: Sparks & Storms
One Week Later - The Scriptorium
The air in the scriptorium was thick with the smell of old ink, drying palm leaves, and the faint, sweet scent of the neem paste used to keep insects away. Morning light slanted through high windows, illuminating dust motes dancing in the silence.
Agni's charcoal stick moved in precise, even strokes. His copy of the Dhanurveda text was flawless—each character identical, each line perfectly straight. The only sound was the soft scratch-scratch of his writing and the measured rhythm of his breathing.
From two desks over, a different rhythm emerged.
Tap-tap-tap-tap.
Neer's foot bounced under his desk. Relentless. Irregular. A chaotic counterpoint to the room's solemnity.
Scratch-scratch. Tap-tap-tap-tap.
Agni's jaw tightened. His next stroke dug too deep, tearing a tiny hole in the leaf.
Tap-tap-ta-tap-tap.
He put down his charcoal. Took a slow, controlled breath. The air around his hands warmed.
Acharya Manu, eagle-eyed at the front, cleared his throat. A warning.
Agni picked up the charcoal. Scratch-scratch.
Tap—
The tapping stopped.
Agni glanced over. Neer had abandoned his own writing. He was leaning back, balancing his stool on two legs, staring out the window with a faint, dreamy smile. His charcoal stick was twirling between his fingers like a tiny baton.
Their eyes met through the dusty sunbeam.
Neer's smile widened. He brought the twirling charcoal stick to his lips and blew on it gently, as if blowing a kiss. A tiny cloud of black dust puffed toward Agni.
It was such a childish, stupid gesture.
A hot, sudden spark leapt from Agni's fingertip. It zipped across the gap between the desks and landed with a minuscule hiss right on the back of Neer's hand.
Neer flinched, the stool legs hitting the stone floor with a clack. He stared at the tiny red mark blooming on his skin, then back at Agni. His eyes weren't angry. They were… fascinated.
Acharya Manu was suddenly there, a silent, imposing shadow. "Agniveer. Neervrah. Is there a problem?"
"No, Acharya," they said in unison, not looking away from each other.
"Then perhaps your energies would be better spent in the sparring ring than wasting parchment." The Acharya's voice was dry. "The courtyard. Now. Hundred laps each. Then you may… discuss your differences with practice swords."
---
The Sparring Ring
The midday sun was a hammer on the packed earth of the ring. Other students formed a loose circle, whispers rustling through them like wind through dry grass. A fight between the Fire-Prince and the Water-Boy wasn't to be missed.
Agni stood at one end, rolling his shoulders. He'd swapped his robe for a simple dhoti tied tight around his waist. His skin already gleamed with sweat.
Neer stood opposite, stretching his arms over his head with infuriating casualness. He'd tied his hair back, but loose strands stuck to his damp neck.
"First to three touches," announced Bhargav, an older student acting as referee. "No elements. Pure skill."
They saluted. Neer's salute was a lazy, flowing arc. Agni's was a sharp, downward cut of his wooden blade.
Begin.
Agni moved first—a testing lunge, fast and direct. Neer flowed around it like water around a rock, his own sword whispering past Agni's ribs in a near-miss.
The crowd murmured.
Agni pressed. His attacks were a relentless barrage—high, low, thrust, slash. Textbook perfect. Each one designed to overwhelm, to dominate.
Neer didn't overwhelm. He slipped. He dodged. He parried at the last second, redirecting Agni's strength instead of meeting it. He was always moving, a blur of blue and brown, his feet light on the earth.
Thwack!
Agni's blade caught Neer's shoulder. A solid hit.
"One for Agni!"
Neer just shook his arm out and grinned. "Finally warmed up, Fire-Prince?"
Agni didn't answer. He attacked again. This time, Neer didn't retreat. He met the strike, wood clacking hard against wood. For a second, they were locked, blade to blade, close enough for Agni to see the sweat beading on Neer's upper lip, to see the fierce concentration in those blue eyes.
"You're trying too hard," Neer hissed through gritted teeth.
Agni shoved him back. "I'm trying to win."
"That's your problem."
Neer surged forward. His style changed. No more flowing defense. This was aggressive, unpredictable—a sudden rainstorm after a drizzle. He struck at angles Agni hadn't drilled for, his movements intuitive, messy, and brilliant.
Thwack! Thwack!
Two quick, stinging hits to Agni's side and thigh.
"Two for Neer! Match point!"
The crowd erupted. No one had taken a lead against Agni in months.
Agni's vision tunneled. The heat in his core, always carefully banked, surged. The wooden sword in his hand grew uncomfortably hot. The air around him wavered.
Neer's eyes dropped to the sword, then back to Agni's face. His grin faded. He saw it—the loss of control.
Agni charged. Not a disciplined strike. A raw, angry rush.
Neer sidestepped, but Agni anticipated it. He dropped and swept a leg. Neer leapt, but Agni was already rising, his wooden blade coming up in a vicious uppercut—
—that stopped a hair's breadth from Neer's chin.
Neer had frozen in mid-air, his own sword point pressed against Agni's throat.
They hung there, suspended in the moment. Breathing hard. Chests heaving. The world had shrunk to the two points of wood at each other's most vulnerable spots.
The crowd was silent.
Slowly, Neer lowered his sword. Agni did the same.
"A draw," Bhargav announced, sounding unsure.
Neer let out a long breath and wiped his forehead with his arm. He looked at Agni, really looked at him. The anger was gone from his eyes, replaced by something searching. "You almost had me."
"You let me," Agni said, the words tasting bitter. He'd felt it—the split-second hesitation in Neer's counter.
Neer shrugged, the casual mask sliding back into place. "Maybe I just like the view from up close."
He turned and walked away, accepting a waterskin from a friend. Agni stood alone in the center of the ring, the heat slowly receding from his skin, leaving behind a hollow, restless feeling.
He'd fought to win. Neer had fought… to see what would happen.
---
That Evening - The Lotus Pond
Agni found him by the water, sitting on the low stone wall, trailing his fingers in the dark water. The setting sun turned the pond's surface into molten copper.
Neer didn't turn around. "Come to finish the match?"
Agni didn't sit. He stood a few feet away, arms crossed. "Why did you hesitate?"
Neer watched a lotus bud bob in the wake of his fingers. "You were angry. Not fighting. Just… burning. It's different."
"It's winning."
"Is it?" Neer finally looked at him. In the twilight, his eyes were the color of the deep water. "What are you winning, Agni?"
Agni had no answer. The hollow feeling expanded.
Neer pulled his hand from the water and shook it. Droplets flew, catching the last of the light. One landed on Agni's bare arm. It was shockingly cold. It didn't steam. It just sat there, a perfect, cool bead on his sun-warmed skin, before slowly tracing a path down to his wrist.
They both stared at it.
"See?" Neer whispered, his voice barely audible over the evening insects. "Fire and water. We don't have to destroy each other. Sometimes… we just are."
He stood up, brushed past Agni, and was gone, leaving behind the scent of wet stone and lotus.
Agni looked down at his arm. The droplet's path had dried. But he could still feel it—the memory of its cool, deliberate journey.
High above, in his secluded cottage, Acharya Vishrayan watched from his window. He hadn't seen the sparring match. He hadn't needed to. He could feel the disturbance in the Gurukul's energy—like two opposite currents in a still river, swirling, testing, preparing to become a whirlpool.
He stroked his white beard, his ancient eyes clouded. The test was coming sooner than he'd hoped.
The children were playing with forces they didn't understand.
And playtime, he knew, was almost over.
---
END OF CHAPTER 3