| 𝔉𝔢𝔞𝔱𝔲𝔯𝔢𝔡 x 2 |
Book 1 in the FORTRESS series
Spirits. Ghosts. Apparitions.
Rudra Sharma doesn't believe in any of it.
He has always been a Science buff. Majoring in Physics, hoping to become an IAS officer one day and solve the practical p...
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The next few days went by in a haze with nothing untoward happening, and Rudra was content spending his time with Shravani. Though he always felt slightly irked whenever she ran away if he attempted to kiss her or take her to any lonely corner, he chose to let it go, assuming she was just an overly traditional, conservative girl.
His evenings were mostly spent conversing with Ishita, and he realized that he adored the girl. A bit too much. She had a genuine smile that could melt his heart at any point in time. Her presence could light up an entire room full of darkness. And that was when he recollected those instances from their childhood where he, his sister, and Ishita played together in the latter's backyard, the girls in pigtails and him in his boy shorts. However, over time, he drifted away from her, finding newer friends in school. But now that they were reconnecting, bonding afresh, he liked it.
Even his dreams were pleasant, and his hallucinations during his waking moments did not terrify him. Each and every one of his dream started with the same rosy fragrance that he had come to cherish, and it ended with Chitra's alluring smile. He woke up gleeful instead of perspiring heavily, but a major confusion bugged him, and he just hoped for a reasonable clarification on the same.
"So, your grandmother prepares this perfume?" Rudra asked on the morning of Dhanteras, sitting at the dining table, fiddling with the pancake on his plate.
"Yes," Ishita said, stuffing a piece of paratha in her mouth. "I am running low on it, and she had fallen sick, so she could not make new batches. But now that she is all well, she might send a few bottles with Mom."
"And this requires pink roses?"
"Yes. And sandalwood. Oh, and camphor too."
Something clicked in his mind this time around, and he could distinctly recall Raghuveer having this same conversation with Chitra in his dreams. "How does Ishita's grandmother have the same recipe as Chitra?" he muttered under his breath. Turning towards the girl, he said, "Where did your grandmother learn it from?"
"The concoction has been passed down our family through generations."
He had his brows furrowed. "What in absolute hell is going on?"
Glimpsing at his parents, who were busy arguing over the kind of embellishments that would be hung around the house during the festive season, Rudra stared at his ceramic plate, the fork clutched in his palms. He didn't have enough courage to narrate to his parents about all the lunatic anecdotes he had the fortune of coming across. It might trouble them pointlessly when he was himself unsure about everything. They might also think that they had adopted a madman. The thin line between his imagination and reality was blurred to the extent that he wished he could find a resolution to his woes and put a full stop to Kalavati and her dark activities before his parents would discover his ugly secret.
Additionally, what was the point in bothering his parents when the rest of his clique and Nidhi had not complained of any supernatural occurrences of late? So far, everything seemed positive, and he was certain that the sacred thread they were wearing would protect them from the evil clutches of the lady in red. All they needed to do was keep wearing it. Perhaps Ishita's cuckoo idea worked well in their favor.
