(Book 4) Hayden Mackay and The Fest of Vrindahina

35.2 The Act of Nirnaya

"Here, dry your hair," said Ashwant, tossing me a plush towel, "I'll go get the box."

He hurriedly disappeared into the kitchen from where Ira exited carrying a plateful of sandwiches. "Eat them and finish them," she said, placing it on the table, and grabbed a couple of them in her hands, "I'll take a few for Nazira. She says she wants to stay in the bedroom for a while with Maruthi."

I gawked at her, dropping the towel aside in the chair. "Maruthi? It's alive?"

"Yes," she said, walking towards the bedroom, "It arrived just a few minutes before your guys showed up. That's one intelligent parrot Nazira owns. It remembers Ashwant very well and it must have seen it only a couple of time in the academy. Can you imagine?"

Ira stepped inside the bedroom and in that split second of time, before the door closed, I sought the opportunity to gaze inside. There she was, sat on the bed, still in her damped clothes and her legs swollen. The bird was flying around her. She was laughing merrily finding her long-lost companion alive, trying to hold it in between her hands. Watching her unbothered, I felt my heart aching, as if a hot coal was placed in my chest. We were indeed back, so was it going to be like this now? Did it come with a price of leaving everything that had happened between us all through the month and moving on with our lives? I was extremely reluctant to believe this unjustified musing. It took all the force of will I possessed to not to bow down to my instant desire of walking over into the bedroom and taking her into my arms.

She is mine. Mine only.

The sudden slamming sound pulled me out of my thoughts, and I chid myself. What the heck I was thinking. I should be happy for her to have someone to welcome her. Then I gained the sense of my stone burning. I immediately closed my mind, hating the idea of Singh being all ears.

I made aware of the situation, watching Ashwant dragging the mahogany box, placed on the table, towards me. It was one vintage artefact Doctor had shown us back in the academy, its engravement on the surface, especially the vivid asterisk was quite appreciable.

"Come on, do the honours," Ashwant said, passing me the key.

I sighed heavily, uninterested. Only to respect his wishes, I leaning forward inserting the key inside the hole, turned it twice back and forth until I heard a low snap. Then at once, the lip slid open by itself raising slight dust particle. I gazed down and in it was...

"A paper!" I yelled, getting highly irritated. I held the wheatish rolled paper, carrying a seal, from the velvety interior of the box and cried aloud, "I went through hell only for this stupid paper?"

What was Doctor thinking? Was this some kind of joke? He made me and Nazira go to that universe, pass through feakin' twelve challenges and confront Shaytan Rup only for this stupid paper? There must be a hidden volcano inside my stomach waiting to erupt, fury sweeping off me.

Ashwant clicked his tongue and took the paper from me. He detached the seal and rolled it open. Narrowing his eyes, he carefully went through. Then he pursed his lips, moistening them before he looked back at me.

"You should read it," he said, his mouth curved into a gentle smile.

"I don't care..."

"Hayden, read it. I insist," he said, maintaining his composed nature.

My blood was boiling, and I felt an urge to create sparkles at the tip of my hands. I doubted if on touching the paper it might get turned into ashes. However, I snatched it from him and skimmed through it first. It seemed some kind of a document, handwritten, and instantly guessed to whom the writing belonged. I didn't quite understand what it was all about. I looked up at Ashwant from above the paper who wiggled his eyebrows and then got back to the paper reading it, slowly -one word after the word.