The horizon burned crimson as dawn broke, painting the skies above Ahmednagar with the color of blood. The fort stood tall, its granite walls scarred from endless cannon fire, its ramparts littered with the debris of war. Inside, silence reigned—not the silence of peace, but the silence of tension, of anticipation, of lives stretched thin between survival and death.
Chand Bibi walked the corridors of the fort like a shadow. Her armor gleamed faintly under the dim torches, but her eyes—sharp, storm-like—carried the weight of every fallen soldier, every starving child, every anxious whisper of the people who looked up to her. The walls themselves seemed to pulse with her will, as though the fortress breathed because she commanded it to.
That morning, the Mughal encampments stirred with new activity. Scouts reported massive reinforcements arriving, their banners like a forest of fire-colored cloth, their drums beating like war-thunder. The siege had grown tighter, the noose constricting. No messages could enter, no supplies could leave. The Mughal emperor's generals were determined: Ahmednagar would fall, and with it, the last bastion of defiance in the Deccan.
But within those walls, Chand Bibi planned.
In the war council chamber, dimly lit and perfumed with the smoke of incense to mask the stench of fatigue, her commanders waited. Faces gaunt, eyes sunken, they leaned over the war maps carved with trenches, troop placements, and weak points.
"The Mughal reinforcements have doubled their lines," one commander muttered. "We cannot break through. Our men are weary, our stores low. If this continues…" His words faltered.
Chand Bibi's gaze was fire. "If this continues, then Ahmednagar will endure. Not a stone of these walls will fall without blood to defend it. Do not speak of breaking. Speak only of fighting."
Her voice carried like a blade. The men straightened, their despair forced back by the force of her conviction. Yet deep down, each of them knew the odds. It was not courage they lacked—it was time.
That night, the fort was alive with whispers. Chand Bibi moved quietly through the barracks, speaking to the soldiers herself. She stopped at one young guard, no older than seventeen, his hands trembling around his spear.
"You fear death?" she asked him softly.
He looked at her with wide, hollow eyes. "No, my queen. I fear failing you."
She placed a gauntleted hand on his shoulder. "Then you will not fail. Tonight, every man, every woman in these walls is my shield. Together, we are unbreakable."
The boy nodded, a tear slipping down his cheek. He straightened, his trembling subsiding.
And so she moved from soldier to soldier, pouring her fire into their hearts, giving them something the enemy could not take—hope forged from her own iron will.
But hope, like fire, attracts shadows.
As Chand Bibi returned to her chambers, she sensed it again—that chilling presence, the invisible watcher who haunted her nights. For weeks she had felt eyes upon her, not from the Mughal camps but within the walls themselves. Betrayal festered in Ahmednagar. Somewhere among her own, treachery slithered like a viper.
On her desk lay a parchment, folded neatly. She had not left it there. Slowly, she unrolled it.
Scrawled in hurried hand were the words:
"The enemy is not outside the walls. The dagger waits within."
Her heart stilled. She burned the note at once, its ashes scattering like black snow. Yet the warning echoed inside her mind. Who among her men was loyal? Who waited for the moment to plunge steel into her back and fling open the gates to the Mughals?
The next day, thunder rolled—not from the heavens, but from Mughal cannons. The bombardment began at dawn and did not cease until the stars bled across the sky. Stones shook loose from the fort's walls, dust filled the air, children wailed, and still Chand Bibi stood tall upon the battlements, refusing to bow.
But as she surveyed the fields beyond, her eyes narrowed. A signal fire burned in the enemy camp, one of unusual pattern. Not a call to arms. A message. A message meant for someone within Ahmednagar.
Her suspicions sharpened. Somewhere inside her fortress, a traitor signaled to the Mughals. The viper had shown its tail.
That evening, she gathered her closest guards, hand-picked men and women whose loyalty had been proven through blood.
"There is a traitor among us," she told them, her voice like the storm over the battlefield. "One who whispers to the Mughals, one who feeds them our lifeblood while we bleed. I will not sleep until that viper is found."
Her guards swore their lives to the task, shadows fanning through the fort like silent hunters.
Yet even as she gave the order, Chand Bibi knew the danger. The viper was cunning. The viper was patient. And the viper wanted her dead.
That night, as torches flickered low, Chand Bibi sat alone by her window, gazing at the siege fires circling the fort like a ring of hell. Her hand tightened on the hilt of her sword, the steel catching the faint light.
She whispered into the night:
"Come for me, if you dare. I am waiting."
And outside, in the darkness of Ahmednagar's winding corridors, unseen footsteps moved closer.
The dagger had begun its crawl toward her heart.
✨ End of Chapter Ten ✨