A/N-Before you read, please note that this is treading into Uttarakhand, where Maa Sita is left in the forest.

Genre: Angst

It's just, Lakshman fears.

Sita bhabhi was once so beloved to the people of Ayodhya. Her name was revered as perfection to every woman, hailed as goddess-like to every man. People fell to the ground if her shadow even touched their village, forget their own. They went so far as to make little statues of her and do aarti in front of her every evening as if she was Maa Lakshmi incarnate.

Lakshman fears the unpredictable ocean of thought. People in Ayodhya, it seemed, didn't have the straightforward mindset that he had. People in Ayodhya would never be able to accept Maa Sita's purity anymore. They would never understand that the same reason that they took her name before anything auspicious in the first place was the reason why she could never betray her husband.

But they never thought of her as an honorable queen more than they knew her as Ram bhaiyya's wife. And while that was fine with his faultless bhabhi, who treasured being bhaiyya's wife like a diamond,  it was also the core reason why they started those wretched rumors. 

The moment their 'perfect wife' image was tarnished, even in the darkest depths of their flawed minds, their reverence disappeared as quickly as the north breeze changed pace.

 In an instant. 

He sees Urmila adjust her pallu as she leaves to do aarti in the temple near their palace, and he feels like following her, shadowing her, shielding her from the questioning eyes and the sharp tongues and the unforgiving thoughts that collected so quickly for her didi.

Urmila is her own woman, much more than his wife, he knows that, but the villagers would never quite grasp that. Lakshman didn't know why. 

Ram bhaiyya called it love, immense love, and the parently protectiveness that arose from thus. But Lakshman thought that if it was, indeed, love, (could it even be called that?) it had to be a twisted one. He'd loved Ram bhaiyya so much that he hadn't once questioned Sita bhabhi. He, who followed him for fourteen years without a word, who had seen the battle of Lanka.

What love did the villagers claim to possess that they could speak so quickly and boldly that even the king was forced to listen to them?

Urmila walks away without any of Lakshman's thoughts breeding in her breezy mind, fabric already slipping off her long, curly black hair, and Lakshman barely suppresses the instinct to chase after her and slash every silent, blistering thought against her in those creeping eyes with his sword.

Sita bhabhi had only been in Lanka for eleven months. Urmila had been alone in Kosala for fourteen years.

Clenching his hand in a fist, Lakshman can't find it in himself to relax back into his chair until Urmila does return. He tries to smile as she paints a bright red tilak on his forehead with her thumb, embraces her tightly, trying to memorize her joyous giggling, and watches her go again, off to their chambers.

The villagers weren't talking. Yet.

When they had, word spread like the spread of flame on an oil drenched muslin. And that was doubt upon the lady no one could even think of harming, the beloved queen of Kosala. 

Sita bhabhi was gone (how could he forget, when her desolate face was etched into his mind forever?) upon Maharaj Ram's command.

Lakshman has never cowered in front of anything in his life, he swears it, and yet Lakshman fears.

 He fears the mind of a human being, whose tides turn so quickly, and yet can never turn back. Whose power is so great that they can force a man who single-handedly extinguished Khar, Dushan, Tadaka, Jamadgani, Ravan, to act against the wife whom he loved without thinking, more than life itself. Whose evil, evil, evil thoughts are hidden under the guise of something as pure as love. 

He fears what they may say against Urmila, what despicable conceptions may be lurking on the tip of their tongue. What ideas could be masked behind their admiring gazes. 

He fears the idea of Urmila that resides in their minds, and more than that, the havoc she could wreak upon their lives without even ever existing beyond the thoughts of men.

The things people could say about the woman who had just hugged him so tightly, her eyes warm with a love he surely didn't deserve, her smile shining with sheer adoration, the doubts they could raise against someone who stayed by his side so unconditionally. 

The woman they could create in their warped imagination.

He fears the next command of Maharaj Ram.