✦ ⭑ I. Choosing the Field
The night they decided to rob an empire, the Map Room smelled of oil, rain, and resolve.
A storm had passed earlier.
Now, water dripped from the eaves.
Inside, Narasimha stood before the great map, fingers resting lightly on one particular road—thin, crooked, threading its way from an inland revenue office toward the coast.
Sri, Ayyappa, Raghava, Devudu, and Venkanna gathered around.
A single lamp burned low, shadows tall behind them.
Sri tapped a pin stuck into the road.
"Three times a year," she said, "the Company sends a caravan from the inland treasury at Yemmiganur to the bigger depot near Kurnool. Coin, records, ledgers, sometimes seized grain or goods."
Raghava added,
"Trinetra reports say the next one is in three nights. Larger than usual. They've squeezed fifteen villages extra-hard this cycle. The karnams say the sacks hold not just coin—records."
Long strips of paper listing:
names,
dues,
arrears,
notes like "stubborn", "troublesome", "example needed".
Narasimha's eyes narrowed.
"Fifteen villages," he repeated softly. "Fifteen throats marked for later tightening."
Ayyappa crossed his arms.
"Escort?" he asked.
"Estimate: twenty-five to thirty sepoys," Raghava replied. "One British sergeant. One Indian overseer who does the shouting. Four carts. Two bullock wagons."
Sri leaned over the table.
"If those records reach the larger depot, Madras will have neat lists," she said. "The next time someone wants to make their merit in Company eyes, they'll select targets from those lines. 'Ah, look, this village is always behind. Let us be creative.'"
Venkanna's staff tapped once on the floor.
"So," he said. "We cut the scribbles before they become nooses."
Narasimha traced a point along the road.
Here, the road dipped between two low rocky ridges, a small stream winding through scrub at one side.
A perfect place for an accident.
"A bottle neck," he murmured.
Ayyappa's eyes followed his finger.
"Good place," the commander said. "High ground both sides. Trees enough for cover. Stream to muffle sound. No nearby hamlet to see too much."
Devudu grinned.
"Also," he said, "if someone were to bury something there, or burn something, the smoke would look like just another farmer's overnight fire from afar."
Sri flicked a glance at Narasimha.
"You're really thinking about it," she said. "You understand what you're asking, yes? This isn't a bridge collapsing or a ledger going missing. This is an attack. At night. No flags. No witnesses."
He nodded once.
"Yes," he said. "This is what comes after Varaha's snout has sniffed out enough rot. We cannot always nudge. Sometimes, we must bite."
Ayyappa's gaze sharpened.
"Objectives?" he asked.
Narasimha spoke like a man reading a mantra he had already carved inside himself.
"First," he said, "we remove the tax records. Every name, every column, every neat little judgement on those fifteen villages—gone. To the Company, they become… fog."
"Second: we prevent easy retaliation. No bodies left in the dust for some other passing patrol to count and write tales about. Those who die… are honoured or burned. No spectacle."
Sri raised a brow.
"And third?" she asked.
"Third," Narasimha said quietly, "we let them blame the wrong enemy."
He looked at each of them.
"Bandits," he said. "They have that word ready in their mouths already. Let them use it."
❖ II. Naming the Operation
Later, in the inner room, only Narasimha, Ayyappa, and Sri remained.
Outside the door, the rain had stopped.
The night felt held in a palm.
"We need a name for it," Sri said. "For the records we don't keep."
She smiled thinly.
"Something poetic," she added. "You insist on making all these nightmares sound like epics anyway."
Narasimha thought of fields in moonlight.
Of harvests done quietly, sickle by sickle.
"Operation Silent Harvest," he said at last.
"The British think they have reaped," Sri said, catching on. "We… harvest back. Without shouting."
Ayyappa rolled the words on his tongue.
"Silent Harvest," he repeated. "Good. Reminds the boys this is not a parade. This is a surgery. No noise. No glory."
He looked at Narasimha.
"Who leads?" he asked.
"You do," Narasimha replied. "You and Devudu. Take two Tiger Corps squads. Shadow Mandal support. No more than twenty-five of ours in the immediate kill zone. The rest… on the edges."
Ayyappa frowned.
"And you?" he asked. "You're going to sit in your nice stone hall and chew pens?"
Narasimha smiled without humour.
"I will be there," he said. "But not in the centre."
Sri's eyes narrowed.
"You're going to watch," she realised.
"Yes," he said simply.
Ayyappa started to protest.
Narasimha cut him off with a raised hand.
"I will not interfere," he said. "I will not charge in like a fool and leave you covering for me. But this… this is our first. The first time we take more than tools. The first time we spill blood like this when we had a choice to stay quiet. As king, it is my duty to face what that looks like."
Venkanna, at the doorway, said quietly,
"He chooses to watch so that his conscience does not become a clerk's entry. Good. Let him see the mud his mandalas draw."
✢ III. The Net is Cast
Preparations moved like water in the dark.
No new men were recruited.
No unusual calls went out.
Instead:
a potter in one village finished his orders early and "decided" to travel to see relatives—taking with him a bundle that did not clink like pots;
a shepherd grazing his flock in the hills near the chosen bend lingered a bit longer, counting more rocks than goats;
a group of women carrying firewood along a side path noticed small marks on trees—barely visible scratches, aligning like a secret script.
All these were signals.
Tiger Corps men slipped into position:
pairs on each ridge's slope,
three in the dry bed of the stream,
four hidden near likely resting spots.
Shadow Mandal operatives ensured:
no drunk idiot from a nearby hamlet decided tonight was perfect to go hunting;
a certain local petty thief was "encouraged" to stay far away with the loan of some coin and the suggestion of easier pickings closer to town.
On the morning of the planned night, Narasimha rode out ostensibly to inspect canals.
By afternoon, he had taken a less obvious path into the hills.
By twilight, he sat under a thorn tree on a ridge overlooking the chosen bend.
Beside him:
Venkanna, silent as stone,
one Tiger Corps spotter, eyes sharp.
Beneath, the road lay like a waiting throat.
The sun sank.
The sky went from gold to indigo.
Stars blinked awake.
Far off, hoofbeats and wooden wheels began to murmur.
❖ IV. The Caravan
The British tax caravan came on schedule.
It always did.
The Company prided itself on its predictability.
Four bullock carts:
the first, loaded with small chests of coins, guarded closely;
the second and third, piled with sacks—grain, cloth, some seized personal items;
the last, under canvas, holding ledgers and record boxes tied with neat rope.
Around them walked two dozen sepoys, muskets on shoulders.
At the front rode an Indian overseer, Subedar Chakravarti, proud in his borrowed authority.
At the rear, a British sergeant named Collins, moustache thick, voice harsher than his courage.
"It will rain again," Collins grumbled. "We should have camped earlier."
"The sooner we reach Kurnool depot, the sooner we sleep under proper roof, sahib," Chakravarti replied, obsequious but nervous.
His eyes flickered to the darkening rocks.
They arrived at the bend just as the last light died.
The stream whispered.
Crickets tuned their legs.
"Here," Collins said. "We rest briefly. Water the animals. Ten minutes."
The caravan slowed.
Sepoys spread a little.
Some went to relieve themselves in the bushes.
Others sat on rocks, rubbing their feet.
Collins took a skin of water from a cart, drinking greedily.
To an untrained eye, it was a perfectly ordinary scene.
To Narasimha, watching from above, it looked like a table laid for someone else.
His hands tightened in his lap.
"These are men," he murmured. "Tired. Hungry. Some just following orders. Some enjoying the power too much. Some… not."
Venkanna's gaze remained on the road.
"And yet," the Guru said, "those ledgers would strangle fifteen villages. If you let them pass, you will be the rope that did not break."
Narasimha exhaled slowly.
"I know," he said.
Below, in the shadow of the rocks, Ayyappa gave the smallest nod.
Silent Harvest began.
✢ V. The First Cut
The first move was not an arrow.
It was absence.
One sepoy, stepping aside to relieve himself, never returned.
He walked behind a boulder, opened his trousers, and—
a hand clamped over his mouth.
Another chopped precisely at his neck.
He sagged, unconscious.
He was dragged into deeper shadow, bound, gagged, set aside.
Alive.
Elsewhere, a man checking a cart wheel felt something prick his ankle.
He looked down, confused, just as fingers dug into a nerve cluster in his shoulder.
Darkness took him.
Within minutes, five men were removed from the board without a sound.
Only when the number left standing had thinned subtly did the second phase begin.
In the streambed, three Tiger Corps archers crouched.
Their bowstrings had been waxed.
Their fingers knew each notch by heart.
Above them, in the rocks, others waited, blades and short clubs ready.
Ayyappa saw Collins tilt his head back to drink again.
The sergeant's throat, pale in the lamplight, glowed like a target.
"Now," Ayyappa whispered.
Arrows flew.
No roar.
Just a hiss.
Collins jerked, water spilling from his hand, shaft buried in the soft space between collarbone and heart.
He made a wet, surprised sound and toppled from his perch.
Before his body hit, more arrows sang.
They did not aim at random.
Every shaft sought:
arms reaching for muskets,
legs about to run,
shoulders turning to shout.
Sepoys fell:
some dead,some screaming,some clutching wounds.
Confusion exploded.
"Who? Where?" someone shouted.
"Bandits!" another cried, as they had been trained to think.
Chakravarti's horse danced as he tugged at the reins, eyes wild.
"Form line! Fire! FIRE!" he shrieked.
But there was no line to form.
Men had dropped where they stood.
The survivors ducked behind carts, panicked.
One fired blindly into the rocks.
The shot sparked, hitting nothing.
From the slopes, Tiger Corps men flowed downward like shadows loosening.
They did not scream.
They did not chant.
They moved in pairs:
one disarming,
one striking.
A sepoy raised his musket butt to bash a shape—
the shape wasn't there anymore.
A hand hit his elbow, his joints screamed, his weapon spun away.
A club met the side of his head.
He fell, breathing, but done.
Another tried to run.
An arrow thudded into the ground in front of him, stopping him short.
Hands seized him from behind.
Chakravarti tried to rally.
He drew his sword, swung at a figure emerging from behind a cart.
His blade met another—Devudu's, grinning even in the half-light.
"Our fathers' land says hello," Devudu said.
Chakravarti snarled.
"You think you can break the Company's—"
His words cut off as a knee drove into his gut.
He dropped, gasping, and a sharp blow at the base of his skull gave him the sleep he had earned.
In less than the time it took for a pot of rice to boil, the caravan was… quiet.
Groans replaced shouts.
Many of the Company men were dead.
Some alive but incapacitated.
None remained in any position to fight.
On the ridge, Narasimha's fingers dug into his knees.
He watched every movement.
Every fall.
Every flash of steel.
His stomach clenched.
"These are lives," he whispered. "Each an entire world to someone."
Venkanna's voice was calm.
"And what are fifteen villages?" he asked. "Fifteen times that many worlds. Weigh it. That is leadership."
Narasimha swallowed.
He did not look away.
To rule, he had decided, meant never looking away from the cost of his own commands.
❖ VI. Harvesting Shadows
When the last echo died, Ayyappa raised a hand.
"Stop," he said.
Tiger Corps men froze.
"Kill no more," he ordered. "Check. Count. Clean."
They moved among the fallen, checking pulses.
Some they finished with a swift, merciful thrust—those too badly wounded to survive and too dangerous to leave for later vengeance.
Most they had already killed or rendered harmless.
Three unconscious men—the ones taken first—were dragged into the centre.
"Leave these," Ayyappa said. "They will have… a different journey."
Sri emerged from the darkness like another shade, accompanied by two Shadow Mandal operatives.
Her eyes did not linger on the bodies.
They went straight to the last cart.
The one with the boxy shapes under canvas.
"Devudu," she called. "Our harvest."
Devudu grunted, pulling aside the tarp.
Under it lay:
wooden chests bound with rope,
bundles of tied scrolls,
two sealed, leather-wrapped ledgers with the Company seal.
"Careful," Sri said. "If they have any labels, we note before we burn."
They cracked open boxes.
By lantern light, she and the others quickly scanned:
columns of names,
rows of numbers,
notes like "resistant / recalcitrant / useful informant".
Her jaw tightened.
"So clinical," she murmured. "'Apply pressure here; they will squeal. Here; they will break.'"
She looked at Narasimha's ridge, invisible to her but felt.
"Not tonight," she said.
She nodded to the men.
"Records first," she said. "Wooden chests for ledgers—we burn here. Metal cash chests—we take what we can carry. The rest… find a river deep enough."
Within minutes, the road-side clearing changed shape.
Documents were piled in a neat stack, soaked lightly with oil.
Sri whispered,
"Fifteen villages, we free you by ink tonight. May it be enough."
A torch touched the pile.
Flames licked up, paper curling, seals melting.
The fire flared bright, then steadied, controlled.
Tiger Corps men threw on extra brush so that, from afar, it would look like any other night campfire.
Coin chests were opened.
Only some could be carried without slowing them dangerously.
A portion was taken for Narasimha's covert war fund.
Another portion, smaller, was already marked in Sri's mind to be sent back, quietly, to the villages robbed.
"What about the rest?" one man asked, eyeing the heavy boxes.
"Throw two into the stream," Sri said. "Let the fish feel rich for once. The Company will assume bandits couldn't carry it all."
✢ VII. No Bodies for History
Now came the part the men disliked.
Death was cleaner than hiding death.
But Operation Silent Harvest required that the Empire find as little as possible.
Ayyappa gathered them.
"We do not leave them for jackals," he said. "We are not cowards. We honour the dead—even enemies. But we also do not leave a tidy display for their friends."
He divided the work.
On one side of the road, where the earth was softer near the stream, a pit was dug.
Not too deep.
Just enough.
The dead were laid in:
sepoys and Collins alike,
swords and muskets placed beside them.
No looting of personal trinkets.
That too was part of code.
Devudu murmured a brief prayer.
"Go," he said, "to whatever awaits men who followed orders, wise or foolish. Your officers made you tools. Tonight, those tools broke. Sleep."
Soil rolled over cloth and flesh.
The earth received them.
On the far side, three bodies too mangled, too exposed to move easily were laid together.
Brush was piled.
Oil splashed.
The pyre was lit.
It burned fast.
To a passing patrol the next day, it would look like a bandit camp attacked by rivals or an accident.
Three unconscious men were stripped of their uniforms.
Blindfolded.
Their hands bound loosely.
When they woke, Ayyappa crouched before them.
"You're alive," he said. "Because we decided some news must travel."
Their mouths worked behind gags, eyes terrified.
He continued calmly.
"You will walk. You will find the road. You will stumble to the nearest post. You will tell them what you remember: little. You heard shouting. You felt blows. You smelt smoke. You crawled. You saw men in rags. You heard them speak like bandits. You saw no lion. You saw no zamindar."
He leaned in.
"If you mention Uyyalawada's name," he said quietly, "I will know. And one day, when you stand guard thinking yourself safe, you will feel an arrow kiss your throat. Do you understand?"
They nodded frantically.
He cut their bonds.
"Walk east," he said. "You'll hit the road by dawn. Go."
They staggered away, half-stumbling, half-running, driven by pain and fear.
One of the Tiger Corps spat.
"We let them go?" he muttered. "After what they've been doing?"
Ayyappa's eyes were hard.
"We are not here to kill for pleasure," he said. "We kill to shape the board. These three will spread the story we want. That is more useful than their blood."
He looked up at the ridge.
"Narasimha wants it this way," he added. "And he is the one who will answer to gods and ghosts in the end."
❖ VIII. "Let Them Believe That"
On the ridge, Narasimha watched the fire glow, then settle.
He watched earth cover faces.
He watched the three stumbling figures vanish toward the road.
When Ayyappa and Sri joined him, he still sat, arms draped loosely over his knees, staring at the dark bend below.
"Well?" Sri asked gently. "Do you think we have just damned ourselves? Or saved a little piece of fifteen futures?"
"Both," he said.
His voice was hoarse.
He didn't bother to hide it.
"Do you regret ordering it?" Ayyappa asked bluntly.
Narasimha thought of Sita's buffalo.
The dead boy in Uyyalapalle.
The fifteen villages' names turned into neat black lines.
He shook his head.
"No," he said. "I regret that this is a world where such choices exist. But not the choice itself."
He looked at Sri.
"The records?" he asked.
"Gone," she said. "Ash. Scattered. Those names will no longer sit on some desk in Madras like insects pinned under glass."
"And the caravan?" he pressed.
"From a distance," she replied, "it will look like an attack by opportunistic dacoits. Half-emptied chests, a burnt cart, a burial pit. Careless documentation. The three we released will talk about chaos, not discipline."
Ayyappa smirked.
"They'll swear there were fifty men where there were twenty," he said. "Fear multiplies shadows."
Narasimha's lips curved faintly.
"Let it," he said.
He rose, muscles protesting.
"What will the British write?" he asked, looking outward as if he could see all the way to Madras.
Sri answered in a clipped, mocking tone.
"'Regret to inform: tax caravan attacked by bandits in remote region. Loss: moderate funds, some records, men. Cause: growing lawlessness. Recommend increased patrols.'"
"Bandits," Ayyappa snorted. "Always bandits."
Narasimha's eyes hardened.
"Good," he said.
Ayyappa blinked.
"Good?" he echoed.
"Let them believe that," Narasimha said, voice low but firm. "Let them believe the threat is shapeless, greedy, stupid. As long as they do not see the pattern, they cannot cut its head."
He looked at the dark road again.
"We will be thunder that arrives as drizzle in their reports," he murmured. "By the time they recognise the storm, their maps will already be wrong."
✢ IX. Bandits on Paper
Days later, in Madras, ink tried to tame the event.
On the Collector-General's desk lay a new report:
"Sir, reporting attack on revenue convoy near Yemmiganur. Approx. 20–30 assailants, presumed local banditti. Casualties: 14 sepoys dead, 1 European sergeant (Collins) killed in action, 9 missing presumed dead. Funds partially lost; significant portion of tax documentation destroyed in subsequent fire, likely accidental. Survivors (3) report chaotic night-time assault, no clear leader identified. Request permission for harsher measures to discourage such depredations."
Below, in a different hand, a note:
"File under: Bandit Activity – Rayalaseema. Consider modest increase of patrols. No direct evidence linking to specific zamindar. Avoid overreaction that might provoke wider unrest."
Harwood read it, teeth grinding.
He saw what others did not.
The site description.
The precise choice of location.
The absence of bodies displayed or villagers implicated.
This was not random.
This smelled like the lion.
He approached the Collector-General.
"Sir," he said carefully, "I strongly suspect Uyyalawada Reddy in this. His region. His methods. His—"
The older man waved a hand.
"Suspect, suspect," he said. "Always you bring me suspicions. You cannot run an Empire on feelings, Captain. Show me a signed confession. A captured rebel. A banner. Until then, this is banditry. One of many such irritations."
He leaned forward.
"You must learn," he said, "that sometimes, it is politically convenient not to look too deeply. If we 'discover' a coherent rebellion, London expects expensive solutions. Forts, regiments, commissions. If we label it bandits…"
He shrugged.
"Then we send a few extra patrols and carry on."
Harwood's hands curled into fists behind his back.
"Of course, sir," he said.
Inside, he thought:
He is not a bandit. He is something else. And by the time you admit that, it will be too late.
❖ X. Heaven Takes Note of the Harvest
From the divine vantage, the road that night had been a streak of motion and intent.
Now, weeks later, its memory hung in the cosmic weave.
Lakshmi traced the pattern.
"See," she said. "One line of cruelty on paper erased. Fifteen villages breathe a little easier… for now."
Saraswati nodded slowly.
"And new karma," she said. "Some heavy, some light. Men killed who might have simply retired in boredom one day. But also, villages spared future beatings. The scales do not stay still."
Parvati looked at Narasimha, sitting in the temple later, jaw tense, eyes weary.
"He did not look away," she said.
Maheshwara's voice came, low as distant thunder.
"Destruction is sometimes necessary," he said. "The manner of it matters. Tonight, he killed function, not just flesh. He burned documents that were knives. He buried bodies with some respect. That will echo."
Vishnu's eyes were thoughtful.
"In Marvel's later days," he murmured, "when SHIELD and Hydra play games in the dark, when covert teams strike without flags, some will claim they invented 'black operations.'"
He smiled faintly.
"They should know," he went on, "that long before their helicarriers, a lion in south Bharat orchestrated an operation called Silent Harvest, where the first rules of ethical stealth war were written: no terrorising civilians, no body parades, no glory. Only… removal of a choke."
Brahma wrote:
Operation Silent Harvest – successful interception of inland tax caravan. Casualties contained to combatants. Tax records for 15 villages destroyed. British administration attributes to generic "bandits", failing to identify central organiser. U.N.R. continues to walk tight moral line between necessary violence and restraint. Long-term consequence: increased local faith in his unseen protection; incremental erosion of Company efficiency.
✵ XI. Ashes and Seeds
Back in Uyyalawada, Narasimha sat once more with his council.
Sri laid out new, blank palm-leaves.
"What we erased," she said, "we must now replace with something. Not on their desks—on ours."
She wrote in clean script:
"Silent Harvest – villages: Uyyalapalle, Devuni Kunta, Chinna Konda…"
Fifteen names.
"Next few months," she said, "these villages get priority. Extra seed. Quiet coin. Tiger Corps patrols nearby. If the British try to probe them from another direction, we will know."
Raghava added,
"And we must prepare for new tactics. They will start chaining caravans. Mixing records. Using more Indian intermediaries to make us hesitate."
Ayyappa cracked his knuckles.
"Let them," he said. "We will adapt. Today it was one convoy. Tomorrow, maybe, a courthouse. Or a prison wagon."
Narasimha listened.
His mind was already ahead.
He saw:
this ambush as first note,
future strikes as variations,
all building toward a crescendo he could not yet fully hear.
He was tired.
He was also fiercely, quietly alive.
At last, he spoke.
"Tonight," he said, "we took fifteen knives away from their table. That does not end hunger. But it stops some throats being cut."
He looked around at those who had become more than councillors:
co-conspirators in a war of ink and steel.
"Remember," he said, "this was a beginning, not a victory. The British will learn. They will harden. So must we. Not our hearts—our resolve, our care."
Sri smiled crookedly.
"Ever the troublesome king," she said. "Even when we pull off a perfect operation, you refuse to celebrate."
He sighed theatrically.
"I will celebrate when I can go one full week without hearing the word 'tax'," he said. "Until then, if I smile too widely, some god will be offended and send more paperwork."
They laughed, the tension easing.
Later, alone in his chamber, he sat by a single lamp.
The flame danced.
He watched it, thinking of another fire devouring ledgers on a lonely road.
He whispered, to no one and to everything,
"We harvested in silence tonight. May the next harvest be grain instead of blood."
Outside, somewhere in the hills, a Tiger Corps patrol moved, unseen.
On the sea, a Samudra Sangha ship shifted its cargo list to hide a few extra gun barrels.
In Madras, a clerk stamped "Bandit Activity" on a file and pushed it to the side.
And far overhead, cosmic watchers noted that the Deathless Lion had taken one more step from preparation into open, if hidden, warfare.
The sparks in the night had turned,
subtly,
into a pattern of silent flames.
The storm was no longer coming.
It had begun.
✦ End of Chapter 32 – "Operation Silent Harvest" ✦