The Crown in the Storm ✔️

Fortune favours the bold

I couldn't sleep that night. Every piece of information that I knew rushed to the front of my mind. Everything seemed to get mixed up. I dreamt of Rania and Hania screaming at me... Izzy getting hurt and Uncle EJ crying. I kept seeing Zaroon in the shadows, his face contoured from pain. I even saw the bangle boy from the market, his eyes filled with sadness.

Tired and thankful for concealers, I walked to the dining hall. I shuffled my way to the dining table. Thankfully, Hania and Rania were the only ones there.
"Rough night?" Hania asked as I sat down. I nodded and reached for my teacup. Rania groaned beside me, her face in a grimace. I took a sip of tea and the fog in my mind cleared up a little.

"What's up with you?" I asked her.
"Came up with different statements for every single Ferozeuddin event"
"Woah," Hania and I said at the same time.
"Yeah... so I'll email them to you, so you can go through them and I can sleep"
"When do you go back to work?"
"Next week. Hussein texted me this morning... things have slowed down because of the heat but everyone will be back next week"

"The boss man himself... huh" Hania muttered and I laughed.
"Right like Mr Bodyguard is any better"
"Hey!" I protested, my cheeks red.
"I knew it," Hania said pumping her fist in the air.
"There is nothing to know..." I said, spreading butter on my toast.
"Oh please they were talking all the way to her room," Rania said to Hania.
"How do you know that?" She waggled her eyebrows. Had she followed us? Why was I flustered?
"I know Salaar is hot... but Zaroon" Hania gave me a thumbs up.
"There is nothing there..." I said glaring at them as they laughed. Sighing, I gave up and started to go through my emails.

"Someone is here from Murad Saeed's office Begum Sahiba" I nodded to let them in. A young man, in a suit, walked into the office dragging a whole suitcase of files.
"Greetings Begum Sahiba... these are the documents from Murad's campaign"
"Goodness, is that all?" I said sarcastically. He shook his head and pushed his glasses back on the bridge of his nose.
"We have 3 more suitcases Begum Sahiba," he said, his tone serious.
I took a deep breath. "Bring them in"

I sat on the carpet, with the files fanned out around me. I had a highlighter in one hand and a file in the other.
"Someone's hard at work," Izzy said walking in. He whistled at the number of files I had spread around me. "I'm sorry, are we in college again?"
"God I wish I had put this much effort in college"
"True... where do I walk?" I pointed at the small path that I had made.
"The last time I worked this hard was when I was a new intern," I said. He laughed and came to sit beside me.
"What are we searching for?"
"We are searching for... any mention of the new revolutionaries, highlight that in yellow and the election data, should be in purple" he picked up the purple highlighter and started to highlight.

"I should put myself to use" the words were so reminiscent of what Ammi Jaan had said, I had to close my eyes to banish the image from my head.  We worked silently, side by side for a while. Taking a short break, he placed the papers in a neat pile and stretched.

"This probably not how you imagined your honeymoon to be like"

"Hahaha, true. I was a little disappointed but I get to spend time with you."

"Great, I'm the consolation prize," I said with a laugh.

"So... any plans for the fifth?"

"Feroze is going to be here so we'd probably be dealing with him... oh," I said realizing what he was talking about. "Birthday, right"

"You forgot about your birthday? Thing's truly are in a dire state"

"You have no idea... which reminds me, I forgot to ask you about this, but what is this new port tax thingy? What's going on down in the ports?" He raised an eyebrow and I explained what the shopkeeper had told me on Saturday.