Eight days.
That was all the time that had passed since Arjun opened his eyes in this new life—born into marble halls and perfumed air as Rudura Maurya, the first son of Chandragupta Maurya and Queen Durdhara.
The days passed in a haze of silks, shadows, and whispers. Even as an infant, with a body that could not yet crawl, his mind—ancient and sharpened by another life—was wide awake, absorbing everything.
Of all that he had seen in these first days, nothing fascinated him more than her.
Queen Durdhara was young, perhaps not yet twenty, and possessed the kind of beauty Arjun had only ever seen in old frescoes and carefully restored paintings. Her skin glowed like bronze under the golden lamps, and her eyes, lined with black kohl, held a mixture of steel and tenderness.
She carried him often, close against her chest, her silks brushing against his skin, her jewelry chiming like tiny bells. The faint scent of jasmine and sandalwood clung to her every movement.
When she smiled, the whole room seemed to bow to her presence. And in those moments, Arjun remembered: This is the woman history called Durdhara—the first queen of the Mauryan dynasty.
On the seventh day after his birth, the palace gathered. Priests daubed his tiny forehead with vermilion, chanting in a language older than empires.
In a voice that carried through the great stone hall, they declared:
"Rudura Maurya, son of Chandragupta Maurya!"
The words echoed against the carved pillars. Courtiers and generals bowed deeply; servants pressed their foreheads to the polished floor.
Even in his tiny body, Arjun understood the weight of that name.
I am the firstborn. The heir.
This title would give him everything he needed—if he was clever enough to keep it.
That night, the halls grew silent.
The great torches burned low. Attendants dozed in corners, lulled by the hum of crickets outside the palace walls.
In the royal library, scrolls and palm-leaf manuscripts lay open, abandoned after a long day of study. The air was thick with the earthy scent of ink, old wood, and drying leaves.
A careless nurse had left his cradle near a low desk, then slumped against the wall in sleep.
Arjun's small, helpless body could not move far, but his sharp, watchful eyes devoured everything.The elegant Brahmi script on a scroll. The diagrams of the Ganga plains. The faint murmur of guards speaking outside the archway.
Each whispered word, each mark on the page, was a piece of the puzzle.
From these scraps, he built a map inside his mind:
His father was Chandragupta Maurya, king of Magadha, a man who even now dreamed of uniting the many kingdoms of Bharat.
The city was Pataliputra, the Mauryan capital—a place he had only read about before.
And the year, written in the margins of a brittle scroll: 321 BCE.
So I am here at the very beginning, he thought, excitement burning behind newborn eyes. This is the chance I never had—the chance to shape history with my own hands.
As the moon climbed higher and silvered the library floor, a sudden chill swept through the room.
The torches flickered. One went out.
A strange ripple spread across the marble tiles, like ink spilling in water.
From that spreading blackness, a shape emerged.
The shadow.
It was formless, yet immense, a towering figure made of smoke and something older than smoke. And in the heart of that darkness, two molten golden eyes opened.
"Eight days old," the voice murmured, deep as the earth, "and already you hunger for knowledge."
Rudura's small body froze. The nurse still slept in the corner, oblivious.
"You begged to see the past," the shadow whispered, its words curling like mist, "and so you were born—the first son of Chandragupta Maurya. But do you understand? Every gift has a cost. Knowledge is never free."
Its voice deepened, vibrating in the very walls of the library.
"For every secret you steal, something will be taken. The more you take from history, the more history will demand from you. Remember that, Rudura Maurya."
The shadow leaned closer until the golden eyes filled his vision.
Then, just as silently, it dissolved, vanishing into the black.
The warmth returned. The library was once again just a library, quiet under the watchful moon.
But Rudura lay in his cradle, his tiny fists clenched so tightly that his nails dug into his palms.
No matter the cost, he swore silently, I will not waste this life. I will use this gift, and the past itself will bow to me.
(To be continued in Chapter 4)