-: Pancha Vastra :- ( By Shailu )

[shailu4ever]

 

 
Arjun opens his mouth.
 
A hundred questions crowd his mind all at once.
 
How do you know my name?
What is this place?
How is this village even here?
 
But when he finally speaks, what comes out is something entirely different.
 
“I'm… very wet.”
 
The words sound absurd the moment they leave his mouth.
 
The woman’s smile widens slightly.
 
“Yes,” she says with quiet amusement.
“You are also someone who has just crossed a causeway that will be underwater in about twenty minutes.”
 
Arjun turns instinctively toward the sea.
 
Through the rain he can barely see the dark shapes of the stones he navigated earlier.
 
Waves are already swallowing them one by one.
 
“You will not be able to leave until tomorrow,” the woman continues calmly.
“Possibly longer, depending on the tides.”
 
 
 
“I didn't, I wasn't planning to, ”
 
“The island appears when it wants to be found,” she says gently.
 
Her tone suggests this is a perfectly reasonable explanation.
 
“Not when you wish to find it.”
 
Arjun stares at her.
 
He waits for the hint of a joke.
 
There is none.
 
 
 
She inclines her head slightly.
 
“I am Amma Lakshmi, elder of this village. This place is called Jalanidhi.”
 
Her voice carries easily across the open square.
 
“While the tide holds you here, you are welcome to rest. Dry your clothes. Observe our festival if you wish.”
 
She pauses, then adds softly:
 
“Tomorrow, you may leave when the sea allows it.”
 
 
 
Something shifts in her expression then.
 
Her eyes meet his again.
 
And for the first time since arriving on the island, Arjun feels something deeply unsettling.
 
He feels seen.
 
Not the casual observation of strangers watching a newcomer.
 
But something deeper.
 
Something that looks straight through the surface of him.
 
Through the soaked clothes.
 
Through the exhaustion.
 
Through the carefully built walls he’s carried since Rhea left.
 
It is the uncomfortable feeling of someone looking directly at who you are, not who you pretend to be.
 
 
 
“Or,” Amma Lakshmi continues slowly, “you may stay longer.”
 
The rain softens around them.
 
The villagers watch silently.
 
“If the island wills it.”
 
 
 
Before Arjun can ask what that means, a burst of laughter cuts through the moment.
 
A young girl runs across the square, barefoot in the rain, chasing a stubborn goat that has clearly escaped from somewhere.
 
“Kannan! Come back!” she shouts.
 
The goat bleats indignantly and bolts toward one of the largest buildings in the village.
 
Arjun recognizes it immediately.
 
A granary.
 
A massive thatched structure raised slightly above the ground, designed to store harvested grain safely during monsoon seasons.
 
Standing near its entrance are nine women dressed in ceremonial white saris with red borders, their hair decorated with jasmine flowers.
 
They appear to be preparing something, arranging clay lamps, baskets of rice, and bundles of freshly cut grain.
 
The harvest festival Amma Lakshmi mentioned.
 
The goat darts straight between them.
 
The women laugh and scatter as the animal races past.
 
For a moment, the quiet village fills with lighthearted chaos.
 
But in that brief moment,
 
two of the women glance toward Arjun.
 
Their expressions shift almost imperceptibly.
 
Not surprise.
 
Not curiosity.
 
Something older.
 
Something that feels like recognition.
 
As if the arrival of a stranger during a storm is not an accident.
 
 
 
And Arjun stands there in the rain, dripping seawater onto ancient stone, realizing he may have stumbled into a place that should not exist.
 
Yet somehow, impossibly,
 
It does.
 
And somewhere deep within the village, hidden behind the temple walls and the forest beyond,
 
Something unknown is waiting.

-- oOo --

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