The skies had turned dark when young Devi, barely sixteen, left with her newly wedded husband, Anandan—a man seven years her senior. In many ways, Devi’s Ammavan or maternal uncle thought it was an ideal match as he wanted Devi out of his household as soon as possible. Her Ammavan had raised Devi as one of his own after her parents died, but as his son grew older and his gaze lingered too long on his cousin, Ammavan knew it was time to send her away as he had hoped to marry his sons in a rich household.
After searching long and hard, he had met Anandan who himself was recently heard to be orphaned when his mother had passed away a few months ago. In Devi’s village, tradition demanded at least six months of mourning after a parent’s death. But Ammavan cared more about ridding himself of a burden than upholding customs.
Both orphans met for the first time during their wedding and had shared just a glimpse of a smile. The bullock cart after travelling for almost five and a half hours had finally reached the Anandan’s mana – the ancestral property. Devi had unknowingly slept on Anandan’s arms on the way over in the cart only to be startled and realizing that she rested on him. Still afraid of her new husband, Devi kept her gaze lowered, avoiding his eyes. She was anxious to know him better and start a new life in this mana which seemed like a brand-new world to her. Devi’s life had changed over night and in a very drastic manner.
Anandan’s mother had raised him as a widow for the last twenty-three years until the day she breathed the last. Some still whisper that his mother had something to do with Anandan’s father’s disappearance. But his mother did the dutiful job as the mistress of the household and had raised Anandan to be a handsome and steadfast young man who was earnest in maintaining the ancestral property.
Devi stepped out of the cart and took a good look at the mana. The rusty gates welcomed her with an eerie feeling which she had brushed off as anxiety. Anandan went ahead and opened the locks on the front door. The mana cried for a fresh coat of paint and it was evident that it was long past its prime. The estate was still wealthy enough to provide for the family for generations but they did not have the luxury to make overhauls or improvements to the property. Anandan and his mother lived a life of modesty and did not even have household help.
Devi was not sure on whether she should enter along with her husband or wait till he asks her to step in. Something felt off for her. There was no one in the mana. There were no elders to welcome them in for the very first time. The discomfort was not helped by the demeanour of her husband as well. Anandan shouted from inside, “What the hell are you waiting for? Are you planning to stand there all night? There’s work waiting inside.” It was her new husband’s.
His first words since their wedding unsettled her. She hurriedly entered the old manor. Anandan, exhausted from the trip, slumped onto his father’s plancha, the old wooden resting chair. He pointed to the Madayil - the garden space behind the house. Devi was not sure on what the ask was from her husband and stood confused.
Anandan sighed and asked her, “It has been a while since I last cleaned this room. Do your job. You’ll find the broom and dustpan in the Madayil. If it is not there it will definitely be near the Kulam.” Kulam is the bathing space used by the Namboodiri household of this mana.
The orphaned Devi, who had pampered all this while by his uncle and aunt, had the first shock of her barely adult life but did not have a choice when it came to adhering to her husband’s commands. She was in an unfamiliar place and had no choice but to comply.
She promptly found the broom and almost two hours later, she had managed to dust the entire manor. The thali on her neck or the wedding ornament worn by the bride felt heavy as she continued to sweep the dusty mansion. The new bride was still finding it challenging to work while wearing it.
The tulsi or the holy basil plant in the middle of the manor in the nadumuttam or the open courtyard looked pale and withered, signifying that there was nobody to properly care for it all this while. The main entrance hall didn’t take her much time as there was not much furniture lying around. Over the years, Anandan’s mother had the furniture sold every now and then to raise short term funds. For two people who were occupying the huge manor, Anandan’s mother deemed that unused furniture was really unnecessary furniture. The Madayil however made the family self-sufficient with enough banana, jackfruit and coconut harvests for each season.
Once she was done, Devi hesitantly asked “Ettaa, it is almost nighttime…Can you tell me where the pathayappura is? I would like to get started with dinner.” Pathayappura or the grain storage was also severely depleting. The harvest was not that great and Anandan did not pay much attention to it on expiry of his mother.
Anandan barked, “You took an unusually long time to clean this house! My mother used to take half of this time. Did you even bother to light the nilavilakku? Didn’t your elders teach you anything about your duties? Is dinner the only damn thing in your mind right now?”
Devi was instantly moved to tears. She had hoped for kindness. Instead, he struck with words. She was starting to regret to have consented to the marriage with Anandan but alas it was a little too late for that.
She wiped off her tears and instantly lit up the nilavilakku, the traditional brass oil lamp after Anandan was on her back shouting to change the oil and the thiri – the cotton wick. For a brief minute while she was lighting the match, the flick shed some light on the picture on the wall. The picture was an old image of her husband’s late parents which had faded over time. She thought to herself that it might be the only surviving picture of them together that her husband could find. She went the extra mile by placing a small string of flowers on top of it to pay her respects. But she still couldn’t make out the faces in the picture. The only thing that was properly visible was her mother-in-law’s thali. A chill snaked down her spine. The thali—was it hers alone? She leaned closer to the faded photo, her breath hitching. The ornament around her mother-in-law’s neck... it was identical. No, it was the same.
Her Ammavan stood in for her late father, as was custom, to tie the thali—a duty usually performed by the bride’s father in the Namboodiri tradition. It was the very same thali that she had on her neck. She looked at her husband with shock. He remarked, “Don’t look very surprised. I offered this to your Ammavan. Every bride in this household had worn this on their wedding day. Be grateful that you are part of this prestigious lineage. Or would her majesty prefer a brand new one?”
Devi was not sure on how to respond to that cruel remark and started to openly weep again. But this time, Anandan did not stop with striking with his words but escalated to using his hands too as he gave her an unnecessary tight slap. The sting of his hand echoed louder than the slap. Her ears rang and her body stiffened. This wasn’t fear—it was something colder. He had left a bruise deeper than the skin. With her eyes bloodshot and her body trembling, she took a look at her husband. Her eyes which were filled with sorrow made the rabid animal even more infuriated. He gripped her cheeks tightly, “Stop crying! The pathayappura and the kitchen is that way! Go and make me something to eat fast!”
Devi turned away quickly and was afraid her tears would invite another blow. Her legs moved on instinct as she made her way to the pathayappura, but her mind had splintered. The slap had done more than sting—it had opened something in her, a quiet dread that started in her chest and now throbbed at her temples. She had not expected warmth, but this? This felt like being married to a storm.
She struggled to find the rice pot, her fingers trembling as they sifted through the dwindling grain. Even the kitchen bore silence like a curse. No sounds of utensils clanging, no comforting aroma—just emptiness and the low creak of the wind scraping through the half-closed wooden slats.
Later that night, the mana sank into darkness, except for the wavering light of the nilavilakku. Devi had placed it outside the bedroom door as tradition demanded, but its soft glow only made the shadows inside more menacing.
Anandan was already on the bed, his torso bare, his face unreadable in the flickering light. He said nothing when she entered. Just watched.
Devi slowly sat across from Anandan at the far end of the bed. She could sense his impatience growing darker like a storm cloud. She got reminded of the jokes that her friends made about what her wedding night would entail. But something inside her was abhorring the idea of procreating that night.
“Come closer,” he roared as he was getting impatient by the minute. She obeyed and her limbs were stiff. He reached out and pulled her towards him roughly, the callouses on his hand grazing her chin. His breath was blistering and urgent. There was no tenderness in his touch, only possession. No moment of reassurance, only command. The moment that followed was not shared—it was seized.
She bit her lips to stifle the pain that was ready to come out as an outright scream. He mistook it as her arousal. The pain was sharp, not just in her body but in the way her soul flinched. Her fingers clutched the edge of the mat, her nails dug into the wooden bed beneath. Her tears soaked into the pillow, soundless and unseen.
When it was over, he rolled to the side and drifted to sleep almost immediately. Devi lay frozen, eyes wide open, staring at the ceiling. She could feel the thali around her neck pressing into her skin like a shackle. The rest of her clothes were tossed aside and had borne silent witness to the horror. Outside, the nilavilakku flickered in protest, the wick nearly spent. That was when she smelt something rotten. She thought to herself that she had died and her corpse was letting out the stench.
In the silence of that room, Devi realized something she hadn’t dared to until now - this was definitely not the happily ever after that she was expecting in her story. As her tears dried into the mattress, Devi understood clearly that this wasn’t a home—it was a life sentence which had just begun.
The sun broke her troubled sleep the next day. Her husband kicked her from her slumber. She was startled and struggled to find her mundu tossed aside last night. She hastily got up and ran towards the kulam hoping that she doesn’t have to ask him where the turmeric powder was. The last thing she wanted was another slap to start the day.
The kulam was cold and filled with slippery algae. She bore it all and stepped in. She drew a deep breath and submerged herself. A little part of her wanted to give up and wanted to sink to her end. She opened her eyes inside the water. For a brief moment, she felt like something had tugged on to her thali. She looked down and noticed an elder woman reaching out from the deep ends of the kulam attempting to pulling her in by catching hold of the ornament. Scared for her life, she pushed her way up to the surface and started to spit out the water that had got in while trying to escape. She wore her mundu and ran back to her house.
Anandan was already at his wit’s end. He was furious that Devi had woke late and that he had to wait further until she prepared food for him. Devi noticed him waiting for her. There was a pair of buffalo horns hanging on the wall above the back entrance leading out to the kulam. For a brief moment, Anandan resembled the monster with buffalo horns from a safe distance. Safe enough to avoid his fist making contact with her face again.
As she approached him, she started to palpitate. The shortness in her breath filled the air with tension. She held on to her mundu tightly as she was dripping water from her torso. Anandan was instantly turned on. He stopped her midway and dragged her back to the bedroom. The horrors she had borne last night were not merely a nightmare but a punishment she continued to undergo even during the day. Her legs turned numb from having Anandan on top of her. The young woman was barely able to get up after going getting roughed up. Once she was done, he forced to take another dip in the kulam before entering the kitchen.
Before long a month had passed. But for Devi, it had felt like an eternity. She had rarely stepped out of the home. She had lost track of what day or date it was. There were no visitors. No one from her family had even bothered to visit her once or take a peep on whether she was dead or alive.
All of a sudden, the heightened sense of a strong stench came back. This time she was determined to find the source. More than the curiosity, it was panic that her husband might catch a whiff that would lead to him choking the remaining life out of her. She paced from room to room hoping to find its source. That led her to the master bedroom. She made it a point to never enter the room during the day as she barely could look at it after the horrors she had to tolerate every night. For the mornings anyway, there were plenty of other bruises, beatings, heat injuries and cuts that she had suffered in almost every part of the house. The kulam though extremely cold at times was not as cold as her husband.
She found Anandan sound asleep in the bedroom. The stench became worse as she went nearer. A little part of her was hoping that he had passed away in his sleep and it was his damn corpse that was letting out the stench. Alas, he was still alive. He was sound asleep after working the entire day on their field. Digging up holes to plant new saplings. The pickaxe that he had used was right near Devi as she saw an opening to end her oppression once and for all. This was her only window of opportunity. She could either run for her life or use the pickaxe to turn her husband in to a lifeless corpse. It was a forbearing.
She started to bite her nails in anxiety. She stood frozen in the doorway as the air in the room thickened with the stench. She thought to herself that living and breathing men couldn’t possibly smell like that. It was something far darker, something that belonged to the forgotten and the decayed. She started to suffocate in the stench and a cold shiver came down her spine.
The room turned cold and a sense of dread was blended into the stench. Her mind raced, what on earth was that smell? Why does she smell it often whenever her husband is intimate with her? Is her body letting out something as a defence mechanism to keep Anandan at bay? That’s when she came to her senses that it was not her but something in the top shelf.
She found a copper drum in the corner which she had used as a step ladder to climb and reach up to the shelf. She found a few half-rotten and half-bitten sarees clearly aged more than a few decades. She found a trunk that she didn’t recognize. She pulled it down with it almost toppling on her and crushing her with its weight. It contained letters which had yellowed over time. There were even a few old black and white photographs.
She read one of the letters. Then another. And then another after that. Each letter addressed to her Anand Etta.
One of them read that her husband Anandan had tried to strangle her because she entered the kitchen while on her periods. Another letter read that her husband had hit her with a whip after unintentionally adding extra salt to the stew. Letter after letter described what each of these women had borne at the hands of the same demon – Anandan. With tears pouring down her cheeks, she had another startling revelation. All the letters were in her handwriting.
Was the house helping her to document all these torments? Each described her life. Yet the names — Mrinalini, Ananya, Aparna — told her it wasn’t just her story. It was a script. Rehearsed. Rewritten. Lived again. All variations of her own. All describing a script similar to her own plight. Her own voice, writing of sorrow, of fear, of menacing whispers in the halls, of a life that was once filled with happiness and hope which turned into loathing and ashes.
She took out one of the photos and her jaw almost dropped to the ground. Her pulse pounded. She rushed to the hall, to the faded portrait by the nilavilakku. Had she really looked at it before? She hadn’t noticed it before, not really. The dust came away in flakes as she wiped it clean.
The two figures in the photo stared back at her. It was her and her Anand Etta. But how was that possible? How come the couple had stared in a picture clearly aged at least twenty years. It was unmistakably their young faces. She backed away in horror, clutching her stomach.
A wave of nausea suddenly hit her. She ran out, back to the kulam, and vomited violently near the steps. The bile burned, but not as much as the thought blooming in her mind. She suddenly realized she had missed her period. She went down to the kulam climbing down the stairs to clean her mouth after puking.
All of a sudden, a hand with bangles came out of the water and pulled her in. She struggled to get out and in a moment of panic, she called out for her husband. But alas, he never came. Then it stopped. She was completely drenched and managed to crawl her way out of the kulam.
She came back inside and the stench was still lingering. What was that smell? Is it an omen of something worse to come? By that time, Devi has had enough of this abusive life. She wanted to flee from this nightmare, but her feet remained glued to the floor. She realized she had no place to go. Every bone in her body screamed at her to turn away, but she forced herself to step into the room, her legs trembling beneath her.
She picked up the pickaxe and approached the bed cautiously. He was still sound asleep as his chest rose and fell in a steady rhythm but it was the unnatural stillness of his body had unnerved her.
The pickaxe met bone with a dull thud. No scream. Only a gurgle, then… stillness. For a heartbeat, she believed. Then his hand twitched. His eyes — they were open. Staring at her, amused. He did not even finch to the sharp intrusion on his head. Her body trembled as she slowly backed away, her mind struggling to comprehend what she was seeing. Was he… was he dead? Her eyes darted to his face, but there was no sign of life. His skin had taken on a ghastly hue, a sickly pallor that made him appear as if he were a part of the decay that surrounded them.
She took a step back as her mind was still comprehending what she had done. She let out a scream that had been building inside her since the day she married. Her chest finally broke free which echoed in the silent halls of the manor. She collapsed against the door with her heart still pounding heavily. She was unable to tear her eyes away from her husband’s dead body.
Devi stood frozen in the hallway, with her hands still trembling and her body numb with fear. She couldn’t accept that it was all over and that she was finally free. Free of the horrors that she had endured. Free of the terrorizing that had nearly broken her will to live. But the worst was yet to come. A voice behind her started her, “Bitch! Where the hell is my lunch?”
It was her husband in the flesh. But the flesh had the pickaxe sticking out of it. Devi’s eyes enlarged with panic. Without hesitation, she started to run. The demonic and inanimate Anandan followed her with the pickaxe now plucked out of his skull and in his hands, possibly to return the favour.
The manor, once a place of cold silence and witness to Devi’s abuse, now felt alive with something darker, more sinister.
She ran to the kulam. Anandan came in full steam while holding on to the pickaxe. Devi couldn’t believe her eyes. The kulam was filled with dead older women. Who were these women? How did their bodies end up here and why is she seeing all of that now?
Devi was ready for the fate that awaited her. She closed her eyes out of fear. But something unexpected happened. Anandan slipped on the algae near the kulam and landed inside the kulam. He had hit his head hard on the steps and the water turned red as the oppressor finally met his fate.
Devi stood at the edge of the kulam as the rest of the bodies had disappeared. The kulam turned red with the blood coming out of her husband’s body. She pulled his body out. She couldn’t afford to take any more chances. She found the pickaxe near the footsteps of the kulam and took multiple swings at his lifeless body. She couldn’t take another chance. She kept swinging the pickaxe until her body gave out.
She buried him just past the sloping bank, the same pickaxe he had once used to threaten her now striking earth for his final bed. The mud was stubborn, thick with roots, as if the land itself resisted her attempt to erase him. But she didn’t stop until the pit was deep enough, dark enough to hold all of him.
Before covering him up, she reached for her thali — the thread that had once marked her as his property, now seemed to sear her skin. She tugged it off with one swift motion, its gold pendant glinting once before she tossed it into the pit. She let him have it in death. She thought to herself to let it rot in the ground along with him.
By the time she smoothed the soil back, the sky had shifted. An ominous hush had fallen over the mana. She went back into the mana to pack, to leave and to never turn back. Something strange happened as she entered.
She stared down at her hands. Her stomach had gotten rounder and swollen. Inside the mana, time blurred. Days and months sped up by mere minutes. Her belly grew with unnatural speed. Each breath heavier, her body no longer her own. Unable to walk, she finally made it to the bed where her husband forced himself on her on every occasion. Then, in the storm-wrapped night, the baby arrived.
No cries, no chaos. Only a grim silence as she brought him into the world alone on the stone floor, beneath the portrait that mocked her fate. The infant didn’t wail. His eyes were open. Unblinking. In his tiny clenched fist, something glimmered.
The thali. Mud-streaked and still wet. She screamed until her throat gave out.
But in time, she stopped resisting. She nursed the boy. Named him Anandan, because what else could she do? The house swallowed her identity until Devi was only another echo in its long corridors. She waited for the end, because she now understood.
This was never her story.
It was his.
Years passed. The boy grew, just like before. The same gait. The same gaze. Even the same cruel smile curling in moments of silence. She knew what was coming long before he ever lifted a hand.
And one morning, as mist blanketed the kulam, she heard him call out: “Amme…”
She didn’t bother to turn. The familiar stench had come back to haunt her. He stood beside her, taller now, the same face she'd buried years ago.
The reflection of their faces in the kulam mirrored the ominous portrait still hanging in the hall. His face had a grin and hers reflected lifelessness. She didn’t resist as he pushed her into the water.
The kulam accepted her without a sound. She was now one among the many mothers that had been pushed into the kulam.
Then he stepped back into the house — his house — now empty once more. But not for long.
In a nearby village, a girl named Akhila giggled as her mother tied her plait and spoke of her coming wedding. She didn’t yet know the name of her groom. Only that he came from an old mana and his name was Anandan.
The loop had found its next step. The new bride stepped in for a dip in the kulam after Anandan had brought her to the mana. Only to have Devi’s spirit reach out to her and grab her thali to warn her about the fate that awaited her. The very fate that the rest of the brides had endured in each of their lifetimes. Alas, it was too late as Akhila replaced Devi as the helpless woman who is currently tasked in raising the devil.
And the house waited, as it always had.
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