A walk in the clouds

Chapter twenty two / abducted

The next morning
Near the small Darbar hall

Kumar Abhimanyu and Kumari Adira were walking towards the audience hall. Both were trying to smile at each other but both were troubled. Holding each other's hands they walked to the entrance. Earlier in the morning breakfast too had been a strained affair with everyone trying to keep up the spirits but no one in the mood to eat or talk. Abhi's father along with Kumar SuryaUday Singh, Babasa, both my uncles, will be there waiting in the Darbar hall. After yesterday's episode Pitaji had requested Dadisa and Maasa to remain in there room. Although the hall will be well guarded but the crowd could be unpredictable . Pitaji did not want to take a chance. He had been extremely reluctant to let Adira come too.

Abhi too was badly riddled with doubts.
He wished he could simply flee away with Adira, he was not ready to let Adira stand in front of a court and he would be justifying his marriage to everyone. What she had been, he was well aware, and then he had knowingly accepted her, rather he had been the one to  convince her and he did not think that he needed to explain his relationship to the public. His feelings, his life, were just that his!! Private!! He was not prepared to dissect them in public. He had been trying to calm himself down since morning but it did not seem to be working. Holding Adira's hand helped a bit but the thought of taking her to face a volatile crowd was getting to him. He was being asked to put her at risk, something he was not in agreement with. If anything were to happen to her!!!...... the very thought..........

Every step she took led her closer and closer to the men waiting in the hall. Her feet felt as if they were tied down with weight and every step was a endeavour. Her body seemed to be pulling her in the opposite direction, telling her not to go there..... to run.......Her mind was at war too, the very thought that so many people would be there at the very scene where yesterday she had been publically humiliated and manhandled was scary. She could not face them all over again. What if the incidences repeated themselves. All those people, sitting there arguing about her. Waiting to judge her. She felt so little, so small. Everything that had felt so beautiful, so right suddenly started feeling so ugly. So very wrong. I could feel my confidence shattering, I was turning back to the old Adira, the girl who had stopped seeing herself as a person, just a empty shell of a body passing her time till she met her heavenly maker. My limbs were going numb. I don't know how I was going to face those people. What if they become violent again. The terror that had gripped me yesterday when strange hands had pulled me, dragged me away from Abhi, seemed catch hold of me again. Unknown strange faces hurling abuses at me. The anger in there face!! My body had started shivering uncontrollably. No!! No!! I could not go through all that all over again. As the fear gripped me again tears started rolling down my cheeks. I stood there, a statue!! Finding it easier to go into a shell and not let anyone near on in. Maybe if I closed my eyes and refused to see them all the problem would go away!! Maybe I should just run........"

Abhi stop walking and pulled me in to his arms.
"Shhhhh.......... don't worry!! I am there"
For a few minutes we just kept standing there till she stopped shivering.
"Honey! Look up!"
She did not however react to his words! She just stood there so still. He understood the terror she was facing. She seemed to have frozen into herself. The scene still so fresh from yesterday, and then to expect her to face it all again today.......... but if it was all to go away then it needed to be faced... to be delt with.... he would rather she not face it ever, but it was forcing itself in us. It refused to go away and we had made our choices when we accepted our love for each other. We had know that we may have to face such a situation some day, and it seemed today was that day.
Gently coercing her to look at him by putting his finger under her chin and gently tugging it up, he smiled at her with more confidence then he felt.
"Darling! Do you trust me?"
She nodded affirmatively.
"Then trust the fact that I am not going to let go of you. There in the hall what ever the verdict, you are mine. And I will not be parted from you. Damn it!! you are my wife and no one has the right to part us. I will not let that happen.
Pitaji has a lot of guards not only around the palace but outside the hall too. My personal guards will be inside with us. This time I come prepared. I dare anyone to even come near you.  He will be a dead man that I swear!!"