Rajan arrived, breathless, a public man suddenly mortal. His suit was immaculate; his calm, manufactured. He offered Meera a proposition — hush money disguised as salvation. The camera captured his every move; thousands watched the exchange. Meera felt the weight of her father’s handwriting in her palm and the watching eyes of a town that had loved its horse and its unlikely heroine. The heat wasn’t only from the fire; it was from the choice burning in her chest.