In the deepest quarter of Burhanpur, where the river curled like a serpent beneath ancient stone bridges, silence fell heavy over the weavers' district. Not the silence of sleep or stillness, but the breathless quiet of something waiting to move.
Beneath the old loomhouse, far beneath the hum of ordinary life, the Saanjh gathered.
No names. No faces. Only threads.
The chamber flickered with the glow of oil lamps suspended in crystal bowls. Looms older than dynasties lined the walls, their shuttles motionless, their strings coiled like vipers. The air was thick with incense, dust, and something older. Magic that smelled like spun lightning and burnt jasmine.
At the center stood the Speaker of the Pattern, her eyes hidden beneath a veil of silvery thread. She listened not to voices, but to vibrations.
"She has crossed over," the Speaker said, voice low, textured with command. "The Weave bends. A choice has been torn."
The others stirred. Some shifted the hoods of their robes. Others merely leaned forward, shadows stretching across the looms.
"And Mumtaz?" asked one.
"She has corrupted the golden thread," the Speaker replied. "Bent it around her like a crown. But the Pattern rebels."
A hush fell. A single thread, luminous and alive, swirled down from the ceiling and coiled around the oldest loom. The wood groaned. It had not been used in centuries.
One of the younger Saanjh stepped forward, uncertain. "Is it time?"
The Speaker raised her hand, silencing the air itself.
"Not yet. We watch. We wait."
She turned toward a tapestry that hung on the far wall, partially woven, never finished. At its heart, a falcon hovered mid-flight with wings outstretched, eyes burning with foresight. But now, a new shape had begun to emerge behind it.
A figure cloaked in green.
And behind that… another. Hidden. Blurred. Watching all.
The loom began to vibrate, threads lifting on their own. A warning.
"She's not alone," the Speaker said. "Something else has come through."
A pause.
"Or someone."
The oldest loom in the chamber began to tremble.
Its threads, untouched for decades, twisted in the air like snakes waking from deep slumber. A sound filled the room; not one heard by ears, but felt in the spine. A hum like breath drawn before a storm.
The Speaker of the Pattern turned toward the tapestry again.
The falcon's wings had shifted.
Now they arched not in flight, but in defiance.
The figure in green—Aarifa—stood no longer behind the falcon, but before it. And still, behind them both, that blurred figure watched, presence swelling. It wore no face. It cast no shadow. But it was real.
And growing.
"She has re-entered the mortal loom," the Speaker said. "The threads follow her."
Another elder stepped forward, hands folded into his sleeves. "The realm has not felt a disturbance like this since the first tearing. If Mumtaz succeeds…"
"She won't," the Speaker cut in. "Not if we act now."
Gasps rippled through the gathered Saanjh. In their long memory, intervention had always been the last resort. Their task had never been to change the Pattern but only to guard it.
But the Pattern was bleeding now.
"She carries a false thread," the Speaker continued. "Golden, yes, but tainted with will. She would unmake what was never hers to control."
"But the loom shattered," another elder rasped. "There is no center to hold."
"There is now," the Speaker said. "Aarifa is the center."
She stepped forward and placed a single spindle onto the ancient loom.
It shimmered.
Green. Gold. Crimson.
Three colors. Three truths.
"The time of watching is over," the Speaker said. "We are Keepers of the Pattern. Not prisoners of it."
Silence. Then slowly, the Saanjh began to remove their veils.
One by one, ancient faces surfaced wrinkled with time, eyes fierce with starlight. The youngest weavers knelt beside them, binding threads with quick, nimble fingers. The old looms came alive like great beasts long asleep.
The Speaker raised her hands.
"To Delhi," she said, "and beyond."
The chamber pulsed.
The looms screamed.
And the Saanjh vanished.
From the shadows of the old city, a low chant began to rise. Not loud. Not bold.
But inevitable.
The Saanjh had entered the weave.
Mumtaz turned her gaze to the east, where the looms of Burhanpur slept beneath dust and memory.
Her voice dropped to a whisper. "So the Keepers stir…"
She closed her eyes, and the air around her shimmered like water on the verge of boiling.
"Let them come," she said. "I will show them what it means to be unmade."
In a distant alley behind the spice market, a child no older than seven stopped mid-step.
He looked up.
The sky above Delhi had split not visibly, not yet but something in the pattern had torn.
He turned to the shadow beside him.
"She's here," the boy whispered.
The shadow moved.
Not a man. Not a beast. Not anything you could say you have known before.
Something in between.
"She's not alone anymore," it replied.
And from beneath its cloak, it pulled a spindle of thread so dark it swallowed the light.
"Neither are we."
The boy took a step back, his breath hitching as the shadow unfurled to its full height. Threads blacker than night coiled around its limbs, pulsing with energy older than the looms themselves. A sigil flared on its chest—twisted, broken, and unmistakably royal. It depicted a falcon with one wing bound in chains and the other ablaze, perched atop a shattered loom. Gold threads bled from its talons, unraveling midair; an emblem of betrayal, lost legacy, and a claim to power forged in ruin.
"The forgotten are waking," the shadow said. "The threads cast aside are still threads."
Around them, other shadows emerged: men, women, children each holding fragments of torn weaves, discarded futures, frayed destinies. They moved as one.
The boy looked toward the palace. "She won't stop."
The shadow's smile was razor-thin.
"Neither will we."
And the threads began to twist.