Kairavi

Chapter 12

Kairavi woke up to a placid gust of wind fanning her face. The blinds were sparkling with the incident sunlight, as if it was dying to come in and illuminate the dim room. She stretched and jaunted towards the big windows to pull the curtains.

Instantly, her quarter beamed with brightness of the sun. She squinted her eyes to adjust to the abrupt flamboyance. The memory of the little pleasant moment with rajkumar Sahadev flashed in her mind and she smiled reminiscently.

The growling in her stomach interrupted the blissful train of thoughts. She was starving. Didn't even eat anything the previous night.

'I hope it's breakfast time for everyone.' she anticipated. A fresh set of clothes and a plate of stale food lay covered with a drape on a table beside the bed. It escaped from her recollection that Sahadev had said, he would be sending some food for her.
She took a bath and dressed up in the blue saree and jewellery that had been delivered to the room, the night before.

Kairavi was not a fan of stale food. So she left the plate as it was on the desk, oblivious to the letter that sat with the food.
She sauntered past the hallways and into the foyer, which didn't scare her anymore. In her hurry, she didn't observe that the length of her saree obstructed her footsteps and soon after, she stumbled upon it, breaking her anklet.

But that wasn't the only thing that caught her attention. It looked like the wall was melting down; for she saw some sticky, liquid substance oozing down it's surface. She stretched her hand out to inspect what it was but a voice distracted her.
"Clumsy, are we?" Nakul snickered while standing in front of her. She sighed in annoyance without looking at him and picked up her broken payal. "Are you okay?" he probed while examining her visually. "Yes." she replied sternly, dismissing his question.

"Whoa, somebody woke up on the wrong side of the bed today." He laughed half-heartedly but Chandraputri wasn't amused. Ignoring his amicable attempts to talk to her, she made her way into the bhojan kaksh.
Kunti was waiting for others along with Bheem and Arjun. The second pandav appeared as if he was getting impatient while Kunti and Arjun conversed merrily with each other.

"Pranipat everyone!" Kairavi said cheerfully. "You're up." Their mother smiled broad at her. "I hope you slept well, love." "I did, Rajmata." she informed her while joining them to eat. Yudhishthir, Nakul and Sahadev soon followed and they began helping themselves from the number of dishes that were arranged neatly on the table.
Kairavi refused to look at Nakul. She was obviously furious with his behaviour from yesterday. She ate silently beside Rajmata, occasionally glancing towards Sahadev.

She could feel Nakul's eyes boring through her skin, observing her every move but her stubbornness prevented her from looking at his direction. 'Why is she ignoring me? I apologized for what I said before in that letter. What else does she want?' he thought.

After being done with breakfast, everyone took off to carry out their daily chores. Having nothing to do, she followed Sahadev into the palace garden and sat beside him while he worked on some scrolls that came from Hastinapur.
"Who is Duryodhan?" she asked him remembering about the person who made his brother a ruler. He told her about Dhritrashtra, Queen Gandhari, Gandhar Raj Shakuni, the Kauravas and their enmity with the Pandavas. She gawked in shock after learning about their attempt to kill rajkumar Bheem when he was young. But the thing that disturbed her more, was that Karna had become the comrade of such evil people.

Nakul was watching them from a distance. At first, he was confused with her cold treatment, but now he was outraged seeing his twin get all of her attention. 'Why are you being like this, Kairavi?' He pondered to himself, and as if on cue; she turned her head to look at him.
'I wasn't even listening to his thoughts, then how did I know he was there?' she was puzzled. There was undoubtedly, an unspoken connection between them.

She diverted her eyes away from him quickly but Nakul kept his gaze fixed upon her. Kairavi started fidgeting with her hands, evidently perturbed. She stood up, and decided to walk around the flower beds to evade his stare.
She roamed around stroking the petals and bushes while Sahadev wrapped up his work. She marched towards the orchard and came to a halt beneath a mango tree.

Raw mangoes hung loose from the branches. She stood on her toes to pluck one that that was the nearest to her; but she wasn't tall enough. Another arm went around her from behind and snapped it from it's stem. "So you're already mad in love with my brother?" It was Nakul helping her with the little hunt.
She blatantly ignored his taunt and turned around to leave but he hopped in front of her. "I asked you something." He demanded. "I don't find it necessary to answer that, and I can't stress it enough." she replied.

"What is that you're so arrogant about?" he criticised. "Oh, look who's talking." They had started bickering once again; but this time nobody came to break them apart. In his fury, he backed her up against the tree. He looked very daunting from where the princess saw him and the look on his face wasn't showing any signs of hospitality. "You came here yesterday and you're already drooling for my brother." he groused.

Kairavi was at a loss for words. "Do you even hear yourself?" her voice rumbled with rage. "Yes, I do. My hearing is fine. It doesn't take a genius to infer that you're so thirsty for him!" His jealousy spoke on his behalf.

"What did I do for you to hate me so much?" she yelled at him with angry tears in her eyes.
The toxic mixture of the frustration of Kairavi not forgiving him; and his jealousy towards his brother made him say things that he didn't mean to. 

Kairavi needed to be alone. She pushed him out of the way and sprinted towards her room. She had never felt so disgusted in her entire life.