Answers are what I seek! 

Answers are what I seek! 

 

"Quiet down, will you, little one?" His voice was polite and composed somehow. On the other hand, I was everything but calm. I just shook my head negatively.

 

"No, give me the answers I seek! What're you trying to hide? Do you want to tell me that? Either whatever you said was just to lure me into believing your forged story or you aren't telling me everything. Just tell me, why? I say!" 

 

 

He pursed his lips together.

 

"Now, that is, I don't understand what you're babbling about, little one. I don't seem to comprehend."

 

I negatively shook my head. “You do!”

 

“I told you what you should know.” His eyes were blazing. “I won't repeat the same things numerous times for you to just keep on denying it.”

 

"Why am I here? Is this what you are not getting, or are you simply trying to disregard it?” I yelled yet again. 

 

“Don't you already know the answers yourself? Or do you keep on denying it for the sake of it getting changed?” He took a step closer. “Let me rephrase it once again for you. Don't have any silly notions because my answers won't change regardless of your questions and stubbornness.”

 

My heart skipped a beat at his nonchalant words. His coldness towards my feelings made me upset. How could he just disregard a person's feelings? When he was the one to proclaim that he knew me, shouldn't he be considerate about it? 

 

“Why don't you understand our need to go home—back to the evocation of our parents? It's the only place we have left of them!”

 

"Would you stop yelling, please?" His voice was as calm as before when he requested. Stepping forward, he came nearer.

 

“I told you what you needed to know. And keep your voice down before you wake up, your brother.” Sliding in my space, he minimised the distance. “You hardly feel any fear when being near me, don't you?” I felt like I was being trapped inside a box. “That's a good thing. Don't you think so too?”

“No! Don't come closer, I say!" Backing away, I stepped away as I said that. “And no, I don't!”

 

However, he took another step in my direction again.

 

“You haven't told me everything! Have you?”

 

Because, yes, he wasn't, I had a nagging feeling about him not telling me the whole truth. His strides were long. Distracting myself from his scrutiny, I asked again, "Answers are what I seek; tell me please," backing up. My tone came from a higher to a lower pitch in some quiet seconds as my mind started to depict his obvious closeness.

 

"I can't tell you yet, little one." Another step closer to me. "I won't," he admitted. “Not now.”

 

"Why?" I whispered, standing still as he took another final step towards me. “If you're okay with telling me half of the truth, then why not say everything that needed to be said?”

 

Barely standing inches apart, we barely have any distance left. I just wanted to run. But, on the contrary, I was rooted on the spot by the blazing grasp of his demonic eyes. I wanted the answers so desperately by now, and when I indeed came to know, it was confirmed that there were some things he was hiding behind the half-truth. I wanted to know every reason for his actions! He should have one. Doesn't he? 

 

"Some things are better left unsaid, little one.”

 

What?

 

“What sort of reason is that?” I whispered. “What made you believe I would trust whatever you say when you're being so suspicious?”

 

“You will know what awaits you in the meantime," he countered softly. “It's entirely up to you to choose whether you believe me or not.” 

 

I grasped my dupatta with a racing heart. The realisation itself was both confusing and relieving. “The truth can't be hidden for a long time. It ought to come out one day or another.” She found herself saying that. 

 

“It makes me glad to know we are on the same page.” His finger trailed slowly down my cheek as he murmured, his voice barely audible.

 

I forcefully tore my gaze from his. 

 

"You have grown into a much more beautiful woman, little one. And yet you don't even know that.”

 

His long, lean fingers kept running up and down my cheek as I held my breath at his sudden touch. “That makes you even more exquisite," his callous thumb wiped a single tear that escaped from the corner of my eye as he stated that before tucking my straying tresses behind my ear, “your purity sometimes unnerved me.”

 

I closed my eyes. I could feel the heat of his palms radiating on my face. 

 

Brushing his finger over my ear ever so slightly. “What you should know about being here is that it's for your own safety and his.” Letting his eyes stay a moment or two in the direction of the bed made me aware of him hinting towards my brother. “With me, you both are safe from what your parents have always hidden you from.”

 

I couldn't help but feel a sense of unease spiralling down my spine in his presence or the choices of words he was using. 

 

“With them being gone, you are exposed to a world of danger that I cannot afford to let get to you or him.” His eyes held something—a glint, maybe—which I had never seen before. “So do both of us a favour and accept it as it is without denying the actuality.” His breath hit the top of my head. I felt hot air on it. 

 

The revelation did nothing but add to my suspicion. 

 

What on earth was he talking about? 

 

“Your parents would have wanted it too: to have their children safe and away from any danger that comes their way.” His voice was, in fact, void of emotion, but his eyes held another story in them: they were screaming and mixing and interpreting emotions all at the same time. 

 

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