Rebel Queen

by Michelle Moran

  “Where is Anu?” I asked, searching for my sister. “Anu!” I shouted, but she didn’t appear.

  “Anu is hiding,” Avani said. “She’s in her room. There are too many people.”

  I found her huddled on her charpai, her knees drawn up to her chest. If it was possible, she seemed even smaller and younger than before. “What are you doing in here?” I seated myself next to her, taking her in my arms.

  “I miss you so much,” she cried into my chest. Then she looked up at me through her wet lashes. She was wearing the yellow sari I had sent her; someday she would be a very beautiful woman. “Everybody is happy about you,” my sister said. “But I want you back.”

  “Oh, Anu,” I said, and stroked her hair. “I wish I could live here, too.”

  I coaxed her out into the crowd of smiling faces from all across Barwa Sagar, and everyone wanted to know the same things. What was the rani like? Was the palace as beautiful as they said? Did the maharaja own twenty-three elephants? What about the food, and the beds, and the baths? Did all women wear angarkhas, like me, or did they wear saris as well? Could I show them my pistol? Had I killed anyone yet?

  It was exhausting, and the last of the guests didn’t leave until sunrise, long after Anu had gone to bed. When the house was finally empty, Father came into my room and seated himself at the edge of my charpai. His bald head reflected the rising sun, turning his skin first gold, then orange. We both looked over at Anu, who moved as if she were dreaming. I took his hand and wrote, “I brought more earnings for her dowry fortune.”

  He traced over my palm. “You have changed in five months.”

  My eyes met his, and there was such intensity in his gaze that I became worried. Did he think I—the girl from the palace mirror—had become unrecognizable?

  “You’ve grown more confident,” he wrote. “None of the women in Jhansi keep purdah, do they?”

  “No.” I was worried about what he might say next.

  “Well, I don’t believe you should keep purdah here either.”

  My eyes met his.

  “Dadi-ji will be upset,” he predicted. “But when Shivaji and I go out, I want you to come with us.”

  Of all the gifts he might have given me on my return, this was the greatest.

  Chapter Thirteen

  I suppose you have something to say about the quality of your charpai now,” Grandmother remarked over breakfast the next morning. “You will be demanding a fancier bed, I imagine.”

  As always, her hair was perfectly combed. It swept over her shapely head like a waterfall, cascading down her back in three silver braids. But her sharp cheekbones, which other women envied, revealed her nature. She was all angles and no softness.

  I put down my bowl of yogurt and bananas. “Did you hear me complain?” I said.

  Anu gasped, and Grandmother’s eyes widened. I had never spoken to her with such disrespect.

  “How dare you!” She rose from her chair and I rose as well. I was taller, younger, stronger. She was not going to intimidate me anymore.

  “How dare I what, Dadi-ji? Answer you? Earn my sister’s dowry fortune?”

  “And what will you do? Go searching among the imbeciles who beg outside the temples to find her husband? I assume she’s told you how long it took for her to master making rotis?”

  “Do not insult Anuja.” I turned to my sister. “Anuja, has Grandmother been unkind to you?” Her letters had never said so.

  Grandmother laughed. “Oh, it’s not an insult. It’s the truth.”

  “You will never speak about her that way again!” My voice rose, and my sister covered her ears with her hands. “If I learn that you’ve beaten or insulted her, or acted in any other despicable way, you will be sorry.”

  “And exactly how will I be sorry?”

  “Someday, when your son is too old to work,” I said, “I will be the only one bringing money into this house.”

  “And you think he would let you starve me?”

  Her dismissal of my threat caused something inside of me to break. Suddenly, I was bamboo that not only bends, but snaps, creating edges that are sharp as knives. “I think no one knows which of us will die first,” I said. “And Lord Shiva help you if it’s your son.”

  I turned and walked away. Inside my room, I could hear Anu’s small feet hurrying behind me. She collapsed onto my charpai. “Dadi-ji is going to kill you!”

  “Anu, nothing could be further from the truth. And she is not going to treat you cruelly again. Here is something you must do differently: if she insults you, or threatens you in any way, you must write these words: ‘Dadi-ji has been very kind this week.’ ”

  Anu’s eyes opened wide.

  “Do you understand? She will still have someone read your letters, and you can never write the truth. But if I see that phrase, I will know, and I will come to help you.”

  Anu was speechless.

  “Can you repeat the phrase to me?”

  “Dadi-ji has been very kind.”

  “This week.”

  “This week,” she replied.

  I had changed. But not in the way Grandmother thought: I didn’t believe I was too good to sleep on a traditional charpai, and I certainly hadn’t grown so accustomed to the rich fruits and curries of the palace that I couldn’t enjoy Avani’s cooking. But it was as if my mind was an hourglass and the thoughts inside my head were the tiny grains of sand, and by becoming a Durgavasi, the hourglass had been turned completely upside down.

  For one thing, I understood more about cruelty. After living for five months with Kahini I understood that Grandmother’s bitterness was something she nurtured, feeding it like a vine until it choked out all other feelings. Secondly, I now understood what suffering meant, and could truly see the difference between the very rich and very poor. I’d had no idea that we were poor until I saw the splendors of the Panch Mahal. Yet the time spent at Mahalakshmi Temple, serving curry and sweets to people who would have no other meal—it made my life in Barwa Sagar seem fortunate. It also made me think that with enough charity and dedication, the people who lived on carpets with silver bowls had the ability to make other people’s lives better.

  I won’t pretend I was suddenly like Buddha, making keen observations about the world now that I was a part of it. But new ideas certainly occurred to me, and I found myself thinking about the rani’s guru, Shri Rama, wondering what he would say about life in Barwa Sagar and the women who lived inside like caged parrots.

  During a trip to the market with Father and Shivaji, I was the only woman walking in the streets. Men stared, and most of their gazes were hostile.

  “Does it feel strange to break purdah here?” Shivaji asked.

  “It did in the beginning. Now it feels like being a fish emptied from the bowl it’s spent most of its life in back into the river where it was actually born.”

  By December, the air was bitterly cold and I had read Arjun’s book of poetry twice. Our family was seated on thin cushions around the brazier while Avani fanned the coals, and I couldn’t help but think of the warmth of the palace, where rugs covered the stone floors and there were always enough blankets. Father took out the book he carried with him and held his pen over the heat, warming the ink. When it was ready, he wrote, “What use is Rumi at court? Why aren’t you practicing your English?”

  “The rani values poetry as much as anything else.”

  “Who could be a finer poet than Shakespeare?”

  I considered my answer. I didn’t want to offend him, but I also didn’t want to lie. “I believe Rumi may have been just as talented, Pita-ji.”

  Father frowned. He didn’t like this new direction.

  “At court,” I went on, “English is useful, but it’s also looked down upon.”

  “Why?”

  “Because the English are not well liked in Jhansi. There
are conflicts—”

  “Is that why you haven’t gone back?”

  It was the first time Father had questioned why I was staying in Barwa Sagar for so long. A vacation of a week, possibly even two, was believable. But Diwali had come and gone, and the rani’s child was due. Why wasn’t I at court to protect her?

  “I will return in two weeks,” I wrote.

  He didn’t press any further. But he glanced at my sister before writing, “I know someone well suited to her. And if their Janam Kundlis match, I would like to make the necessary arrangements.”

  Marriage would mean that Anu would go to her father-in-law’s house. Father would be alone with Avani and Dadi-ji, neither of whom could write.

  “Who?”

  “Ishan.”

  Shivaji’s son. I thought of his tenderness when he’d come to our courtyard to heal the broken wing of the tiny bulbul. He was only seven years older. And Anu would only be one house away. I wrote swiftly, “It’s perfect. More than perfect.” I found myself wondering who Father might have found for me if life had been different and I had been destined to marry. But I pushed these thoughts away, since they didn’t serve any purpose. I was forever duty-bound now to the rani. Fortune’s wheel had turned in a different direction for me.

  Father reached out and patted my leg. “Sab kuch bhagwan ke haath mein,” he wrote. And in Hindi, this means, It’s all in God’s hands.

  Father spoke with Shivaji, and it was agreed that a priest should be called to read the Janam Kundlis of the prospective bride and groom. I have already spoken about the difficulties of being born manglik. But neither my sister nor Ishan were bad-luck children, and according to the priest, their Janam Kundlis matched.

  When the priest was gone, Anu found me in the kitchen, placing bowls of water under the legs of the small table where we kept our vegetables so the insects couldn’t climb into the vegetable bowls.

  “Is it true?” she said. “Am I really going to marry Ishan?”

  “Yes. Next year. And I don’t think I need to tell you how fortunate you are that both of your charts matched.”

  Because Anu was a worrier, it took some days for her to become accustomed to the idea that her marriage had been arranged. Then, as I suspect most nine-year-olds do, she forgot about it entirely, opting instead to play with her dolls whenever she wasn’t helping our grandmother in the kitchen. And once the excitement of Anu’s marriage died down, there wasn’t much for me to do. It was too cold to visit the markets, or to go with Father to deliver his carvings. So I sat by the brazier and read Rumi.

  Be with those who help your being.

  Don’t sit with indifferent people,

  whose breath comes cold out of their mouths.

  Not these visible forms, your work is deeper.

  A chunk of dirt thrown in the air breaks to pieces.

  If you don’t try to fly,

  and so break yourself apart,

  you will be broken open by death,

  when it’s too late for all you could become.

  Leaves get yellow.

  The tree puts out fresh roots and makes them green.

  Why are you so content with a love that turns you yellow?

  The last line confused me. Why are you so content with a love that turns you yellow? What love did I have that was mediocre?

  At last a courtier arrived with a retinue of seventeen soldiers to bring me back to Jhansi.

  I had the strange feeling of wanting to be in two places at once, like a sailor who misses the sea as much as he misses dry land. I was sad to kiss Anu and Father good-bye, but at the same time, I felt duty-bound to the rani. And I missed the other Durgavasi.

  I mounted Sher, who had been forced to take shelter in Shivaji’s stable these past four weeks, and my sister reached up to hand me a small box of sweets.

  “I made laddus,” she said. “Your favorite.”

  “Thank you, Anu.” I realized that the next time I returned, it would be for her wedding. “Be kind to Pita-ji,” I told her. “And listen to Dadi-ji. You remember what I told you?”

  She nodded.

  “I’ll see you soon,” I promised.

  Chapter Fourteen

  I studied Jhalkari in the warm glow of the brazier. She’d grown thinner in the past month, and now, she looked less like the rani. There were other changes as well. While we’d been gone, carpets had been hung on the walls of the queen’s room to keep out the cold, and there were thicker, plusher carpets on the ground. Servants had brought in a dozen braziers, and the other Durgavasi huddled around them in small groups. Jhalkari and I were in the farthest corner of the chamber, separated from the others by the fountain, which had been stopped for the winter.

  “So where is Kahini?” I asked. A very foolish part of me hoped that the truth had been exposed and Kahini had been banished from the Durga Dal.

  But Jhalkari had returned a day earlier, and she gave me a look. “In the rani’s chamber, with Sundari-ji.”

  “So Sundari-ji never told the rani—”

  “How could she? There would have to be proof. Without it, Sundari-ji could lose her position, which Kahini would love. She’s already cost the rani’s physician his job. When the rani asked a British doctor—Dr. McEgan—about the status of the plague, he said he hadn’t heard anything. Then the rani summoned her physician to her chambers and demanded to know where the two victims had been buried. But, of course, there were none. So when he couldn’t tell her, she dismissed him as a liar.”

  It was amazing to me that there were people who went through life like a sickle, cutting down everything in their path, except for what was useful to them. Didn’t the hard work of constant destruction ever tire Kahini? Didn’t it become depressing? Even Lord Shiva, the Destroyer of Worlds, regretted his act of burning down Tripura after it was done.

  “Anyway, the rani won’t be leaving her chamber now until the baby comes due. We’re only allowed inside if we’re called.”

  “Does she know that we’ve returned?”

  Jhalkari watched me for a moment. “You mean, does she know that you’ve returned? Because I don’t think she has any reason to summon me.”

  I’m sure my cheeks turned the color of my angarkha. I changed the subject.

  “Imagine if it’s a girl,” I said.

  “Shhh,” Jhalkari cautioned severely. “No one should say that. It has to be a son.”

  Later that evening, the rani finally summoned me to her chamber. I hoped I might run into Arjun there, but two men I’d never seen were guarding the doors.

  The sun had dipped below the horizon, and the chamber walls were burnished orange. I expected to see the rani tucked into her bed, buried in half a dozen covers this late in December. But instead, she was pacing near open windows, her long blue robe flowing behind her like a stream and opened to reveal her very round stomach. She had grown prettier in the time I was gone, softened by the extra weight of her child.

  “Sita,” she said as soon as she saw me, and from the way she spoke my name, I knew she regretted sending me from Jhansi. “Oh, Sita.” She closed her robe and walked toward me.

  I made the gesture of namaste and touched her feet. “It is an honor to return to your service, Your Highness.”

  There were tears in her eyes. I had not expected to see the rani in tears, and certainly not over me. She took my hands in hers and then guided me to her bed. She drew the covers over her chest and indicated the padded stool so that I could sit near her. “Tell me about your father and grandmother and little sister.”

  “Father, Grandmother, and Anuja are all very well, Your Highness.”

  Her face brightened. “Your sister must be preparing for her marriage.”

  “Yes. Because Your Highness was gracious enough to accept me as a Durgavasi, I’ll be able to provide her with a dowry fortune. Father made a
very suitable match while I was home, and the engagement ceremony will take place next month.”

  “I should never have sent you and the other women away. My physician was either incompetent or deluded. I suppose you heard there were never any messengers from Delhi?”

  “Yes. Jhalkari told me what you discovered.”

  “Well, my doctor has been dismissed,” she said, “and Dr. Bhagwat has taken his place. Kahini arranged it all. She interviewed new physicians—”

  “And Your Highness thinks this is a wise decision?” I blurted.

  The rani’s expression changed. She looked disappointed with me. “Sita, Kahini grew up at court. Our childhoods were very similar. And no one”—she emphasized the words no one—“is better suited to understanding what a rani requires in a physician than she is.”

  I lowered my head in shame.

  We sat in silence. Then the rani took a stack of letters from her bedside table. “Deliver these to Gopal,” she said. “Make sure to convey them as soon as you leave this chamber.”

  “Yes, Your Highness.”

  “And Sita, be careful of assuming too much.”

  I was dismissed. Outside the rani’s chamber, Arjun had replaced one of the guards. As soon as he saw me, he grinned.

  “I heard you were back.” He searched my face, and I knew I should say something about his book.

  “It was a long time to be gone,” I admitted, “but Rumi was a great help in passing the time.”

  “Then you read his poetry?”

  “Yes.”