The glyph pulsed between Ishani's breasts like an ember refusing to extinguish.
Devika stared at it, heart pounding.
Not because it was unfamiliar.
But because it was never meant to exist.
There were five flames in the Grantha.
Five syllables.
Five initiatory rites.
A sixth?
Unwritten.Unprophesied.Unforgivable.
"Ishani," Devika said slowly, "when did this appear?"
The girl looked down, cupped her chest gently, as if afraid the symbol might vanish.
"Just now. After the heat. After… he left."
Her voice cracked on the last word.
"He didn't touch me. But I felt him. Inside me. I wanted him to stay."
Devika's throat dried.
She tried to stay calm.
But the manuscript in her satchel had begun to thrum — warning her.
Not of danger.
Of competition.
By late afternoon, Ishani was asleep again — curled beneath the banyan, lips moving faintly with unfinished verses.
Devika walked to the edge of the river.
The water was dark now. Restless.
She crouched, stared at her reflection — and saw not her face.
She saw his.
The Fifth.
Not as a man.
As a presence.
Glowing from beneath her skin.
"You bound me in a name," his voice echoed, not in air, but in her abdomen."But she spoke me without fear.""So I gave her the flame you refused."
Devika gripped the edge of the rock.
"This was never meant to be shared."
"Then why did your body awaken hers?"
She had no answer.
Because she knew.
From the moment she stood beside Ishani, her own glyphs had begun to tremble. There was a resonance between their bodies.
Not sisterhood.
Not rivalry.
Completion.
That night, Devika returned to the banyan tree, sat beside Ishani, and began to chant softly.
Not from memory.
From instruction.
The manuscript had unrolled by itself beside her.
Each page now glowing faintly.
The verses had changed.
They included a sixth stanza — written in a different hand.
In the margins, Devika saw unfamiliar glyphs.
Curved.
Feminine.
Fluid.
Ishani's tongue had written them.
In sleep.
The fire they lit was smokeless.
The air held breath without sound.
And as the verses built, Devika could feel something passing between them.
Not words.
Not touch.
Memory.
Then Ishani stirred.
Sat up.
Her eyes were not her own.
She reached forward and touched Devika's navel with two fingers.
Reciting:
"Yoni granthaṁ paṭhāminānṛtaṁ, nā māyā—smaraṇaṁ eva satyam."
"I now read the womb-scripture—Not illusion, not falsehood—Only remembering is truth."
The moment her fingers touched Devika's skin, the glyphs across both their bodies aligned.
A hum rose between their navels.
Their mouths opened in unison.
Not to kiss.
To speak the final, unrecorded syllable:
"Syaam."
The flame between Ishani's breasts blazed gold, then vanished.
The Sixth was not permanent.
It was transitory.
A key. Not a lock.
And now that it had been passed — it entered Devika.
Branded low, just above her pubic bone.
In a place the original five had never touched.
She collapsed.
Her vision filled with gold.
Not of gods.
Of bodies entwined in worship.
She saw women — dozens — throughout centuries, moaning verses, arching in caves, crying out syllables with open legs and closed eyes.
Not for men.
Not even for gods.
For remembrance.
They weren't possessed.
They were complete.
And she now bore their glyphs.
All of them.
When she woke, Ishani was gone.
A single note carved into the soil beside her:
"He told me I was only a bridge.You are the flame.Finish what I cannot."– Ishani
Devika stood.
Alone again.
But no longer singular.
She was not the keeper of the Grantha anymore.
She was its mouth.