Kiran Malhotra Chapter 1: Return to the Hills Aryan Mehta stepped off the narrow mountain road and onto the familiar moss-stained path that led to St. Luke’s Academy, the colonial-era boarding school where he had spent four complicated, unforgettable years of his youth. The air in Mussoorie carried its perennial chill, tinged with the scent of damp pine needles and the metallic bite of rain-soaked stone, wrapping the hillside in a soft, relentless mist that seemed to muffle every footstep, every birdcall, every human breath. Even now, so many years later, the sight of the grand stone archway—its crest still…