Prince of Dharma (72 page)

Lakshman was silent as he pondered the brahmarishi’s words. 

He had been very quick to challenge the tiger. It was almost as if … well, as if he wanted the fight. He recalled his earlier restlessness on awakening. Between battles. As if he needed to pit himself against a foe, any foe. If rakshasas and giant demonesses weren’t on hand, then a tiger would do. But if this was so, then he hadn’t been consciously aware of it. 

‘Forgive me, Guru-dev,’ he said quietly. 

Vishwamitra walked over to Lakshman and squeezed his shoulder. The strength in the seer’s hands surprised Lakshman. ‘Feel not ashamed, Sumitra-putra. You are young yet and it is barely eight days since you received these potent infusions. It takes even great warriors many years to learn the intricacies of their usage. Why, it took a raj-Kshatriya such as myself several hundred years to achieve mastery of my martial abilities. Of course,’ he added, ‘that was before I set down my sword and bow to take up this life of spiritual penance. And yet, those same qualities of yogic self-control stand me in good stead even today. The greatest battle is the one a warrior wages with his own animal impulses.’ 

Lakshman glanced up at the brahmarishi’s face. It was the first time he had heard the sage speak of his historic past. Every Arya child learned of Raja Vishwamitra’s stirring exploits as a warrior-king, as well as of his transformation into a seer through centuries of tapasya. Like any other Kshatriya graced with the presence of such a great warrior, Lakshman had a hundred questions he wanted to ask the brahmarishi. 

But before he could speak another word, a flash of blinding light seared his vision. He flung his hand up to cover his eyes, taking a step back from the source of the effulgence. Still, his warrior’s instinct demanded he try to discern what was going on, to defend himself against any possible assault. He sensed Vishwamitra standing his ground and staring directly at the blinding illumination. 

As suddenly as it had appeared, the light faded away, leaving behind only a searing memory burned in Lakshman’s mind’s eye. 

He lowered his hands and saw the lone figure of his brother Rama, standing in the midst of the papaya grove. 

TWO 

Kausalya woke from a light doze to find Dasaratha’s eyes open. The maharaja was lying on his back, hands clasped on his chest, head fallen to the right, eyes fixed on the thin slice of indigo sky visible through the window at the far end of the vaulting bedchamber. She observed him calmly for a moment, marshalling her emotions. 

She knew what she should be thinking, that her husband had departed the mortal realm for more elevated pastures, that at least he had passed away peacefully in the night without further suffering, but she stoically refused to entertain such thoughts. It was as if a part of her believed firmly that by thinking such thoughts she would give them credence and substance. An Arya wife did not think ill of her husband and children, whatever the circumstances or provocation. Yet it was more than mere tradition and upbringing. It was a deep-rooted, intensely felt inner conviction. If life gave you thorns, you made do with thorns. You didn’t brood on their nature, the colour, the species, the length, the sharpness … instead, you plucked them out, tossed them aside, and kept walking, on bloody feet if you had to. 

She had acquired that attitude from her mother. Indeed, those very words—make do with thorns—still echoed in her memory in that familiar soft voice. Her mother had passed away the year before Kausalya was married, a tragic piece of timing. But her voice and its lessons, learned in childhood while those strong, deeply lined hands plaited her oiled locks or massaged turmeric paste into her supple young limbs, had carried her through fifteen years of marital turmoil, neglect and loneliness, seven of those years spent without even her growing son, pride of her loins, jewel of her heart, to bring comfort and joy. So much had been denied her. Yet still, that resilient Kausalya, daughter of pride, mother of fortitude and silent will, refused to yield to the samay chakra’s cruel turns and twists. And so she rose from her seat thinking not that Dasaratha was dead and lying glassy-eyed but that he was simply awake and gazing. 

The muted rustle of her sari—she had laid aside the ritual silks of her queenly station the day after Dasaratha had taken to his sickbed, and donned simple homespun saris instead— attracted his attention. He blinked once, and turned his head slightly, adjusting his frame of view to encompass her. Her heart raced as the enormity of the moment dawned on her. Dasa was awake. Alive and awake. It was only then that she realised how close she had come to growing resigned these past eight days. How the muted whispers of acceptance around the palace had begun to seep into her resolve, melting it like a glacier thawed over centuries by the unrelenting heat of the sun. On this occasion, those thorns of life had dug deep enough to draw out more than blood; they had almost drained her of hope. And hope, as her mother had said so often, was the real food of mortal existence; food of the soul. 

He turned his head slightly as she approached, eyes startling in their clarity. The rheumy, glassy look of the feverish nights was gone, so was the glazed, slack-jawed looseness. He had lost weight during this latest bout and it showed on his face. It gave him the appearance of weary determination; a warrior who had fought yet another unwinnable battle and had survived. Not won, for neither this new battle nor the war itself was winnable by any mortal, but survived. He had lived to fight another day. And she was blessed to be here to see the miracle with her own eyes. 

‘Kausalye.’ He used the affectionate ‘e’ suffix that was the closest to a nickname he had ever permitted himself. That was all he said—simply her name. It was enough. 

She dropped to her knees by his bedside, burying her face in his arms, clinging to his shoulder. His skin felt cool and dry to her touch, no longer fiery with fever or clammy from sick-sweat. She kissed his forearm, his hand, his wrist. 

‘I will propitiate the devi,’ she said. ‘I will offer a hundred rams as thanks for your recovery.’ 

He made a small choked sound. She looked up, alarmed, then realised it was an approximation of a laugh, the best he could manage in his weakened condition. 

‘Spare the rams, Kausalye. Just get me something to eat and drink.’ 

She looked up at him. If she needed proof positive, here it was. ‘Are you sure?’ 

‘Sure?’ he echoed. ‘Of course I’m sure. If I’m alive, I must eat and drink, mustn’t I? Unless I have died and this is Swarga-lok and you’ve been given the ultimate penalty of nursing me eternally. In which case, I’ll eat one of those rams you were planning to sacrifice. Roasted, preferably, with plenty of stuffing!’ 

She smiled, warmed by his attempt at humour. It spoke more eloquently than any assurance of well-being. ‘It would be a pleasure, not a penalty.’ 

He smiled a wan smile. ‘Ever the dutiful and noble Kausalya. Don’t you at least occasionally feel ill towards anybody? Think dark, terrible thoughts? Wish destruction and holocaust on those who have hurt you and caused you misery?’ 

She thought of the night she had first known he was in the clutches of Kaikeyi. Not the first night he had spent in her arms, for she had accepted Kaikeyi’s presence by then—not liked it, but accepted it nevertheless—but the first time she had learned of how deeply he was besotted with his voluptuous second queen. She had learned it from Sumitra, who had broken the news to her as gently as possible, confirming what Kausalya had dismissed till then as idle palace gossip and court chatter. She remembered the darkness that had come over her then. The wave of black rage that had risen like an ocean deva bent on destruction, the pounding fury in her heart. She had forgotten all her mother’s lessons at that moment. Forgotten all the wisdom she had acquired through diligent study and practice. She had been at that moment a pure avatar of the devi, lightning-bolt in one hand, trident in the other, lion at her knee, and all she knew was man-hatred and woman-rage. 

And then the infant Rama had called out, shattering the tense silence of her bedchamber. He was barely a year old then, only just weaned. She had gone to the bed, thrown herself there by his side, and bared her breast to him, teasing his curled lips with her forefinger, drawing him to her breast. He had found the hot nipple and paused, turning his head to stare up at her, his silent wide eyes asking the question his wordless mouth could not frame, and she had smiled down at him, caressed his downy soft head, and moved it back towards her breast again. He had drunk then, sucking happily, greedily, as he was permitted this rare return to a familiar luxury, and she had felt the ache in her right breast as the veins of milk, still full and bountiful in their gift of life, began to convey their precious nectar. 

Sumitra had leaned over her, wiping the tears that flowed down Kausalya’s face, drenching Rama’s swaddle clothes, and said quietly, words that Kausalya would remember for ever, ‘At least we have the loyalty of our sons.’ 

Kausalya blinked away the moistness that threatened to creep into her eyes now and looked at Dasaratha. She was stroking his hirsute arm gently, the way she had stroked Rama’s infant head that fateful day. He was staring up at her with an inscrutable expression that mirrored the fixed watchfulness of his infant son in her memory, and in that instant she saw how much he regretted, how much he wished he could undo, how time and past errors of judgement had eaten into the heart of his ego and denuded his former arrogance. This was her Dasaratha again; not Kaikeyi’s Dasaratha, that stranger she had stood by during official functions and court rituals over the years; but her Dasaratha, the prince of Ayodhya she had wed long years ago, the prince she had loved, the king she had watched with pride and admiration, the man to whom she had given her maidenhood and all else, the father of her child, the keeper of her honour. 

‘We choose,’ she said. ‘We choose to walk in light or darkness. I chose my path a long time ago. I have never looked back since.’ 

He stared at her mutely for a long moment. Then he turned his head away, towards the window again. The first blush of dawn was visible through its carved arches, above the delicate boughs of the flower grove. His voice was soft and young, more like his son’s clear, quiet tones than his own customary gruffness. Her Dasaratha was speaking now. 

‘Some of us walk in darkness without knowing we do. We see with black eyes and black hearts. And only when we have gone too deep into the jungle do we realise our mistake. But by then it’s too late to turn back, impossible to find our way home.’ 

She felt his despair and ached for it. This was her curse, not just to bear her given burden, but to feel profound empathy for the pain of others as well, including the one who had caused her own pain. ‘It’s never too late to come home,’ she said. 

He looked at her again. She saw the colours of the dawn reflected in his eyes, the yellowish cast of first light on his wasted features. 

‘Do you think so? Can a black heart change its path this late in the day?’ 

She touched his chest gently, proprietorially. ‘The path was always there. If the heart could but see it.’ 

‘And the consequences of past actions? Our karma?’ 

She shrugged. ‘What we have done even the devas can’t undo. But what we have yet to do, even the asuras cannot prevent us from doing. If you wish to walk the path of light, you can do so even now.’ 

His eyes filled with tears, and his hand gripped her arm with shocking strength. Not the strength of youth and vigour he had once possessed with pride, but the strength of desperation. ‘I’m so afraid, Kausalya.’ 

Her eyes widened. She knew it must cost him dearly to make such an admission. Even had they not been through such vicissitudes in their relationship, it would still be very hard for him to entrust her with such insight. It made her love for him swell even more. She put her other hand over his, gripping him as tightly as he gripped her. 

‘You will not walk alone, Dasa. I’m with you to the end.’ 

He shook his head. ‘It’s not the walk to death I fear, Kausalye. It’s the walk back to righteousness. I fear that I’ve done too much damage to repair. That I haven’t enough time for reparation. That you, my sons, our people, will all suffer the consequences of my mistakes.’ 

For a moment she was unable to fathom his meaning; then she understood. He was speaking not just as a husband, but as a king. ‘You have raised four fine sons. They will walk the path of righteousness for you.’ 

He half rose, face filled with an emotion she had never seen there before, a peculiar mingling of fear and shame and desperation. ‘That is what I fear most! You remember the dream I spoke of yesterday, or the day before, before I slept?’ 

She didn’t have the heart to tell him that it had been eight days ago, not one or two. ‘The one about killing the youth in the jungle, the son of the two blind paupers?’ 

‘The ones who cursed me,’ he said, then gasped in a deep breath. ‘I had more dreams. Terrible, awful dreams. I dreamed that the youth turned and looked up at me as he lay dying, and he was our son, Rama.’ 

She blinked several times, unprepared for this fresh assault. There were things she was not prepared to deal with yet, if ever. ‘Nothing will happen to our son,’ she said. ‘It was but a dream. Our son, all your sons, will do you proud, Dasa. They will carry on the work you began, and accomplish greater things than you ever dreamed.’ 

He shook his head, tears rolling down his face. Their hands remained entwined, but his grip had lost its strength. It felt too much like her mother’s hand as she lay dying in that dark and shadowy sickroom in another kingdom, another palace, another lifetime almost, it seemed now. And the Dasaratha who spoke next was the ageing and ailing, broken and defeated, Dasaratha.