Our Eyes Met Across the Victory Feast, And An Hour Later We Were Risking It All in a Hidden Alcove

The drums had been pounding since sunset, a relentless heartbeat beneath the clamor of voices and clinking metal. I stood near the eastern pillar, accepting another congratulatory palm against my shoulder, the grip too hard, the smile too wide. My mind refused to leave the battlefield: the angle at which Kalinga’s chariot wheel had splintered, the exact number of arrows I had left when their standard-bearer finally fell. I recited the tally silently while the victors around me drank sugared wine and tore meat with their teeth.

Then her laugh rose above the noise—unguarded, bright, almost careless. I looked without meaning to.

Subhadra leaned toward Bhima, one hand on his massive forearm as if to keep herself upright. Firelight slid along the single braid that curved over her shoulder, each pearl catching the flame in a separate, steady gleam. The neckline of her indra-dyed sari had slipped an inch; I saw the soft hollow at the base of her throat catch a bead of perspiration before it slipped beneath the cloth. She laughed again, quieter this time, and her lower lip caught between her teeth the instant the sound ended.

Everything I had cataloged—enemy dead, horses lost, the precise weight of blood on my gloves—scattered. My chest filled with something sharp and useless. I had spent the day proving I was the finest archer living; in that moment I could not have strung a bow.

Krishna stood beside Balarama near the dice boards, a bronze goblet idle in his hand. His gaze crossed the hall, met mine, lingered. The corner of his mouth bent in a slow, private curve before he turned back to Yudhishthira’s account of the single combat. The gesture was so slight no one else would notice, yet it felt like a door cracking open.

Nakula clapped my back, beginning a story about the look on Dhrishtadyumna’s face when our war elephants charged. I nodded at the proper places, but my eyes returned to her. She sipped from a silver cup, throat working, lashes lowered. A strand of hair had escaped the braid; it clung to her skin just above the pearl edging of her blouse, dark against the sheen of salt and lamp-oil. I imagined hooking it back behind her ear, the way her pulse would beat against the pad of my thumb.

The hall felt suddenly overheated, the air thick with roasted cumin and jasmine garlands beginning to wilt. I loosened the clasp at my neck, breathed once, twice, forcing the rhythm until the bowstring calluses on my fingertips stopped twitching. Across the room she set her cup down, lifted her gaze, and for the length of a heartbeat looked straight at me. The noise of celebration flattened into a dull surf. Then Bhima bellowed for more wine, she turned, and the moment folded back into ordinary night.

I forced myself to face Nakula, who was demonstrating with both hands how Dhrishtadyumna’s jaw had slackened when Bhima’s mace clipped his chariot rail. I laughed when expected, but the sound felt separate from me, like a cloak I’d borrowed. Over his shoulder the fire-pit flared; sparks drifted upward, and through their brief glow I saw Krishna still watching. He lifted his cup a fraction—no higher than his waist—then let it fall, the gesture casual enough to be meaningless, deliberate enough to be a summons. I looked away first.

Nakula’s story ended; he pivoted toward a passing tray of fried river-fish, and the small shift opened a line of sight straight to Subhadra. She had moved to the edge of the musicians’ circle. A drummer spoke near her ear; she answered, head tilting, pearls sliding across silk like droplets of moon. One hand rested at her hip, fingers idly tracing the gold belt-chain that dipped toward the fold of her sari. The cloth shifted each time she breathed, revealing and concealing the arch of her foot, the narrow ankle circled by a black thread. I catalogued these details the way I once counted arrows: ankle, belt, pearl, breath. My tongue felt thick from wine I hadn’t tasted.

Bhima’s voice cracked across the hall, demanding dice. Balarama answered with a roar of approval, and bodies rearranged, carrying her with them. I stayed rooted until Sahadeva nudged me forward. We formed a loose ring around the low ivory board. Somehow—perhaps Krishna’s doing, perhaps chance—Subhadra ended up directly opposite. She knelt, sari pooling indigo and copper across the marble, and began arranging the cowrie shells with quick, economical movements. Each time she cast, she lifted her eyes afterward, not to the score but to me. The look was neither coy nor shy; it assessed, curious, as if measuring how much of me would fit inside her gaze. I forgot to track my own throws; my pile of winnings dwindled, grew, dwindled again, meaningless.

A horn sounded beyond the colonnade, announcing the changing of night guards. The game dissolved into friendly argument over a disputed cast. People stood, stretched, drifted toward fresh wine or cooler air. Subhadra remained crouched a moment longer, fingertips resting on the board’s rim. Lamplight slid across her cheek, caught the faint sheen of sweat at her hairline. She exhaled, a small, steady sound, then rose and walked toward the eastern arch without glancing back. The braid swayed against her spine, pearls knocking softly together like distant bells. I watched until the dark swallowed the last glint of them, my palms open on my knees, the dice still warm from her touch.

Balarama’s voice cut through the hall like a war-horn, though the battle he summoned was only dice and wine. “A victory deserves proper spoils,” he declared, thumping his cup against a pillar. “Let the archer test his luck against iron and ivory.”

Laughter answered him; someone dragged the heavy board to the center, cowries clicking like small bones. I rose because refusal would have seemed cowardice, not because I wanted the game. My thoughts were still tangled in the swing of a braid, the precise weight of a pearl against silk.

The circle formed quickly. Sahadeva claimed the eastern cushion, Nakula the western. Bhima lowered himself with a grunt that rattled the marble. I found a space beside Yudhishthira, opposite the empty arc where servants set fresh lamps. Then she arrived, guided by no hand I could see, and knelt across from me. The lamps were behind her; their glow passed straight through the thin stuff of her sari, outlining thigh and hip before the cloth settled into shadow.

Balarama scattered the shells. “Highest chooses first stake,” he ruled, and rolled. The room’s noise shrank to the rattle of cowrie on polished stone. Subhadra watched the tumble, not the score. When the shells settled she lifted her gaze—no smile, no downward flick of modesty—just the directness of a scout confirming distance. The look lasted only the space of a heartbeat, yet in it I felt the same taut string that precedes an arrow’s release. My pulse answered against my collar, stupidly obvious.

I threw next, fingers clumsy. The shells spun, one chipped edge catching light again and again until they lay still: a middling number, nothing to boast. Coins and trinkets changed hands; someone demanded sweeter wine. I heard it all through cotton. She raised the dice cup, forearm flexing, bangles slipping to the crook of her elbow. A thin scar—pale, almost silver—crossed the inside of her wrist; I wondered which childhood game had left it, whether she had cried or sworn or simply watched the blood with that same assessing calm.

Her cast clattered. She won. Instead of claiming the copper coins in the center, she spoke softly. “A question for the loser.” Voices overlapped hers, arguing rules, but her eyes stayed on me. “Tell us, Arjun, what single thing did you most wish for today?”

The circle hushed, amused. They expected a soldier’s joke—another city, another elephant, a vat of southern wine. I felt the shape of the true answer swell in my throat like an unburst word. She waited, chin resting on one hand, thumbnail idly tracing the rim of the board.

“A different vantage,” I said at last. The reply was nonsense, but it carried enough of my usual dryness that Bhima laughed and reached for the wine. Subhadra’s lashes flickered; color rose beneath her skin, visible even in lamplight. She looked down, began stacking the coins though the stake was already paid.

Balarama rolled again, called for wagers. I placed a silver wristlet I barely saw. My brothers shouted numbers, odds, insults. Between their voices she glanced up once more—quick, almost involuntary—and this time the challenge had softened into something curious, almost startled, as if she had discovered a hidden blade inside a fruit. The blush lingered while the dice flew, while coins clinked, while the night guards changed beyond the pillars. I lost every throw that followed, yet each loss felt like winning a secret she and I alone could count.