Long ago, in a kingdom now lost under ruins and silence, there lived a girl named Nandhini. She was not like other girls—she had magic in her hands and dreams in her eyes. She could make people laugh with her illusions, dance with her tricks, and forget their sorrows for a while. People of Varnapur would gather just to watch her light up the air with colours and wonder.
But behind the smile she wore for the world, Nandhini carried sorrow in her heart. She had no family, no one—except for her grandmother, an old woman with shaking hands and fading breath. Nandhini cared for her like a mother would care for her child. They were all each other had.
Everything changed the day Prince Karna saw her.
He didn't care for magic. He didn't clap for her shows or ask how she did her tricks. But he looked at her—really looked at her. What caught him was not the illusion, but the girl behind it. Her face, her quiet dignity, her presence that stayed in his mind like a prayer.
Soon, he spoke to her. And before long, people whispered—the prince is in love. Nandhini didn't know if it was love. But when her grandmother passed away in the night, and she was left truly alone in the world, Karna came to her—not with comfort, but with a marriage proposal.
She said yes. Maybe out of hope. Maybe out of emptiness.
For Nandhini, it was the start of a new chapter, one filled with hope. But as the days passed, hope turned into something darker.
Karna was not like his father. King Varma, though strict, was known for his fairness. He ruled Varnapur with wisdom and a sense of balance. But Karna... Karna had a fire in him that refused to be satisfied. Varnapur was not enough for him. His eyes looked far beyond the kingdom's borders—he wanted more. He wanted the world.
As his ambition grew, so did the darkness in his heart. He started seeing enemies where there were none. He trusted no one. Not his ministers, not his soldiers—not even his wife.
Nandhini saw it all. She saw how the man she once loved was slowly being eaten from within. She spoke to him, pleaded with him. But her voice was no longer music to his ears. It became noise. His silence turned to anger. His love became distance. Every time they sat together, it felt like sitting across a stranger.
One night, unable to hold it in any longer, she asked him, "Karna, what has become of you? You are not the man I married."
For a moment, he seemed to soften. He told her lies—convincing, well-crafted lies about the king being an obstacle to their future. Nandhini, blinded by love, believed him.
And then she said it. The words he wanted—no, needed—to hear.
"Kill the King... Kill the King."
But the palace was old. Its walls held secrets. And some walls could speak.
King Varma heard everything.
The confrontation was sudden and terrible. The king, wrapped in royal fury, stood before them like a storm. His voice shook the pillars. "Have you lost your mind, boy? You would raise a sword against your own blood?"
Karna, too far gone to return, lunged. His sword aimed for the man who gave him life.
But the king was ready. The old lion still had claws. The prince's blade was deflected, his body thrown to the floor. The prince's attempt at murder failed.
For their treachery, both Karna and Nandhini were banished.
The forest of Varnapur was no place for the faint-hearted. The trees stood tall like ancient watchers, their twisted branches scratching at the sky—now burning red under a cursed moon. A wind blew, slow and cold, carrying with it whispers that did not belong to any living thing.
This was the jungle the villagers feared. They called it Raakshak Vanam—the Forest of the Demon.
Here, banished and broken, Karna and Nandhini walked in silence. Neither dared to speak. Their footsteps crunched on dead leaves. Their hearts were heavier than their footsteps—filled with shame, anger, and something darker.
Then—a sound. Not loud, but wrong.
A rustle. A growl. A presence.
From between two massive roots, it crept out. A creature of nightmares—neither bat nor bird, its body twisted like it was shaped by a mad god. Skin stretched wrong, wings where there should be arms, and eyes glowing like burning coal. It was made of shadow and rage.
And it was hungry.
The beast lunged.
Karna roared, fighting with nothing but brute force. His fists met claws. His blade clanged against bone. Nandhini, trembling, raised her hands—and her old magic came to life. Flames shot out from her fingers, lighting up the forest and showing the creature for what it was: an abomination, made of curse and blood.
Together, they brought it down. Karna struck the killing blow. The beast screamed, its voice like shattering glass, and fell silent.
But victory came at a price.
Karna staggered, breathing heavily. He looked down at his arm—bitten deep, bone showing through torn flesh.
Nandhini ran to him. "Karna? Karna!"
But he said nothing.
Before her very eyes, his skin began to shrivel. His face—once proud—turned pale and sunken. His muscles wasted away. His eyes rolled back.
And then, there was nothing. No blood. No breath.
Only a skeleton, wrapped in royal cloth, collapsed on the forest floor.
Nandhini fell to her knees. Her scream echoed through the jungle. It rang through tree trunks. It reached the rivers. It reached the skies.
But Karna was gone.
With tears falling like rain down her face, Nandhini carried the bones of her husband through the dead streets of Varnapur. The wind had turned cruel. The sky hung low and heavy, as if the gods themselves were watching.
She pushed open the doors of the royal court—once a place of music and silk, now a pit of silence. Her footsteps echoed through the grand marble halls. Courtiers turned, gasping. Soldiers reached for their weapons.
But Nandhini didn't care.
She walked straight up to the throne and dropped the bundle of bones onto the polished floor.
"Look at what you've done!" she cried, her voice raw. "This is your son! This is what your hatred has made!"
The bones clattered.
King Varma, sitting high on his gilded throne, didn't move. His eyes were hard. His mouth curled into disgust.
"You bewitched him," he said coldly. "You filled his ears with poison. You turned him against his own blood. Witch."
Nandhini stepped forward. "No!" she screamed. "I loved him! I only ever stood by him. I wanted what he wanted. That was my sin."
The king's eyes turned darker than night.
"Then you will suffer for it."
She dropped to her knees, her hands shaking. "Please…" she whispered. "At least let me bury him. Give him a resting place. Let me leave. Let me go."
But mercy was dead in the heart of the king.
With a wave of his hand, guards surrounded her.
"Chain her. Parade her through the streets. Let the people see what becomes of traitors. Let them spit on her like she spat on my crown."
The iron shackles closed around her wrists. The courtiers turned away. No one spoke for her. No one moved.
And as she was dragged from the court, Nandhini looked back one last time.
Her husband's bones still lay on the floor, alone, uncared for.
Bound in heavy chains, Nandhini was dragged through the dirt-stained streets of Varnapur. The same streets where once children laughed at her tricks, where flowers had been thrown at her feet, now echoed with hatred.
The people, the same ones who had once cheered her name, now spat it like poison.
"Witch!"
"Traitor!"
"May your soul never find peace!"
Stones flew. Mud was hurled. Hands that once clapped now pointed with scorn. Her feet bled. Her shoulders sagged. Her cries of pain turned into sobs. And slowly… the sobs faded into silence.
Then, just as her body was ready to fall, she lifted her head.
Her voice was low—like a whisper rising from the grave.
But with each word, her voice grew. Grew louder. Grew sharper. Until it shook the walls of Varnapur itself.
"I curse this land!" she screamed.
The crowd fell silent.
"Let no girl in this kingdom see her fifteenth year! Let every daughter suffer as I have suffered—betrayed, broken, alone! May your joy turn to ashes! May your bloodlines dry like the wells in your deserts! Let this kingdom rot into dust and silence!"
The wind stopped. The sky turned still. Even the king, watching from his balcony, felt a shiver crawl up his spine.
Then—Nandhini fell.
Her body collapsed into the mud, silent and still. No one came forward. No one touched her.
And there she lay, forgotten.
But her words… her words did not die.
Her lifeless body was left to rot, just like Karna's.
The very next morning, the curse began.
A fifteen-year-old girl in Varnapur was found dead in her bed—no wounds, no illness. Just gone.
Before the people could understand what had happened, another girl died. Then another. In their homes. In their sleep. All of them on the edge of turning fifteen.
Panic gripped the kingdom.
The people cried out. Mothers wept. Fathers begged the heavens.
King Varma, shaken to his bones, did everything he could. He summoned priests. He brought sages from distant lands. Snake charmers, tantriks, scholars—anyone who claimed to know magic. They chanted. They burned incense. They sacrificed goats and gold.
But nothing worked.
Year after year, the curse claimed its due. The people tried to escape it. Many fled Varnapur, taking their families across rivers and deserts. But even there, the curse followed. The girls still died.
And so, the kingdom began to rot.
Houses were left empty. Temples crumbled. The market became silent. Varnapur, once filled with colour and song, became a land of whispers and ghosts.
Soon, no one remained.
Only ruins. Only ash. Only silence.
And yet, even today, they say—when the blood moon rises in the sky, Nandhini's spirit walks among the broken walls of the palace. Her anklets do not ring. Her eyes are hollow. But her voice... her voice is still loud.
It echoes through the trees like a curse that refuses to die:
"Kill the King… Kill the King…"