The wind howled through the mandap, carrying the haunting melody of Varun's snake flute. Dust and petals swirled in the golden light, wrapping the space in an otherworldly glow.
Above them, a figure floated, moving with a serpentine grace that seemed almost unnatural. Her body twisted and turned, every motion flowing seamlessly into the next, as though she were part of the wind itself. The family watched, tense, hearts caught between awe and fear.
Her hands arched and curved in intricate patterns, tracing the invisible paths of some ancient ritual. The golden light reflected off her movements, casting dancing shadows across the marble floor.
The notes of the flute rose, and so did the figure, spiraling slowly, her presence commanding the very air around her. The family could barely breathe as the energy in the mandap thickened, charged with something both divine and dangerous.
Then, ever so slowly, she brought her hands to her face, pulling a veil away. Time seemed to stretch, every heartbeat echoing in the silence.
And as the last shadow of fabric fell, the mandap froze in stunned disbelief.
Kiara's lips parted, her breath caught in her throat. Vikram's eyes widened, disbelief etched across his face. Varun's fingers lingered mid-note on the flute, unmoving, his gaze locked. Yuvaan's eyes narrowed, searching, trying to comprehend.
The Pratap Singh family—Vinod, Chandrika, Aakash, Susheela, Riddhi, and Angad—stood frozen, all of them caught in a single, shared moment of shock.
The figure before them, radiant and formidable, was unmistakable.
It was Kajal.
The wind calmed just enough for Kiara to find her voice.
She took a step forward, her eyes wide, disbelief trembling across her face.
"Mom… it's… it's you," Kiara whispered. "You… you're a serpent?"
Kajal's golden eyes shimmered, and slowly — deliberately — her lower body shifted.
Her legs dissolved into shimmering scales, her form lengthening, coiling, transforming until the truth stood unmistakable before them:
A woman above the waist.
A golden serpent below.
Majestic… deadly.
Her voice rang out, steady and proud.
"I am Swarnnaagin," Kajal declared. "The Golden Serpent of Naagalok."
A stunned silence fell.
Vikram staggered a step back, his breath stolen.
"My… wife?" he whispered. "You… you're a Naagin?"
His world seemed to tilt, shock burying itself deep into his expression.
Before anyone could speak again, Yuvaan stepped forward, exhaling sharply.
"That's fine," he said, trying to hold onto some logic. "But… why were you attacking me? I'm your son-in-law."
Kajal's expression hardened instantly.
"You are not my son-in-law," she hissed, her voice low and venomous.
Her serpentine coils tightened, anger radiating from every scale as old pain flickered across her face.
"You are the murderous King of Kaalvansh. Kaal. A monster who destroyed everything I loved."
Her eyes burned gold, shimmering with fury and grief.
"I want revenge for what I lost because of you."
The mandap fell into a suffocating silence…
and the wedding that was meant to unite two families now stood at the edge of a devastating revelation.
Vikram stepped forward as if the ground beneath him had turned to glass. One wrong breath and everything would shatter. His eyes did not blink, did not stray, did not soften. They stayed fixed on Kajal… on the woman he had known all his life… and yet in this moment, could not recognise.
"Kajal… what is happening to you…?" His voice cracked like an old door. "Yuvaan may have been Kaal once, in a life long gone… but this life… he is Yuvaan. The boy who loves our daughter more than anything in this world."
The woman before him did not flinch. Her serpent eyes gleamed with a fury that seemed carved from fire itself.
"Lies," she breathed, the word sharp enough to cut. "You are blind, Vikram. He cannot love. He can only destroy. Wherever he walks, ruin follows like a shadow that has forgotten how to leave."
Yuvaan's shoulders lowered under the weight of her words. He did not defend himself with anger, only with a quiet ache that trembled through the air.
"I know what I did as Kaal," he whispered. "I know the horrors. I know the blood. I know the darkness. I will never wash those sins away. But in this life… love has been my only redemption."
Kajal laughed.
A sound so cold, so hollow, it felt as if the chandeliers themselves dimmed in response.
"Redemption?" she repeated, amused and disgusted all at once. "You… redeemed?"
Her golden tail curled across the marble floor, every movement slow and serpentine.
"You carry too many sins for redemption. And the only redemption that could ever belong to you… is death."
She moved toward him with an unhurried grace, every inch of her gliding with lethal calm.
Kiara broke first.
She rushed forward so fast her bangles clattered together, her tears spilling before she even realized she was crying.
"Please," she begged. "Mom… please stop. Don't do this. I'm begging you."
Kajal's gaze slid toward her daughter, and for a second her expression twisted — not softer, but deeper, older, carved with old sorrow.
"You plead for him?" Her voice trembled with the ache of years she had never spoken aloud. "You plead for the one who snatched the most precious thing from us?"
Varun turned pale.
"Snatched… what did Yuvaan snatch?"
Kajal's head turned toward him, slowly, painfully, as though the past was dragging her by the neck.
What lived in her eyes was not anger now.
It was tragedy.
Raw. Naked. Bleeding.
"Because of him," she whispered, "I lost my unborn child."
The world stopped.
Silence fell like a blow.
Kiara stumbled backward, her hand flying to her mouth, her eyes drowning in tears.
Vikram's knees threatened to give out, his hand clutching his chest as if the truth itself had struck him.
The family stood frozen, breaths held, eyes wide, unable to move.
Even Yuvaan staggered a step, not with denial, but with a guilt he had never known he carried.
Vikram's voice came out in pieces.
"Unborn… child…?"
Kajal closed her eyes, and grief washed over her face like a shadow that had waited fifteen years to be seen.
"Yes," she breathed. "Fifteen years ago. That picnic… I was going to tell you. I was pregnant. Barely a month. So small… so fragile… but ours."
Her voice broke.
"But Taamsi and her daayans attacked us. They wanted Jishwa's identity. They feared her power… feared she would rival him… Yuvaan… Kaal… whatever monster he once was."
She took a trembling breath.
"And while they dragged me into that ditch… I lost my child."
Kiara collapsed into silent sobs.
Yuvaan's eyes shut tightly, his heart folding in on itself.
Guilt he could not even remember earning now buried him alive.
The air grew heavy… suffocating… the walls themselves mourning.
Kajal lifted her gaze again, but this time her expression was carved from steel.
"I woke up days later, injured, half-conscious, washed up on a lonely shore. Someone from Naaglok found me. They healed me. They turned me into what I am today. Swarnnaagin."
She straightened, her golden aura burning brighter.
"And from that moment… only one purpose lived inside me."
Her eyes, glowing with vengeance, locked onto Yuvaan.
"To kill you."