had never known what fear taste likes until now. Until this eerie silence suffocates him. And he swears, his ancestors must have feared it as well. A gulp.

A step towards her and she stumbles back.

A gulp.

She steps back from him. From her Maan.

The breezes halt, the midnight glory hides behind the clouds of pain designedly.

The trees stilled as they silently hold themself witness for the uproar that's yet to witness by the universe, the war that will ruin the cosmos of lovers, that will taint the unsullied word, Love, itself.

"Aarzu" He whispers, softly, fear lingering in his voice to a point he, himself couldn't recognise as his own, for Nawab Zamaan Shah feared nothing in his twenty-nine springs of existence except once.

Once these blue pairs of eyes searched for his amber ones in a room full of people and found that. They pleaded with him, for love, for chance, and he walked away, from her unheard plea, from her unrequited love.

"Aarzu" A plea this time.

"Why?" A small broken voice that screams betrayal. A betrayal from a lover. A stab where it hits the most.

"I have to" A truth he can't deny, he never want to.

"Why?"

"Amma was not the target Aarzu, Sahir Mirza was." He snapped.

"My Amma was not the target, my Brother was." She screamed.

The winds drift crazily suddenly, for the lovers are fighting their survival now, for hate is making its way now.

"My father's murderer was the target Aarzu," He justifies without the essence of guilt in that voice.

"Who happens to be my Brother Zamaan" she screamed as she looks into his amber eyes and Zamaan swear he never want to see that sight of hers ever again.

Red eyes.

Broken.

Hate.

"Khoon ka badla Khoon hota hai Aarzu" He said.

"Khoon ka badla khoon hota hai Zamaan" She whispers, and for once he furrowed then she continues.

"Aur dard ka badla dard." she said as she takes another step back.

"Aarzu" He pleaded.

"Khoo diya apne Maan, khoo diya." She said as she nears the door, stopping just a step away from it.

"He killed my father, Aarzu. He killed my anchor. I was not even an adult when I lost my family. He killed my aunts in front of my eyes, in front of all of us. How could I not avenge that?" He said, for this time a lover is asking for his beloved to stay, for another chance.

A tear billowed down her blue pools as she recalls the past. A gulp of pain as she shut her mind out of it again. It took her years to put a curtain on the dreadful past, a decade to get rid of all those nightmares, now is not the time for it again.

"Just like I did, maybe" she whispers, too slowly for him to hear, and he didn't. He should have, maybe.

The sky roars and the tree swayed crazily. For the lovers had lost it yet again, in hands of hatred again.

And she walks out of the brown wooden door, passing the huge lawn with her heavy dupatta trailing behind her carrying a heavier heart.

Pain. And only that.

Lost. And all lost.

Love. And all gone.

Hatred. And only hate.

Main ne puchha pahla patthar mujh par kaun uthaega

Aai ek aawaz ki tu jis ka mohsin kahlaega

Puchh sake to puchhe koi ruth ke jaane walon se

raushniyon ko mere ghar ka rasta kaun bataega

Dali hai is khush-fahmi ne aadat mujh ko sone ki

niklega jab suraj to khud mujh ko aan jagaega

logo mere sath chalo tum jo kuchh hai wo aage hai

pichhe mud kar dekhne wala patthar ka ho jaega

din mein hans kar milne wale chehre saf batate hain

ek bhayanak sapna mujh ko sari raat daraega

mere baad wafa ka dhoka aur kisi se mat karna

gali degi duniya tujh ko sar mera jhuk jaega

sukh gai jab aankhon mein pyar ki nili jhil 'qatil'

tere dard ka zard samundar kahe shor machaega

Walking away from the place she always dreamt to called her home. A home she never got to make. Perhaps it was just another house.

A house of cards.

And as she walks towards the threshold, the roaring sky and the screaming orders in the background addresses the sound of crumbling.

A house of cards crumbling on her feet.

Her home broke before it could even be built, again.

Her heart broke before it could have healed, again.

"Aarzu" Another scream from behind and this time she did stop her trail without looking back, stilled at her place as he walks towards her.

"Aarzu, please don't"

"He ordered the attack, Zaheer" She murmured, in pain. For she is talking her confidant now, not the brother of her captive.

"He was bound to." And her head shot up. Another gulp.

He was bound to.

Riyasat mein badla zaroori hai.

"Was a decade of pain not enough for me to bear, Zaheer?" A whisper again.

"It was not you, Heer ki Aarzu" He replies with a sad smile.

"It was not me, like always." He nods.

"But I am in pain, like always." He gulps.

"Just don't"

"I'm leaving Zaheer."

"Aarzu, he won't let you."

She just smiled, a smile so painful that he wanted to dig his own grave and bury himself then and there.

This girl is broken.

This girl had lost everything.

And she deserves none of this.

________

The sky roars and the thunder screams, the sky mourning for the lost lovers. Among the chaos she walks, barefoot, bleeding, a mile went already, away from Shah Haweli, away from her lover.

And suddenly a familiar car stops in front of her, her brows furrow. She is going away from her lover, yes she was. She was going back to this person, no she wasn't. For Aarzu Zamaan Shah had made her choices way back, a decade back.

"Get in the car Aarzu" A nefarious voice she had loved once as he stands in front of her with a cold face, hatred filled eyes.

"Leave me alone Sahir Bhai," she said loud and clear.

"Leave you alone after your husband ordered an attack on me? Sacch mein? Are we kids now again?"

A gasp left her lips and the last thing she remembers was getting hit by someone from behind as darkness engulfed her and she remembers, once her Abba had told her, Riyasat mein koi kisi ka saga nahi hota.