In the room above the blackening roof, Puttaswamegowda lies in bed. Honni is trying to rouse him, but the old body has nothing left. They are oblivious to the chaos downstairs. Sundru and Maadhi walk into the old stone corridor where Annaiah’s body is burning. They are seen through the flames to be holding hands. Sundru, looking like Kamadeva himself, waves his free hand as though feeding the fire. A burst of colour sparkles in the air, red, golden-yellow, blue, green, purple, orange, indigo, violet, magenta, pink, brown, silver, grey. Dawn breaks just as the multi-coloured flames shoot up.

At the Ooramma temple, Chandru manages to free himself. As he struggles to pull his father out, Ramappa urges him, ‘Take Ajji and go to your uncle’s house! Save what you can! Go right now. I will be all right.’

Chandru, reacting to the panic on his father’s face, grabs Ajji by her hand and rushes there. As he nears, he sees the flames from Annaiah’s body and the chanting crowd. The smell of saraayi and hogesoppu is gagging. What is this? Rains pouring outside and flames inside! ‘Ajji, come quickly. You have to stop this,’ he cries

She can see the flames as well as he. ‘Oh, the whole of Annaiah’s prophecy is coming true! Where did this horrible flame come from? Who will rise out of the ashes?’

Chandru pushes and pulls to reach the front of the house where Thimmakka is leaping around. He is too late to save Annaiah, whose body has all but crumbled to blackened bits. But he sees Parvati stuck on the other side of the fire. Swift as thought, Chandru jumps through the fire, and reaches her side.

Parvati cannot move. He shakes her hard and, without a glance at the silently smiling Sundru and Maadhi, picks her up in his arms and jumps back through the spitting fire. Sundru and Maadhi make no attempt to cross.

Ajji turns to Krishnegowda, standing to one side. ‘Save them,’ she pleads. He gives her a curious smile and shakes his head. Ajji looks at him in a daze.

‘So, you are my great-grandson, Siva,’ she says in a soft voice, uncomprehending yet clear. ‘Kamanahabba is over. The third eye has opened, the ritual is complete: Kamadeva and Ramani are burning.’ She slowly sits on the stone floor.

The flames eat their way right up the corridor where Sundru and Maadhi are standing. The back door is open to the closed-up well and the ground stained with colours from Sundru’s body, or perhaps from the sparks his hands emitted. The flames reach higher and higher, but no one can see if they have reached Sundru and Maadhi. No one knows if they leave by the door or if they let the fire eat them. No one does anything to stop it.