The Last Rudra - Chapter 146

His father looked at him. For the first time, Oman had seen the pride in his eyes for him.

“You’ve proved me wrong, son,” said he, smiling. Oman could still recall the warmth of his hand on his shoulder.

“Take this, it is yours now.” He placed a silver key on his palm. Puzzled Oman examined tiny key. Alien runes were engraved on it.  He couldn’t make out of them, so he glanced back at his father. but he was not there. The divine Vimana, his ancestors, and Ayaan, all had vanished. Oman found himself falling down like a meteor.

The next moment he was in his bed, sweat-drenched and gasping for breath. They had left him alone in this cruel world, fumbling.

For a long time, Oman kept staring out of the window as if his soul had left his body. Two big drops had rolled down on his checks. He couldn’t recall when he had cried last time, but that night he felt like a toddler abandoned by his parents in a wilderness. He wanted to scream. He didn’t want the cursed throne, he didn’t want to be a lord. All he wanted was them to come back.

However, Had anyone ever been able to come back from the kingdom of white wives?

Oman pulled himself together, hearing the distant wailing of four years old Drona, the boy who had lost his parents.  Padma and other maids were trying to soothe him.

Oman sighed as he decided to take a walk in the orchard, for he knew sleep would not come again, at least not that night.

He donned his cloak and stepped out of his chamber. It was then he heard whispers.

Bewildered he swept his spiritual sense. The stone walls were whispering.

Oman’s first thought was that he was hallucinating. He would have paid a visit to  Nimohi if Amora hadn’t told him that he wasn’t.

The house-anima, whose origin no one knew, brought him to this rusty door.

The golden door clanked open, revealing a carpeted corridor. Oman took a deep breath, despite tending the palace for a decade, he still felt uncomfortable entering the ancient palace.

He left his slippers out and stepped in. Like always, Amora magically turned into a tangible person.  His hawk-like eyes looked more intimidating. The scarred face man with fiery hair had put on a golden cloak.

On his first visit, the house -anima’s strange transformation had startled Oman.  Amora chuckled as he explained the cause.

The opulence palace, whose walls were gold platted and covered with exotic murals, was not in the same dimension as the old castle. Here, tangible and intangible coexisted together.

Oman had frozen to his spot when he saw two boys chasing each other, their laughter echoing in the grand hall. The two boys were none other than him and his brother Ayaan. When he got over his surprise, he looked towards Old Amora, who smiled and replied,

“A memory and nothing! Old Cira sometimes likes to cling to things. You shouldn’t mind that. Follow me, it is time you to know the secret, that your ancestors have been safeguarding for eons.”

They crossed a floorless corridor, avoiding the uncanny beings roaming all over the place like apparitions.

“What is the place?” asked Oman, looking at scenes flickering in the air all around.

“Inna’s Palace or as Mitras called it, the prison of Vela,” replied Amora sighing.

“Who is Vela?”  Omas asked as he saw his blood-soaked sister, Gayatri, taking the last breath in a scene. It was like he had entered his brain and was watching his memories.

“You will soon know,” all the old man said as he led him out of the giant gate.

Oman had roamed practically half of Varta. He had seen myriads of uncanny things –he had spied on nymphs. He had watched ghosts’ gory wedding feasts. He had been to Yama’s circle.

However, never in his entire life, he had witnessed such a mind-boggling sight.

A giant head as large as his castle itself was floating up in the air. The hugeness hadn’t lessened the beauty of the soul enchanting face. Glossy black as if made of dark night was fluttering in the ether wind.  Her eyes were emerald green and teary. Intricate runes were covering her forehead a little bit similar to Bhadra, the fowler.

There was no star, no moon but darkness around her. Oman couldn’t make out the source of light that was illuminating the strange face.

“Why are you here, Amora?” asked the female. Her voice was gentle and sweet like the song of a city bride.

“The guardian has changed, Vela” replied Amora, Oman could feel the hidden reverence in his gruff voice.

“Oh! I see.” She looked at Oman with piqued interest.  “The child didn’t listen to me, then. ” she sighed looking straight into the void.

“I’ve told him. He couldn’t change a thing. But alas! He didn’t listen to me. I can see his soul being sold in Nyasa.”

Oman didn’t know what the lady was talking about, he looked at Amora, for an explanation.

“But it might be not true. One shouldn’t turn passive just because his actions would bear no fruit. I think he has done the right thing.” Amora said.

“You don’t see what I see, Amora. I wish you never had to. ” sighed Vela.

Silence fell among them. It seemed the whole cosmos was wailing.

“May I know what is going on here?” Oman broke the sullen silence. They two were treating him like thin air.

Vela looked at him. Her eyes filled with pity.

” Amora, initiate the ceremony. Let him know what his ancestors have left for him,” said she.

The ceremony was nothing, but the chanting of a hymn composed of obscure syllables. Amora tabbed the place between his eyebrows and the so-called kunjika (key spell) had appeared in his mind.

||| aṁ kaṁ chaṁ ṭaṁ taṁ paṁ yaṁ śaṁ vīṁ duṁ aiṁ vīṁ haṁ kṣaṁ ||

dhijāgraṁ dhijāgraṁ trōṭaya trōṭaya dīptaṁ kuru kuru svāhā ||

Oman could feel the power of each syllable as he articulated them one by one. His whole body began to shudder. The blood began to boil. His memories churned forming a whirlpool. Oman, despite his high cultivation, collapsed on his spot. And the horrors began to flash before him.

His body convoluted, his beastly howls echoed.

He didn’t know how long he had been like that. When he came around, he had aged a decade. His eyes had lost their youthful gleam. His heart had turned cold as icy. The key his lord father had given him in his dream, was the inheritance, passed down from generation to generation.

But was it really an inheritance? Wasn’t it a curse? Curse to bind them all.

He now knew why his father let his precious daughter die. He knew why Ayaan died. Everything that had been concealed so far was clear as a day. Now he knew what had made Mora to  kill every dwizas or why he was hell bent on destroying every spirit shrine.

He was after this. The watcher of three realms. The keeper of all secrets. The source of all knowladge.

Now he knew how Ankha, despite being a cripple, had became a semi hara. He had  the blood of gaurdians flowing in his viens.  After death of his father, he must have inherited the key to this astral plane.

He looked at the female face with a complicated gaze. How could those eyes still have so much warmth after witnessing horrors of three realms. Why hadn’t her heart not shattered yet?

“Do you accept your duty?” asked Amora.

Oman looked at him. Did he really have a choice?

“yes!” It was a simple word, but it had changed everything.

The invisble shackles had tied his soul.

*****

Oman entered walked down the corridor, ignoring the distrubing scenes flickering around him.

“Where is the suspicious spot?” He asked Amora. Oman didn’t want to stay this place more than necessary.

“At the stadiam. ” Amora replied as they walked down floorless corridor.  “I felt strange flactuation a while ago. ”

Oman’s face turned serious. The prision of Vela was encompassing entire Minaak. The both place coexisted at the same place. He couldn’t make out the working behind this spatial law.

After walking down the maze of  corridors, and chambers, they halted at a spot.

“Look, here. ” Amora pointed in the space.

Oman didn’t see anything out of ordinary.  According to his inherited memories, the

whole diamension was a giant array, casted by some powerful being. As for whom, there was no memory of the person. Oman sure Amora and Vela knew the person, but you couldn’t get anything from them.

From his inherited memories, all he had learned was that long ago something had happned to this world, which forced thier ancestors to create this dimension and imprisioned Vela.

To maintain this array, the gaurdian had to organise Inna’s feast..  As for what was the connection between the two, it took Oman a decade to make out.