Shreema examined the blade of durva grass. One central stalk flattening into a blade, with two blades growing out of it, a perfect triplet. She put it aside on the tray. It didn't feel strange anymore. She looked up to the murals surrounding her. The stories drawn into them escaped her, whispering her own instead.

Shreema had walked with her head down into the temple. It was a few days since she had achieved womanhood.

"Can I help you?" a calm voice spoke behind her.

"Yes, I was sent by Sirisha di!?"

"Oh! Yes, I remember. I'm the one who wrote back to you" the chief priest shook her hands, "So you versed in the arrangements of offerings for all the twelve pujas?"

"Yes and also seven levels of marriage ceremonies." the girl replied excitedly looking around the temple especially the murals.

The priest followed her gaze, "you want to ask about the apsara!?"

"I heard they call them devdasi!"

"Does it matter? Apsara are divine dancers. To hold anyone's attention and entertain them with something else elemental is dance and music...I don't think dancers are ever mortal!"

"Do you know her story?" Shreema pointed to a mural.

"I know she wasn't born from the milk ocean or not gifted with eternal youth! She knew all sixty-four forms of dance though, as much as I recall!" the priest ushered her to walk with him.

"So how come the stories stopped, how come she stopped?"

"To be human today means being corruptible. Being the best among all of us didn't make her a part of society. She was a performer, people expected perfection from her on the stage. People thought how good it would be to meet her off the stage, turns out they were right. The perfection started to creep behind the curtains. We were growing because of her..."

"...Evil is a magnificent thing, most people don't want to leave it behind. So the people turned, her dances became erotic, her sarees too revealing. They say one day she was never heard of again. Truth is we stopped talking to her altogether, lest she seduces us into a better person!"

Both of them breathed heavily. The priest spoke first, "I didn't get your name?"

Then she told the priest her name.

"You could've kept in dancing. Sirisha comes here with her troupe once a year." the priest led Shreema to the garbhagriha.

"I wanted to do this. I like working in temples!"

"I don't think you have to be my assistant for very long!" the priest started to arrange flowers on the dais, "the revenues are down. No one donates to this temple anymore. You just might be the next priestess of Mayatalav."

He wasn't wrong.

It all felt like a dream now. Talukdar taking notice of her, wooing her. She eventually got stronger and left her only child in care of her mentor. She still remembered the day she came back from Coochbehar to find Nandan waiting at the temple steps.

"I thought about doing something royally atrocious! Burn this temple you call a home, flay you at the dead of night..." Nandan didn't mask his hate.

Shreema envisioned the temple in flames and felt the lump in her throat go away. Whatever purity she had acquired bringing new life into the world, she felt it leave her. "Why didn't you?"

"Well, I got married for one. I thought I would able to better deal with you if I understand you. How foolish of me!?" Nandan chuckled.

"You reached a verdict?"

"I decree nothing would change between us!" Nandan spoke like giving a sentence, "I could've loved you if you told me about my father. I could've hated you if you came to our home with his child! But I believe you will do neither of those things and you will still end up destroying us!"

Shreema listened with attention, her responses froze. She for a moment considered her decisions, wondering if she will remember this moment in her coming life.

"I decree that you will know that all your suffering, all your sacrifice, all the things you didn't do. It meant nothing! I will still watch you from afar, regard you as a stranger. I will make sure nothing changes between us!"

Somewhere deep within her a bubbling laughter died down. She was ready to renounce a great deal, she suddenly realised she would suffer because of it.

"You think you command a presence. I simply chose to walk away from it!" Nandan turned to the shadows leading to the Sikdar estate.

He went back to taunting her on how she defiled a place of worship. He never attempted to stop lauding her either.

Shreema thus didn't feel anymore proud or humbled, when she brought the pocket deeds of the temple to Nandan. Now the temple belonged to the Sikdars and She did not.

Shreema kept on plucking the perfect sized durva grass. She looked at the murals again and then turned his attention towards the deity. Everyone below the Himalayas celebrate the period the goddess apparently returns to her father's home. The temple was built on the belief that this would be the home of where she would reside with her consort.

Shreema smiled at the passing time. Her thoughts drifted at the events in this temple, she contemplated herself being there through all of it.

Nandan should've burnt the temple that day, Shreema would've enjoyed putting the flames out.