The snails on the lakebed had alerted Idhika to the large blue hole she now saw clearly. When she tried nearing it, gushes of warm water pushed her back. The pressure varied in areas, so she had to try different angles of approach. Its western edge had a sharp cut that slowed the water, so she swam from that side and managed to close in on it, enough to grab on to the edge with her left fin. A quick second and one slender thrust into the hole, and her thin, slippery body slid into a dark marine cavern further under the lake, where the waters were calm and discernibly warmer. Could it be? Idhika thought, remembering what her father had told her years ago about the springs at the bottom of the lake.

Sanaka, by then, had already made his way to the lowest point of Vanyasa, the trench in Pandayam Tal. He had entered the same blue hole and slowly moved to the bottom where the springs were.

Idhika, far from being as practiced, proceeded hesitantly. She eventually reached the springs, and behind them spotted a ditch with a small opening. Since it seemed to be the only way forward, she did not wait long before entering it. A few metres in and the water started receding. Is that the surface I see? Before too long, as the brown tilapia, she poked her eyes out from the water to find herself in a cavernous underground chamber. It was a pocket of air at the bottom of the lake. There was a hut’s worth of dry land, most of it hidden in the shadows of cave walls. But what she could not miss, deep within the darkest of the dark corners, was a faintly iridescent golden light shooting out of an open lid. Idhika gaped, struggling to breathe out of the water, as her eyes adjusted to the absence of light.

There they were. Around fifteen barrels in the shape of gigantic kamandalus—and one of them afforded her a peek at its contents. Madhu!

At that moment, although the fish couldn’t possibly weep, somewhere inside, Idhika did break down; her nose did twitch before her cheeks swelled and eyes filled with tears. The burden Aranyani had put on her as the Eka had been lifted. No Mahayatra! She was relieved, ironically breathing easy for the first time as an underwater creature. She could feel remnants of her old self again, after so long. She couldn’t wait to tell the matriarch.

But the relief dissipated in a few minutes and a simmering hatred began in her. Looking at the barrels of Madhu—a confirmation of Sanaka’s deceit—the yogini felt anger like she never had before. One man, Sanaka, had taken it upon himself to deceive his own. He was trying to exploit the place that was home to her, and home to all her brothers and sisters. He was responsible for letting all those intruders in. Was it not enough that he was kidnapping Souls from the plains and forcing them to face the perils of the Mahayatra? All for Madhu? He had even separated her from her father.