Arjun stood before the ber tree, the morning light now fully upon him. He looked at the hundred knife marks. He looked at the red clay circle he had drawn every day for five years. Then, he raised his chakram one last time.

The next morning, before the sun bled over the fields, Arjun went to the ber tree. He took out a small, folded piece of paper. On it, he had sketched the boot print—the half-moon crack. Then, with a steady hand, he drew a line connecting it to a name he had finally uncovered by bribing an old servant: Ratan Singh , Sukha’s elder brother, who had died in a cart accident three years ago. Ratan had the limp. Ratan had the boot. And Ratan was dead, killed by his own guilt-ridden horse falling into a ravine.

Arjun walked back to his mother. She saw his face—not the face of a ghost, but of a man who had put down a heavy stone.

In the dusty, saffron-hued village of Kheri, where the Yamuna river bent like an old woman’s back, the word nishaan meant everything. It meant a mark, a sign, a target. But for the men of the Rathore family, it meant one thing: revenge.

Arjun felt his pulse become the drumbeat. He did not confront Sukha. He did not draw his chakram . Instead, he waited.