Page 118 of The Burning Mountain
Veer went to speak to his mother after his meeting with Bhupathi. He hadn’t told anyone about the recent change in plans, selfishly holding on to the possibility that he could still find a way to keep Chandra safe.
His palms itched and he knew time was running out. He needed to decide. Sage Aswi, who had been staying in Rajgarh this past year, had decreed the time to use the key to be a fewminutes past midnight—exactly a day from now. Which meant his time for tarrying was over.
Veer hadn’t meant to ask his mother anything, but his conflicted feelings regarding his wife came tumbling out, anyway. He thought he would feel better, but he felt worse, hearing himself recounting how he had meant to hurt her deliberately. The ache in his chest just wouldn’t go away.
“This will be the first and last time I’ll ever advise you on this matter. You are husband and wife, and I should have no say in the goings on between you two, but since you asked me,” continued Queen Archana Devi in a stern voice, “here is my advice and listen closely.”
Veer turned away from the city to face her.
“There must be a reason you wed her?” she asked.
Veer’s brows rose. He hadn’t been expecting a question. “With the war between our kingdoms, I obviously had to choose a bride to end it.”
His mother shook her head, annoyance pinching her brows, as if he were being dense. “But you chose her. Of all the seven princesses, you wanted her. Why, Veer?”
He went silent for a while, his gaze returning to the city spread out beneath the palace. His eyes stared unseeing, at the neatly paved roads, the packed squares of buildings broken by the rectangles of apple orchards planted by his grandfather. The marching guard walls that bordered their city and beyond, the green fields and verdant vegetation spruced by the fertile waters of the River Saptavarshi. Everyone was on the move, soldiers and citizens alike, the impending natural disaster and the whispers of war had everyone on edge.
“Because I liked her,” he said finally. “She didn’t indiscriminately hate or see us as foreigners. Her kindness extends beyond her kin, her people, or her kingdom. She’s a brave woman who gives her life for what she believes in. I…I’venever met a person like her. Not even in the last seven years since I stayed away.”
“So this request of hers, this is par for the course for the kind of woman she is, am I right?”
Veer didn’t say anything. His mother moved her arm as if to touch him on the shoulder, and he shuffled closer, so she could avoid stepping onto the connecting platform. They were all aware of her fear of heights. But she had informed him she wanted to brave that fear today, to come and see her beloved city before the dark night tomorrow, when Meru threatened everything they held dear.
“You love her because of who she is as a person.” Her voice had softened to a gentle admonishment. “Why would you want to change that fundamental attribute?”
Veer ignored the first part of the sentence, neither admitting nor refuting that he loved her, choosing instead to express his frustration about her. “How am I supposed to protect her if she insists on putting herself in danger?”
“You can’t, Veer,” answered his mother with an exasperated sympathy. “At some level, we are responsible for our own safety and choices. Taking away that freedom in the name of protection is worse than death. Sometimes, to love is to let go. Chandra isn’t stupid. You have to trust her in the decisions she makes for herself.”
Veer took his time digesting that information.
“You sent Sameera to her. Why did you do that?” he asked finally.
Archana Devi adjusted the downturned collar of his shirt, her fingers caressing the smooth weave of pashmina wool. “Because I wasn’t convinced about her statement in front of the court seven years ago. She said she hated you, but call it a woman’s intuition, I didn’t think that was entirely the case. And I trusted your judgment. You couldn’t have chosen so poorly.”
She rubbed his shoulder in a way that was achingly familiar, and Veer felt a rush of love for this woman, who had provided him with unconditional love and support…even when he didn’t deserve it. Veer glanced at her disfigured knuckles that she kept hidden.
“I doubt my own judgment,” he said, his throat raw with regret. He would never dream of admitting such a thing to anyone but his mother. “After Virat…”
“You were a child when you met Virat, and he wasn’t always bad or evil. We are all at fault for failing to recognize what he has become and the things he has done, the people he had wronged.”
“Did you always know the truth about the past?” he asked, voicing the question that had haunted him since Chandra revealed her truth. He recalled he had turned a deaf ear to his mother’s pleas to investigate more about the incident, becoming annoyed at her persistence and had even avoided her. How he wished he had listened to her wise counsel.
“Of course not. I sent Sameera more to be her friend than to ferret out her secrets. Sameera refused to do so, anyway. She would only mention that what happened in the past was not what appeared on the surface.”
His mother patted his shoulder one last time and walked away. “Go to your princess and have a talk. She probably misses you as much as you miss her.”
“I don’t—” The automatic refusal that sprang to his lips died a quick death with one glare from her.
“Don’t lie to your mother…”
Shota waylaidhim when he went searching for Chandra.
“She’s on the far west balcony—the one that overlooks a sheer drop down the mountainside,” he informed him as he leaned against a wall.
Veer muttered thanks and went past him to climb up the steps that would lead him to the upper levels of the palace.
“She knows about Sameera,” called Shota.
