“I swore that oath for Maarani, her parents. I swore it to water. It was a sankalp, taken with aachman. I…”

“The one who made you swear it can also make you take it back.”

“It doesn’t matter to me, Papa. I am so relieved to pursue polo…”

His father turned and strode out of his chambers.

“Papa?” Samarth called out. He did not stop or turn back, kept striding towards the Queen’s chambers. Samarth took a deep shuddering breath. Then another. Then another. It would be alright. He just had to let the storm pass.

————————————————————

“Kunwar?” Ajatshatru Kaka found him in the stables that evening. Brushing the horses always got him to calm down. Samarth patted Chickoo’s neck and turned — “Yes, Kaka?”

“Rawal has asked you to go and see him in his office.”

Samarth immediately passed the brush to a groom and turned and strode out.

When he was out of eyesight of people, he ran.

Down the road to the main palace grounds and up the stairs.

There he stopped, and strode, pushing his hair back from his forehead and checking his clothes.

His T-shirt was dirty and had horse hair stuck to it.

His jeans were stained. Nothing his father did not know about him anyway.

Samarth reached the King’s office and knocked on the closed door — “Rawal?”

“Come.”

He slowly opened the door and stepped in, keeping his head held high even if he did not meet his father’s gaze. If he cowered now, Papa would barrel on full force and flatten him. Make him do something drastic.

“Shut the door,” Papa clipped.

He clicked the door shut and came and stood in front of his desk, hands clasped in front of him.

“You are a minor,” Papa stated without preamble.

“I still make your decisions, and will continue to do so as your father until you are a major and then as your king after that, until I am convinced that you can make them yourself. This oath you swore does not stand any grounds therefore, so you will forget about it and move on. You are the heir to Nawanagar’s throne, and I am announcing your Yuvrajabhishek tomorrow.

Once that is done this month, we will put this behind us. ”

“Rawal, I am sorry, I cannot accept that,” Samarth held his ground. As he had expected — something drastic.

“I did not ask you if you can accept it or no. I command you that this will happen.”

Samarth shook his head, his head lowering — “You are my king, but I swore that oath to god, to water. I am sorry, Rawal.”

“What do you mean you are sorry?!” Papa shot to his feet, his voice rattling from the walls of his office. “You think you broke an antique in the palace? That’s what sorry is for, not for this!”

“I am still sorry, Rawal…”

“You. Will. Be. King. No question about that.”

“I can’t.”

Papa stared at him, then took a deep breath.

“Fine,” he said. “Then let her go.”

Samarth’s eyes widened. “Let who go? Maarani?”

“Yes. I do not want a marriage over my son, my heir, my kingdom’s future…”

“You will not talk about Nawanagar’s Maarani like that!” He roared back. This was his limit. For the first time in his life, he fought back. “We didn’t bring her to our palace to send her away.”

“I didn’t bring her to this palace to snatch the rights of my son!”

“You are angry, Papa, please calm down. Maarani is a good person, she has made your life very good. You are angry that is why you are thinking like this…”

Papa sat down, desperation storming his face.

“I will not have any more children,” he decreed. “You will be my only heir.”

Desperation bled into Samarth’s blood as well.

“I have sworn to enable Maarani’s heirs to rule Nawanagar. If you do this, Rawal, I will leave. I will accept the honorary citizenship that Argentina has offered me and leave forever.”

They hadn’t offered anything on paper yet, but his global under-16 polo ranking had gotten him a letter from the Argentinian government that hinted at something similar.

“Listen, Samarth,” his father shot back up, pushing his face over his desk — “Don’t you dare blackmail me.”

“I am sorry. But Papa,” his face rose, tears blinding his eyes — “I cannot go back on the word I gave Maarani’s parents. What will my Rawal’s reputation amount to? What will Solanki’s reputation amount to if I do that?”

That brought his Papa up short. There was no answer to that. Because a Solanki’s word was just as heavy today as it had been 800 years ago. It was given, it was kept, and hence it was trusted. In the silence that his last plea brought, Samarth could see his father’s cavalry crumble.

————————————————————

Rawal interrogated me, Harsh gestured.

“What did you tell him?” Samarth asked, knowing if his father had directly run the interrogation then Harsh would have definitely been broken. Papa knew people’s pain points.

Everything.

“What did he say?”

Harsh shrugged, then shook his head.

He knows about your promise to never marry. He was angry. My father will bury me tonight when I go home.

Samarth laughed despite the situation. Harsh was a solid, sensible guy. But with the authority that his father wielded over him, he turned into a dramatic little boy. Always scared. Always wary.

Star refused to make you take your oath back.

“Why should she make me?”

Harsh shook his head, enraged. Samarth could see him torn between stating his not-so-subtle opinion on the ‘why’ and holding back in lieu of Maarani’s stature.

“Today your home is going to have fireworks,” Samarth changed the topic, grinning from ear to ear.

I am not going home.

“Good. Stay back here then. Hira ben will make us wagharelo rotlo.”

You eat wagharelo rotlo, I am going to Lakhotia Bazar to eat chowmein.

“Take me also!”

Harsh shook his head.

“It’s my birthday tomorrow!”

He shook his head again. He must be going with his rowdy gang then.

Samarth forgot sometimes that Harsh had grown up rough and tough, in a rowdy neighbourhood with rowdy boys.

He was also seven years older than him, a fact that had never come up between them at any point.

Not in conversations, not in capabilities, except driving.

Rawal is trying everything, Harsh gestured again, resurrecting the topic he had changed.

“I know, he called Maarani’s parents to the palace yesterday.”

Pandyaji too.

“What would our astrologer do about this?” Samarth threw his head down on the wooden fencing of the pen. “I hope this gets resolved before I have to go back to school, Harsh. I hope Papa accepts it.”

“Huuuu!”

Samarth pulled his head up, his body achy after the session he had just had.

He is not wrong. You are giving up a life he wants badly for you.

“I know.”

You are wasting your best years. Once they are gone, they will never come back.

“When does anything that goes ever come back?” Samarth chuckled. Mothers definitely didn’t.

Harsh’s hands lifted to gesture again, then fell back down.

Samarth stared at him, at all the lectures he had given him since that day of his oath.

At all the angry grunts and rude fingers he had shown.

Harsh had come to accept it, even understand it after these months.

Papa would too. He just had to keep his guard up and stand tall behind his oath until then.

“Alright, I have to go see Rawal,” Samarth rubbed his hands together and pushed his fingers through his sweaty hair. “He had asked me to come after court.”

Harsh waved and set off down the road towards the back gate where he parked his bike. Samarth turned towards the palace, grabbing his mobile phone and napkin from the chair. His mobile vibrated in his hand. He glanced down. Ava.

His heart stopped beating. Then began thundering.

He swiped the answer button and plastered the phone to his ear — “Ava?”

“Hi,” she said tentatively. Her voice, that smile in her voice he recognised even over a call…

“Hi,” he managed to croak from a tight throat.

“I called to say Happy Birthday.”

Samarth turned towards the windy trees and the sun shining bright over him, reminding him of the hills of their school, of that home he had left behind.

He chuckled — “It’s tomorrow.”

“I know, but we are in Khargone and are going to Yawal tomorrow. I might not get network.”

“What’s there in Yawal?”

“Yawal Wildlife Sanctuary. Ghats, forts, a waterfall… that’s what Nanaji has described, so let’s see.”

“Didn’t you Google it already?” He asked, knowing her penchant for stalking anything and everything.

Her sputter sounded. “Yeah, fine, I did. The first photo looked doped! Glow-in-the-dark kinda waterfall.”

“Are you taking picnic food or plan to eat there?”

“You think? Naniji has set up a whole basket of bread, kurmura, Tang, and… what else, wait…” she rustled around, naming items — “cheese slices, PickWick, wow!” The sound of a plastic wrapper being torn open and a loud crunch. “Strawberry and pineapple both…”

“Did you just steal from your Naniji’s picnic stash?”

“I stole strawberry PickWick.”

“That’s Kresha’s favourite.”

“Exactly. Who’s the culprit? Not Ava for sure,” she laughed, crunching the wafer biscuit. “Enough about me, how are you?”

“I am good…” he began to lie. Then stopped. She deserved honesty about this.

“Actually,” Samarth sighed. “Papa found out.”

“Oh.”

“Yeah… it’s been tensed around here.”

Silence.

Had he touched a nerve?

“He will understand eventually,” she said.

“Hmm…” he swallowed. He had made it awkward.

“Samarth?”

“Hmm?”

“Are you happy?”

His eyes blinked rapidly, head turning from side to side.

The grooms were putting away grooming kits and cleaning the stalls, the horses were grazing in the distance, the birds were chirping on mildly green trees of Nawanagar as the summer sun beat down on him.

His Papa was angry but he and Maarani had been living a happy life.

“Yes,” Samarth answered.

“I am happy then,” her voice smiled.

“Are you angry?” He asked.

They hadn’t spoken again after that last time. They had just shared looks… or rather, he had taken her angry glares all through their last months.

“Not anymore.”

“Why?”