The evening descended quietly, wrapping the palace in soft twilight. A dusky breeze filtered through the high arches, rustling the silk curtains and carrying the faint scent of sandalwood.
In the hall, the warmth of laughter echoed faintly—Anika was showing Shiv something ridiculous on her phone, and Rajeshwari was smiling softly at their antics. Ranvijay stood silently by a pillar, eyes flicking toward the corridor.
Myra hadn't come down yet.
She'd been quiet ever since the movie room incident. Avoiding his gaze. Flinching a little too easily. He knew her silence wasn't from fear. It was something else. Something deeper. She had felt everything—he could read it in her uneven breath, her eyes fluttering shut under his touch, the quickening of her heartbeat. She felt everything and still said nothing.
But he wasn't angry. He was waiting.
Suddenly, a shriek shattered the peace.
"Fire!" A servant came running through the corridor. "The east wing—it's on fire!"
Chaos erupted.
Ranvijay was already moving. Myra.
The east wing was close to the guest chambers. Where she had been staying.
Thick smoke coiled through the halls like a serpent. Fire licked at the carved wood, crackling and furious. Servants scrambled, buckets sloshed, Rajeshwari coughed into her dupatta as Shiv led her out. Anika cried out for Myra, panic-stricken.
"Myra!" Ranvijay shouted, pushing through the thick, heated haze.
The world around him blurred into orange and black. His lungs burned, but he kept going, following the trail of smoke until—
There.
Crouched near the corner of the room, half-curled behind a wooden screen, her eyes wide and stunned, was Myra.
"Myra!" he rushed to her, lifting her into his arms. "You're okay. You're safe—I'm here."
But she didn't react.
Her eyes weren't on him.
She was staring into the flames. Frozen. Her body trembling.
The heat roared around them, a maddening chorus of snapping wood and screaming fire. Yet, for her, it wasn't just this moment—it was something else. Something that pulled her down and back. Far back.
Her pupils dilated. Her breath stilled.
And it hit her like a strike of lightning.
A woman's scream.
"Run, Myra! Run!"
She was younger—so much younger. A child.
The flames danced higher, brighter. They weren't here. They were then.
She saw her mother—face smeared with soot, sari torn, blood trailing from her temple—pushing her away. Shoving her through a narrow doorway.
"Myra!"
Then a shadow.
A small hand.
Clutching a burning log.
Throwing it.
The fire exploded.
Her mother caught in the blast, screaming.
The world went white.
And then black.
"No—NO!" Myra gasped, jolting back into the present, flailing against Ranvijay's grip. "She—she was in the fire! Mama! And—"
She choked on the air, tears streaming down her cheeks.
"There was a child. A hand. My hand?"
Her fingers trembled, staring down at her palms like they held the sin.
Ranvijay's jaw tightened.
He didn't speak.
He couldn't.
He only held her tighter as the fire raged behind them, eyes not on the flames—but on her.
Because the memories had begun to return.
And soon, the truth he had buried so deep... would rise.
The fire was doused quickly.
Servants rushed. Guards barked orders. Buckets sloshed. The smoke still lingered, curling like a ghost around the chandelier that had almost collapsed in the hallway.
But Myra… she stood frozen.
Back pressed to the cold marble, arms limp by her sides, eyes wide—haunted. Her lips trembled as if trying to speak, but nothing came out. Not a cry. Not a breath.
She had gone pale.
Ranvijay, who had been holding her only moments ago, now crouched in front of her. One hand hovered near her cheek, not quite touching.
"Myra?" His voice was soft but laced with urgency. "Look at me."
But she couldn't. Her body shook, eyes still fixed ahead—as though the fire hadn't died, as though it still raged within her vision.
And in her mind… it was burning.
She saw the glow. Not the fire in the hallway—but that fire.
Ash falling like snow.
A tall woman—her mother—wrapped in flames, voice screaming but unheard. And then… a small hand.
Tiny.
Child-like.
Gripping a broken, burning log.
And throwing it.
The flames licked the old drapes. The room caught fire.
She saw her mother shielding her—pushing her out of a collapsing doorway—before being swallowed by the inferno.
A scream pierced the air. Not from memory—but now.
Her own voice.
She screamed and clutched her head, nails digging into her scalp.
Ranvijay's heart dropped.
"Myra!" He grabbed her shoulders. "Come back—look at me!"
She blinked, breath sharp and shuddering, as if dragged from drowning.
Her body slumped forward, and he caught her before she hit the ground.
---
Later that night
In the dim room, Ranvijay sat beside her bed, his face shadowed with guilt.
A physician had visited and said it was a panic-triggered episode. The fire had unsettled something deep. A locked memory. A traumatic fragment of the past.
Ranvijay knew exactly which memory.
He covered his mouth with his hand, eyes dark.
She saw it.
Or at least a part of it.
A child's hand. The burning log.
And if the memories continued to surface… she might think it was hers.
He closed his eyes tightly.
"No," he murmured. "You didn't do it, Myra… It wasn't you."
But she had been there that night. So small. So unaware.
So innocent.
And yet now, fate was making her believe otherwise.
He brushed a loose curl away from her forehead. Her face, even in unconsciousness, was troubled. Eyelids fluttering. Whispers escaping her lips in broken murmurs—
"Maa… fire… hand… mine?"
His jaw clenched.
How could he tell her the truth?
How could he explain that he had been there too? That he had seen it all? That he had watched her mother burn—and done nothing?
Or worse… that he knew whose hand had set that fire.
But letting her remember bits and pieces, letting her spiral into guilt—that wasn't something he could allow.
He stood, turning away from her bed.
He had to decide.
Tell her?
Or bury it deeper?
But one thing was clear—this fire was not just in the past.
It was still burning.
And Myra was walking into the flames, piece by piece.