Chapter 7: Born from the Hurt We Hide

That evening, the sky turned copper.

A gentle wind rustled the trees around the cave. The fire crackled softly. The shadows stretched long, reaching for the walls as the sun disappeared behind the hills.

Draupadi sat near the fire, silent, unmoving.

Agnika slept against her chest again, but her little fingers twitched from time to time — still restless, still afraid, even in sleep.

Draupadi had not spoken all day.

Not to Bhima. Not to the twins.

But Yudhishthir had watched her. Quietly.

He now approached, slow and thoughtful, carrying a small bowl of warm milk with herbs — the kind meant to soothe weariness not of the body, but of the soul.

He sat beside her, wordless for a while, listening to the fire crackle between them.

Finally, he spoke.

> “You look at her like she’s broken.”

Draupadi didn’t look up. Her voice was low. “She isn’t. She’s just… carrying something too large for her hands.”

Yudhishthir nodded slowly.

> “Because she was never meant to carry only herself.”

Draupadi looked at him then — not with anger, but with grief she hadn’t named aloud.

> “She saw it, Yudhishthir. She saw what they did to me… and she cried like she was the one standing there. She held me like I would vanish if she let go.”

He reached over and gently placed the bowl of milk by her feet.

> “Because she’s not a child like others, Krishnaa.”

> “Then what is she?” she whispered. “A watcher? A mirror?”

Yudhishthir's gaze moved to the sleeping girl in her arms.

> “She was born from the hurt no one spoke of.”

> “What do you mean?”

> “The world hides pain. Men bury it. Women carry it. Kings pass judgment over it. But no one truly sees it.”

> “And she does?” Draupadi whispered.

> “She doesn’t just see it. She was shaped by it. Not your pain alone. Not mine. But all that went unanswered — all the cries swallowed, all the moments where justice turned its face.”

He pointed gently at Agnika’s back, where the mark shimmered faintly even now.

> “That mark is not a symbol of origin. It is a symbol of absorption.”

> “Then she is a wound,” Draupadi murmured, tears rising. “And I love a wound.”

Yudhishthir shook his head gently.

> “No, Krishnaa. You love a healing. The wound is what made her, yes. But love… your love… is what will shape what she becomes.”

Draupadi looked down again at the child — sleeping now, peacefully at last.

She whispered, more to herself than him:

> “What kind of being is formed not from joy… but from sorrow?”

Yudhishthir responded without hesitation.

> “A being the world needs most.”

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That night, Draupadi fed Agnika with gentle hands, even as her tears fell onto the child’s hair.

She no longer saw her as just a lost baby.

She saw her for what she was:

> A memory the world forgot.

> A question no one dared ask.

> And perhaps… an answer that still hadn’t come.

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🌌 End of Chapter 7