Love and Redemption

Chapter 22

Avdhesh Singh Ranawat was a loyal commander-in-chief of the army. He went to the village of Srirampur as he expected the robbery there. As expected the dacoits came and plundered the house of a landlord. Avdhesh found the team of the police officers of Vijaygarh who were vigilant along with Trayambak Sharma nearby. He signaled them to follow them up the dacoits as he too, did the same.

The search party followed the eight masked dacoits deep into the forest. The police officers were waiting to take an action. The masked dacoits reached the heart of the forest and sat down. It was the Queen’s favorite spot and hence, forest was not safe from now, Avdhesh Singh Ranawat realized.

The eight masked dacoits ignited the fire and sat down near the stream of water. Under the moonlit sky, the water was flowing calmly in the river. Unusually, the search party was surprised to see that the masked dacoits did not remove the cover of cloth from their faces. Unlike the usual dacoits, these masked dacoits did not even checked the looted items and distributed the loot amongst themselves.

The search party concluded that perhaps, the dacoits were waiting for their leader to come but no one came. On the other hand, the dacoits began to chit-chat comfortably with each other.

After waiting for a while, Avdhesh Singh Ranawat and Trayambak Sharma signaled the police officers to go and confront the dacoits and capture them but what happened next left Avdhesh Singh Ranawat perplexed while Trayambak Sharma also feigned anger as well as confusion. 

The search party surrounded the dacoits from all directions. Hiding behind the bushes, the police officials took the position to attack the dacoits. Keeping their bows and arrows ready, the senior police officer went to the dacoits and announced, “You are behind every loot having in the kingdom so you all are under arrest.”

The masked dacoits looked towards him and had a great laugh. One of the dacoits attacked the police officer and said, “See, the fragile queen has sent her dogs to capture us”.

This heinous comment was enough to agitate Avdhesh Singh Ranawat who looked with disgust towards the dacoits. Trayambak Sharma smirked internally realizing the plan of Veerbhadra. When Avdhesh glanced at him, Trayambak Sharma feigned anger.

On the other hand, the other police officials who comprised the search party attacked the dacoits. The police officers fought bravely but the eight masked dacoits were enough to overpower them.

When one of the dacoits slit the throat of one of the police officer, Avdhesh Singh Ranawat was beyond angry and disappointed. He was astonished at their unimaginable courage. They were fighting like trained royal guards and hence, the search party was of no match in front of them.

Avdhesh regretted not asking the royal guards to accompany the search party. As the dacoits were busy passing atrocious comments about the queen, Avdhesh was sickened. Taking out his cold steel smallsword, Avdhesh attacked the dacoits.

The skirmish between the masked dacoits and police officials turned into a bloody battle as two of the police officials belonging to the search party lost their lives while others were brutally injured, including Avdhesh Singh Ranawat.

Avdhesh was beyond angry and frustrated. In anguish, he wondered who those dacoits were. He concluded that they were perhaps, some dangerous enemies in disguise because there fighting skills displayed the high expertise in war combats. As the injured Avdhesh tried to attack one of the dacoits, the other one hit him at the back of his head and the mighty Avdhesh Singh Ranawat staggered on the ground thereby, falling down. His head was bleeding badly.

Trayambak Sharma smirked and signaled the dacoits to run away. As the masked dacoits mounted on their horses and ran away, the peacefully silent forests which had witnessed a mini battle moments ago heard the painful lamentations and outcries of the injured members of the search party.