Ravanan

Chapter -15

Petrified Bindhu lied inside the cave and she felt like her entire body was frozen from the shock. " Where are you Ragav? I cannot take this anymore ", she cried as Kumar's final groan kept mimicking in her head.

"........ tied the body near their tents ", a voice approached the cave while talking with someone.

"Hey ! Did you sleep well yesterday? " , Raj cheerfully questioned Bindhu and carried fruits and water . The fruits were fresh and the water was clean and Raj asked her to eat the fruits, but she was even petrified to talk back.

"What's wrong with you ? Why are you hesitating? Just eat the fruits and rest well. We will leave this place soon", Raj said and left the place as soon as he gave her food. But his voice didn't vanish. Bindhu heard some murmuring sounds and witnessed three shadows sat in front of the cave.

" Well , what do we do next ?" , Kaali initialised the conversation.

" I still don't feel satisfied. Where is Ragav ?", Ravanan questioned Raj while majestically sitting on a huge virgin rock.

"There were camped at the bottom of the waterfalls and slowly gaining on us by capturing and investigating our people", Raj answered while snacking on a full pineapple which was half of the size of his head.

" Tell our men and women to be safe and ask them to migrate around the forest from time to time. We need to shift ourselves to the next village before they come ", Ravanan said. The voices slowly started to move away and vanished at a point.

" Seems like they went. This is your chance Bindhu. You need to get out of here ", Bindhu thought this as a chance to get away.

She searched for a way to get rid of the ropes first that was tied over her legs. But all she got was the wet sand, stones ,leaves and some small tree trunks. Her mind sparked with a thought and she placed the rope on the ground and straightened it with her legs and began rubbing the rope with two ropes . The wet and hard rope doesn't gave up easily. Bindhu had to put up a lots of effort and her pale, white hands became red . The rope finally started to surrender and freed her from the cave.

Then she took a small blunt stone but still could cut. She freed her two hands with heavy strain. She lied speechless for a second.

Her legs started to jerk in excitement like it had been electrocuted. She could feel the fresh air of freedom through her nostril. She held the cave's sidewalls with her two hands for support and slowly crawled out of the cave. The place was entirely empty and noiseless except the bird's chirping sound.

She placed her right leg on the ground. Then she slowly placed her broken left leg on the ground.

" Ouch ! It doesn't hurt that much. Thanks to that woman's herbs", Bindhu murmured and observed the surroundings.

The world looked beautiful for her. The birds were seated on the tree trunk and fed its young and featherless fledglings. Ants , the abundant number of forest's soldiers poped out from there sand and some started to rebuild their rain damaged castle with the sand, some cleaned their antennas and headed in all directions in search of food and some surgically sliced an over grown grass hopper. The grass hopper gave a counterattack, but it was outnumbered by the soldiers and it's body parts were completely separated. The bees filled the air with the song made by their wing beats and took their flights to rob the nectars from the flowers.

All the scenarios looked so heart warming. Her lips started to bloom smiles again. She then saw an inappropriate figure lying near the cave and on seeing the trident behind the figure, she recognised the person . Her smile backtracked and her heart started to thrust like a charcoal train.

"Not again", she thought and silently grabbed a tree trunk and sauntered towards him without making noise, But her left leg betrayed her at the perfect time. She felt a sharp pain and lost her steps. Her body began rolling on the wet ground , collapsed on Ravanan and ended up waking the sleeping beast.

"Huaah! It's you again why don't you curl up your tail and sit in a place" , Ravanan rubbed his eyes and spoke in a sleepy tone.

Bindhu quickly sat on his belly and pinned him on the ground. She started to punch him with all of her might. But Ravanan felt it like a bunny sitting and jumping on him.

" What are you doing ?", he taunted her. He could feel her heavy breath and her feeble and soft chest were expanding and shorting with every breath while attaining its limit. Ravanan grined on seeing her adorable face and pushed her away .

" Do you want to play with me kitten ?", Ravanan got on his feet and playfully questioned Bindhu. Bindhu searched for any other objects and launched all the stones she found on the ground and Ravanan handily distracted its path with the trident and suddenly she sprayed the wet sand on to his eyes ,turning him blind for a minute.

" uh-huh", Ravanan slipped down and wiped the sand. When he opened his eyes, Bindhu vanished into the woods without any trace.

She was nowhere to be found . Ravanan took a black cotton sheet and covered his upper body and yelled Kaali's name.

" Yes brother coming ", Kaali yelled back and rushed towards the place, feeling the tension in his brother's voice.

Bindhu hopped into the forest by using a tree trunk as a walking stick and escaped from Ravanan's claws. She stopped near a tree to catch a breath. She knew she couldn't stay there for too long. She started to hop again.

On her way, she felt like something was following her. A broken branch fell from the tree. Bindhu instinctly reacted to the sound and pointed her supporting stick in the air . It was nothing but some monkeys jumping and playing around. Her heart started to calm down a bit ,but another shock came from nowhere and stood in front of her.

Two men were standing ahead of her. One was shrimp with a deep color and the other one was a tall and sturdy ,but skinny. It was obvious that they two were tribal men like Ravanan. They carried a spear and their neck was crowded with chains made of animal's bone and teeth. But they didn't look like a complete tribe either. It seemed like they originated from forest ,yet they lived an intermediate life between complete tribal people and the people who lived in society.

The short and evil looking man opened his mouth and asked Bindhu Whom she was and what was she doing in the forest in a annoying voice.

His eyes gazed at Bindhu like a hyena analysing it's prey. Bindhu doesn't felt like she would be safe at these people's hands. Yet she couldn't stay in the forest all by herself .

" What should I do ? Even if I managed to stay hidden from Ravanan, I might still end up inside the hungry animals intestine. So I think it's better to say everything to these people", Bindhu thought to herself.