The monsoon had trapped us all inside the old haveli for three days straight, the rain hammering the tiled roof like a thousand impatient fingers. Electricity flickered, then died completely. In the yellow glow of oil lamps, secrets that had slept for years began to stir.

I was twenty four, newly married to Arjun, the dutiful son. Everyone called his father "Sasurji"tall, silver-haired, fifty eight, moving like a leopard that already knows where the throat is. The servants still whispered that in his youth he had ruined half the village girls and silenced the rest with one look. I used to laugh at those stories. I stopped laughing the night the lights went out.