Druve did not go downstairs immediately after leaving Riya's room.
He walked to the far end of the hallway and stopped near the window, his phone still in his hand. For a while he simply stood there, replaying the conversation. Not everything Riya had said was useful in the way he needed it to be. Her fear mattered, but fear couldn't give him an address. The helplessness she had described told him someone might have hurt her, but it couldn't tell him who. Her certainty that she had once waited for someone raised more questions than it answered.
He pushed those aside for now and concentrated on what could actually be checked.
A white ceiling. Bright light. The sharp smell of disinfectant and medicine.
Hospital.
A dark room.
A chain around her ankle.
Men.
Fire.
Running through smoke while something heavy dragged behind her.
Druve opened a blank note on his phone and typed five words.
Hospital. Fire. Dark room. Chains. Men.
He stared at them.
The last three were almost useless as starting points.
A dark room could be anywhere. Chains could be bought anywhere and leave no public record at all. Men meant nothing unless Riya eventually gave him a face, a name, an accent, a voice or some other detail he could identify.
He wouldn't discard them. A clue that meant nothing today could become important once another piece appeared.
But he couldn't hunt a dark room.
He couldn't search for a chain.
And he couldn't find nameless men.
His eyes returned to the first two words.
Hospital.
Fire.
Those were different.
Hospitals left records.
Fire left even more.
Druve straightened.
He went back through Riya's words carefully. She hadn't known whether the hospital smell belonged to the dark room. She hadn't known which image came first or whether they even belonged together. He couldn't force them into a single sequence simply because it was convenient.
But he didn't need to.
He only needed to test whether the connection existed.
Riya's accident had happened within the last four months. Whatever was missing from her mind had to fit somewhere inside that period. If there had been a fire at a hospital or another medical facility anywhere near that time, he could find it.
Large incidents would be easy.
The smaller ones interested him more.
A major hospital fire made newspapers and official reports. A small electrical fire in a private hospital might make nothing more than a fire-service entry, an emergency repair invoice and a story remembered by a night-shift nurse.
If someone had something to hide, Druve doubted they would choose the kind of place that attracted attention.
He dialed a number.
The call was answered almost immediately.
"Sir."
"I need a search done."
"What are we looking for?"
"Every hospital or medical facility that had a fire incident in the last four months."
There was a brief pause.
"Every hospital?"
"Yes."
"That could be a wide search."
"Then start wide."
"Large incidents first?"
"No. Pull those because they're easy, but don't waste most of your time on them. I want the incidents that didn't make news."
The man became more attentive. "Small fires?"
"Anything involving fire or smoke. Electrical short circuits, generator fires, oxygen-related incidents, kitchen fires, storage rooms, waste areas. I don't care how they classified it."
"All medical facilities?"
"All."
Druve began walking slowly down the hallway.
"Government hospitals, private hospitals, nursing homes, clinics, rehabilitation centres, specialty centres. Anything capable of keeping someone overnight."
"What location?"
"Start with the area around where Riya Rathore was found and expand outward."
The name caused a brief silence.
"Riya Rathore?"
"Yes."
The man knew Druve well enough not to ask the obvious question.
"How far do you want us to expand?"
"Anywhere reachable within a few hours."
"That will increase the number considerably."
"Then increase the number of people searching."
"Yes, sir."
Druve reached the staircase but didn't descend.
"And focus on private facilities."
"Large private hospitals?"
"Not only those. Smaller ones first. Nursing homes. Privately owned clinics with inpatient rooms. Places operating under trusts. Medical centres that don't advertise much."
"Why smaller?"
"Fewer people. Less scrutiny. Easier to control what gets reported."
There was a pause while the man wrote.
"Do you want only confirmed fires?"
"No."
That answer came immediately.
"Check smoke incidents, emergency electrical repairs, unexplained temporary closures, wards suddenly shut down, patients moved during the night. Anything that could indicate a fire without someone officially calling it one."
"That means we'll have to go beyond public records."
"Exactly."
"How far beyond?"
"Fire stations. Police contacts. Ambulance services. Electrical contractors. Generator mechanics. Fire-equipment suppliers. Oxygen suppliers. Anyone who might have been called because something happened."
The man was silent for a second.
"You think someone may have been inside one of these places."
"I think there may have been a hospital involved."
Druve gave him nothing more.
"Time window?"
"Four months. Prioritize the weeks surrounding Riya's accident."
"Understood."
"And don't send me a list of every hospital that had a burnt wire."
"We'll filter."
"Filter by unusual activity. Patient transfers. Ambulances arriving or leaving at odd hours. Police called and then told they weren't needed. Fire-service calls cancelled before arrival. Sudden repairs. Temporary closure. Anything that doesn't fit the size of the reported incident."
"Yes, sir."
"If one place gives you more than one of those, call me immediately."
"Got it."
Druve ended the call.
He looked again at the note on his screen.
Hospital. Fire. Dark room. Chains. Men.
Five pieces.
Two he could use.
For now, that was enough.
He dialed another number.
"Sir?"
"I need you working separately from the other team."
"On what?"
"Fire-service records."
"Aren't we checking hospitals?"
"They're checking hospitals. You're checking fires."
The man understood the distinction immediately.
"Last four months?"
"Yes. Every fire-service response involving a medical building."
"Only registered hospitals?"
"No. Hospitals, clinics, nursing homes, treatment centres, diagnostic centres, abandoned medical buildings—anything."
"Abandoned?"
"I don't know what kind of place I'm looking for yet."
"All right."
"Include calls that were cancelled before the crew arrived."
"That could be messy."
"Messy isn't the same as useless."
"No, sir."
"Check small incidents where a crew arrived but no formal case was opened. If a facility claims nothing happened, verify it."
"How?"
"Talk to the people who were there."
The man gave a quiet laugh. "That simple?"
"Yes."
"You're not the one making the calls."
"That's why I'm paying you."
The laugh disappeared.
Druve continued, "If you find a fire at night, move it higher on the list."
"Any reason?"
"Yes."
The man waited.
Druve didn't elaborate.
"Understood."
"And look at ambulance movement around the same time."
"Transfers?"
"Any ambulance leaving the property."
"Where it went?"
"Trace it."
"Even if the hospital says it was unrelated?"
"Especially then."
The man was quiet for a moment.
"All right."
Druve ended the second call.
He finally descended the stairs.
The house around him continued normally. Someone spoke quietly in the kitchen. A door closed somewhere farther down the corridor. Rana's security personnel moved around the property as they had since Druve had tightened access.
None of it held his attention.
His mind was already somewhere else.
A hospital.
A fire.
If he found one that matched, he could begin working backward.
Who owned the place?
Who worked there?
Who had been on duty?
Who called the fire service?
Who repaired the damage?
Were there cameras?
Had footage disappeared?
Had anyone left suddenly afterward?
Had an ambulance moved that wasn't recorded as a patient transfer?
Had police been called?
Had someone paid to make the incident disappear?
He didn't need Riya to remember everything.
He needed one piece that existed outside her head.
Once he had that, people became searchable.
Rajveer found him in the downstairs sitting room several minutes later. Druve was standing beside the table, reading incoming messages.
"You've started something."
Druve didn't look up. "What makes you say that?"
"Three of your men just walked outside to make calls, and you've looked at your phone six times since I entered."
Druve glanced at him.
Rajveer sat down. "What did she tell you?"
"Nothing I can prove yet."
"But enough to send people searching."
Druve put the phone on the table.
"Hospital. Fire."
Rajveer waited for more.
"That's it?"
"For now."
"What about everything else she saw?"
"Dark room tells me nothing about location. Chains tell me what might have been done, not where. Men are useless until she gives me something identifiable."
"But a hospital can be traced."
"Yes."
"And a fire leaves records."
"Usually."
Rajveer studied him. "Usually?"
"Officially or unofficially. Something burns, someone repairs it."
A faint understanding appeared in Rajveer's face.
"So you're looking at hospitals with fires around the time of Riya's accident."
"Not only hospitals. Any medical facility capable of keeping someone there."
"You think she may have been held somewhere?"
"I think I don't know."
Rajveer raised an eyebrow.
Druve continued before his father could comment. "That's the mistake people make. They decide what happened first and then search for proof of it. I'm not doing that."
"Then what are you doing?"
"Checking whether anything she described exists."
"And if it doesn't?"
"I rule it out."
"And if it does?"
Druve's eyes hardened.
"I find out why."
His phone vibrated.
He picked it up.
Initial public incidents being compiled. Two teams moving to private facilities.
Another message followed.
Do you want facilities with emergency electrical repairs but no reported fire?
Druve typed immediately.
Yes.
A third message appeared.
Include temporary closures listed as renovation?
Yes.
Rajveer watched him.
"You really intend to check everything."
"No."
Rajveer's eyebrows lifted.
"I intend to eliminate everything that doesn't fit."
There was a difference.
Druve didn't need to investigate hundreds of places personally. His men would remove the obvious ones. A hospital with a documented kitchen fire at midday while hundreds of patients and staff continued normally could disappear from the list. A major hospital fire with complete evacuation records and media coverage could be checked and discarded quickly.
What would remain were the anomalies.
A private facility with a fire no one reported.
A medical centre closed suddenly for repairs.
An ambulance leaving without a patient entry.
A night-shift employee who resigned immediately afterward.
A security camera that happened to fail.
A fire-service call cancelled minutes after it was made.
Those were the places Druve wanted.
His phone rang.
He answered.
"Sir, one issue."
"What?"
"There are several private facilities operating under clinic licenses that have inpatient rooms. Technically they won't appear in hospital searches."
"Include them."
"Some are registered under charitable trusts."
"Include them."
"And a few are barely registered at all."
Druve's expression changed.
"Those first."
The man paused.
"Understood."
"Also check facilities that shut down within the last four months."
"Permanently?"
"Temporary or permanent."
"Even without a fire report?"
"Yes."
"That expands things again."
"Then expand."
"All right."
"And check ownership changes."
"Why?"
"People close businesses when they want problems buried. Sometimes they reopen them under another name."
The man was silent for a second.
"You think whoever did this covered their tracks."
"I think if someone tried to kill Riya afterward, assuming everything before her accident was innocent would be stupid."
"Understood."
Druve ended the call.
Rajveer was still watching him.
"What?"
His father's mouth shifted faintly. "Nothing."
"Dad."
"I was thinking."
"About?"
Rajveer leaned back. "You spoke to her for what? Half an hour?"
"Approximately."
"And from that you have teams checking fire-service calls, private hospitals, ambulance movements and electrical repairs."
"She gave me something usable."
"She gave you a smell and fire."
"Yes."
Rajveer gave a quiet breath that might have been amusement.
Druve's eyes narrowed. "What?"
"Whoever hurt that girl chose the wrong person to make curious."
"I'm not curious."
"No?"
"No."
"Then what are you?"
Druve looked at the phone in his hand.
"Close."
The single word wiped the faint amusement from Rajveer's face.
Druve looked down at the five words still open on his screen.
For weeks, Riya's accident had been nothing but a blank. He could protect her from another attempt, interrogate everyone around her, rebuild security and watch every person who came near the house, but none of that told him what had happened before she was found.
Now, for the first time, he had something that might lead backward.
Not enough to identify anyone.
Not enough to accuse anyone.
But enough to hunt.
"I think there's something there," Druve said.
Rajveer studied him. "Someone who hurt Riya?"
"Maybe."
"And you think you're getting close to him?"
Druve's gaze hardened.
"If the hospital exists, yes."
It wasn't arrogance.
Druve knew exactly what happened once he found the first real point in a trail.
People left traces even when they thought they hadn't. Money moved. Phones connected. Vehicles travelled. Employees remembered. Someone talked to the wrong person. Someone kept a receipt. Someone lied differently from everyone else.
One inconsistency became two.
Two became a name.
And a name was enough.
It was not without reason that Kaal feared Druve.
Kaal knew what most people didn't.
Druve did not need the whole truth handed to him.
He needed one loose thread.
Once he caught it, he pulled until everything attached to it came apart.
Upstairs, Riya had given him that thread without even knowing she had done it.
She had spoken about fear and darkness because he kept asking her what she saw, heard and felt. She hadn't been trying to solve anything. She hadn't known which detail mattered.
Druve had.
A hospital.
A fire.
That was enough.
His phone vibrated again.
Preliminary list in two hours. Small/private facilities will take longer.
Druve replied:
Don't rush the private list. Make it complete.
Another message followed almost immediately.
If we get a strong match?
His answer was just as quick.
Call me before you approach anyone.
Rajveer noticed.
"You don't want them questioned?"
"Not yet."
"Why?"
"If someone covered something up once, I don't want them knowing we're looking."
Rajveer nodded slowly.
Druve put the phone into his pocket.
"When I find the place, I want to know everything about it before anyone there realizes I've found it."
"And then?"
Druve looked at him.
"I find whoever hurt her."
There was no anger in his voice.
That made the words colder.
He genuinely believed he was moving toward Riya's attacker now. Somewhere inside those hospital records and fire reports might be the first person who could explain the missing hours before her accident.
He didn't know how close he had actually come.
The clues Riya had placed in his hands were not pointing where he thought they were.
Hospital.
Fire.
Darkness.
Chains.
Men.
Druve thought he was following Riya's missing past.
He could never have imagined that the trail beneath his feet stretched seven years behind him.
That somewhere among the reports his men were beginning to pull apart was a path leading toward the question that had consumed almost a quarter of his life.
He had searched cities for her.
Followed false sightings.
Paid people for information that led nowhere.
Sat through nights when hope became something crueler than grief because it refused to die.
He had hated Sruthi for leaving him.
Hated himself more for giving her a reason to.
He had begged for one clue when the world had given him none.
And now, when he wasn't searching for her at all, he had finally picked up the edge of the truth.
Druve stood and walked toward the study, already planning what he would do when the first list arrived.
He thought he was getting closer to the person who had hurt Riya.
He had no idea that every hospital he checked and every fire he traced was taking him toward his everything.
His life.
His Sruthi.