‘That was no ordinary dream, Aman,’ Idhika said. ‘Your mother wanted to put you on the bus, sure. But it seems you had your true Adwaita that night, the first time your lips touched Madhu. It was not when you came to the valley. Do you remember? They only declared me the Eka when everyone else failed, and having grown up in the valley, I was immune to Madhu. There was no way to tell for sure, so they declared me the leader, but you—’

‘You’re the true leader,’ Aarti said with unblinking eyes. Everyone was looking at Aman.

‘But the gift of the instinct?’ Savitri asked.

‘He . . . has that,’ Fayza said with her head in her hands.

Aman told the others how, after returning from the Dronagiri woods, he had developed a certain sharpness as well as chronic nausea. And, in retrospect, that sharpness had enabled Aman to excel at Chaturanga and even save them all from the kirtimukhas twice.

‘Nausea is a well-known symptom of being the Eka,’ Idhika said, shaking her head. ‘You should have said something . . .’

‘But . . . so Vaidya Chitra lied to me when she said it was because of the kirtimukha’s cut?’ Aman said, pointing to the scar below his lip.

‘Wait, so you are supposed to lead this journey?’ Jagrav asked. ‘Is that why the Mahayatra has been so trying for us, Eka?’

At the sound of ‘Eka’, Aman turned to Idhika. But it was him they were addressing.

The Blue Rose having revealed himself, far down south, the valley’s leaves were a touch greener, the animals faintly quicker and the days somewhat warmer.

‘Doesn’t that mean Aman is supposed to be the exception to the laws of the valley?’ Savitri asked, elbowing Fayza, paying no heed to the gravity of the situation. She was clearly referring to the rule of celibacy they all had to follow.

Aman looked across to Fayza’s firelit face, her red cheeks, the mole on her temple and her bright smile. As the Eka, the valley would have to accept them as a couple, and nothing excited him more. A thick mist rolled in from between the trees. Aman and Fayza broke eye contact only moments later, when they heard Idhika sobbing.

‘What’s wrong, Idhika?’ Aman asked her.

Idhika couldn’t stop crying. Each time she looked at Aman, she wept harder, almost as though she cried for him. A minute later, she somehow managed to talk: ‘Aman . . . this is a boon . . . and a burden.’ She sniffled. ‘I don’t know if you have noticed, but for some time . . . I’ve been racked with pain. Holding on to a secret.’ Her face was red and her eyes puffy. ‘About a month ago, Aranyani had revealed to me a piece of information that completely broke me.’

The hairs on the back of Aman’s neck stood on end. Before he could say anything, Idhika’s lips trembled. And softly, she began to sing a familiar song: ‘Tucked within brambles that may . . . Shielding boughs and keeping at bay . . . Every dashak centres a blue rose . . . Scent of which dale invariably knows.’ Idhika paused, to wipe her nose. ‘Watered, it riots by the nights . . . Sheeny, eliciting awe from sights . . . But in the valley fortified by the one that slithers . . . For the sake of home, that flower must wither.’