Mayajaal: the snares of illusion || On hold ||

Chapter Ten

Most of the people were gone, including Chiran and Tulsi Devi. But Vishnugupta had some plans. He signalled Dhananjay to come closer.

He whispered, "Listen to me, bring all your close and trustable associates in our private chamber. Let's have a discussion. Don't tell anyone about this meeting."

Dhananjay nodded and walked away. King sighed and entered the palace. He turned right and started going ahead in the corridor. He turned and entered a room. Dhananjay followed him in a while.

King had his fist tightly closed. He looked at the people before him. "I don't trust him." he referred to Chiran.

Others nodded in approval.

Dhananjay sighed, "I think Chiran might be planning something. We should be prepared."

King nodded, "He has evil and conning mind. We don't know for sure if he truly seeks forgiveness. I'm damn sure he killed our Acharya and he is lying. Okay, he might not want this war, but he used it to kill our Acharya. We don't know his strategy."

One of the ministers said, "Maybe we should kick him out."

King shook his head, "No, we are not powerful as of now. Let's restore our kingdom first." Vishnugupta looked outside the window. He could see burning and destroyed houses all over. People ran hither and thither. He sighed, "Okay, so here's what we will do. We would get wealth from him, restore our kingdom, and kill him. We could make him disappear out of blue and no one would find out."

The ministers looked at each other. One of them said, "My king, wouldn't that be wrong to kill him just like that? We aren't so sure about this. It would be adharma."

King shook his head. "Trust me when I tell you. I know Chiran and he has the capacity to fool anyone. He was doing adharma. We can publically prosecute him later. But people can get attracted to him by then, by his drama, and by his so-called charity to us. We have to think before acting."

"But what if we are wrong? That would be a wrong deed from our behalf."

King looked at the minister. "A king is given the ability to take decision based on previous experiences by carefully examining the situation. I'm king of this kingdom and it's my responsibility to punish the offender. And I know Chiran is the one. If you look at his activities, all he did was sweet-talking. His words had fooled us in the past. He lied to us many times. He went behind our backs. One should be away from such individuals as far as possible. I don't want him to fool our people as well. We have to take this drastic step before he destroys the entire kingdom all over again."

~~~

It had been few weeks since the meeting, maybe about two month or so. Chiran gave all his money to the kingdom. The schooling system had started. Both Vrinda and Tulsi devi were putting efforts to bring back the original system, which was difficult. Vrinda, being a child herself, could hardly manage the household and studies while mother would be out, teaching.

But something was off about Tulsi Devi, king knew it. She wasn't herself while teaching. She even got paler and thin over the weeks. But again, king wasn't much around her to notice her degrading health. He was busy on fulfilling his new mission: renovation and execution of Chiran.

Everything was set, yet again, on renovation. Since everything was practically destroyed, it was going to take time to get the refurnished building back.

The public was impressed by charitable efforts of Chiran. Everyone but king and his close associates.

The king was looking over the paper. He marked an empty land behind the palace. "Lets expand our military base. The training sector should be increased by 2 acres here."