Her pov
It was well past nightfall by the time the palace finally grew quiet.
The quiet that settles not just in corridors, but inside you—where thoughts grow louder because nothing else remains to interrupt them.
Rudra had fallen asleep beside me, one small hand still curled into the edge of my sleeve as though even in sleep he refused to let go. I looked at him for a long moment, brushing a strand of hair away from his forehead, my chest tightening at the simple, unknowing comfort he had given me.
He had no idea. No idea what he had steadied inside me, what storm he had silenced without even trying.
I shifted carefully, making sure not to wake him, and reached for the parchment once again. It lay where I had left it, waiting, patient in a way I had not been.
I had tried to write. So many times.
Words had come, but none of them had felt right. Some felt too small for what I carried, others too heavy to send. Each attempt ended the same way—unfinished, abandoned, as though I was still standing at the edge of something I could not yet step into.
I exhaled slowly, steadying myself. It doesn’t have to be perfect. The thought came softly, but it stayed. And then, without warning, he was there again—not in front of me, not in form, but in memory so clear it felt like a presence.
Just write… and I will come.
He hadn’t said those exact words. But I knew. I knew with a certainty that did not need to be spoken. My fingers tightened slightly around the edge of the paper as another memory surfaced—quieter, but no less powerful.
The temple.
That fleeting moment when everything had blurred just enough for truth to slip through unnoticed. The way his eyes had changed for a second—not confusion, not hesitation, but recognition. As if the act we had been part of had stopped feeling like pretense… and something real had taken its place.
I had seen it. And I had not imagined it. A faint breath left me, something between nervousness and resolve. He will come. The thought did not feel like hope anymore.
It felt like trust.
I lowered my gaze to the parchment, the emptiness of it no longer intimidating, but inviting. And this time— I did not hesitate.
The ink touched the page, and the words began to flow, not carefully measured, not restrained, but honest in a way I had never allowed them to be before.
I did not think about how they would sound. I did not think about how they would be read. I only wrote.
Because for the first time—
I was no longer afraid of what the truth might become once it left me.
Here’s your letter, rewritten with emotional clarity, flow, and depth while keeping her raw honesty intact:
Aditya,
This may be the last letter I write to you.
I don’t know how to shape these feelings into words that feel worthy of them, but I have to try—because this feels like my last chance to say what I have been holding back for far too long.
There are things I have not told you.
Not because I wanted to deceive you, but because circumstances made it easier to remain silent than to explain. If there were half-truths in my words before, they were never meant to mislead you.
But what I felt—what I wrote to you in every letter—was never a lie.
And neither is this. I do not know if words are enough for what I feel, but I will say them anyway.
I love you.
I think I loved you from the very first moment I saw you in that jungle. Everything that followed, every letter, every attempt to reason with myself… it was never to understand the feeling.
It was to escape it. But I cannot run from it anymore. So today, I will not hide anything from you.
I am not an attendant in the palace.
I am the princess of this kingdom.
And now, they are preparing to marry me off.
A swayamwar has been announced. They say I will have the right to choose, but how do I choose when my heart has already done that for me?
I have already chosen you.
I do not care whether you are a soldier or a king. None of that has ever mattered to me. What matters is you.
And now I am asking.
If you feel even a fraction of what I feel --then come.
Come before the swayamwar.
It will be held on this coming full moon.
Come and take me from here.
I will wait.
—Barkha
The last word lingered beneath my hand long after I had finished writing it, as though the ink itself needed a moment to settle into truth. I did not move at once. My eyes remained on the letter, tracing the lines I had finally allowed myself to write without restraint, without caution, without the careful distance I had maintained for so long.
It was done.
And yet, instead of relief, something deeper rose within me—something fragile, something overwhelming.
My vision blurred before I could stop it. The tears came quietly, slipping down without urgency, as though they had been waiting for this exact moment to be released. One drop fell onto the parchment, then another, the ink beneath softening where it touched. I watched it happen, aware of it, but made no attempt to wipe it away.
Let it remain, I thought faintly.
Let him see what these words cost me.
My fingers loosened their hold on the quill, the tension I had carried for days finally giving way. The weight of everything I had been holding back—fear, certainty, longing—pressed down all at once, and my body yielded to it without resistance. I leaned back into the sofa, my head resting against the cushion, my breath uneven but slowing.
At some point, without deciding to, I closed my eyes.
Sleep did not come gently; it took me completely.
When I woke, it was not to sound or movement, but to a stillness so complete it felt deliberate. For a brief moment, I did not move, suspended between sleep and awareness, until I felt it—the small, steady weight resting against me.
Rudra.
He lay curled in my lap, his breathing soft and undisturbed, his tiny hand still loosely holding onto the fabric of my sleeve as though even in sleep he sought something constant. I looked down at him, my hand instinctively brushing his hair back, careful not to wake him. There was something about his presence that steadied me before I even understood why I needed it.
And then I became aware that I was not alone.
I lifted my gaze slowly.
Vimoksha stood across the room.
The letter was in his hand.
For a moment, everything within me stilled. He had always been difficult to read, his expressions guarded, his thoughts rarely allowed to surface fully. Even now, there was something in his face—something I could not quite name—but it did not reveal itself easily. It simply remained there, quiet, contained, and impossible to ignore.
He was looking at me.
I met his gaze, holding it for a second longer than I intended, before my eyes lowered on their own. Not out of fear, but because I could not yet hold the weight of what that look might mean.
My gaze fell to the table beside me.
The plate. Next to the one I ate with Rudra. He must have come to make me eat. And then he had seen the letter.
He had read it.
The silence between us stretched, but it did not feel uncertain. It felt deliberate, as though he had already decided what needed to be said and was simply allowing the moment to arrive at it.
So I waited.
And after a pause that felt measured rather than hesitant, he spoke.
“If he comes…”
The words were calm, unhurried, but they carried a weight that settled immediately.
I looked up at him again.
His gaze shifted briefly toward the letter in his hand, then returned to me, steady and unwavering.
“…then I won’t let the swayamwar happen.”
For a second, the meaning did not fully reach me. Or perhaps it did, but my mind resisted accepting it too quickly, as though it feared it might disappear if grasped too soon.
“... and if he won’t, then it will.”
He stepped forward then, closing the distance just enough to place the letter back on the table. He set it down exactly where I had left it, as though restoring something rather than interrupting it.
There was no emphasis in his gesture, no attempt to explain himself further.
The statement stood on its own.
And then he turned and walked away.
The door closed behind him with a quiet finality that did not match the shift he had left in his wake.
I remained where I was, unmoving, my hand still resting lightly against Rudra’s hair, my gaze fixed somewhere between the letter and the space Vimoksha had just vacated.
Something had changed. Because now, without asking for it— someone had chosen to stand beside me.
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