A Short Story by Baby Shaw

The Blue- Eyed Silence

 

To become a writer, all he really needed were a few simple things— a lined notebook, a pencil that wouldn’t fade, and a sharp cutter. And of course, there was that wide, moonlit field and a half-dried canal. There were acacia trees, pigeon pea fields, and patches of kheri, a humble crop that the landlords never bothered to take away. The upper-caste people thought kheri was too lowly to eat. Even the name sounded so poor that people doubted it could be food at all. But for them, it was a blessing easy to grow, filling, and theirs alone. They planted kheri on the high ridges of their land. It didn’t need much care; the plants grew on their own. No one noticed, and they could quietly store sackfuls of it at home.

This little village didn’t have much trouble or need. A thousand stories could be written right there. But one day, the writer began to feel that beyond this calm, quiet land there must be another world full of stories. Stories from the roads, stories from the blaring horns of cars, stories of women being burned or made to disappear. He had heard such stories dark, strange, terrifying ones. Yet he wished those stories could be like the color of the sky, or flow like rivers, or dance like the wind. He had heard that stories hide in the dust of the road, in the rustle of leaves, in the murmur of rivers, and in the whispers of unknown women. Stories are born, and stories fade... he knew that well. So he wanted to step out, to see both the world of stories and the world beyond them.

He had spent many years caught between two minds. The village wouldn’t let him go. It tempted him sometimes with the promise of being king, sometimes with the charm of beautiful women. Once, it even told him that Marang Buru himself had sent him to reform the customs of the village that he should become the Dehuri, the head priest!

But still, he didn’t want to write lost stories. Not anymore. So one night, staring up at the North Star, he decided to leave. No one had ever left the village before not even him. When word got out, it spread fast. Some people were shocked, some afraid. And those who didn’t like him thought, “Good riddance! But may he never come back!” Only one girl quietly wiped her tears and asked,

“Why are you leaving?” 

“I need to write those stories.” 

“I can give you stories! Every day! New ones!” 

“But you’ve never even left the village. How could you?” 

“I learned them from my grandfather.” 

“His eyes saw differently. I’m looking for something else.”

There was also Old Mother that’s what everyone called her, even the writer. Her hair was white as snow, her skin loose and wrinkled, her eyes yellowish and tired. No one knew her age; they only said even the oldest trees and stones hadn’t lived as long. Yet Old Mother herself was so simple, so mysterious, that she could easily be the subject of a story only no one had ever tried to tell it. The writer had tried a few times, but failed. Sometimes things look clearer from far away, but up close, they blur. The same thought came to him again.

It was spring. Between the falling of old leaves and the birth of new ones, life and death seemed to play their secret game. The young men and women of the village were caught up in the mystery of Phagun, the season of color, bloom, and desire.

Once, they had come to the writer to talk about birth and death. They believed that whatever he wrote would one day come true it had to. So they told him their stories of love, how everything turns dreamlike when one falls in love, how the mind floats in a soft haze of feeling. They even confessed, without shame or hesitation, the details of their first moments of union. Listening to them, the writer suddenly remembered the girl whose eyes would glisten whenever she looked at him.

Still, they knew

“Love’s traps are spread everywhere.”

Yet they believed their story would begin one day with their own hands. Between past and future, they entered a strange, glowing present. Every tree, every bird, every bit of dust in the village even the mornings and evenings seemed to write a new story each day, only to toss it into the dry canal before dawn. The canal, on receiving those stories, would swell with joy its two banks overflowing, full of water, small fish, big fish, even crocodiles. And as the little fish died, the canal would dry again. Then new stories. New dryness.

For the writer, these cycles had become so ordinary that he didn’t even want to waste his pencil or his precious sheets of paper writing them down.

One day he went to Old Mother. 

“I have to go beyond the village,” he said. 

“Why? The Blue-Eyed Woman lives out there! She’ll devour you…” 

“I’m going to her,” he replied. “Stop scaring me. Instead, teach me—how to tame her.” 

Old Mother smiled faintly. 

“There’s only one spell—love. Pure, selfless love.” 

Then she added softly, 

“Women believe only in love—that’s their one truth.”

The Blue-Eyed Woman, he had heard about her since childhood. A story told and retold of a woman beautiful, fearless, and free. So when Old Mother mentioned her, he wasn’t surprised. But hearing the word love after so many years made him shiver slightly, as if something ancient inside him had stirred.

Leaving the village, the dry canal, the dense acacia groves, the fields of pigeon pea, the writer stepped into the open world.

Beyond the village, he came to a place that was neither village nor city, a vast open ground. In one corner lay a spread-out rug, and around it sat fifteen or twenty people, young and old, all holding notebooks and pencils, each trying to write their own story. In the middle sat an old writer, thick glasses on his nose, half-asleep.

When they saw him, everyone straightened up, trying to draw him into their groups. But the writer knew these stories well, the tales of division and belonging, the old games of sides and factions. So he stood a little apart and looked at the dozing, bespectacled man with curious eyes. 

“I’m looking for the Blue-Eyed Woman,” he said quietly.

The others froze. Every writer there knew, more or less, about her. In their myths and manuscripts, she appeared again and again... part of the eternal order, the ancient culture. Society had built her image stone by stone. And now, to knowingly seek her out,  to face her, was as good as surrendering one’s life.

They began whispering among themselves and slowly drifted away.

The writer stood alone for a moment. Then an empty bottle rolled toward his feet. Following the path it came from, he saw the others laughing. One of them called out, 

“Do you know? She survives by eating human hearts!” 

The writer nodded. 

“I’ve heard that story too—since I was a child. My grandmothers told it to me. Just tell me—which way does she live?”

He looked at the drowsy old writer with the thick glasses and asked softly, 

“Do you know where she is?”

The old man slowly raised his trembling hands and handed over a yellowed newspaper clipping. The headline read—

“Young Girl Burned Alive—Accused of Being a Witch.”

—“Is this what you’re looking for?” 

—“Is she... the one?” 

—“Maybe. Maybe not,” the old man murmured. “When I was young, I too went looking for the Blue-Eyed Woman. My mentor—a great writer himself—gave me this clipping. He said I had the makings of a true writer. That my gift would become real only if I could write this girl’s story the right way.” 

“But…?” 

“I tried,” he sighed. “But I was in a hurry—chasing the easy path, the recognition, the government prize. I failed. I wanted to return the paper, but my mentor said, ‘Keep it. Someday, someone else will come.’”

The younger writer hesitated. 

“Can women really be that cruel? Witches, demons—are those things real?” 

“Writers create stories,” the old man said wearily. “They make truth and falsehood at the king’s command... And... And... Oh! No... Uff! Now go. I’m sleepy.”

The younger writer realized it was time to leave. He stepped out onto the main road and saw a girl in a pink ghagra walking a tightrope, her hips swaying gracefully in mid-air. Below her, the ground was littered with coins and business—noise, barter, life. The rope itself floated, shimmering in the sunlight.

Then she looked down—straight at him. Her eyes—vast, blue as the open sky, bright with sunlight. In that instant, the rope quivered. The air trembled.

A dark-skinned man holding the balancing pole shouted, 

“Lachhman!......"

A boy rushed forward and before the writer could even move slashed off the girl’s ears, her nose, her heart. The white gerbera in her hair turned blood red.

Reporters came running, cameras flashing. They turned her into a story, into a headline, into a viral post. Lachhman threw a contemptuous glance at the writer before walking off to give his interview.

The writer stood frozen. He had never seen anything like this in his quiet village. It took him time to steady himself. He went to a roadside tap, splashed his face with cold water, and tried to breathe. When he looked up, a pack of dogs was watching him barking and laughing.

He knew dogs were supposed to be loyal, faithful. So he said nothing and began to move away. But the leader of the pack stepped forward and spoke, 

“No one trusts Blue-Eyed Women here. We don’t let them be. She has a job. Walks home alone at night. No fear, no shame. Imagine! If women start flying free, how will society survive? And what kind of men would that make us?” 

Another dog growled, 

“Walking around without a veil... such shamelessness!”

The writer had no arguments left. He only wanted one thing all his life—to meet the Blue-Eyed Woman once, to talk for a while, and to find one true story that would make him immortal.

He walked. And walked.

Years passed. His knees weakened, his hair thinned, his glasses grew thick. In his old satchel, the newspaper clipping still remained—along with others he had collected. One photo showed a naked street, crowded with eyes—and a naked girl walking through them, her body striped with lashes of blood. The writer zoomed in again and again but couldn’t find the fangs the stories had promised. How, then, could she have torn out a child’s throat and drunk its blood?

Wrong...

he thought.

All wrong...

A thousand questions buzzed in his mind, unanswered, relentless. He was bent now, frail but the dream of writing one great story still burned quietly inside him.

He began walking again, down a lonely path. Fallen leaves rustled beneath his feet. The few remaining Shal trees in the dying forest shivered at his steps. Among the wild shrubs, Putus flowers, white and pink, whispered softly to him. Everyone knew him now as the seer, not just a writer. Even the trees and flowers believed that those who see deeply are touched by mercy.

One Putus raised its tiny stem and said, 

“Over there.”

The writer followed its gesture—toward the dead canal beyond the forest. 

“There?” he asked, his eyes gleaming.

After all these years, he thought he had finally found her. Even in his old age, a fierce youthfulness flooded his veins. He quickened his pace.

Ahead was a massive fire pit. The forest, the dry river, the erased borders of history—all were burning together: plastic, polythene, insects, men, memories, extinct species. The quiet dark was filled with a blinding, trembling light. The air smelled of holy fire and ash.

Hundreds of priests stood chanting, 

“Om Swaha! Om Swaha!”

The sacred flames devoured everything in their path.

And as the writer stood staring into the blaze, he forgot everything else.

The yellow glow of the fire stirred a strange tenderness in his heart. Within that ache, he saw the village headman sitting on one side of the blazing flames, surrounded by his pack of loyal dogs. Seeing the writer, they pushed a brick toward him as a seat. Another brought him a freshly brewed glass of *mahua* liquor. His throat was dry; he poured two drops onto the thirsty earth in offering and then finished the rest in a single gulp. The drink coursed through him like liquid fire, he suddenly felt younger, almost alive again.

Just then, a baby’s cry pierced the heavy air. Faint, yet sharp. The writer rubbed his eyes and saw a girl dressed entirely in black from head to toe. Like a goat brought for sacrifice at the shrine of Kalimui. The chants grew louder, stronger. The fire roared higher.

A wooden chair was brought forward. The baby, tied to the girl’s lap, was slowly lowered into the flames. The fire leapt greedily upward. The chants thundered. The girl’s veil slipped from her face her eyes were blue, burning, wrinkled with pain, unable to scream because her mouth was gagged.

After a few moments, they lifted the baby’s small, charred body out of the fire. Alongside came another glass of mahua liquor.

“The whore was getting too bold! Love, huh? A virgin mother! Bitch! Done for now! Ha ha…” 

“They’re a stain on society! A man will reach out, sure—but a bastard child? That we cannot tolerate!” 

“A sacrifice was needed! We just had to give it a grand name—Prahlad… like Holika!” 

“But this time it was a child!” 

“Oh, come on! You’ve seen the population, haven’t you? All this fuss for a bastard? Damn! Makes me want to spit!”

The dogs barked and growled, their words sounding like praise to please their master. The writer stayed silent. For by then, he could feel something strange—a tail sprouting slowly from his back, claws growing long from his hands, a thick black belt tightening around his neck.

The headman turned to him and said, 

“So, Writer Saab! How did you like Holika Dahan this time? A completely new concept, eh? You people—you give us no fresh ideas anymore. We have to come up with them ourselves now! It’s all about culture, you see—culture! One can’t neglect it, no matter what. It must be kept alive!”

And in that nod, the cruel jest of his life unfurled like a half-written page in the wind: the boy who fled his village to capture the wild, devouring Blue-Eyed Woman, only to find her gagged and bound in the very flames he once dreamed of taming with love. Old Mother’s spell—pure, selfless love—had led him not to redemption, but to this fireside seat among the faithful dogs, his pencil now a relic in his satchel, too heavy to lift against the weight of complicity. He had sought immortality in her story, a tale to outshine the stars; instead, he became its silent co-author, etching silence where screams should have been. The baby’s cry, that final, fragile thread of truth, dissolved into the canal of his soul—swelling briefly with the illusion of stories, only to dry under the relentless sun of tradition. Here, at the journey’s end, he was home: not the king or priest he might have been, but the scribe who nodded to atrocity, his heart a dry bed where once rivers of words had promised to flow.

 

The writer nodded slowly, mechanically. 

“Yes… yes… indeed. Indeed.”