The Poet, The Princess, and The Promise: A Short Story

Darshini

By the time I arrived at the palace, the sun was rising, signaling the beginning of the day. I closed the door behind me, careful not to make so much as a squeak. In the corner of my room sat Shree, my pura, now awake and cooing at my arrival.

I sat down to release him from his cage, and he flew about my room, knocking things over and nearly hitting himself against the walls. Before he could hurt himself, I caught him in my hands, checking him over for any injuries. Luckily, he had none, and I breathed a sigh of relief.

"What's wrong, Shree?"

Running footsteps reached my ears, and my heart began pounding, matching up to the rhythm of the footsteps. Shree began cooing some more and escaped my hands to resume his flying about the room. I called out his name again, but he didn't stop.

"Darshini, open the door!" a voice that I recognized as my mother's called, and a hand began banging on the wooden door. "Darshini, open this door right now."

What is happening?

I went over and opened the door, but as soon as I did a slap met with my face, one so hard that it turned my head to the side, and its sound resounded. My cheek began vibrating, and heat filled my face. I felt my eyes widen bigger than saucers, and my eyebrows raised in surprise. In front of me stood amma, her shoulders squared against her side and her features contorted in fury.

Behind her stood an entourage of servants, Aadhira being one of them. When I glanced her way, mouthing 'what happened?', she looked away from me. "Is this what you've resorted to doing?" Her tone, assertive and cynical, scared me.

"Amma, what are you talking about?"

Amma grit her teeth, and I braced myself for another beating. "I hire that poet to aid you in your studies, and you sneak around with him, that too, right under my nose?" By now, she was no longer talking to me but rambling, going on about my ungratefulness and what she had done to deserve this.

"It's a good thing that Aadhira had told me everything before things could get any worse, otherwise who knows how far you would go with this lowly act." The wheels in my head began turning, and I understood.

Aadhira was still avoiding looking at me. So that's why she acted strangely last night. "I'm going to die of shame before I die of old age because of this girl." Amma was now hitting her head against her palm, and the servants behind her were chattering. I bit my lip, unsure of what to say.

"If word of this got out, what would happen to your appa and me? The entire kingdom will spit on us, saying that we didn't raise the princess right."

So this was about their reputation being tarnished. I did not know how to console amma, but the matter of consoling soon passed, for she cleared her throat and looked right at me.

"I will tell your appa to order the death of that rascal," she said, referring to the rascal as Karthik, and that was when I knew. It was the time to beg.

"No, amma, please! Don't kill him. I'll listen to you, I'll do anything. Just please don't kill him." I was full-on begging, on the ground with my hands on amma's feet, my head bowed down. I must have been repeating that mantra for a couple of minutes now, and when I looked up, I felt pure fear. The dawn light reflected upon my mother's face, but instead of brightening or enhancing her features, it made her look truly frightening. She had been listening to my pleas with a straight face, but now once realizing that I was serious when I had said I'd do anything, a smile, one that showed no happiness, appeared on her expression.

Karthik's life, my life, was in someone else's hands.