Chapter 17
CHAPTER 17
I watch over Kalyani.
Vaguely, I am aware that we are taken to Kaushika’s own hut. In a corner of my mind, I remember the last time I was here, when I was trapped by his warding. Anirudh and Romasha would have killed me then, or at least detained me until Kaushika did the deed.
I recall all of this, but I cannot work up the interest to ponder the memory any deeper. I sit down on the only stool within the hut and take Kalyani’s hand in mine while Anirudh and Romasha murmur to each other.
Neither of them has mentioned my fight with Kaushika, nor the magic I did. I myself cannot get it out of my mind. I should have destroyed him then and there. Instead, I was weak. When I tell Rambha of this—and I know I must—she will be furious. She might even tell Indra, and who knows what the lord will do? He could exile me for this act of betrayal alone. I will never see Amaravati or Rambha again.
The thought chokes me. I try to erase the feel of Kaushika’s touch from my skin, erase the memory of his anguished face and those words that seemed so sincere. If anything had happened to you … Kalyani lies breathing slowly on the cot, and I think of what the poison could have done to her. Did Indra truly send this to the hermitage? Is it because he does not trust in my ability to finish the job? Is the lord becoming desperate enough to resort to such an evil deed? I told Rambha how the hermitage is warded, and she would have been duty-bound to share her information with him. Did Indra hear this news and plan to send the poison here in this form?
“No,” I say out loud, vehemently. I cannot believe it. I will not.
This is no mere matter of an irreverent village. Halahala could destroy all three realms. Even Indra would not dare. I myself have heard him lament how halahala remains in his care, yet he cannot touch it. But if not he, then who?
Kalyani murmurs in her sleep, and I lay a stilling hand on her.
“I’m sorry,” I whisper. “You are my friend, and I know if you could speak, you would tell me Indra is to blame for this. But if so …” Tears choke me. “How can everything I’ve believed be wrong? He is a deva, and loyalty is all I know. That has always been my path, even if I have questioned it. Have I been wrong to be devoted?”
“You have not,” Kaushika answers. “But consider who you must give your devotion to. And why.”
I stand up slowly. I did not hear him come in. How long has he been there? What did he hear of what I said? I search back to whether I revealed anything dangerous, but Kaushika merely glances at me—a quick, inscrutable look that makes me squirm—and enters his home.
There is no indication of the man who spoke so brazenly to me before. Instead of heat and anger, he looks tired. He crouches next to Kalyani and takes her wrist in his hand, counting her pulse. I notice the shadows under his eyes, the stubble that rakes his cheeks. His hair is no longer in a topknot, but falls in gentle waves to his shoulders. His clothes are different too, no longer ones of a sage or a yogi but of nobility, the pale cream kurta embroidered with delicate gold, the pajamas that are edged with zari. Where has he been that he must dress like this? He looks younger. Softer.
Kaushika counts Kalyani’s breaths for a long, silent minute. Finally, he sighs. “She will be all right. The poison was in a dilute form, and we acted quickly. We will use as much of our collective power in the hermitage to heal her as we can spare.”
A rush of relief loosens the knots in my shoulders. Kaushika rises and we stare at each other. Memory resurges in me of how we were holding each other. How hot his hands were on my body. The intoxicating scent of his skin.
He must be thinking of the same thing. Pinpoints of color appear on the very tips of his cheekbones. An unrecognizable awkwardness steals over me, as though I am not an apsara at all.
“I want to apologize,” he says formally. “For what I said. For the way I said it. You did save my life. Thank you.”
I nod. Kalyani stirs, muttering in her sleep again, and Kaushika clicks his fingers. The candle dims. We are plunged in shadow, but at his gesture I follow him past the single room toward the second door that leads out to a tiny veranda. We sit together at the one step to the threshold. From here, I can see the meditation garden, although there is no one there this late in the night. The hymns have become quieter, audible only through the melodic hum of magic. A hundred thousand stars glimmer in the sky. The whispers of the breeze, the scents of rosewood, the sheer solidity of him next to me … it is almost peaceful. I want to stay in this companionable silence. Yet there are questions to ask.
I glance at him. “Will you finish the Initiation Ceremony?”
He shakes his head. “It is no longer necessary. I will allow anyone who wishes to stay and train to become a sage.”
My brows rise at that. “I thought the ceremony was a matter of great tradition. That as a sage you must weed out those who are impure.”
Kaushika shrugs, though the movement looks wooden. “Everyone here has proved their intent already with their actions,” he says. “They could have left when the hermitage was attacked. Instead, they chose to stay and help. They have built wards, strengthening the hermitage over and over again. Even now, they are patrolling the forest, looking for possible enemies, all without my say-so. They are devoted, not just to Shiva but to what we do here. Their devotion is undisputed.” He glances at me, and his gaze softens. “As is yours.”
My mission fills my throat, coating my mouth with the bitter taste of betrayal. I had my chance to end Kaushika and I didn’t take it. What does that mean for me now?
“And the other sages?” I ask, to distract myself from my growing anxiety. “They will countenance this break from tradition?”
“The other sages …” Kaushika sighs and presses his eyes with the heels of both palms. He looks so vulnerable that I want to peel his hands back, kiss his eyes, comfort him, but I still my body with effort. He sighs deeply. “The other sages are older and far more traditional than I have ever been. They think of me as a rebel, and I have tried to keep to their demands to prove that I am pure of heart. Yet after what occurred yesterday …” He shakes his head and meets my eyes. “You were right. I did endanger these people, and I have a duty of care. What is one more transgression against tradition? The Mahasabha was called by the sages so that I may present my students and convince them that I can be trusted to teach wisdom to those who seek it. Yet in reality, the Mahasabha is a political gathering, and they are more concerned with something else.”
I hold my breath. “And what is that?”
Kaushika turns to me, and I understand his look. It is here, the secret he would tell me that would destroy him. I can feel it hovering on his lips, wanting to be uttered. A slow kind of horror skims through my blood. I dare not move.
He holds the moment, studying it. I see the point of decision, a shift in the set of his muscles. I know he is going to tell me, and my body freezes. I can neither look away, nor embrace this knowledge I have sought, trapped here in this moment that will inevitably decide my path.
“You asked me before where I sent the halahala,” he says quietly. “Where I go when I leave the hermitage.”
I nod and say nothing.
“I have—I created —a meadow. A place that I go to in order to meditate.” Kaushika’s words are careful. Slow. “It is a powerful place, Meneka. Years of my meditation have consecrated it beyond any other in this realm. When I meditate there, my power grows tenfold. What would take me years of tapasya, I am able to do in a few hours.”
My mind churns with this. I remember what I overheard by the pond a few weeks ago. A crime against nature , Sage Agastya called it. Why? Because of the way it rips into the air, the energy it must take? Even Indra cannot simply open a gateway to any place he wishes. Even he must rely on the winds of Amaravati.
Oblivious to the chaos in me, Kaushika sighs again. “The sages at the Mahasabha disapprove of a place this powerful, and of the manner in which I have consecrated it. Yet if I had not, what would have happened to the halahala? We would all of us have been poisoned, every creature burned away from the very cycle of birth and rebirth—not by breaking it and embracing true reality but by never having existed in the first place. Even the sages themselves would have been destroyed by its spread.”
I shiver, thinking of how close we all came to destruction. I cannot comprehend it. The power that Kaushika exhibited. The fact that he did it with me.
“Will the poison be safe there?” I ask.
“For now,” he replies, though there is frustration in his voice. “But it cannot stay there forever. I have tried to summon Shiva again, but the Lord has not replied. Perhaps he does not believe the sincerity of my intention, but surely he must hear me. Surely he must see who is behind this.”
I stare at Kaushika. “I know what you must think, but it cannot be Indra. It simply cannot.”
His voice is gentle, and his fingers flicker toward mine lightly as though to give me comfort without touching me. “I am sorry,” he says softly. “A betrayal like this is hard to accept. I understand that. Believe me.”
“No, you do not understand.” My voice grows frantic, and I have to take a deep breath to control it. “How can it be Indra, Kaushika? How? I know you despise him for what he did at Thumri and to your own kingdom. He is a deva, and he has behaved irresponsibly, but this? This is unconscionable. Indra could not, not even if drunk on soma.”
“Meneka—”
“He is a hero ,” I say, my voice breaking. My desperation spills out rapidly in a half sob. “Do you not remember he saved all of humanity from endless famine and released the waters of the world back into the mortal realm tens of thousands of years ago? That story is still sung in my kingdom. Without him, the dragon-demon Vritra would have destroyed it all. Nothing would have survived. Indra was the only one brave enough to fight the demon. Even you pray to the essence that is Indra. Even you acknowledge his power.”
My breath is heavy, filled with silent tears. Kaushika frowns, and I ache for him to see reason in my words. I need him to understand, to agree , because if he does not, if Indra truly did send the halahala, I would never be able to live with this knowledge. If the lord is capable of this monstrosity, what else has he done? What else have I done, in blindly obeying his orders? I am clinging to my last hope, to Indra’s innocence in this heinous crime despite the many mistakes he might have made. I cannot allow Kaushika to strip away my faith in Indra; in my heart, I cannot even allow Indra to do so. Who am I if not a creature of heaven? Even at my most despairing, I have always thought to return to his swarga. Am I to live the rest of my life in the knowledge that I have been an agent of evil ?
Kaushika is still frowning. For a suspended moment he does not say anything, and his gaze flits to the stars, visible in the evening, contemplating Indra and swarga. Weighing my words. Listening.
I know what I am saying is suspicious. If he has ever thought me to be an apsara, I am simply confirming it with my protests. Yet he has already told me so much about himself. Should I not push my advantage? I cannot bear it, to hear such blasphemies from his mouth. I cannot bear what this means for me and for him.
If he truly believes all these things about Indra, he will justify any action against my lord. He would kill me now if he knew who I was, and he has probably already killed my apsara sisters without mercy. That thought has never left my mind, since the very beginning of this mission, but in this moment, I know that I have built excuses past it, hoping for it not to be true. This man I have come to understand, even come to like to a certain extent, I cannot reconcile with the sage who would kill apsaras in cold blood. In the twisted corridors of my mind, the two thoughts seem connected. If Kaushika can believe in Indra’s innocence with the halahala, he will not hurt me. He will not have hurt my kin.
I know there is no logic behind this—whatever Kaushika and Indra have done, I cannot change the past, yet I cannot bear for either of them to have committed such horrors, not even in the pursuit of their beliefs. Not even if they thought they were justified. I simply know that if any of this is true, it tells me more about myself than about them, because of how I understand them, and sympathize with them. Has this mission ruined me to such an extent already, so stealthily and invisibly, that I am lost to my own good sense? I try to breathe past the thick obstruction in my throat.
“If not Indra,” Kaushika says slowly, “then who? You say your kingdom worships him. Then do you know of anyone else who would have access to the poison?”
I try to think. I really do.
I search for another explanation to the halahala, and a hidden memory taps in my mind, a thread I must pull that will lead me to the truth. Yet I cannot sift through it when everything is so blurry. Kaushika is asking me for clarity, but I don’t want him to base it on what I say. I want him to reassure me , to take care of me, to tell me everything I’ve ever believed has been fine, simply because I am me and he believes me.
I bury my head in my hands, aware of the incongruity of my desire.
Kaushika lets out a deep sigh. “I am sorry,” he says again. “Indra has been a hero in the past. But please think this through. The bracelet did not reveal itself until I touched it. It was meant for me, and only the lord of heaven has cause. Indra is threatened by me. He knows I do not like him, and he has tried to thwart me many times before. The last many weeks, he sent storms to the hermitage as a warning that he knows where I am. I was able to keep them at bay during the Initiation Ceremony. Otherwise, the hermitage itself would have been flooded away. If there really was someone else behind it … well, that might change some matters. But I cannot see another answer, and Indra cannot go unchallenged. This is why the sages and I must meet. The sages must see that Indra is a menace to the entire realm. To send halahala is monstrous by any estimation. Even you agree to this.”
I can say nothing. I am to blame for the storms sent to the hermitage. I told Rambha of the hermitage’s whereabouts. I never expected such a retaliation, but I feel the lord’s desperation pressing at my throat like a knife. I feel the urgency of my mission like first blood drawn. Rambha’s voice echoes in my head, reminding me to be devoted. I think of how even she did not see fit to tell me everything occurring in Amaravati, of how she told me to do my duty unquestioningly, to be a good little apsara obeying commands blindly.
Yet here is Kaushika, my enemy , telling me secrets of his own accord, trying to understand me even though his entire life has been to work against those of my kind. My heart aches so much that I can barely breathe. I think of what I want to do, and who owns me. Rambha and Indra and Kaushika and my friends from the hermitage spin in my mind like colors within water. The words almost form on my lips, to blurt out the truth about my identity, simply to see what he will do, but I hold myself close, trembling. I cannot risk it, not even now, especially not now. What if I am misreading everything about Kaushika? What if I have been seduced by the hermitage and the mortal realm?
Kaushika’s voice washes over me in a comforting breeze. “How did you know it was halahala?” he asks.
“I sensed it. I … I don’t know how.” My voice is muffled, my head still buried in my hands. The faint memory tap-taps again in my head. I loosen my topknot, my hair spilling over me, covering whatever of my face Kaushika can see. I do not care about the propriety of appearing like a sage, not anymore. It is enough that the action releases some of the tension in my head. That, just for a moment, I am hidden from him when I am so obscured to myself.
Kaushika shifts beside me. I feel a movement, as though he is about to touch my hair but thinks better of it. “And the magic you did?” he asks softly.
“I—I don’t understand it myself.”
Everything is confusing. Did Indra allow me to use Amaravati’s power for mortal magic? Was it because of him that the two magics combined? Why would he allow me this if he sent the halahala himself and wants Kaushika dead this badly? Despite what Rambha said, I can no longer make sense of how the ability to do tapasvin magic could have been granted by Indra. This magic must be my own. If tapasya truly allows any soul to access divinity, then why should I be any different from a yogi? I try to slow myself down, but each stream of thought ends only in more questions and objections. Blooms of sincerity and deception coil inside me, twisting, until I cannot breathe. I have been turned inside out, everything I held within spilled out for all to see and leaving me hollow. I cannot rely on anything, and I float unmoored, a rudderless boat in the roiling waters of chaos.
Kaushika exhales softly. “It is all right, Meneka. I believe you. You have no reason to tell me anything. I have no reason to ask.”
I look up at this, surprised. I brush back my curtain of hair.
Irrationally, it is Rambha’s voice I hear in my head: What good is love, what good devotion, if it is only transactional? A sense of wretchedness steals over me, and I have to breathe hard to contain the sudden sob in my chest. I cannot believe it—that he is offering so much of himself, yet expects nothing in return. That he does not question me further like I have questioned him at every occasion. Is this a trick?
Kaushika smiles slightly, a glint of white teeth in the starlight, as if he has heard me. “I never wanted your secrets, you know. I only wanted for you to be true to yourself. If that knowledge awes you, you are wise. I was awed by you too.” His gaze locks on me. “I am awed by you all the time.”
My voice is a whisper. “Because of the strength of what I can do?”
“No,” Kaushika says. “Because of you. Of what I see in you.”
A sound escapes me, half sniffle, half laugh. I am an apsara. My marks see what I allow them to. Yet, I have not shaped myself into his desire—not deliberately.
“What do you see?” I ask skeptically.
“I see a vision of beauty, sacred and deep,” he says quietly. “I see a woman who is strong, because she has fought terrible battles with herself. Who has won them and lost them and understands the futility of fighting but does it anyway because to not do so would be harder. I see a being, daring and audacious, talented and hungry. I see a power who can challenge the gods themselves. I see you, Meneka, and I see the great Goddess Shakti herself, she who belongs with Shiva. Why do you think that in Thumri I looked to you as I completed my mantra? When the power from my own tapasya started to wane, it was you who gave me strength. Reminded me of another path. Reminded me of love.”
My words choke within me. It is too much, the sincerity in his speech, the scent of him, the heated gaze. It is too much, this validation I have never received even from those closest to me, to be seen as something more, to be seen as being capable beyond my own estimation. Whether true or not, I want to believe him. I want to deceive myself, even if all this is an illusion.
I lift my hand to touch the cuff of Kaushika’s sleeve, tracing a finger along the embroidery of his kurta. “You met with another royal today,” I say inconsequentially. “That is why you are dressed like this.”
“A particularly difficult queen,” he says, smiling slightly. “Yet I believe she understands what I am trying to do.”
“And what are you trying to do?” I ask, lifting my gaze to him. “What do you intend to achieve with the irreverence you foment against Indra?”
“An opportunity,” Kaushika answers. “An opportunity for justice in the world. How many more must suffer like the villagers in Thumri? Like my own kingdom? I seek wisdom, Meneka, to imagine something different. My meetings with the royals are simply to gauge if they feel similarly. If I take on Indra, we must be united.”
I stare at him. I wonder if the queen he met today is the very same one I overheard him speaking with at Shiva’s temple. It is significant that he is meeting with a royal so urgently, when so much else is occurring. A part of me knows I must ask about it, but my fingers hover over his pulse, and his eyes darken. I want to tell him that the clothes are beautiful, that he is beautiful. The words catch in my chest, aching.
Kaushika’s gaze lingers on my face, watching all this.
I swallow, and the sound is loud. I am drowning, and even though I know it is a losing battle, I call out to Amaravati in a desperate attempt to remember my mission, remember my devotion. Reveal your lust , I whisper, and I see my own head thrown back as Kaushika fills me with ecstasy, and this time I accept what I have known all along. That his lust and desire are a mirror to my own, just like the magic we did with the halahala. We are two opposites bound to each other in this game of mark and seducer, each of us taking either role, unknowing, unaware. The lust I saw in him is mine, the empowerment of everything I can be, realized through the mirror he holds up to me.
My fingers skim his wrist again, lightly skating over the kurta, reaching for the strong contours of his bicep. Kaushika exhales, a soft sound that lifts the hair off my forehead. I don’t know why I do it, but it is a test of the both of us. I let my touch climb, then hover over his mouth, my thumb tracing the outline of his lips. He licks his lips in the same instant, and his tongue rasps over my finger, tasting it. He gives it a soft nip, catching it between his teeth, and a whimper escapes me.
I stare at him, but he does not touch me any further. I can tell; he is waiting, he is trying not to scare me off, when we are hovering here in this moment that will change everything. It is so absurd—that he should care, that he should give me the space to retreat when I am the creature of lust and he the sage—that my whimper becomes a small laugh, halfway between joy and disbelief.
Enough , I think. No more games.
Before I can stop myself, I climb into his lap and straddle him.
I have no time to think if I am being too forward or if I have misinterpreted him.
Kaushika’s gaze widens, and his arms encircle my waist. I feel his strength beneath me, and the corded muscle of his thighs. We both gasp as I settle and lean into him, eyes closed. All I can smell is him , all I feel is his body, so perfectly aligned with mine. His thumbs skim just below the swells of my breasts, and I feel the contours of my curves through his touch. I suppress a moan, at how close we are, at what we are about to do. My hands bury themselves in his hair, and it is as soft as his body is hard beneath me.
I force my eyes open. I force myself to draw back and study his face.
I will not come to this now in deception. I will have him understand what this means—no ordinary mark, but Kaushika, a sage .
“This will end your asceticism,” I whisper.
“I’ve recently learnt it is not the only way.” His eyes are on my mouth.
“This is your choice,” I say.
“Agreed. Is it yours?”
I dip my head and graze my teeth on the skin of his neck. “What do you think?”
He laughs, and my heart leaps with that sound. His hand threads through my hair, cupping my scalp. He tugs lightly, bending my head slightly back. I want to close my eyes, but I hold on to myself with a final will. I watch him through my lashes, searching him.
“You cannot blame me for this,” I warn.
“Oh,” he whispers. “But I am.”
And he surges forward, his lips assaulting mine. My mouth is hot, my hands gripping his hair. Under me, he groans , his fingers supporting my neck, tangling in my tresses as he pulls me closer. I angle my head, my hunger a hot flame within me. This is madness. It will only end in pain. This man hates my lord, my home. He may have already harmed my sisters. But all those thoughts flitter away like so many seeds in the wind. I cannot stop kissing him, and he devours me like he wouldn’t allow me to stop. He tastes of spun sugar and ginger, the camphor of his scent driving me to distraction. I part my lips and pull his tongue along mine, and he groans again, his fingers by my rib cage, thumbs skimming just over my nipples, rubbing them back and forth until they harden through my kurta.
“Meneka.” His voice is a tortured whisper, and within it I hear a thousand admissions, a million promises. “I’ve thought of this for too long.”
I shiver against him as the images of his seduction return to me, this time unbidden, golden visions where he pleasures me without asking for anything in return.
A part of me wants to stop. His words make him sound like another successful mark. Yet there is something true within the iron of his voice, something that tells me it is not my influence as an apsara that’s brought him here to me, but me . Beyond my magic, beyond my power.
I tighten the grip of my legs around his waist. I feel his hardness perched right below my bottom, and his hips rock into mine instinctively. Kaushika hitches me higher, never breaking the kiss, and I kiss harder, rolling my body into his, ragged and breathless, devouring him. A dampness grows between my legs, and his hands cup my backside, kneading, his fingers flickering just there.
Pinpoints of pleasure shoot into my spine, into my head. I moan, biting into his lower lip, sinking my nails into the skin of his throat, unable to get enough. I want more, so much more. I want him on his knees. I want to be on my knees, his hand pushing my head while he begs me for sweet release and I give it to him. I want to conquer this man. I want to own him and bend him to me, not because of my mission but because he will be strong enough to take it, to want it, to understand it. Is this truly who I am? Simply another apsara intoxicated with her own power, desiring worship by her thralls? Indra’s gleaming court shines in my head again. Rambha says, Seduce , and I think of whether I am, whether I have.
I break the kiss, my breathing rough. “I—I don’t want to stop,” I stammer, but the words are not for him. They are for me, a justification, a plea. Who will I become if I go through with this? There will be no turning back.
“We won’t stop,” he says firmly. “Not until I give you what you want. Not until you are satiated.”
“What if I never am?” I whisper.
“Then we have a long time of discovery, don’t we?” he says, and his smile tingles against my skin. “I am certainly not going to complain.”
I laugh, and it is a sound torn from me. The thought crosses my mind, that I have seduced him without my knowledge, so much an apsara that I have done this even without my permission, let alone his. I want to give into it badly, my control slipping with every kiss he trails across my neck, that I cannot remember why this is wrong. His tongue glides over me in slow patterns, too dizzying to note, and though I am the one being pleasured, a strangled sound escapes him that tells me that he will allow this, that he will let me conquer him, that he will surrender and know it for strength, that he wants this too. I have never been reluctant about sex, and there has certainly been no more meaning to it than pleasure, but knowing what it would mean for him, for me to do this with a mark … I clutch him, not wanting to leave, not wanting to stop, yet too afraid to continue.
Kaushika rescues me from my own mind. “Let yourself go,” he whispers, and his fingers sneak under my trousers, skin on bare skin, kneading the soft flesh of my bottom, reaching. He is inches away from where I need him, and I squirm, trying to get closer, but he holds me tight. I utter a sound of frustration as rapid need courses though me. Dampness is trickling down my thighs, and I press against his hardness, whimpering.
“Do you like this?” he asks quietly.
Almost too much so , I think. “Y-Yes,” I whisper.
My voice is a rush. His hand slides inward, and I bite my lip to keep from screaming. I try to move my own hand, to feel him in turn, but I am trapped by his hard chest, and he shakes his head. He slides his tongue across my jaw, nips at my ears, a low growl of refusal erupting from him. I can almost hear his words. Not me. Just you.
The sound undoes me. It is too intoxicating, that he is both a seduced mark and not. That I am both an apsara and not. We are two raw creatures caught in this whirlpool of identities we have been forced into and embraced.
His knuckles brush over my aching center. Then one thick finger slides through my opening, twisting expertly, and I cannot control it anymore. I cry out, and my back arches. He tugs my head back, his hand in my hair. My eyes are shut in exquisite agony, and I feel the feathery touch of his lips, on my cheeks, my chin, my throat. His breath whispers on my eyelids, the rasp of his tongue as he licks my lips, parting my mouth, stroking it with a skill that I can only compare to lovers I’ve had in heaven.
I whimper with the dual assault of his fingers and tongue. His mouth ravages me, even as his thumb finds that perfect spot. He moves his hand faster, and my hips grind against his touch. My thighs clamp around him, but he pushes them open again, stroking between my folds with the pad of his thumb. I struggle to touch him, but he has captured my fingers within his free hand, trapped between us, so that I cannot give him pleasure, but finally, finally , must take my own instead.
And then all thought flees from me as the apex of my pleasure comes hurtling toward me in showers of gold in my head. I cannot form a single coherent thought. I am reduced to that one sensation.
I cry out, an insensate sound that must surely echo in the night, but Kaushika is there, swallowing it before it escapes. I lose my grip on reality, squeezing his hips between my thighs, riding out my climax. His hands dig into the flesh of my bottom, pressing me to him, bringing us as close as we can be in this position with our clothes still covering us.
Kaushika’s mouth continues to stroke mine, his tongue deep with each frantic movement of my sudden climax. I hear his whispered breath, ragged and short, words of endearment in a haze of broken speech. My hands are clenched in his kurta, fists almost painful. Aftershocks of the pleasure still ricochet through me, and we remain entangled, feeling every twitch, every relaxation.
Slowly, my body grows limp. My fists loosen. I open my eyelids and find Kaushika watching me. A smile quirks his lips, half-satisfied, half-curious, the dimple peeking through. What did we just do? Does he regret it? Do I ?
My hands keep smoothing the cloth on his chest uselessly. I try to pull away but find it impossible to. “You are not bad for a sage,” I say ridiculously.
“I was once a prince,” he replies, laughing, just as ridiculous an answer. His mouth moves against mine softly, nipping at my lips, kissing my cheeks, brushing over my eyelids. It is like the softest petals, intoxicating and sweet. Heat churns in my belly, and it costs me everything to pull myself back, to make him stop.
Kaushika does not insist. He cocks his head, waiting. I want to say something, but all I can do is tremble, goose bumps erupting on my flesh. Kaushika pulls me into his warmth, tucking me closer in a tight embrace. I drop my head on his chest, letting myself be comforted by this man I am sworn to destroy.