The Curse, The Revenge, Continued
Naina froze there. She looked at her mother in law bewildered. ‘Shivansh? You mean to say this King Cobra is “Shivansh” and his mate is “Shivali” whom you have hidden from me all this time???’, yelled Naina. Naina screamed, ‘YOU HAD SNAKES IN YOUR HOUSE, THAT TOO LETHAL SNAKES, AND YOU ARE TELLING ME THAT NOW. WE HAVE A BABY IN THIS HOUSE. DO YOU KNOW HOW DANGEROUS SNAKES ARE?’ Savita was shivering. She somehow took her phone and called Shankar, Uma and Shiv home. When all of them came, Savita called a meeting. In that meeting she said, ‘ We have hidden the fact from Uma and Naina that we have two snakes at our home. That too king cobras. We all know the reason of hiding this. However, today we have to tell Uma and Naina the truth. Naina and Uma, our family was cursed. To get out of this, we were asked to keep these two snakes at home because they belonged to the temple where this saint, who blessed us, lived. However we were asked to keep this a secret because if we blurted out this secret, people will not allow us to keep the snakes and then our family will never come out of the curse. Now that the secret is out, we all need to know what to do with Shivali? We cannot leave her in the forest, neither can we kill her. It will be a sin. However, I am afraid she will try to wreak vengeance on us. How are we to stay safe?’ Naina was quiet. She thought this was all superstition, but, the way Savita narrated everything, it was not easy to leave things presuming superstition is never real. She then said, ‘Is there a way to appease Shivali?’ Savita looked down on the floor and said, ‘Maybe we can arrange a prayer session. If only Shivali forgot about revenge. Let us pray to Lord Shiva.’
The prayer session was arranged. The house resonated with sonorous chantings. Everyone prayed deeply. The saint however said that no matter what, people around should stay careful.
Days passed. Everyone stayed careful. The door, windows and everything in Shivali’s room was checked properly. Everyone was careful with the baby as well. However, Shivali seemed to show no signs of revenge. She quietly stayed in the room never to come out.
Eventually Naina conceived. The entire family was worried about Shivali’s revenge. Nothing happened. Naina gave birth to a health baby girl. Everyone was happy. However, Naina was always engulfed in the pangs of guilt of killing Shivansh. She made Shivali lonely. Yet Shivali so far, has not wreaked vengeance. Naina spent sleepless nights worrying about it. Shankar and everyone in the family tried to lessen her worries by telling her time and again that if Shivali had to take revenge she would have done it immediately.
Well, everyone was right. Shivali was not in the mood of revenge. Infact she was happy that Shivansh was not there anymore. Why? Well, Shivansh had been cheating on her all this time. He sneaks out of the room to meet another female snake. Shivali was happy that he was killed. Now she is at peace, and she will continue living with this family happily ever after.
