Warrior Princess; Her Quest to the throne

Known to only a handful people, Ramanujam had been working on developing a whole new language for quite some time now.     

Contrary to what people may think, coming up with symbols, rules and grammar was not an easy task. Even though he had managed to only finish the alphabets till now, he had shared them with Saraswati, using her as his guinea pig for the project. He often mixed those symbols with the coded messages when he sent them to her, increasing her task by multifold. And then, if the message was a nasty one, then all that wasted effort on it, made the person wanting to strangle the sender as was the case this time with Saraswati.     

"You better watch out! When I get my hands on your neck, I will make you beg for mercy in three different languages, you as*," she muttered dangerously, crushing the note in her hand.     

Gurukul, Chandragarh     

Mriga was disconcerted as Yash followed her at a leisurely pace while she went to look for Prithvi in the Admin building.     

Yash gave an indulgent smile at her antics. It was true that her team had put out the requisition for a finance field expert since it was an arena which Mriga had no clue about. In order to prepare for the group discussion which may include a topic from that field, both Chiranjeev and Abhirath had felt the need for one. Since they didn't know one personally, the requisition had been sent to the Dean's office, seeking help.     

As fate would have it, Harshvardhan had seen it while sitting in the Dean' office who was his senior from their student days.     

Harshvardhan had recognised Mrignayani's name as the requisition lay on top of the pile, immediately seizing upon the opportunity for his son. He had told the dean to specially recommend his son's name to Prithvi as his son was looking for mentoring opportunities to enrich his experience. Yashvardhan's grades were good enough to warrant such a recommendation and even if they hadn't been, the dean was well aware of Harshavrdhan and his wife's background and couldn't have said no. That's how Yash found himself walking side by side with his girl, who was scowling so hard that he was worried that her eyebrows may fall off due to the excessive pressure on them.     

After debating with himself endlessly, he started softly, "I only want to help. There is no other hidden agenda. I swear!"     

Upon his words, Mriga paused mid-stride and turned back to look at him.     

"I don't want you to help me. I don't want to have anything to do with you anymore," she said with a slight tremor in her voice.     

Before he could say anything, she raised her hand and continued, "Don't you get it? I can't afford any distraction. This event is really important to me and I don't want anything marring my concentration."     

Yash couldn't hold back and took her raised her hand in his own.     

In a tone which was part imploring, part pleading, he said, "I believe… no, I know that I can be your strength. I want to see you at the top and I think that you will need my expertise. I want to do my best to help you. Can you trust me this last time? I promise not to disappoint you."     

Before Mriga could extract her hand out of his, he left it and slid down on the ground in front of her, kneeling down in an apology. She stared at him, her mouth agape. Yash let go of his pride, his stature and bared himself in front of her, regardless of the people milling around. As he raised his eyes towards her, the trembling vulnerability in there stopped her from saying what she had intended to.     

"Get up. What is wrong with you? Enough with the nonsense. Just promise me that you will keep your dealings strictly professional. No staking claim on me, no fighting with teammates, no…" she pulled him up as she said all this.     

Yash had tears welling up in his eyes as he smiled at her.     

Before she could finish uttering the ground rules, he shook his head, "I know what to do. I won't create any trouble, I promise. Now, can we go and eat? It is really not good for you to start your day with an empty…"     

Mriga put a finger to her lips and gestured him to become quiet. She changed the direction towards the foodhall.     

The thought in her head at the moment - God save me!     

Vindhya, who had been one of the many people pausing to see a guy go down on his knees in front of a girl, crushed the note in her hand. It had been an application which she was going to submit to the Dean's office, officially asking for Yash to be a part of her team.     

"I am going to win this competition, come what may," she swore to herself as hot tears of humiliation scalded her cheeks.     

Himprayag     

"After this meeting, we have to go elsewhere. Just follow my lead in front of the princess, ok?" Bela told Shaurya.     

He nodded his head.     

She looked at him curiously. He definitely seemed more confident tonight than he had been three days ago. She was looking forward to his performance tonight.     

Gayatri had been on a look out as they reached a rough shed which lay at the end of the military training ground. To reach here, one needed to cross many army camps which were filled with Ahilya's loyalists. No spy belonging to Mithilesh's camp would be able to walk in here without being discovered.     

Bela bowed politely and then gestured towards Shaurya.     

"My son, whom I had told you about," said Bela.