CHAPTER SIXTEEN
AADHYA HAS SHIT TIMING
✧ ⋆ ☽ ✯ ☾ ⋆ ✧
"Can you please think about this for a second?" Aadhya insisted, casting him with a beseeching look that Rocky could almost feel the concern rolling off her in waves. "You are not indestructible no matter what you might believe. Something needs to be thought out in careful consideration. And this is the most outrageous kind of irresponsibility."
"Darling," Rocky cuts her with a calm gaze, pressing his hands down her shoulders in comfort. "It will be okay," The bearded man assured her with all his conviction. Because he will be. He has a plan, and all the enemies he had inside his kingdom are currently in one place.
"This is not another Dilawar or Shetty," The desperation in her tone was enough to get all the guards he had assembled to leave the room and give them their privacy. "We are tacking about Adheera here. You didn't see how they pictured him and his army." Her voice rises with each passing second. "And - And I don't want you to die before I can tell you just how much I love you."
When he promised he would protect her from everything worst, even if the worst comes through the fears in her mind. And the apprehension she has for Adheera, he wished to erase it too.
The words caused all of his moments to cease with a screeching halt. "What did you say, darling?" Rocky asks, every minuscule of his attention pitched on the girl beside him.
Rocky savours the look of thinly disguised amazement on her face, as though she herself realised what she had confessed just then. Her brown eyes were intent on him, as familiar as his own heartbeat. "I love you," She says once more, aloud and with more surety than anything she had ever said.
He caught his breath. She had said it - the words there was no going back from. Rocky never thought three words would be large enough to tip his world, but here they are.
"I am sorry for taking this long to realise it won't end in any other way." A look of such pain crossed his lover's eyes as if she's regretting wasting so much time they had when together, only to send him far, far away now with death looming over them a couple of minutes away. She made a soft sound and reached for him with a kind of desperate ease that made Rocky's heart jump. "So, come back to me, okay?" There was a plea in her voice and so much love in her eyes, mixed with pride and despair. "Give your hardest fight and come back, and we can get married whenever you want."
Rocky sucked in a breath. He could feel his heart pounding as if it wanted to tear its way out of his chest. And all he could say to her was, "Your timing is absolutely astounding, darling." And it seemed like the right thing to say because it earned him a shaky chuckle. But soon, a broken sob leaves along with it. And then she is throwing her arms around his neck as her small hand's bunch in the material of his jacket. She held him tightly as if she could encircle and protect his body with her own.
"Wait for me," he says against her cheek, holding her just as tightly. But there was an unmistakable tenderness in the curve of his fingers around Aadhya's shoulder as he bent to kiss her. Their first real kiss. And even though it was chaste and quick, it was a kiss of desperation and clutching more than passion, pressing as hard as they could to get close, closer. When he moved back, there was a promise in his dark eyes. "Once I come back, we can both go and see your sister, okay?"
She nods, steeling herself against the tears stinging in her eyes and the hard painful knot swelling in her throat. After a moment, she reluctantly lets go of Rocky's body. But soon, her hands go to her own neck, and she unties the knot of the amulet he had once given to her when they parted. "Keep this with you," Aadhya softly commands, giving him back his mother's blessing she had kept safe with her until then. "I'd rather if mother's protection is with you right now more than with me."
He touches her face with aching tenderness of love and sorrow. "Vanaram and his men will be guarding the palace as a precaution." Aadhya didn't argue with him on that. She knows there was no way he'd compromise her protection. Not even if she insisted. Rocky's eyes moved to the tiny creature, who had been staring at them with luminous interest until then. "And you too," Rocky warns Oatmeal. "Take care of her until I get back. Otherwise, I am cutting half of your rations."
***
And so, a promised Aadhya stayed right there. Even with her heart racing a mile every minute with genuine worries and anxieties, she kept true to her words. Every few seconds, she would stare at the clock, and it always felt like a minute had passed since she checked an hour ago. It was maddening, and Vanaram prowling up and down the hall like a tiger pacing its cage at the zoo wasn't exactly helping either.
"Will you stop that?" Aadhya snaps like a third-grade teacher demanding that Vanaram stop doodling on his desk with a marker, only to earn a death glare from the commander-in-chief. But she wasn't in a mood to care. "All the pacing is giving me hives," She confessed, "So, please," she made a forceful gesture towards the couch across her in annoyance.
Vanaram stares at her for a solid minute, like he is contemplating a homicide. But after a moment of further consideration, he slowly takes his seat like a man trained to be a robot. "Thank you," Aadhya fights the urge to throw her hands into the air in exasperation at the Herculean effort he put into following a simple demand. Or maybe, she's only annoyed with the pattern he is even breathing was because she still thought him a bad guy. And it wasn't like Vanaram came with an FDA approved sticker for her to readily trust him.
After a long silence, she couldn't help it. "Adheera," She says his name aloud, trying and failing to empty her curiosity and concern out of her tone. "Tell me about him."
Vanaram regards her with a cold, considering look. For a second, Aadhya wonders if he's considering which would be the most bloody and painful way to kill her. He had one of those faces, you see. But then, he opens his mouth, "These walls of KGF have witnessed more bloodshed than water. And Adheera's sword is the only reason for that. The people in these mines shake in their very bones even at the smallest mention of a dead man and his sword...do you know why?"
The question was soon answered by himself.
"From a young age, Adheera was influenced by the Vikings clan's ruthless tactics and cruelty. He adopted those methods soon after and became the epitome of cruelty. He ensured that no one dared to point fingers at KGF. He abducted and forced people to toil in the mines. And more importantly, to fulfil his brother's wish, Adheera created an empire mercilessly at the might of his sword."
Thoughts awhirl, foreboding yawns darkly in the pit of her stomach at his words. With her mouth dry, Aadhya inquires, "And if I were to say he is still alive, do you think Rocky could defeat him?"
"What?" Vanaram stilled, the gleam of his eyes intent on her face in the shadows. She could see the gears turning inside his head, and then all his walls slammed into their place, his open and honest expression from a second ago gone before she could make anything out of it. "No," he denies, shaking his head as though he shouldn't even be encouraging her thought. "No! If Adheera were still alive, he would not have let him even set his foot in KGF."
"I thought you would look happier," Aadhya couldn't help but observe. She believed with their rightful leader back from the dead, there would be some relief in his eyes at least. "Guess not," she murmurs to herself with an assured nod.
Vanaram rockets to his feet and begins pacing again, no longer pretending to be composed anymore. But suddenly, he pauses, looking predictably frustrated, a muscle flickering in his cheek as he clenched his jaw. "Is he really alive?" And it looked like it cost him a lot to ask that question. Aadhya nods once. "You should've run then. I saw first-hand how cruel Aadheera can be. He won't leave anyone alive. Not the guy who took what's his. Not his lover, and definitely not the guard dog who shifted his loyalty."
It was concerning when she heard Vanaram referring to himself as a dog. Was that how he was treated here. Probably. Aadhya didn't think Suryavardhan and his associates gave their employees good pay. Definitely no benefit packages. And certainly no dental. But what's more concerning was that Vanaram, like once Rocky, didn't seem all that worried about his death.
"Well, unfortunately, Rocky isn't the type to run from anything," Aadhya folds her hands over her chest and slumps in her seat with a weary sigh. "He is usually the one who does chasing."
"Adheera is not anyone."
"You don't think I told him that?" snapped Aadhya with an angry retort. But with a deep inhale, she softens visibly, giving him an assurance she herself didn't have in the first place. "Don't worry, we will be fine. At the end of the day, Adheera is still human, isn't he? And he can only bleed so much before he falls like any other."
Vanaram sighed - a deliberate sound - and decided to sit in his assigned place once more. He doesn't point out that Rocky was a human too. And for that, she was thankful.
***
The sight of him tore at her. He was shockingly bruised and bloody, a long gash running the length of his cheek, his lower lip bloodied, and more than a dozen bleeding rents in his clothes. The biggest one was the wide stab wound under the right side of Rocky's ribs. But from the rhythm of his breathing, it was clear his lungs hadn't been punctured.
"No, no, no," Aadhya muttered as she leapt towards him, Vanaram right beside her. She had never seen him look so damaged with her own eyes before. "What happened?" She asks, her own heart leaping into her throat as she takes the white coat one of the guards had pressed into his wounds and helps add a little more pressure on the still-bleeding wound.
Rocky hisses in pain but still infuriatingly manages to flash her a smirk, even in that state, even when he was literally hanging with his hand thrown over one of the guard's shoulders. "You should've seen the other guy," he says like it was supposed to give her some comfort. But it doesn't. She moves her gaze from his face to the body to examine the situation, only to pale a little more with each slash she witnesses.
"Carry him to my room," Aadhya orders, swallowing the lump in her throat, her stomach churning with nausea. It isn't the time to cry, Aadhya, she thinks. You have some shit to do. You can't break down just yet. The guards and the rest of the workers in the Mansion were quick to help Rocky walk. "He needs immediate medical attention," Aadhya turned to Vanaram as she walked just a few paces behind the group to give them the way. "Where are the doctors Rocky had ordered for last week?"
"Since you didn't want people to panic, we kept them stationed in the mines as usual. But I already sent someone to fetch them," Vanaram replies, hands behind his back, chin straight as he answers, his eyes fathomless and black. "They should be here any moment now. All the surgical tools and medicines will also be shifted here."
Aadhya nods, halting for a second before she enters the room they had laid Rocky in. "And the other guards who made it out, let them be treated too. Ask someone to clear the hall downstairs. It will be more than enough to staff them all there." Pausing, she stares up at the commander levelly. "And Vanaram, I want full details about what happened? And I want to know if Adheera's still alive."
Aadhya saw the pulse jump in his throat as he exhaled before Vanaram answered with a, "Yes, miss." When he turns and stalks back the length of the corridor once again, fully prepared to carry out his task, Aadhya enters the bedroom, holding herself perfectly still even though everything inside her thrashed restlessly, screaming to get out.
"Hey," She whispers a greeting softly when she reaches him after signalling all the guards away to take care of their own treatment. Rocky's eyes sharpened, striving through the haze of pain to focus on Aadhya's voice. Then he looked to her side and let his arm flop out on the bed, a futile moment, as though he were reaching for something just beyond his grasp.
Aadhya smiles through the despair that echoes in her eyes as she wastes no time holding his hand. They were cold... so different from the warmth he always spreads her with. "The doctors are on their way," She tells him and keeps talking to him, hoping he doesn't fall asleep.
"They will be here shortly, and they will patch you up. And when you are all good and new, we can marry, okay. But I don't think Vanaram has any experience in managing a wedding tough-" her laugh was desperate around the edges, but at least he was still awake and humming through everything. "Do you think we should hold a little intimate gathering instead? I mean, it's not like we have much of a family anyway-"
***
I want to kindly point out that this wasn't how I envisioned the whole thing. But my spontaneous brain was like - delete the entire draft and rewrite it completely differently, I dare you. And here we are.