A. Dev Menon 1 The train ride from Ernakulam to Fort Kochi was slow and blurred with rain, the landscape melting into green paddy fields and red-tiled roofs beneath the gray monsoon sky. Mira Thomas sat by the window, her notebook unopened on her lap, her thoughts adrift. The smell of damp earth and old train seats mingled in the air, but it was the silence inside her that weighed most heavily. Just a week ago, she had packed up her apartment in Mumbai, returned the engagement ring to a velvet box, and walked away from a relationship that had…
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Punit Verma Chapter 1: The Scent of Silence The train to Jaipur had arrived late, and by the time Naina Kapoor reached the haveli, the sun had already begun its descent behind the sand-kissed domes. Her taxi curved through the narrow lanes of the old city, honking past cows, scooters, and spice-laden carts, before halting before a tall wrought-iron gate. Beyond it stood Rathore Haveli — ancient, quiet, and steeped in the kind of forgotten grace that makes you instinctively lower your voice. The caretaker opened the gate with a creak, and she stepped into a world of fading frescoes,…