The Queen's king |✔️

7 .The smile

Arjuna was walking around the palace with Vishnudas, the prince of Ramapur. The initial plan was to discuss the trade issues and how both the kingdoms could grow together but Vishnudas kept swinging towards personal talks, he kept talking about his dear sister Priyamvada as if he was a trained parrot. What further annoyed Arjuna was the way he couldn't draw a line between his personal life and political life and from the short conversation they were having Arjuna could say that Vishnudas has a great liking for rich life which has become a barrier from understanding what his people require. The only political aspect he believed in was that only trade flows and money would make the kingdom prosperous.

At one point of this conversation, Arjuna felt pity for Ramapur, it annoyed him that the crown prince was not aware of the fact that it was his people and their happiness which can make a kingdom prosperous and not the other way round.

"And yes! Did you visit our royal garden, king Arjuna?" Asked Vishnudas, with excitement. This Prince was not only annoying but also stupid, thought Arjuna.

"No, we didn't get time to explore the palace." Replied Ratan.

"There is no way that you would leave this kingdom without visiting our beautiful gardens, it has a huge variety of flowers and-" And the rest of his rant went unheard, this man is all talks and no work.

As soon as they stepped in the gardens, he could see a familiar figure. It was Chitra, he noticed. But the closer they got a small frown made its way on his face, a young kid was hiding behind Chitra's skirt and the kid looked frightened of the woman standing before them.

Why did Chitra look nervous? It looked like the woman standing there was warning them and that scene just snapped something in him.

"..remember your place, you fool-"

"Priyamvada? What's going on?" Asked Vishnudas, confused as ever.

The moment when she turned behind and her eyes fell on Arjuna, her expression and body language shifted in seconds, her angry expressions turned into a deep blush and that didn't go unnoticed by him.

Again he thought, all she did was act around him. What does this family take him for? If they play and put on an act of a loving family he would fall for it? He started to regret his decision to visiting this kingdom.

"Nothing much, brother. I was just teaching our sister the rules of this palace. Right, Chitra?" She asked Chitra, raising her left eyebrow as if she was challenging Chitra to contradict her sentence.

Chitra nervously nodded her head and the kid behind her ran away taking this distraction as a chance. 

Taking this as his only chance he stepped forward so that she could feel his presence. Even in this nervous state, he couldn't help but swoon over her innocent beauty.

He stood right in front of her, only a few feet apart as he asked, "Who might this beautiful Lady be?"

Chitra raised her eyes partially but soon averted her eyes seeing the small smile on his lips.

"She is engaged " Squeaked out Priyamvada, standing beside Chitra trying to push her away so that she could stand in front of Arjuna.

Arjuna smirked looking at Priyamvada, "Well, what a unique name this Lady has."

While Priyamvada's cheeks reddened due to embarrassment for the first time he saw Chitra smiling, facing down to the grass. Her eyes twinkled when she was smiled, making his smile widen. The light evening breeze made the petals of few flowers fall down and miraculously, they were swirling around princess Chitra as if they wanted her attention.  

"Her name is Chitra." Said Priyamvada, this time being serious.

 Chitra's long smooth black hair was flying around due to the wind and she slowly lifted her dainty arm to push her hair behind her ear and then she looked up at him, Arjuna could feel everything around pause out, it was as if she was the bright moon in a dark sky and he was the human down on earth staring at the angelic beauty.

"I am Arjuna, king of Abhiras." He said finally coming out of the daze, but in a hurry to listen to her voice. 

Before she could reply, Priyamvada spoke out in an accusing tone, "Meenamma must be back Chitra?"

And just like that in seconds Chitra excused herself almost running her way back as if she was frightened. 

Wrong, he thought. Something was definitely wrong in this palace. He kept looking at the way the princess ran away.

He could hear Vishnudas clear his voice as if he was silently asking him to turn around and when he did he found Priyamvada standing closer to him.

"Well, Priyamvada can show you around the garden," Vishnudas suggested and Priyamvada took another step close towards him with hope-filled eyes.

"Thank you for the offer, Prince. However, I have a few important petitions from my country to take care of." Arjuna replied curtly, ignoring the fake princess and left the garden with a curt nod.

By the time Arjuna and Ratan reached their chambers, he found Vikram standing outside with a tensed expression.

"My king! I got important-"

"Ratan you and these soldiers are dismissed for the day," Arjuna ordered, halting Vikram's words.

And when everyone around left Vikram continued, "From the information we discovered, there is a pattern that those disappeared villagers maintain. They leave the silver coins in a pot inside a particular temple."

"Good. Have you placed our spies around that temple?"

"Yes, my king. But the only way to enter the temple is through the entrance as the walls are built too high to sneak in at night. So the only way to place the pot inside is to walk in through the entrance."

"All we need to do is to set a trap and catch that mouse sneaking in." Arjuna completed the sentence for Vikram, it seemed like an easy catch but he should not underestimate those cruel bandits.

"This might be a once in a lifetime opportunity to catch a member of those bandits so I will personally go and catch him." Said Vikram with determination in his eyes, " Please give your permission to- "

"Count me in." Saying so Arjuna walked towards the window of his room.

"What?" Vikram blurted out, not understanding.

"It's been a while since I had some action in my life Vikram, So let's go together and catch the bad guys?" Arjuna spoke in a jovial tone.

Vikram went blank for a second and he spoke out, "I know that there is no reason for you to trust me with such an important task but- "

"Oh Vikram, please don't start with that nonsense. Okay then, take it in this way that I would like to see the village and as I would already be around I might help you with catching that bandit? "

Again Vikram took a long time to process, all he has to note is that his king remains unharmed and catch that bastard, thinking he finally nodded his head in agreement.

A walk around the village and a mouse to catch, what could be more interesting?

------------------------

Hey there! Don't forget to press the star down here 🌟