Over the course of that week, Fayza found out many more things about Vanyasa. Chief among them: who not to be friends with.

‘That’s weird!’ Aarti’s voice startled Fayza. Fayza looked up at the girl standing at her hut’s entrance. Aarti shot her a wide smile. ‘That really is weird!’

‘Hi, I’m Fayza . . . And what is so weird?’ She extended a handshake.

‘I know your name, Fayza.’ Aarti’s folded palms clashed with Fayza’s extended hand. ‘Namahkrita.’

‘Oh. Of course! How could I forget?’ Fayza retreated her arm and bent in mutual respect.

‘How was your Adwaita?’ Aarti asked.

‘As magical as I’d always imagined. But I’m not the Eka,’ Fayza said.

Aarti smiled. ‘I thought as much. You’re the last person the lord is going to—’

‘What do you mean?’ Fayza cut her off. ‘He could have looked at me as much as anyone else.’

Aarti let out a snort of derision.

‘I ask again. What is so “weird”?’ Fayza said.

‘Oh, it came as a bit of a surprise to me . . . how clean your hut is,’ Aarti explained.

‘What are you implying?’ Fayza asked.

Aarti stayed silent.

Fayza was caught off guard, but it was nothing she hadn’t been subjected to before. Experiencing discrimination in Vanyasa was unexpected, though. Wasn’t it supposed to be as she had been told—‘a home to equals, in confluence with all faiths’?

Before Fayza could press her to come out with what she was thinking, Aarti left. Fayza tried to put the unpleasant interaction out of her mind, forcing herself to think about the life that lay ahead in Vanyasa. ‘What’s the first thing I should do when I’m there?’ Fayza had asked her grandfather’s friend before she left.

‘I’ll tell you,’ the sage had said. ‘When in doubt, always go to the Temple of Indra on top of Kalanag.’

‘What’s Kalanag?’

‘One of the three parvats around Vanyasa. Although there are many mountains, the giants are Sarp-poonch, Kalanag and Rohini.’

‘Which one is the tallest?’ Fayza asked.

‘That’ll be Sarp-poonch. But it’s further away, beyond the forest called Aranyala. The other two are beside the village. Kalanag is on the eastern edge and Rohini in the south.’

Fayza could see Kalanag behind her. The steps which ran up to the holy shrine of Indra started not too far from the edge of her cottage.

She started climbing the stairs, the sage’s words echoing in her head. ‘But that bread, Fayza. Up there, yes, at the Temple of Indra. Guru Amrav’s recipe comes from the King of the Gods himself. Do you know that they sing tales about that bread in Rishikesh?’

As she climbed, Fayza spotted several stone cairns adorned with triangular orange flags, and before long, she had arrived within sight of the temple. When she reached the crest of Kalanag, she was taken aback by the force of the wind.

The top of the mountain had a rectangular stone structure raised a few inches above the ground. Behind it was a simple room for the priest which appeared to be built of hay. Tall, thin weeds swayed in the wind around the shrine.