Updated Mar 23, 2026 • ~5 min read
Chapter 10: The father’s concerns
ARYAN
His father attended the opening and said nothing at the time, which was worse than saying something at the time.
Devraj Singh at fifty-eight was a man of considered position and considerable patience, both of which he had deployed in service of the clan’s interests for thirty years. He was not, Aryan understood, a man who opposed things out of feeling. He opposed things out of calculation, and his calculations were usually sound, and what he had calculated about the Priya situation was both accurate and insufficient.
He called the next morning.
“She managed the opening well,” his father said.
“She did,” Aryan said.
“The extended network responded to her.”
“Yes.”
“Vikram is already converted.” A pause. “Your aunt has not reached a position yet.”
“Kavitha takes longer,” he said. “She’ll get there.”
“The Mehta family inquiry is still open,” his father said. “I have not declined it formally. They are waiting.”
“Decline it,” Aryan said.
Silence.
“Aryan—”
“I am not going to bind with a Mehta candidate,” he said. “My tiger knows its mate. I know mine. The Mehta inquiry, whatever its political merit, is not a path I will take.” He kept his voice level. “I’m not asking for permission. I’m asking you to decline it formally so they can close the question on their end.”
“The other clans—”
“Will have opinions,” he said. “They always do. The Singh clan has been managing the opinions of other clans for three generations. We are good at it.” He paused. “Priya is a Sharma. The Sharma family has been our steadiest relationship for a century. A formal liaison binding strengthens the connection, it doesn’t create a vulnerability.”
“It creates a precedent,” his father said. “An heir binding to a human — even a liaison-family human—”
“Chai ko chai bolo,” Aryan said. The old phrase — *call tea what it is.* His grandmother had used it. “She is not just a liaison-family human. She is the mate my tiger has been waiting for since she was born. You know this. You have always known this. The Mehta inquiry exists because you have been managing the clan’s politics in the space where acknowledging it would have complicated things, and I have allowed that management because it was reasonable and correct.” He paused. “It is no longer necessary. The situation is no longer deferrable.”
His father was quiet for a long time.
This was the other thing Devraj Singh did: he went quiet when he was thinking, genuinely thinking, not performing the pause. Aryan had grown up learning to read the difference.
“She is not what I expected,” his father said finally.
“What did you expect?”
“Someone younger,” he said. “Less formed. Someone I could — not manage, but position. Someone who needed the clan to be the world she was entering.” Another pause. “She already has the world. She knows the records, she knows the registers, she managed the opening with more sophistication than most senior clan members would have. She doesn’t need us.”
“No,” Aryan said.
“She has chosen to be here,” his father said. “That is—” he stopped. “Her choice is more visible than I expected.”
“Yes,” Aryan said. “That is what a free choice looks like.”
His father was quiet again.
“Your mother,” he said. “Her situation was not—”
“I know,” Aryan said, more gently. His mother’s bond had been different — rushed, constrained by circumstances, a choice that was real but narrow. “Priya is not in my mother’s situation. She has options. She is choosing.”
“She hasn’t chosen yet,” his father said.
“She is in the process of choosing,” Aryan said. “She needs the full information. I am giving it to her as she needs it, at her pace.”
“And the retreat,” his father said. “You’ve invited her.”
“For the collection review,” he said. “She knows what the retreat is.”
“She knows what it is,” his father said. “She doesn’t know what it will be, if she’s there with the full clan.”
“She handled the opening,” Aryan said.
“The opening was controlled,” his father said. “The retreat is family.”
“I know the difference,” he said. “So does she.”
Another silence.
“I won’t decline the Mehta inquiry yet,” his father said. “Give me the retreat first. Let me see how she is with the clan.”
Aryan considered this. It was a reasonable ask — not obstruction, but the request of a man who needed to see the full picture before he was prepared to act. His father did not work otherwise.
“The retreat,” he said. “Yes.”
“And the Mehta inquiry stays open until then. Not pursued, but not declined.”
“Until the retreat,” he said.
His father ended the call.
Aryan stood at his window with his phone and looked at the city and thought about his father’s distinction: *she doesn’t need us.* He had said it as something unexpected, something that had complicated his calculation. Aryan had heard it as the most important thing his father had said.
A woman who didn’t need the clan and was choosing toward it anyway. A choice that was visible in its freedom. That was the thing the Mehta inquiry would never produce — a candidate chosen from within the clan network was a candidate constrained by the network, a choice made in a narrower field, a freedom that was real but bounded.
Priya had walked into his gallery from the outside world with a career and a life and a family legacy that stood on its own. She was choosing toward him from a position of genuine independence.
He thought: my father knows this is different from what the other clans can offer.
He thought: he will see it fully at the retreat.
He thought: I am ready for the retreat.
His tiger, which was always ahead of him on these things, had been ready for the retreat for thirty-one years.
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