Ravi's gut twisted. Who poured the chai? Lakshmi claimed she prepared it at dawn, but her alibi was the kitchen—unseen. Vikram was in Hyderabad till midnight, flight logs confirmed. Gopal? Milking cows at the barn, verified by a neighbor.

The sun bled crimson over the parched fields of Kodad, a dusty speck in Nalgonda district where Telangana's relentless heat etched lines into every face. Inspector Ravi Kumar wiped sweat from his brow as his battered jeep rattled into the village square. It was October 4, 2025, and the air hummed with the drone of harvest machines, masking the whispers of murder.

Ramachandra Naidu, the town's tobacco baron, had been found sprawled in his millet field that morning, his throat bloated from arsenic-laced chai. No signs of struggle—just a silver tumbler tipped beside him, the poison's bitter tang still clinging to the earth. The locals called it a curse from the old Yakshini temple on the hill, but Ravi knew better. Curses didn't leave fingerprints.

Kodad wasn't his beat. Ravi hailed from Nalgonda city, summoned by the district SP after Ramachandra's son, Vikram, raised hell on social media, tagging every politician from Hyderabad to Delhi. "Justice or Bust," the post read, with a grainy photo of the corpse. By noon, it had 50,000 likes. Ravi cursed the digital age; it turned quiet killings into circuses.

He parked near the Naidu haveli, a crumbling fortress of red sandstone amid banyan trees that clawed at the sky. The family waited inside: Lakshmi, Ramachandra's widow, her sari wilted like forgotten laundry; Vikram, 28 and slick with urban polish from his Hyderabad tech job; and Gopal, the younger brother, a gaunt farmer with eyes like chipped flint.

"Tell me again," Ravi said, sinking into a charpoy that creaked under his weight. The room smelled of incense and grief, walls adorned with faded photos of Ramachandra shaking hands with ministers.

Lakshmi spoke first, her voice a tremor. "He drank his morning chai alone, as always. By 7 a.m., he was gone." Her bangles clinked like accusations.

Vikram paced, phone in hand. "Appa was poisoned, Inspector. Gopal's been eyeing the land for years. That strip by the river—prime for his cotton scam."

Gopal spat betel juice into a spittoon. "Lies! Your father owed me lakhs from the '22 drought loans. He poisoned himself with debt."

Ravi noted the tension, thick as monsoon mud. Ramachandra owned half of Kodad's 300 square kilometers—fields that fed Hyderabad's hookah bars. Motive? Everywhere. But evidence was a ghost.

Outside, the village buzzed. Ravi wandered the square, where chaiwallahs sloshed tea from dented kettles and auto-rickshaws belched fumes. Old Man Subba, the temple priest, sidled up, his dhoti stained with kumkum. "It's the Yakshini, saar. She demands blood for the well they dug last monsoons. Ramachandra's machines disturbed her sleep."

Superstition. Ravi dismissed it, but Kodad's lore clung like burrs. The Yakshini well, a crumbling pit on the estate's edge, was said to swallow greedy souls. Locals avoided it after dusk, when shadows twisted into serpents.

Back at the haveli, forensics from Nalgonda arrived with a kit that looked pilfered from a Bollywood set. They swabbed the tumbler: arsenic, trace amounts, mixed with jaggery to mask the bite. "Administered within the hour," the techie muttered.

Ravi's gut twisted. Who poured the chai? Lakshmi claimed she prepared it at dawn, but her alibi was the kitchen—unseen. Vikram was in Hyderabad till midnight, flight logs confirmed. Gopal? Milking cows at the barn, verified by a neighbor.

Night fell like a shroud. Ravi couldn't sleep in the guest room, its fan wheezing like a dying man. He slipped out, torch in hand, toward the fields. Crickets screamed, and the air tasted of earth and secrets.

A flicker—movement by the well. Ravi crouched behind a neem tree, heart pounding. A figure, cloaked in shadow, knelt at the pit's edge, sprinkling something into the water. Powder? Poison residue?

He lunged. "Police! Hands up!"

The figure spun, a glint of metal—a sickle. It slashed wild, grazing Ravi's arm. Blood bloomed hot. They grappled, tumbling toward the well's maw. The attacker was slight, hooded. Ravi pinned them, wrenching back the cloth.

Saraswati. The maid. Lakshmi's shadow, 19 and silent as mist.

"Why?" Ravi gasped, cuffing her wrists.

Tears carved tracks through her kohl. "Naanu... for Vikram-anna. He promised marriage, city life. But Appa found out, threatened to disown him. Said I'd ruin the family name."

Vikram. The devoted son. Ravi pieced it: the late-night return, not from Hyderabad but a lovers' tryst. The post? A smokescreen. But the arsenic—where?

Saraswati sobbed. "From the rat poison in the barn. Gopal keeps it for pests."

Gopal. The red herring.

Dawn broke as Ravi dragged her to the haveli. Vikram's face drained white at the sight. "You... you framed me?"

"No," Ravi lied, watching the boy's collapse. "She acted alone. For love."

Lakshmi wailed, but her eyes held relief—no scandal for the Naidus. Gopal slunk away, land dreams intact.

Back in his jeep, Ravi bandaged his arm, the sting a reminder. Kodad's fields stretched endless, secrets buried deep as roots. The Yakshini well gurgled mockingly, but Ravi knew the real monsters wore human skins—lovers, brothers, sons.

As he drove toward Nalgonda, his phone buzzed: another case, another village. But in the rearview, Kodad faded like a bad dream, its shadows longer than truth.