Mischief
Summary : Aag lagaye aur kudh na jhale, aisa hum hone nahi denge.
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Apparently into quicksand that's where she fell.
They end up in the opposite teams. Amrit, Nayantara and her husband Ranjit ends up in a team while Veer gets the two kids. The remaining positions they fill with servants.
Ranjit and Veer toss and Veer's grin is a quick flash of a knife when he wins. Tossing the coin in the air, he steps back and tugs at her braid as he passes.
"Twenty runs," he says arching his brows. "Score twenty runs against me and your secret is yours."
Amrit stares after him and Nayantara gives her the bat.
"Aap dono ke koi alag match chal raha hai?" She asks with a grin very similar to that of her cousin.
"Eyes on the ball, Amrit."
This time her voice is warm. Her smile is genuine.
"I'm a little protective of Veer. Things he had to go through while all of us were in London, all those years. I haven't quite forgiven myself. Aap ki galathi nahi hai. Aur aap dono mein itna pyaar hai dekh kar achchi lagi."
"Jiji," Amrit mutters rather helplessly.
"Just don't you dare hurt him," her eyes gleam warningly for a moment. "Uss ke saat bewafai ka anjaam karatnaak hai."
"Why would you say that?" Amrit asks before she could stop herself. Nayantara smiles.
"Let us just say, Shrighar mein aap ki bohut baatein ho rahi hai, kuwar Rani sahab. There are mouths that your Kuwar Sahab can shut, then there are those he cannot."
With that she walks off the pitch leaving her and Ranjit to bat.
Ranjit is a pleasant man, a doctor by profession and not deep in the waters of these riyasat politics. He smiles at Amrit, raises his bat in a gesture of support. Amrit attempts to return the smile but it turns a little wobbly.
What was Shrigar talking about her? And why?
"Amrit!" Veer calls over, rather loudly at that. He is tossing the ball from hand to hand. Oh shoot - the match!
Is she supposed to bat? And what is Veer doing...?
"Eyes on the ball, Biwi sahab."
Amrit grips the bat, her hands suddenly clammy. She just have to make twenty runs, what is that? It is nothing. And this would be over.
Twenty runs.
Twenty runs.
Veer moves rather sharply, his arm cutting through the air, his swing rather hard to keep track of.
The ball escapes his hand and comes hurling towards her. Amrit swings her bat at it and to her surprise and relief the wood finds the leather with a thud. The ball goes in the air with a nice curve and straight out of the line of their vision.
Somewhere in distant a servant shouts.
"Found the ball. It's a six, hukum!"
The look on Veer's face, especially now that she and Ranjit have made a run and Amrit has drawn close to where Veer was standing is priceless.
"Fourteen more, Kuwar sahab," she tells him, unable to hold it in. Veer looks at her in a side way glance.
"You are this good?"
"Do bhaio ki behan hoon, how could I not be good? Aur aap ne full toss dhala tha."
Veer mutters something under his breath and then his eyes turn rather mischievous.
"Ragav," he calls. "Aap balling kijiye, mami sahab ko lagtha hai wicket keeper ke zarurat hai..."
"Hey!" Amrit says, as Veer hands over the ball. "How can you change the bawler mid over? You can't - that's cheating!"
Veer comes closer, bows until they are nose to nose.
"Hum rajwade hai biwi sahab. Khel bhi humari, rules bhi humare."
He goes to stand behind her and Amrit is very aware of his presence.
"Why are you so nervous?" He asks rather playfully. "You know you jump forward to bat."
"I hate you."
"You wish!" He laughs. "Kher, sochthi rahiye, humare barre mein. Yasho - go to the boundary. Haan- wahaan. Stay. Yes!" He drags his eyes back to her. "Aaj toh tumhe haarna hai - biwi sahab. "
Ragav is unpredictable but still a child. Amrit hits the ball for a four this time. Even Nayantara is cheering from the sidelines.
"Das," she tells Veer.
"Dekhthe hai," he replies. Then reaches to tuck a strand of hair behind her ear.
Her cheek is warm from all the excitement and his fingers are cold. The contrast makes her shudder.
"There is a rule in war, never celebrate your victory too early."
"There is another Kuwar sahab, never underestimate your enemy."
She swings her bat and the ball is swept along the lawn. Both Yasho and Ragav chase after it. Amrit makes two runs with Ranjit and they return for a third run just as Yasho manages to get the ball.
"No no no," Amrit cannot possibly run any faster, and the ball comes in a projectile over their heads to Veer's outstretched hand.
Trying to keep it in her vision and also run back at the same time Amrit stumbles and falls - scraping her elbows and a knee in the process. The crease is only a few feet away, and her eyes water with pain. She hisses through her teeth.
Veer lets the ball drop, not even touching the bails and comes to crouch beside her instead, gently holding her arms and lifting her off the dusty ground.
One look at her scraped raw elbows, he shakes his head and picks her up instead.
"Veer," she protests gently. Veer glowers at her.
"Chup!" He casts a look around to address all the others and says, "We are done. Aap do aur log bhula lijiye."
With one last quick smile at Nayantara he carries her off, not caring a cent about the looks they were getting, or the heat on Amrit's face.
He carries her straight into their washroom and places her on the edge of the tub.
"Lift your saari Amrit, I need to see where you got hurt."
He doesn't even look at her, instead he is busy with soaking a hand towel. Amrit gulps.
"It's on my knee. There is nothing to see Kuwar sahab it's just a scratch it will be all dried off in a hour or -"
The look he gives her, makes her words dry up instead.
"I've seen your knees before - stop fidgeting and do as you are told."
She still doesn't move. He watches her with the wet cloth in his hand.
"Tum kar rahi ho, ya hum kudh karrein?"
He actually kneels at her feet and stretches out a hand towards the hem of her saari.
"I'll do it, I will." Amrit quickly snatches the hem off the ground and folds it upwards, revealing the injured knee in all its red, rawness.
Gently he presses the wet cloth to the scraped knee, cleaning off the sand that clings to raw skin. Amrit watches him, watches how focused he is, how even for a moment his eyes don't stray from her injury to all that exposed expense of skin. Her heart tightens in a clenched fist of emotions.
"Why are you crying?" He doesn't even raise his head as he asks. Amrit touches her cheeks and finds out that indeed they are wet. Veer looks at her.
"Itni dard ho rahi hai?"
"Shrighar ke log meri baare mein kya bol rahe hai Kuwar sahab?"
Veer's hand pauses, then after a moment his jaw clenches. He finishes cleaning her wound and starts applying ointment.
"When I was young, and my baba sahab was still alive, he used to say this to Ma sahab. Unke zaada Baatein humein yaad nahi hai par yeh baat hum kabhi nahi bhoole. Woh baat hum aaj aap ko bata dete hai.
"Amrit Taj sar mein pehenaya jaata hai, Uss ke baad log chehere ko nahi Taj ko dekhte hai.
" Similarly, in the royal family, they don't see people. They see titles. They want something that anchors them to these hundred years old traditions. We are those living monuments. They look up to us and see, not people and their petty troubles but the power and prestige that we represent.
"Ab aap Kuwar rani hai, kal ko aap humari Rani banengi, yeh log ab aap ko alag nazar se dekhenge. Aise nahi dekhenge jaisi ki aap ek ladki hai, jisski nayi nayi shaadi hui hai, nayi ghar mein naye logo ke saat rehena seekh rahi hai - zindagi ko jeena seekh rahi hai.
"Whatever you do, they will notice. They will talk about it.
"If you smile they will wonder why. If you don't they will still wonder why. If we are close, they will say you have cast some witchcraft on me. If we are distant they will say there must be something rotten in our marriage.
This will go on.
"Even if you are eight five and dowager grandmother to the king, they will still comment upon you sneaking laddus from a pooja tali, or you gossiping with kitchen staff or - why are you laughing?"
Amrit couldn't stop it. She slaps a hand against her forehead and continues to laugh, until the last of her tears fell in laughter.
There are patches of red in her cheeks and a blotch on her nose, she looks so endearing that Veer couldn't help himself.
He gathers her close, until her laughter is muffled against his heart. She doesn't pull back, the fit of chuckles slowly subsides.
"Why do you picture me as a granny who steals sweets?"
Veer bites his lip over a remark about her sweet tooth. Amrit herself didn't realize how her eyes gleamed at the sight of anything doused in sugar syrup.
She pulls back and is now watching him expectantly, he cups her face, and his thumbs caress those two red blotches of happiness on her cheeks.
"I imagined you as an all haughty dowager queen mother too, did I not?"
Her smile dimmed.
"You imagined yourself gone again."
"Biwi sahab, hum aap se saat saal bade hai. When you are eighty five - I'd be ninty two. What are the chances of me living that long?"
"Then what are the chances of me living up to eighty five?"
"Sau saal jiyengi aap," he cuts her off rather firmly.
"Ek sau saat saal jiyenge aap."
They burst out laughing at the same time again and their foreheads bump together.
Still chuckling, Veer rubs her forehead with his palm, holding it there, he looks down at her. His hand is large enough to half cover her eyes. Still she watches him, eyes lit up in amusement.
"Haar nahi manongi na?"
"Koshish karke dekhlijiye. Haarna aap ko hi padenga."
There is a promise of fire in her voice, he holds to that warmth with all of his being. Veer feels as if he had been frozen numb all his life and she is the sun, finally peering through an endless night, he basks in her presence - in her smiles.
"You didn't make twenty runs," he reminds her.
"You carried me off the pitch!"
"Oh?"
"Oh yes."
"Biwi sahab..."
"Kuwar sahab..."
Veer stops the bubbling laughter with effort and stands up.
"Go - work on your interview. That girl is here. Can you walk on your own or shall I help?" Then he touches her cheek with the back of his palm. "Ab kush?"
Her heart swells at the simple inquiry. He had noticed her mood in the morning, had probably been bothered by it.
How well did he read her, why did he - when all of her loved ones choose to see what they wanted and ignore the rest? Amrit was beginning to realize it now. That, that is what they did.
They projected what they wanted on her and saw her through a filtered glass, as a sister, a friend, or even a lover. None of them saw Amrit as the imperfect woman that she was.
Veer did. In fact he had seen her as nothing but herself. It scared her a little, how exposed she was to this man.
That he knew every single crease of her conscience and had so much power over herself. She had started as an unwilling pawn and he the monster at the centre of her maze. That is no longer the case...is it?
"Kuwar sahab," she takes his name rather cutiously, her heartbeat picking up. She wants a taste of this unwitting thrall, this quicksand of a feeling.
She wants some power of her own.
"Idar aayiye zara."
Veer approaches her, looking down at her quizzically. She gestures him to bow down, he watches for a beat before lowering himself.
"Closer," the whisper came out as a breath. Veer made a sound in the back of his throat, a little sound that heated up her blood. "Aur pass."
She encircled her arms around his neck and brought their faces closer.
"Aur pass?" Veer asks.
"Hmm," humming her assent Amrit bumped their foreheads together, gently, before a giggle escaped her. She draws back, biting her lip.
"There," she says. "Misfortune averted."
Veer isn't done, however. His arm wraps around her waist and tugs her closer in a powerful movement.
She slams against him, all softness against hard muscle with a little startling gasp.
His breath fans her face and he brings himself closer.
"Yeh toh nainsafi hui, biwi sahab. Aag lagaye aur kudh na jhale, aisa hum hone nahi denge."
Her eyes flutter close when he blows gently on her face.
"Shaam ko milte hai." He mutters in her ear and unexpectedly his lips close over edge of the shell of her ear and tugs.
A hiss of a breath leaves her parted lips.
"Biwi sahab."
With that he draws back and leaves, whistling a tune under his breath.
**
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