holy water.

Mama, I sobbed in my mind, my chest heaving with silent, agonizing grief.

"Ma... I'm sorry. I tried to find them. I tried… to carry your memory like a lamp through the dark…, but the oil has… but the oil has run out. I cannot go back to that house. I cannot let a man who bought me like a prize horse touch the hands you used to kiss…. If I return…, I am already dead. This way... at least I choose the timing of my departure." "I'm sorry… I’m sorry ma. I tried… I tried very hard... I tried so hard to be brave, as… You asked. But I am not strong enough…. Please… Please… Please forgive me… forgive me."

I closed my eyes, a strange, beautiful peace finally settling over my battered soul. Death was not scary. Living was scary.

"Forgive me, God. You gave me life, but my father turned it into a prison. If suicide is a sin… surely selling a child… is a greater one. Let the Sangam take me. Let the Yamuna wash away the bruises, please… please… I can't take it anymore…, I just can't…and the Ganga carries my soul to where my mother waits…"

With a final, trembling breath, I stopped fighting the current. I let my legs give out. I finally gave up.

The dark, freezing water rushed over my head, instantly silencing the world. The cold was absolute. Surprisingly, I was sinking very fast, the heavy fabric of my clothes pulling me down into the muddy, sacred abyss. My lungs burned for air, my survival instincts screaming in panic, but I clamped my mouth shut. I just welcomed the darkness. I let my consciousness slip, drifting into the merciful void.

But just as the last spark of life began to fade behind my eyelids, something impossible happened. It's quiet here. No shouting. No belts. No wedding bells that sound like funeral tolls.

"I'm drifting... the light above the surface is shimmering like a dream I'm finally waking up from. I'm sorry, Ma... I'm coming ho—"

In the freezing, violent depths, a firm, scorching heat clamped around my waist.

It was a hand—large, calloused, and terrifyingly strong—locks around my waist. A massive, incredibly strong hand, hauling me violently against a hard, muscular chest. It's a grip that refuses to let go, a heat that defies the river's chill. Someone was holding me. Someone was fighting the river for me.

Who... who is pulling me back to the pain? Who is denying me my peace?

I tried to see it, tried to see who was pulling me from the grip of death, tried to see the face of the man who thinks he can save a soul that is already gone, but the darkness was too heavy. The lack of oxygen finally took its toll. My head fell back against the stranger's chest. My strength fades into the current.

The last thing I feel is the pressure of his arm against me... and then, nothing. and the world vanished completely.