Vajra An Elven Tale

Chapter 28

Reveal - Return

"Talking is a dangerous pastime ..."

- Sanskar

"You have a face for candlelight."

Sanskar hoped the conversation would anchor them, would anchor him. The conversation would keep him reminded of the bigger game at play, perhaps the most fragile and tender ploy he had ever embroiled himself in. It was one thing to study politics as it was played around him, by courtiers and warriors, who thought of him a little more than a boy, who always had interests worth guarding. All Vajra court ever needed was a little prod there, a little nudge here – the schemers would run the show themselves, thinking he was none the wiser to their little adventures but at the same time doing things exactly the way he wanted. Sanskar had never felt the need to indulge them, or involve himself in those almost childish ploys of power. But this – this was nothing but.

Everything, the fate of three races, the fate of his family, and everything he ever cared for, hang in the balance of this particular coup at Padmapeeta. All the world balanced upon one frail sickly woman – who may or may not serve his interests. Sanskar had a lot on his plate, and yet, all he could think of was the woman in his arms and how the candlelight softened and shaded her face in gold. How her eyes had a way of catching light to give the illusion of stars themselves.

"And you – my lord – have a way of always landing on your feet."

Her laughter rang in intimate peals of joy, a warmth that he fondly basked in. She twirled around him with an easy elegance of a routine dancer and Sanskar wrapped his arms around her when she came to stand before him again. The music floated in rising and falling waves, neither as slow as Nagas' nor as rowdy as battalion feasts of Vajras.

When the dance required them to step closer yet, Swara pressed a finger on his creased brow rather jokingly.

"What are you thinking?"

"Did you realize that perhaps we learned this dance from the same man?"

"Mohan?" They said simultaneously and Swara smiled. "Please," she said biting back a chuckle. "I need to get the image of you two dancing together out of my head!"

"Do you?"

The tenor of his tone dissolved her chuckles. Swara found herself unwittingly peering into those mountain lake green pools of his eyes, simmering invitingly. The shadows around them had deepened just as the green of his eyes had darkened. They were no longer dancing, but clasped in a loose embrace.

"I am obliged to help you with that aren't I?" Sanskar asked innocently, all the while dipping his head to nuzzle at the crook of her neck, one of his hands climbing leisurely along her spine. One of her hands clenched his, the other bunching the lush material at his back – slipping in an errant search, wandering along his nape.

"I don't think either of us are much good at this," she murmured, nose pressed against his throat. When he spoke, his breath tickled and burned her.

"At what?"

Swara cannot pin point the moment they had withdrawn from the assembly. But the shadows are cooler under the alcove, as cool as the marble behind her back. Candles burned around them casting diversions of shadows dancing in the faint traces of music.

"The dance." Her reply is a whisper dissolving into a pleasured sigh as Sanskar releases the hand clutched in his pressing a kiss on her wrist. Swara allowed her fingers to trace along the golden threads in his coat, coming to halt where she could feel the steady thump of his heart beneath her palm.