by J. F. Collen
Hemit didn’t worry. Achan understood the importance of a new mahout having a say in a match that lasted a lifetime. He’d taken Dhaval to Sonepur years ago, and he’d promised to do the same for Hemit. Happiness filled Hemit. In less than a year, he would embark on his new life and transform from boy to man, from elephant handler to elephant driver. A true mahout!
Watching Ravi with the elephants, Hemit shook his head. Ravi held the longest, sharpest training knife in his hand. “You don’t need that,” Hemit yelled. Ravi ignored him and continued to put distance between him and the elephants. He’s no braver than a flapshell turtle. At the first sign of a threat, instead of standing his ground, Ravi retreated into his shell and closed the flap. “You grumble to me about our family’s cruel training methods and look at you. You’re just as bad. All talk and no action.”
“It’s not like I’m really using it.” He smiled his snaggletoothed smile. “It’s just for effect.” The elephant advanced, and Ravi hesitated between moving forward or backward, and then he retreated.
“You care more about yourself and pleasing your achan than you do about the elephants.”
Ravi’s eyes said it all. They screamed, “Well, of course I do. Don’t you?”
But Hemit didn’t care about pleasing Achan. He didn’t know how or when, but he would work tirelessly until their methods of training improved. Hemit couldn’t watch anymore. He loved Ravi like a brother, but his cousin’s cowardly ways gnawed under his skin like a hungry tick.
A blurry shape exited the jungle. Quick as a sambar deer, it leaped into the dell and stopped. It disappeared into the crown of Lord Krishna blooms. Hemit curled his fingers into a fist, leaving a small hole at the end, and looked through it. “Where’d it go?” It popped back up and dashed up the winding trail. As the form got closer, he shouted, “Bella?”
“There you are,” the pint-sized ball of energy squealed behind the fence. She adjusted the crown of flowers falling off her head.
Hemit looked around and narrowed his eyes. No Auntie? Six-year-old Bella had traveled from Bombay to spend the summer with Uncle Ajay and his family. She might know how to navigate a big city, but not a jungle. The only lethal animals in Bombay stood on two legs, not four.
Hemit opened the gate to leave, closed it safely behind him, and caught up with Bella. She jumped into his arms, and he twirled her around until she yelped for him to stop. Placing her on the ground, he asked, “What are you doing here, Bella?”
“I followed you.”
“You little beast. Are you a black panther stalking its prey? We never heard you.” Hemit rolled his head back and laughed. “Or maybe I did. It was you following me and not a jungle cat.”
“Or a squirrel.” She grinned, exposing dimples on both cheeks. He picked up one of her wayward braids and tickled her nose with the coarse end.
“Prickly, like an elephant tail,” she laughed.
He knelt down. Looking her in the eye, he said, “Bella, it’s very dangerous to be in the jungle by yourself. You could have gotten lost or worse.” His breath quickened. “There’s a tiger on the prowl. Promise me you won’t do that again.”
Bella put her hands on her hips and puckered her mouth. Hemit held back a chuckle. His little cousin had such difficulty obeying rules, even those meant to keep her safe. She rolled her big brown eyes. “I promise,” she said.
She probably has her fingers crossed behind her back. “Come here. Let’s watch the elephants.” He lifted her up and placed her feet on one of the rungs of the sturdy fence railing.
She wrapped her fists around the fence railing and peeked over the edge, grinning.
“Can you see now?” Hemit stood beside her with his hand on the small of her back.
Bella giggled. “It’s pretty hard not to see an elephant.”
Hemit tweaked her braid. “Aren’t you a mischievous monkey today? Should I start calling you Hanuman?”
Bella frowned. “Are you saying I look like a monkey?”
“No, of course not. Monkeys are much cuter.”
She gasped and Hemit held back a snort. He should feel awful teasing her, but she deserved it after her naughtiness. Didn’t she? Besides, poor Auntie probably fretted herself into a frenzy after Bella’s latest vanishing act. He’d love to ease Auntie’s mind about Bella’s safety, but with so much work left unfinished, Achan would serve his head on a stick if he left.
Achan’s elephant, Jani, left the herd and darted to Hemit. She stuck her trunk between the rail, snaked it around his waist, and pulled him close. Hemit laughed. “I’m glad to see you too.”
Achan didn’t believe Jani loved Hemit. He had said, “Animals don’t love. She’s happy to see you because you bring her water and food, trim her nails, give her baths, and take her for walks. I’d be happy to see you too if you fed me appam pancakes all day.”
More than a full belly and a clean hide made Jani light up whenever she saw him. She loved him. Achan didn’t know everything, even though he thought he did. With soft strokes, Bella petted Jani’s trunk, and she rumbled her happiness.
Achan and Dhaval marched down the path. Achan scrunched his face like an angry monkey. He rushed over and ordered Jani back to the herd. She ignored his command. Achan entered the courtyard and took the iron hook to her until Jani whimpered and fell to her knees.
Bella gasped.
Achan yelled, “You should know better, Hemit. We’re in the middle of training.”
Hemit’s stomach twisted into a knot. If only he had the nerve to steal the ankus and poke Achan with it. Let him see how it felt to get stabbed. It took everything out of him not to charge through the fence and make Achan stop using the elephant goad. But he didn’t dare. He’d never win that fight.
Jani looked over her shoulder before joining the herd. Her pain coursed through him as if it were his own. He felt her agony. Those eyes screamed, “Help me,” but his fear of Achan turned him powerless. Why couldn’t anyone else recognize the elephant’s sadness at each betrayal? Their pleading? Their confusion? This connection sliced through him, sharp as a dagger, and continued to hurt like a wound that never healed.
“Sorry, Jani,” he whispered under his breath. He turned to Bella and wiped away the tears that threatened to fall down her cheeks. “I’m sorry, Bella.” The words rang hollow to his ears.
“How come they hurt them, Hemit?”
Raking his fingers through his thick hair, he hesitated. He was practically a man, and he didn’t understand why they hurt them. How could a girl of six? “It’s always been that way, Bella.”
The mid-morning sun blazed, and he wiped away the sweat dripping from his neck. The sadness in Bella’s eyes tugged at him. “Don’t worry. We’ll figure something out.” Her smile rewarded him.
The elephants suffered from the unrelenting heat. They flapped their ears to cool down, but remained lethargic and irritable. In the wild, the herd would have moved deeper into the jungle where the air was crisper, but captives didn’t have that choice.
Achan tramped across the stable yard, stirring up powdery dust clouds in his path. “Hemit, take Jani down to the river. Give her a bath. Let her cool down. When you’re done, bring her back. Then do the same for Kari.”
“Yes, Achan.” Hemit jumped down from the bottom rung of the fence.
“Don’t forget to pray to one of the elephant gods before mounting her.”
Hemit had ten gods to choose from, one for each part of the elephant’s body, from its forehead to its feet. He settled on Lord Ganesha, the remover of obstacles, and Varjanya, the god of the elephant’s heart. Ganesha for safety and the Varjanya for compassion. Between the two, maybe they could convince Achan to throw away the ankush.
With several long breaths, Hemit quieted his mind. In a soft voice, he recited: “Lord Ganesh, son of Lord Shiva, remover of obstacles, guardian of the doorway to the enlightened realms. May you bless us with good beginnings.” He smiled at Bella. “You stay here.” That twinkle in her eyes alarmed h
im. The little one did as she pleased. “If you do as I say, you can come with Jani and me to the river.”
Was she deciding the world’s fate? She pressed her lips into a firm line, pulled her brows in, and smoothed the wrinkles from her sari before answering. “It’s a fair bargain.”
Satisfied she would do as told, at least for the moment, Hemit opened the gate to the fenced corral and grabbed the ankush leaning against the wooden rail. With catlike movements—unhurried and calm—he approached Jani from the left. She beat her trunk on the ground and rumbled a welcoming. A good, long pee signaled her happiness.
As much as he hated to, Hemit used the ankush to guide her to his right. He didn’t want Achan to transform into Lord Shiva and perform the Rudra Tandava dance, shaking in fury. He’d already seen him angry enough for one today.
Standing in front of Jani, he grabbed each ear and pulled down hard. She lowered herself, and he clambered up her trunk and sat on top of her head. An easy smile spread across his face. The bird’s eye view lasted for miles, and the lush green mountains and trees and cerulean blue sky cleared his head and settled his soul. He used the smooth side of the small hook to guide Jani out of the pen and toward Bella. “Are you going to wait here or come with me down to the river?”
“With you!” She ran, pigtails flip-flapping behind her. “Why isn’t Ravi coming?”
“He’ll be getting his own elephant soon. Uncle Ajay wants him to keep working with the elephants so he’ll be ready.” Hemit smiled. “No fun for Ravi.”
“More fun for us,” she shouted as she ran next to him.
Hemit raised his chin. Served Ravi right. In the past, he’d have excused Ravi’s actions, but not today. He’s always saying one thing and doing another, and it’s not fair. Hemit shouted, “That’s right, Bella. More fun for just you and me and Jani.” Ravi’s look of betrayal almost wrenched Hemit’s heart as much as Jani’s pain. Why is Ravi trying to make me feel sorry for him? Hemit sighed. Because it works. “Come on, Bella. Let’s go.”
Usually the emerald-green jungle teemed with life, but the drought had sucked the life out of the living. Brown leaves crackled under Jani’s feet. The river, muddy and not nearly as deep as it was several months ago, flowed rather than raged. The drought made everything smell old and stagnant. He missed the smell of rain, fresh and earthy and pungent. He stood on Jani’s back and steered her into the deepest part of the river, where it was over her head. Jani drew the water into her trunk and squirted it into her mouth. She sucked up more and spurted it into the air, spraying herself and Hemit. Hemit laughed. “So you want to play, do you?” He slipped from her back into the water and came up for air, shaking the water from his hair.
Using all four legs to paddle, she kept her face above and her mouth below the water’s surface, and thrust her trunk up in the air to breathe. It always amazed Hemit how such big animals could motor across the river, quick as a boat. She dove under and reappeared down the river. Hemit laughed and yelled, “You think you can hide from me?” He wagged his finger. “You get back here.” She dove under again, and popped up closer. Hemit swam to her and jumped on her back. “I’m refreshed. How about you, Jani?”
As they headed to shore, Hemit said, “You’re having yourself a good time, aren’t you?” She trumpeted. Out of all the elephants, Jani enjoyed swimming the most. Achan said that elephants once swam from India to Sri Lanka, where they settled. Hemit had no doubt that Jani could make the journey. She never tired from swimming.
Hemit tugged Jani to a shallow pool of water and rested her on her side. Bella stood at the shore with her hands on her hips and a pout on her face. Hemit motioned her to join them. She lifted up the hem of her new sari and tiptoed into the cool water. “And why wasn’t I invited?”
“I didn’t know you could swim?”
“Of course I can. I’m not a rock.”
“I thought you wouldn’t want to get your fancy sari wet!”
Bella glowed like a ball of fire. She spun around with a lopsided grin, showing off the fiery red fabric and the thick gold trim. “Amma bought it for me.” She batted her eyelashes. “She said gold and red make my eyes pop.”
With a sly move, Hemit picked up two round stones. “She’s right.” He displayed them in the palm of his outstretched hand. “They’ve popped right out of your head. Do you want them back?”
Bella laughed. “Oh, Hemit.” She flicked her hand in the water, splattering him.
“Feels good, doesn’t it?” Hemit asked.
Bella nodded and splashed the cool water on her arms and neck. Her long, wiry hair framed her face. “Aren’t elephants too fat to swim?”
“They’re very buoyant.”
Her eyes, brown and bright as two nuts, blinked.
“It means that the bigger they are, the better they float.”
“Hmm. Auntie must be very boy-yant then,” she said in her frank but honest way.
Hemit held back a chuckle. “You better not say that to her unless you want her to send you back to Bombay. Come here and help me.”
Bella shrugged and ran to him.
“Stay still, Jani.” He and Bella poured water over Jani’s flanks and took fistfuls of sand and scrubbed her clean. Hemit inspected the folds of her wrinkled skin and removed any trapped mud with a trimmed coconut husk. “Next side, Jani girl.” She tottered to her feet and laid back down, revealing her unwashed side. Hemit pounded her feet and legs until clean, too.
She resembled a huge black rock, wet and ebony-dark. Her eyes looked dreamy and pleasure-filled, and she smiled a silly grin. “You love this, don’t you girl?” She flapped her big ears. Once scrubbed from ear to hoof, Hemit inspected her eyes. “Look, Bella. Her eyes are a little watery and crusty.”
“Is she sad from crying?”
“No, her eyes are irritated. I’ll mash some tender buds of the ambazham plant with honey and remove it with a cloth when we get back. Then she’ll be as good as new.”
After one more quick wash down, they headed home. Along the way, Hemit gathered palm and coconut fronds and used his kukri knife to cut them into hand-sized pieces. She snatched them with her trunk, shoved them in her mouth and eyeballed him for more. He put his hands in the air. “Sorry, Jani. This is all I could find.”
She stomped her foot and flapped her ears. She ripped up dry grass with her trunk and pushed it into her mouth. Next, she swayed her trunk back and forth, searching for the scent of something delectable. She walked up to a banyan tree, reached into the canopy, stripped some bark from the trunk, and devoured that too. She purred and coiled her nose tight, like a pillbug.
Squeaky clean and sand-free, all bodies had dried before they reached the elephant camp. Hemit led Jani inside. He cringed at the tone of Achan’s voice. “Move, Kari. Move, you sister of a pig.”
Not Kari. Kari, the largest in the herd, had a brave and strong presence due to her enormity, but Hemit knew her as a sensitive and timid soul that spooked too easily and knew how to hold a grudge! Hemit put his arm on Bella. “Stay here.” He rode Jani inside the penned stable.
Achan took a long-knifed stick and repeatedly stabbed Kari’s ankles until she flattened her ears against her neck, retreated backward, and sat. Her eyes held the most grief-stricken expression Hemit had ever witnessed. He dismounted Jani and ran to stand between Achan and Kari. He folded his arms and spread his legs wide. Then, he shook out his neck as if limbering up for a fight.
“You are killing her spirit,” Hemit said.
“Move over and let me do my job.” Achan ran a hand through his hair. His eyes turned feral. Amma called it his “crazy wolfman” look, and those colorless, unblinking eyes signaled Achan’s simmering rage could easily surge into a rolling boil.
Usually Hemit knew to stop, but today he didn’t care. “Achan! Can’t you see? She’s scared.”
“Hemit, go home. Now!” Achan’s tall, threatening figure stood firm.
Hemit bit the inside of his cheek until it bled, and he turned aw
ay in anger, fighting back tears. Ravi and Hemit exchanged knowing looks. Both boys’ achans wanted total control over their sons and their elephants. While Hemit at least had enough courage to try and fight for what he believed, Ravi simply followed orders like a sheep. Tight-lipped Ravi offered no support, turned his head, and resumed stabbing the elephant with his ankush.
If Ravi had more courage, we could stand up to them and demand change. But that wouldn’t happen. Ravi feared his achan even more than he feared the elephants. Hemit clenched his fists at his sides. Would he need to fight this battle alone?
—-End of Special Sneak Preview—-
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