1A/N: Title means "intimacy" in Hindi. Set during the brief instrumental reprise of Jashn E Bahara, when Jodhaa is helping Jalal recover.
He is sleeping when she comes into the room, or at least pretending to be.
She does not come to see him in the daytime, only at night. His mother says she is upset, though she will not (or cannot?) elaborate further, and no one else in the Red Fort will give him a straight answer. He does not know why she refuses to see him when he is awake, and he has too little energy to expend trying to figure out why. Or rather, he is afraid to search deeper. He keeps the matter from his mind as best as he can, and concentrates on recovering.
He is dozing lightly, in the middle of the afternoon, when he hears the telltale tinkling of her tiptoeing into his chamber. He keeps his eyes closed, as she moves through the room, until she is standing by his bed, right over him. He imagines her gazing down upon him, but cannot imagine the expression splashed upon her countenance. Indifference? Joy? Grief? Disappointment? Dare he hope, love? Then-
A feather-light touch upon his brow. Only a lifetime of iron self-discipline keeps him from flinching or giving himself away, even though he is recovering from an arrow to the heart and still drowsy from a half-hearted nap. He focuses on staying still, on not leaning into that soft, cool touch, on keeping his breathing steady.
She is shy, almost hesitant, but soon gathers courage. She passes over his forehead, strokes his forearm through the chaddar (part of him wishes the maid hadn't tucked it all the way up, that he had had the foresight to leave it down just a handspan or so).
Then, as though she is becoming bolder, she cards her hand through his hair. Her fingers brush against his scalp and he fancies she trails stardust in their wakes. The connection is sustained for a few moments, in which they both hold their breaths Then she moves her hand back, and she flees the room, her jewelry clinking more anxiously than usual.
He wonders if her fingers burn from the caress and will continue to do so later, just as his skin would burn for hours afterwards the few brief times he had allowed himself to touch her.
In the past week, he has been subject to all manner of herbs, balms, and remedies; yet in this moment, he feels he needs nothing more than the brush of her restorative touch to be in fine fettle once more.
It is late night or early morning when next he awakens with a start, and barely bites back a groan, though no one is there to witness his weakness. Strange, how his right side aches, when the wound is on his left side…
He shifts, and something presses into his right side. He twists his head painfully, and the sight nearly takes his breath away.
Jodhaa lays beside him, pressed into him.
The way she is positioned, forehead pressing uncomfortably into his shoulder, almost facedown on the bed, suggests she drifted off while holding her nightly vigil, rather than out of any conscious decision.
But still.
His wife is sleeping next to him. In the same bed as him.
No separation this time, of a veil and her simmering rage. She is there, soft snores escaping her, curled up next to him, so close that he can feel her warmth and the gentle rise and fall of her breathing.
He is lying in bed with his wife right next to him.
He shifts and turns onto his right shoulder, his good side, so that he is gazing down at her. He moves, almost automatically, to sweep the tangled hair from her face, and it is not the ensuing pain but the memory of his vow that stays his hand.
He hesitates, hand awkwardly poised in midair, shoulder screaming. Then with a rough, sharp exhale, he withdraws it and lays down firmly on his back, clenching his hands into fists at his side. A murky darkness seems to press itself upon his eyes suddenly, irrelevant of the dim candlelight in the chamber.
Shaking off the sudden shadow upon his sight, he inches painfully, lingeringly to his right until her head is settled upon his shoulder. He cannot tell from this angle what expression is upon her face, but her breathing remains steady and slow.
She shifts suddenly, and every muscle in his body tenses.
She sighs, long and deeply, and then it is as though she is curling into him. Her head moves from shoulder to chest, and one arm drapes over the length of his body.
He remains still for a heartbeat, two, ten, twenty.
Slowly, achingly, he allows his muscles to relax, permits himself to nuzzle the top of her head with his chin, grants his body the luxury of shifting ever so slightly back into her. His eyes drift shut, while his other senses remain acutely aware of how right her presence feels, how keen the yearning is for there to be more between them, how good it feels to have her nestled into his side as she slumbers on- until sleep claims him too.
