Chapter 3: Forbidden Knowledge
The tour of the hydro-electric site was a long, dusty procession of hard hats and booming generators. Amartya asked the right questions, nodded at the engineers’ explanations, and felt the minutes crawl by like the slow, silt-laden water of the river below the dam. Shukla, ever-present at his elbow, seemed pleased with his focus. But every calculation about megawatts and irrigation channels was just noise. His blood thrummed with a single, reckless thought: the west entrance.
Back in the armored SUV, returning to the city, Shukla finally spoke. “The final courtesy is a private moment at Shah Qaboos. A gesture of respect for your faith. They will leave you for one hour.”
“I see,” Amartya said, keeping his eyes on the passing blur of roadside stalls.
“It is a gesture only,” Shukla continued, his voice low. “The mosque will not be empty. Be mindful. Your reflection should be on… spiritual matters.” The warning was clear, woven into the bureaucratic language. You are being watched.
The mosque rose from the city’s heart, a sublime confection of white marble and cobalt tile, its great dome holding the late afternoon sun like a caught jewel. The official entrance was thronged with the faithful. Amartya, accompanied by two of the King’s own guards, was ushered around the side, away from the crowds.
Here, the grandeur gave way to practicality. Scaffolding encased the western wall like a metal skeleton. Piles of sand and bags of cement were stacked under stained tarpaulins. The air smelled of dust and wet stone. A solitary, ornate door, partially obscured by construction barriers, stood ajar.
“One hour, Prince Amartya,” the senior guard said, his face impassive. The two men took positions, facing outward, their backs to the door. They were a blockade, not an escort.
He slipped inside.
The space was a transition between ruin and restoration. Drop cloths covered sections of a breathtaking mosaic floor. The great hall echoed with a cavernous silence, pierced by slants of light cutting through high, scaffold-obscured windows. It was cool, and the dust motes danced like gold dust in the beams.
“You’re late.”
She stepped out from behind a massive stone column, and his breath caught. She wasn’t in emerald green today, but in the drape of a simple, grey chador. Yet she wore it like a cape, thrown loosely over her shoulders, revealing the same modern clothes beneath. Her hair was tied back, severe, which only sharpened the elegant lines of her face.
“I was busy being a diplomatic asset,” he said, the relief at seeing her unlocking a grin.
“How tedious for you.” She moved closer, her boots quiet on the marble. “Come. The restoration office. It’s the only place with a door that locks.”
She led him through a labyrinth of stacked prayer rugs and crated tiles to a small, cluttered room overlooking the inner courtyard. Plans were spread on a drafting table; the air was thick with the smell of old paper and charcoal. She closed the door, and the outside world muffled to nothing. The only sound was their breathing.
For a moment, they just looked at each other. The bravado of the garden was gone, replaced by a charged, vulnerable intensity.
“This is insane,” he said softly.
“Insanely what?”
“Fun. Terrifying. Probably stupid.”
“All the best things are,” she replied, leaning against the table. She shrugged the chador off; it pooled on the floor like a shadow. Underneath, she wore a cream-colored tunic and trousers. “So. One hour of stolen time. What does the charismatic Prince of Rajveerganj want to do with it?”
He walked to the window, looking out at the geometric perfection of the courtyard below. “I want to know why you risk this. The guards outside, your father… it’s not just boredom.”
He heard her sigh behind him. “You were right yesterday. I make my own light. But sometimes you need another person to see it, or you start to doubt it’s real. The art, the music, the opinions I swallow during state dinners… it all happens in a vacuum. Until you walked in with your… sunlight. It was a reflection. I saw myself in it. Clearly.”
He turned. Her honesty was disarming, a weapon she’d turned on herself. “I saw you, too. Clearly.”
A slow smile. “Good.” She pushed off the table. “Then let’s not waste the reflection talking about the darkness. Tell me something real. Something you’ve never told anyone at a state dinner.”
He thought for a second. “I’m terrified of deep water. Not like pools. Like oceans. The vast, dark nothing beneath you. My brother Dev used to throw me off our boat just to hear me scream.”
She laughed, a genuine, unfettered sound that seemed to bounce off the stone walls. “The prince is afraid of the deep! I love it. My secret is I hate pomegranates. Everyone here acts like they’re jewels from heaven. They’re just messy, sour bundles of hassle.”
They talked like that, rapid and laughing, the words tumbling out. She mocked the outdated decor in the palace’s "modern" wing. He confessed his addiction to terrible reality television. She described painting huge, furious abstract canvases that she kept hidden in a storage room. He imitated his stern head of security, Shukla, perfectly, and she doubled over, clutching her stomach.
The hour evaporated. The slants of light through the window crept across the floor, deepening to amber.
The shift was gradual. The laughter settled into warm quiet. They were sitting on the floor, backs against an old cabinet, shoulders almost touching. The space between them felt thinner than air.
“You leave tomorrow,” she said, not looking at him. It wasn’t a question.
“Early. The border situation… it’s stabilized. My job as the friendly face is done.”
“And the other job?” she asked, her voice barely above a whisper. “The sunlight?”
“That job,” he said, carefully, “doesn’t feel finished.”
She turned her head. Her eyes were liquid in the dimming light. “It has to be. For now.” There was a ferocity in her resignation. “You will go back to your simulators and your pizza. I will go back to my tents and my silence.”
“It doesn’t have to be silence,” he said, urgency spilling into his words. “When you come to India for the cultural summit, or the trade talks… Dev will host. I’ll be there. We can…”
“When I come?” A bitter smile touched her lips. “My father trades daughters like thoroughbreds. My next appearance outside this country will likely be my wedding trip to some frosty palace in the Gulf.” She looked down at her hands, then back up, and her gaze was desperate. “Promise me something anyway. Lie to me. Promise me when I come to India, you’ll show me the stupid racing simulator. That we’ll eat too much pizza. That we’ll talk for hours where no one is listening.”
He reached out, his fingers brushing hers. A spark, simple and profound. “It’s not a lie. The minute you’re on Rajveerganj soil, you’re my guest. My responsibility. My friend. We’ll talk until we run out of words.”
She intertwined her fingers with his, her grip tight, possessive. “Friend,” she repeated, as if testing the word. It seemed to both satisfy and sadden her. “I’ll hold you to that, Prince Amartya.”
A sudden, heavy bang on the door made them jerk apart. “Prince Amartya,” a guard’s voice called, flat and final. “Your hour is concluded.”
Time crashed back in. They scrambled to their feet. She snatched up her chador, wrapping it around herself with practiced, frantic speed, transforming back into a phantom. He smoothed his hair, his heart hammering against his ribs.
She was at the door, her hand on the latch. She looked back, her expression a masterpiece of conflicted emotion—longing, frustration, a defiant hope. “Sunlight,” she murmured.
Then she was gone, slipping out into the shadows of the scaffold hall.
He waited a full minute, forcing his breath to slow, before opening the door and stepping back into the realm of the guards. Their expressions were unchanged. He wondered what, or who, they had seen.
The ride back to the palace was a silent movie. The vibrant, laughing woman in the dusty office was gone, replaced by the silhouette of a princess in a grey shroud, seen briefly through the window of a passing car as his motorcade entered the gates. She did not wave.
That night, at the final, interminable farewell banquet, King Shaibullah held court, boasting of the hydro project’s success. Zahira was seated far down the table, as she predicted. She was a statue, dressed in formal, covering attire, her eyes lowered to her plate. She never once looked his way.
But as Amartya stood to give his parting thanks, his voice echoing in the hall, he let his gaze sweep the table. When it passed over her, he saw it. Her hand, resting in her lap, was clenched into a fist so tight her knuckles were white. And on one finger, she had painted a single, small, strokes of nail polish in the vibrant, defiant green of the dress she’d worn the day they met.
It was a signal. A secret. A promise.
He finished his speech, the words flowing on automatic, while his whole being focused on that tiny, brilliant spot of color in the sea of monotone. She didn’t want him to go. She couldn’t do anything. But she had done this.
He sat down, his mission accomplished, his duty done. And he felt, for the first time, the true, heavy weight of leaving something precious behind in the harsh, bleaching light.