Discussing the city’s defence, the six councilors exited the council chamber and walked to the end of the gallery, where it branched into three. Kshapanaka and Amara Simha hurried off in one direction, while Varahamihira limped down a flight of stairs. Shanku went off to put the Palace Guards on alert and have a messenger dispatched to Vikramaditya, leaving only Kalidasa in Vetala Bhatta’s company. The giant was about to turn away to dispense his duties, when the raj-guru laid a hand on his shoulder.
“The visions are still bothering you, I presume.” Vetala Bhatta’s voice was gentle and full of sympathy, but his eyes were sharp as they searched Kalidasa’s face.
The giant nodded. “In the Mother Oracle’s opinion, they are from my lost childhood.”
The Acharya waited to see if Kalidasa would mention the Healer, but he didn’t. With a nod of his own, the raj-guru let his hand slip back to his side. The Council of Nine had never kept secrets from one another before, and the giant was almost like a son to him. “You should go and get Angamitra’s search party organized,” he said, trying to conceal his disenchantment.
As the Acharya turned to go and seek out the Mother Oracle, Kalidasa spoke again. “If they are visions from childhood, I know at least one thing now – my childhood had something horrible to do with the Hunas.”
Vetala Bhatta stared. “How do you know that?”
“Instead of fighting them, I have been trying to let the visions reveal themselves to me. The Mother Oracle suggested that might help. Early this morning, for the first time, I saw something new in one of the visions. The one where the man with the drawn bow is chasing me on horseback, remember?” The Acharya nodded. “You thought the man looked familiar.”
“I still don’t know who he is, but the man is a Huna. I am certain because he is marked with the hriiz – a big, black scorpion carved in the middle of his forehead.”
Turning his broad back on the Acharya, Kalidasa descended the stairs. The chief councilor stood for a few moments watching the giant depart, afraid of the horrors that lay hidden in that mind, waiting to creep out. If the savages from the Marusthali had had anything to do with the giant’s childhood, it was no surprise that the trauma had wiped the boy’s memory clean. If there were Hunas in Kalidasa’s childhood, it would have been best had they remained forgotten.
Vetala Bhatta had begun tracing his way to the Mother Oracle’s chamber when the hiss broke over Ujjayini. It seeped through the air, through the palace walls and through the silence, cold and predatory, taking an icy grip on the Acharya’s heart. It came from the time before time, a sound like no sound, stifling everything in its path in spreading waves of terror.
Man-Lion
Fear coiled itself tightly around Shukracharya the moment the chilling hiss came to his ears.
The bones were wrong about the yaksha, he thought to himself, leaping to his feet with a curse and hastening to the window. The mystical being from Kubera’s court was not lying in wait in some forest after all – it was here in Ujjayini, seeking out Veeshada’s dagger. And he wasn’t prepared for it because the bones had it all wrong.
Thrusting his head out of the window, the high priest looked in all directions to try and locate the source of the diabolical sound, but the hiss seemed to come from everywhere – seemed to be everywhere. The ragged shouts of palace guards rose from somewhere down below, followed by the panicked rush of feet, and across the length of the courtyard, Shukracharya thought he glimpsed Shanku and three guards dart across a far gallery.
“There, in the sky,” a voice rang out from far away, carried to him by wonder and fear. Even as the high priest raised his head, he heard the voice again. “Up there… to the west.”
The windows of his chamber opened to the northeast, however, and commanded a view of a different section of the sky. Whirling around, Shukracharya hurried out of the room, following the gallery to an open terrace that overlooked the palace causeway. He stepped onto the terrace, his eyes on the western sky, but all the high priest initially saw were the clouds, heavy and moping.
A moment later, his vision was drawn to one patch of cloud. It was darker than the ones around it, and its shape shifted quicker as well, as if it was subject to a unique set of natural laws. From light grey to slate to black, it changed colour in a matter of seconds, twisting and weaving across the sky in eerie patterns, until the high priest began making out the contours of something enormous and menacing concealed in its folds and shadows.
This was no yaksha, he realized. Yet, the relief he should have felt was missing.
All of a sudden, the cloud composed itself into a dense mass, and in the twinkling of the eye, it transformed into the head and neck of a mammoth serpent, the rest of its body still obscured by the clouds. Shukracharya could almost hear a collective gasp escape from Ujjayini as he stared at the black head with its plume of black and brown feathers, and its harsh, amber eyes.
He could scarcely believe what he was seeing.
“What misery might this be?” whispered a voice from somewhere close. The high priest turned to see a clutch of courtiers and palace attendants gaping at the grotesque creature from a neighbouring terrace.
It is a misery like few others in all three worlds, Shukracharya was tempted to remark. But nothing he said could convey the horror of the thing in the sky better than the beast itself – and he was certain the beast would very shortly put up a grand display of what it was capable of.
As if taking a cue from the high priest’s thoughts, the serpent unhinged its jaws and squirted a viscous, grey liquid down at Ujjayini. From where he stood, Shukracharya had no way of knowing where the venomous discharge had landed, but he saw a cloud of dust kick up from somewhere across the lake. At the same time, he felt a tremor under his feet as the ground shook for a fraction of a second. Then, as the cloud of dust slowly mushroomed into the air, the wind bore the echoes of screams.
The screams galvanized the palace into action. The cries and commands of palace guards rose up from the courtyard below, growing louder as the hissing suddenly ceased and the serpent vanished from sight in a smoky swirl. Hooves thundered on the causeway, and Shukracharya saw Amara Simha and Kshapanaka ride out at the head of a dozen soldiers. Vetala Bhatta emerged into the courtyard, issuing instructions to the palace guards.
The high priest did not wait to see more. He needed to know what – and who – had brought the primordial serpent-dragon Ahi to Ujjayini.
Shukracharya retraced his steps to his chamber at a fast clip. However, on turning a sharp corner, he nearly cannoned into a figure coming from the opposite direction. Drawing up short, he noticed that the pockmarked face inches away from his own was that of the lame councilor Varahamihira.
“Where were you?” the councilor’s eyebrows rose in surprise. “I’ve been looking for you all over the palace.” “Looking for me?” Shukracharya’s tone was guarded. “Why?”
“I want you to come with me. Dhanavantri is not in Ujjayini, and the city needs a physician of your talent and experience.”
“Where do you want me to come?”
“Wherever that monster creates havoc, I suppose. The only way of knowing where you might be wanted is by stepping out of the palace. Come.”
The councilor hopped around on his crutch to lead the way, but the high priest hung back. “I… I don’t think I can go…” Seeing the councilor’s dark face turn back at him sharply, he added, “I… need to see the queen… shortly.”
“You heard the screams from across the lake. The need of Ujjayini’s citizens is far greater right now,” Varahamihira spoke evenly, his eyes searching Shukracharya’s face. At just that moment, the discordant notes of alarm bells struck up around Ujjayini. The councilor cocked an ear at them before looking back at the high priest with a light shrug and a told-you-so expression. “Don’t worry about the queen – you can’t see her for a while anyway. Let’s go.”
At a loss for excuses, the high priest allowed himself to be led into the courtyard, which w
as in a state of ferment. Palace guards ran about securing doors and gates, and setting up defences along the causeway, even though their manner showed precisely what they thought of the precautions they were taking against the beast overhead. Every now and then, they cast apprehensive glances skyward, but the demon itself had not reappeared – though, in a strange way, its absence only heightened the fear already instilled in the men. The pealing of the alarm bells had risen to a deafening roar, and Shukracharya had to lean into the councilor’s ear to make himself heard.
“I don’t have a horse,” he shouted, trying not to sound hopeful. “And no one here is exactly in a position to spare me theirs.”
Acting almost as if he hadn’t registered a word, Varahamihira motioned with his fingers, urging the high priest to keep up with him. Frustrated but helpless, Shukracharya tagged along, and they traversed the length of a covered portico and rounded a corner. In front of them stood an open, two-horse chariot under a thorny babul tree.
“You have a chariot?” the high priest feigned surprise to keep his disappointment from showing.
“How else do you think I move around with this leg of mine?” Varahamihira hoisted himself aboard the chariot and made room for the high priest. “Come, Ujjayini needs your services.”
* * *
Kshapanaka and Amara Simha watched the man emerge, ghost-like, out of the cloak of dust. He broke into a staggering run, wilting under the weight of the young girl he was carrying in his arms, his mouth moving in a silent wail of distress. Tears flowed down his cheeks, leaving wet trails across the layer of chalky dust that coated his face and lay in heavy sprinkles over his head and shoulders. Dust covered the girl as well, imparting vividness to the red splotch of blood clotting on her left temple. The girl was limp in the man’s arms, one hand dangling loose in a way that inspired neither confidence nor hope.
The man approached the councilors and the small company of soldiers, but instead of slowing down and appealing for aid, he carried past them as if they were invisible to him. He made no sign of noticing the tattered ring of onlookers either, curious but fearful townsfolk who hung back and watched the pall of dust, ready to bolt at the first sign of threat.
“Somebody, help him,” Kshapanaka hailed over the pealing of the alarm bells, waving her hand at the nearest clump of onlookers.
Two people from the crowd stepped forward, jittery and tentative, but the man brushed past them blindly, a high-pitched moan breaking from his lips. Kshapanaka followed the man’s anguished and delirious run with sympathy until he disappeared around a bend in the street. When she turned back to the dust-obscured locality that was home to Ujjayini’s ironmongers and metalworkers, her face was flushed with anger.
She urged her horse forward and the others followed. They picked their way through the stone-paved street, strewn with rubble and pocked with craters, slowly pushing inward through the blinding dust, which was wracked by the screams of the maimed and the bereaved. People ran helter-skelter across the councilors’ path, and where the dust thinned, the visitors from the palace could see collapsed houses and caved-in roofs.
“Salutations, your honour,” said a captain of the City Watch, materializing out of the dust. “There are many buried under the debris. They will die if they’re not pulled out soon. We need help.”
Amara Simha nodded and addressed one of the soldiers in the group. “Get a message out to the five closest City Watch posts. Tell them to send as many people for rescue work as possible. Enlist labourers working on the city walls, get volunteers from the public… Ask that lot outside not to just stand around but to pitch in… Quick!”
As the soldier turned his mount around to carry out the instructions, a man and a woman blundered out of the dust. The woman was supporting the man, who was bleeding from a crushing wound to his shoulder. Seeing them limp out of sight, Amara Simha waved the dust from his face and looked at the captain. “How bad is it really?”
“Hard to say, your honour,” the captain replied. “Several houses further down the street have been flattened, that much I know. Many are trapped, and many have…” he paused, struggling to find the right word, “…many have melted.” “Melted?” Kshapanaka asked sharply.
“Like wax,” the captain shivered. “The spittle from the creature’s mouth melts the flesh and bone into pulp. I saw three people die that way – it is horrible.”
“Did the venom also destroy the houses?”
“Yes, your honour. Everything that comes in contact with it breaks or melts.”
“Any idea how many…” Kshapanaka began, when a sudden wave of frenetic cries sprang up from all sides, cutting her short.
The horses instinctively reared and sidled, snorting in fear. Fighting to control their mounts, the councilors and soldiers shot nervous glances at one another, but before a word could be exchanged, the ground beneath them trembled under the impact of something heavy. Cracks instantly appeared underfoot, and the street listed alarmingly to one side, causing the horses to slip and slide and struggle to find a firm footing. More shouts and screams rent the air, followed by the panicked rush of feet.
“It is the creature again,” yelled Kshapanaka, wheeling her horse around and making for the break in the curtain of dust. “Archers, come with me.”
The councilor burst into the open street with her bow in hand, an arrow nocked in place. Behind her came three horse archers of the City Watch, bows and arrows at the ready. Balancing herself on the stirrups, Kshapanaka searched the sky overhead, but except for the dreary grey clouds, it appeared vacant. Then her eyes alighted on two young women cowering under a doorway and pointing high over her shoulder. Reining her horse in, Kshapanaka turned to see the serpent hovering low over the rooftops of a neighbouring locality, from where a fresh cloud of dust had started rising into the air. Executing another about turn, the councilor spurred her horse in the opposite direction.
Amara Simha and the rest of the company of soldiers emerged from the dust just in time to see Kshapanaka and the horse archers disappear down the end of the street. Without wasting a second, the burly councilor went in pursuit, throwing an order at the men to follow him. Their charge took them down winding lanes and back alleys packed with houses, but through the breaks between buildings, the men were able to catch occasional glimpses of the black, wet body of the serpent. With every turn, the men drew closer to the creature, until finally they spilled into a broad street that led to the marketplace.
Pulling up, Amara Simha looked first one way then the other for Kshapanaka. Then he froze.
Kshapanaka and the three archers had had a head start, and the quartet now stood in the middle of the deserted street with their bows drawn taut, taking aim at the plumed head of the monster swaying menacingly over the rooftops. The serpent, for its part, was assessing the councilor and the bowmen with its narrow, malevolent eyes, its eager black tongue flicking in and out of its mouth. Time stood still in the street, and even the pealing of the alarm bells seemed to fade into a void of suspense.
Using her knees, Kshapanaka slowly urged her mount forward and closer to the serpent; the horse archers did likewise, only with a lot less resolve. As Amara Simha watched, scarcely daring to breathe, Kshapanaka pulled the bowstring back one last inch before letting the arrow fly. A split-second later, the three horse archers also shot their arrows, the four twangs sounding like one as they resonated in the stillness of the avenue.
The four arrows lifted toward the serpent in perfect synchrony. The monster, however, barely blinked as it followed the ascent of the barbs, and when the arrows struck its head and snout, Amara Simha saw splashes of muddy water spurt into the air at the points where the shafts had made contact. The next moment, the four arrows disappeared into the serpent’s body, as if swallowed whole, and all that remained were minute ripples on the creature’s shiny, wet skin.
It was as if the arrows had been shot into a pool of water, Amara Simha thought as the serpent, unharmed and now filled with spite, raised its
head high and opened its mouth in retaliation.
“Watch out!” The warning tore its way out of Amara Simha’s throat, but it was too late.
Ensnared in the monster’s hypnotic gaze, Kshapanaka and the bowmen stood rooted as the dreadful hiss unfolded from the serpent’s throat. A chill draught rustled up the street, bringing with it the whispering odour of old battlefields and dungeons, and Amara Simha had to fight to keep fear from entering his heart. Then, with a sudden hacking cough, the creature spat a stream of its deadly venom at its assailants.
His eyes widening in horror, Amara Simha saw Kshapanaka bear the brunt of the attack. The spray hit the councilor and her mount square, its force unseating her from the saddle and hurling her backward into the street. While her horse gave a piteous neigh and distorted into a mangled, squishy pulp, Kshapanaka herself went rolling until she came to a stop against a wall. Meanwhile, the three horse archers and their mounts dissolved into shapeless pools of bubbling, blistering flesh, while steaming cracks surfaced on the street where the venom spattered.
The serpent paused to survey the damage it had wrought before swooping and stretching along the length of the street, its eyes on Kshapanaka – dead still, disheveled, her clothes in tatters, but otherwise miraculously unscathed by the venom. The monster weaved through the air until it hovered over the councilor, its tongue flicking the air suspiciously. Suddenly, its eyes turned a hateful shade of yellow. Arching its neck once again, the creature opened its mouth to eject venom over the councilor.
The sight of Kshapanaka lying defenceless on the road as the obscene black cavity opened above her filled Amara Simha with a red, boiling rage. The girl had grown up in front of his eyes, a wisp of a child who had never understood the complexities of Sanskrit grammar, but who could outshoot Ujjayini’s best archers before she turned twelve. He still remembered the first time he had put a bow in the girl’s hands, she had very nearly buried an arrow into his small toe. He had been convinced she would never shoot straight, and now she lay at the monster’s mercy because she had learnt to wield a bow as few others had.
The Conspiracy at Meru Page 25