Eye of the Storm (Swaragini FF)

Chapter 9

Maheshwari house had been in chaos for the past one hour, but unlike the rest of the house, her sister's room had been deadly silent. She looked at her sister sitting on her bed statuesque. The only thing that indicated there was still life in her was the stream of tears flowing through her eyes.

In the past few months, Ragini's life had taken a turn for the worse. The old Ragini that was filled with goodness had been killed by the rejection, ignorance and betrayal of the three people she had come to care about the most – her love Laksh, her sister Swara and her friend Sanskar. They had pushed her on a path where self preservation and fight for her own happiness had given birth to a new Ragini – one that cared about her own feelings and happiness because she knew no one else was bothered about it.

When the new Ragini had her biggest blow, she had lost all that she fought for – her very happiness and her love. It was at this time that she had vowed revenge from the ones who made her lose everything. Today, she had gotten what she set out to do.

Laksh, the love of her life, had felt the same heartbreak that she once did. He had played games, created mis-understandings and hurt his own brother and love on numerous occasions in the past few months. He had felt the pain of seeing his sibling also be in love with the one that he loved. He had felt the insecurities of losing his love and ultimately reached a stage where Swara had told him that she didn't love him or want to be with him, just like Laksh had once told Ragini. Today, she knew that if she wanted, she could manipulate him to be with her for the rest of her life – just like she had vowed to.

Sanskar, her friend at one time, had felt the pain of seeing his love not being reciprocated. He had felt the pain and insecurity of seeing his love, with his brother. He had felt pain worse than death – as she had promised. And even now, when her sister had ended everything with his brother and realized her love for Sanskar, he had not been fortunate to hear about it before he actually lost his life. It has been an hour since the news had reached them. The flight that he was on, while returning back home, had crashed and there were no survivors expected. He had died even before finding out that his love was in fact returned, in equal measure. His life had truly been tragic.

Ragini looked at her sister, Swara, again. When she had embarked upon her quest for revenge, she had vowed to bring her sister down from the pedestal that she so graciously adorned. She had done many sly things to meet this end. She had also not missed her mother-in-law and Sujata chachi snooping on them during one of their outings. While there had been no discussions or questions about it from the two ladies concerned, she had not missed the changed treatment that Sujata chachi was bestowing upon her sister in the past few days. What she hadn't asked for, and yet obtained, was seeing her sister in the same place that she once was – broken down seeing the love of her life dead, knowing that her love was now forever incomplete even before it had a chance of being whole.

Today she had accomplished what she had desired. She had gotten her revenge – and yet the peace she was hoping for, praying for, at the end of it, was sorely missing. She remembered the discussion she once had with Sanskar a long long time ago. She had, in her innocence, almost stated rather than asked, that he would finally find his peace once he revenge was complete. He, in his worldly wisdom, had said that there would be no peace for him in his life, even after this was done. She had been surprised by his words then, today she understood them. There were no winners in the quest for revenge – only losers. For if there were winners, she wouldn't feel the pain that she felt at the loss of her friend, her eyes too wouldn't water the way they did seeing her sister in pain and she wouldn't feel guilty for wanting revenge and pain for them, in the first place, even though she had nothing to do with Sanskar's accident.

Truth was that this new Ragini, for all her shrewdness and brutality, wasn't strong. She didn't have the strength of character, resilience and righteousness that the old Ragini had. While the old Ragini felt pain, she had the strength to bounce back from it, and with a smile. This new Ragini had left those very strengths behind to become what she had become. Today, Ragini desperately wished that the old Ragini could be back, that she could turn back time and she could erase the last one hour from their lives.

She looked at her sister again. She had barely moved in the past one hour. She couldn't even confidently say that she had seen her sister blink. The family had called in a doctor, but he hadn't gotten around to checking Swara yet. He was taking care of Sujata and Annapurna who had to be sedated along with Sanskar's father Ram.

The door to the room swung open violently and she turned around to see who it was. Her heart skipped a beat and she couldn't stop the tears which had begun to run down her cheeks all over again. In the last few months, she had prayed to god to help her with her plans for revenge. Today she was thankful that god had given her that revenge, to understand how empty it really was. But she was even more thankful that god had taken that revenge away from her, in a short while itself. After a long time, she felt a peace that she had not felt in a long time.

Sanskar stood in front of her hassled, clearly worried for her sister. He hadn't even seen Ragini. His focus was only on one person - his Swara. He was momentarily taken aback seeing Swara in the state she was. Ragini went to him. She took his hand in hers, he was surprised to see her for a second, but his attention didn't divert beyond that from his love. Ragini took him to his sister and made him sit on the bed.

She wiped her tears and left them there, to finally find each other, as she made her way down to pray to the gods for bringing her back. She was for once, completely clear about what she wanted, and what she was going to do. 

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