The Sundarbans had many secrets.
But the greatest of them was hiding inside a boy.
Amod was now fourteen.
The villagers said he grew "too fast, too sharp, too strange."
His eyes—gold-flecked brown—sometimes shimmered like a tiger's at dusk.
His senses were unnervingly acute.
He heard things no human should hear… branches murmuring, rivers humming, distant thunder calling his name.
He was no longer the small child Banesh had once lifted from the river.
He was something awakening.
Something ancient.
Something dangerous.
But Amod himself didn't know that.
Not yet.
---
Scene: The Day the Sky Caught Fire
It happened on a humid dusk.
Amod was returning from the forest with a bundle of herbs when the sky suddenly tore open.
A crack of red lightning split the heavens—
not falling down like normal lightning,
but spreading outward like a wound in the sky.
Villagers screamed and ran indoors.
Birds scattered.
The mangroves trembled.
Amod froze.
His chest tightened.
Something old—older than memories, older than this lifetime—coiled awake inside him.
He whispered, almost unconsciously:
"...Hem… ke… tu…?"
The name meant nothing to him.
But his heart ached as if it meant everything.
A burning pulse shot through his spine.
His vision blurred.
His breath hitched.
He dropped the herbs.
He heard a voice—low, warm, wickedly amused—echo inside his mind.
"Found you."
Amod stumbled back.
"W–Who's… there?!"
No answer.
Only the sound of a tiger's growl rumbling through the airless silence.
---
Far Away – Banesh Reacts
Deep within the Sundarban marshes, Banesh—Gahana-Dev—was awakening from his meditation.
His spine snapped straight.
The mangrove roots around him shuddered like frightened animals.
"...This aura…!"
His calm, ancient heart stuttered violently.
Pain.
Recognition.
Fear.
Hope.
All at once.
He whispered the name he had never allowed himself to speak aloud in centuries:
"Hemketu."
The name trembled in the air, heavy with love and grief.
Banesh rose to his feet, hands shaking.
"No… you cannot have returned yet… you must not…"
But the sky-fire said otherwise.
And it burned in the exact direction where Amod lived.
Banesh's expression collapsed into helpless dread.
"...You… why would you come back like this…?"
His voice softened, breaking—
"Why are you returning without memories…
Why are you returning to me at all…?"
---
Back to Amod
The ground beneath his feet cracked.
Heat rushed through his veins.
His fingernails sharpened, then returned to normal.
The air around him flickered like an illusion.
Amod gasped and clutched his chest.
It hurt.
It hurt so much.
Like something inside him was trying to claw its way out.
"Stop—! Stop, please—!"
The red lightning turned into a swirl of flame-like aura above him—
silent, terrifying, beautiful.
Amod stared up at it, eyes wide, terrified.
"…Why… does it feel like this belongs to me…?"
And then—
The flames vanished.
The sky stitched itself back together.
Everything fell silent.
Too silent.
---
The Forest Watches
Animals—deer, boars, even tigers—were watching him.
Not with aggression.
With recognition.
As if greeting a king who did not remember his throne.
A tiger cub timidly padded forward.
It sniffed his hand.
Amod froze.
"…You're not… scared of me?"
The cub licked his fingers.
Warm.
Affectionate.
Loyal.
Amod swallowed hard.
He didn't know why, but the gesture made his eyes sting.
---
Banesh Arrives From Afar (Not Meeting Yet)
Banesh reached the area—
but from a hidden vantage in the trees, far away enough to not be perceived.
He saw the boy.
He saw the animals bowing.
He saw the lingering traces of the sky-fire.
And his heart nearly stopped.
"...Hemketu… you've grown so small… and so beautiful again…"
His fingers trembled.
He wanted to walk forward.
He wanted to take Amod's hand.
He wanted to whisper,
"I found you."
But he stepped back instead.
He bit his lower lip until it bled.
"…No. If I go to you now… you will remember too soon. You will burn too soon. You will suffer again."
His chest tightened painfully.
"I cannot let you die again."
He turned away.
The forest dimmed around him.
Banesh whispered into the wind, voice filled with trembling sorrow:
"Live freely for now… my Hemketu.
My Amod.
My king."
The wind carried his words away—
Amod shivered suddenly, glancing around.
"…Who… called me?"
No answer.
Only the soft rustle of mangrove leaves—
as if someone had just hidden themselves behind them, silently watching with a broken heart.
---