Chapter -1 The wedding of Smoke and Ash

Reyansh Sharma had never believed in ghosts.

He believed in EMIs, traffic jams on the Western Express Highway, and his mother's ability to make him feel guilty from three rooms away. He believed in chai at 7 a.m. and the quiet dignity of a well-pressed kurta. But ghosts? Curses? The kind of old-world magic that village grandmothers whispered about during solar eclipses?

No. He was a Mumbai boy. He had a marketing degree and a LinkedIn profile.

And yet, standing at his cousin Meera's wedding in Jaipur, surrounded by five hundred guests and enough marigolds to drown a elephant, Reyansh felt something wrong.

It started as a prickle at the back of his neck—the kind you get when someone is watching you from a dark corner. He turned. Nothing. Just a sea of shimmering lehengas and waiters balancing trays of gol gappe.

But the prickle stayed.

The wedding was at a restored haveli on the outskirts of Jaipur, all sandstone arches and mirrored ceilings that caught the afternoon light like fractured stars. The barat had arrived two hours late—fashionably, because this was a Sharma wedding—and the pandit was already sweating through his dhoti as he arranged the sacred fire.

Reyansh stood near the mandap, fanning himself with the wedding pamphlet. His mother had spent the last twenty minutes introducing him to "nice girls" from "good families." He had smiled, nodded, and forgotten every name within seconds.

"You look like you'd rather be anywhere else."

The voice came from his left. Low. Dry. Amused.

Reyansh turned.

The man standing beside him was tall—a few inches taller than Reyansh's own five-eleven—with sharp cheekbones and dark eyes that held a tired sort of knowing. He wore a navy blue Nehru jacket over a cream kurta, no turban, no excessive jewelry. His hands were in his pockets. His posture said I don't care but his eyes said I see everything.

"Excuse me?" Reyansh said.

"You heard me." The man tilted his head toward the mandap. "Your cousin's about to circle the sacred fire seven times. Everyone's crying. You're checking your watch."

Reyansh looked down. His left hand was, in fact, hovering near his wrist. He hadn't realized.

"That's not—I was just—" He stopped. Sighed. "Fine. Yes. I'd rather be anywhere else."

The man laughed. It was a quiet sound, barely more than an exhale, but it did something strange to Reyansh's chest. Something warm. Something dangerous.

"I'm Arjun," the man said, extending a hand.

Reyansh took it. Arjun's palm was calloused—unusual for a wedding guest—and cool despite the heat. "Reyansh."

"Groom's side or bride's?"

"Bride's. Meera's my cousin. You?"

"Groom's friend. College." Arjun's gaze drifted back to the mandap, where Meera and her husband-to-be were now garlanding each other. "Third wedding this month. You'd think I'd be used to the performance by now."

Performance. Such a strange word for a wedding. But Reyansh understood exactly what he meant.

The ceremony continued. The pandit chanted in Sanskrit, his voice rising and falling like a wave. The sacred fire crackled, sending tendrils of smoke into the amber evening. And Reyansh found himself watching Arjun instead of the bride.

There was something about him. Something off.

Not in a bad way. In a way Reyansh couldn't name. When Arjun moved, the air around him seemed to thicken slightly, like heat rising from asphalt. When he blinked, his eyelashes cast shadows that were too long, too sharp, as if they belonged to someone standing under a different sun.

You're being ridiculous, Reyansh told himself.

But the prickle at the back of his neck didn't go away.

---

By the mehendi ceremony that evening, Reyansh had decided he was imagining things.

The women of the family had taken over the courtyard, their hands being painted with intricate henna patterns while Bollywood music played from hidden speakers. Reyansh sat on a charpoy near the edge, nursing a glass of watered-down whiskey and pretending to scroll through Instagram.

"You again."

Arjun lowered himself onto the charpoy without waiting for an invitation. Their shoulders brushed. The contact sent a jolt through Reyansh—not electric, exactly, but resonant, like two tuning forks struck at the same frequency.

"You're following me," Reyansh said.

"I'm avoiding the photography booth. They want me to do a 'candid' shot with the other single men." Arjun made a face. "I'd rather eat glass."

Reyansh snorted. "Dramatic."

"Honest."

They sat in silence for a moment. A cousin ran past screaming about someone's leaked honeymoon photos. An aunt tried to drag Reyansh to the dance floor. He refused. Arjun watched the whole thing with an expression of mild amusement.

"Your family is exhausting," Arjun said.

"You have no idea."

"I have some idea." Arjun's voice dropped slightly. "My family is the same. Loud. Loving. Completely incapable of understanding that not everyone wants the same life."

Reyansh looked at him. Really looked. In the golden light of the courtyard lamps, Arjun's face was almost too beautiful—like something carved from old wood and left to weather for centuries. His jaw was strong. His lips were curved in a half-smile that didn't quite reach his eyes.

"What do you want?" Reyansh asked. The question came out softer than he intended.

Arjun turned to face him. For a moment, his dark eyes held something raw. Something hungry. "I want to stop pretending."

The air between them changed.

Reyansh felt it—a shift, like the moment before a storm breaks. The lamps flickered. The music seemed to dim. And for one impossible second, he thought he saw shadows moving behind Arjun's eyes. Not reflections. Something alive. Something ancient.

Then Arjun blinked, and it was gone.

"You should get your drink refilled," Arjun said, nodding toward Reyansh's empty glass. "The whiskey here is terrible, but it's terrible in a comforting way."

Reyansh laughed—a real laugh, the first one all weekend. "You're strange."

"So I've been told."

They exchanged phone numbers under the guise of sharing wedding photos. Reyansh typed Arjun's name into his contacts with fingers that trembled slightly. He told himself it was the whiskey.

He didn't believe himself.

---

That night, Reyansh couldn't sleep.

The haveli's guest room was too hot, even with the ceiling fan spinning at full speed. He lay on the embroidered bedsheet, staring at the dark ceiling, replaying every word Arjun had said.

I want to stop pretending.

The words echoed in his skull like a prophecy.

Around 2 a.m., he gave up on sleep and walked to the rooftop terrace. The moon was full—so full it looked like a painted coin stuck to the sky. The desert air was cool and dry, carrying the scent of sand and distant rain.

He wasn't alone.

Arjun stood at the edge of the terrace, his back to Reyansh, looking out at the dark Aravalli hills. His Nehru jacket was gone. His kurta sleeves were rolled to his elbows, revealing forearms corded with muscle and marked with thin, pale scars.

Scars?

Reyansh stepped closer. "You couldn't sleep either?"

Arjun didn't turn. "I don't sleep much."

"Insomnia?"

"Something like that."

Reyansh stopped beside him. The moon illuminated Arjun's profile—the sharp line of his nose, the curve of his jaw, the strange stillness of his expression. He looked like a man waiting for something. Or someone.

"What are you looking at?" Reyansh asked.

Arjun pointed toward the hills. "There's a temple out there. Very old. Older than the haveli. Older than Jaipur." His voice was distant. "They say a curse lives there. A king who loved someone he shouldn't have. The priests bound his soul to the earth so he could never leave, never rest, never find peace."

Reyansh shivered despite the warm air. "That's dark for a wedding weekend."

"Is it?" Arjun finally turned to look at him. In the moonlight, his eyes were no longer dark—they were amber. Gold-flecked and luminous, like embers glowing beneath ash. "I think weddings make people think about love. And love makes people think about what they'd risk."

"What would you risk?"

Arjun smiled. It was a sad smile, a knowing smile, a smile that had seen too much and forgotten nothing.

"Everything," he said. "And I have."

The wind picked up. The lamps on the terrace flickered and died. And in the sudden darkness, Reyansh felt Arjun's hand brush against his—cool, calloused, careful.

"You should go back inside," Arjun whispered.

"Why?"

"Because if you stay, I won't be able to pretend anymore."

Reyansh's heart hammered against his ribs. He should leave. He knew he should leave. This man was strange, unsettling, possibly dangerous. His eyes had changed color. His shadows had moved. Every instinct Reyansh possessed was screaming at him to walk away.

But he didn't.

He turned his hand over and laced his fingers through Arjun's.

"Then don't pretend," Reyansh said.

For a long moment, nothing happened. The moon hung overhead. The wind died down. And Arjun stared at their joined hands like he was watching a miracle unfold.

Then he pulled Reyansh closer—not roughly, but with an urgency that took Reyansh's breath away. Their foreheads touched. Their breath mingled. And Arjun whispered four words that would change everything:

"You asked what I want."

He paused.

"I want you. But I'm not what you think I am."

To be . Continue

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