by Kevin Missal
“Look at the proud one. At least one of us is not trapped,” Kripa gleefully said.
“Pisach! Pisach!” The words were gibberish and before Kripa could speak again, Kalki signalled at his tied arms.
“Open,” he said to Shuko. “Bite,” he motioned at his hands.
Shuko flapped his wings and reached down, and with his sharp beak began to tear the knots apart. As the rope splintered and the last strands were undone, he freed his hands from the restraints. Kalki, grinning, patted Shuko as he went for his legs, opening the remaining restraints at ease.
“Fast, fast, the shadows,” Kripa hissed under his breath.
Kalki swivelled his head and from the entrance of the dark caves, the moonlight allowed Kalki to see a shadow appear. He hadn’t realized it was dark outside now. For how long had he fainted? By the gods, he had to be fast. The shadow materialized, and it was none other than the huge Simha. He was crouching with bumbling hands and arms around his gigantic body. Kalki hurriedly undid the knots on Kripa and then started opening Padma’s.
“I’ll rescue the others,” he said as Padma looked at him questionably.
“You could have just ignored me,” Padma gritted her teeth as Kripa helped Kalki free the others.
“Okay, we don’t need another fight now,” Kripa silenced them.
Kalki snapped back, “I wish I could, but you are travelling with us.”
“There’s a reason why I’m doing it.”
“Perhaps to get us in trouble?” Kalki frowned.
“Your brother made me promise to help you!” she exclaimed.
Kalki shot her a glance, confused. Arjan made her promise? A stranger like her?
Padma averted her eyes and crouched towards the three women, in an attempt to open their bounds. They began to untie their knots.
Kalki did so as well, gritting his teeth. He undid the restraints for the bald-headed girl. He noticed that she had big, brown eyes just like Lakshmi. For a moment, he found her full lips and aquiline nose extremely attractive. She had a face that anyone would love to just stare at, like a canvas of beautiful scenery.
“Uh,” Kalki blushed, until he realized she was saying something to him.
“Hello!” She slapped him hard.
“Yes, yes, I’m sorry,” Kalki sighed, trying to grasp the situation.
“There are more!”
“What?”
He felt a pat on his shoulder. It was Kripa. In haste, Kalki turned around to look at the cave entrance.
There are more.
Kalki realized what the bald-headed girl meant. Standing at the entrance, there was Darooda Simha with two comrades hunched together by his side. Shuko looked at them once, and wasted no time in flying away to ensure his safety.
“Food,” Darooda grinned, his sharp incisors glinting in the frightening moonlight.
“Aw, come on, learn to fight,” Kalki prodded.
Arjan shrugged. “I’m not a fighter, Kalki. You know that more than anyone.” He firmly grasped his book in response.
“Stop being such a wimp.” Kalki instanlyt lurched at him, but ended up twisting his foot and tripping on the floor; his chin suffered a bruise.
Putting his book on the ground, Arjan bent to pick him up. They were in Shambala, in the farm that they owned. Skies met the green fields, foliage, bushes and shrubs, all held up and folded around in a warped reality. The scent of mangoes and olives and the sound of soft whistling wind with the chirp of the sparrows let Arjan wonder that Shambala, out of all the villages of Keekatpur, was a peaceful place, and not home to warriors.
And yet, Kalki was like that, born in the wrong land. Perhaps.
Arjan dusted his dhoti off and helped Kalki to stand up. “So much for being a wimp.”
“Shut up.” Kalki flared his nostrils. “I can’t believe you don’t fight. Fighting is exhilarating. If it were up to me, I would fight all the time. I’ll find someone manlier to spar with. Where is Bala?” He grimaced at Arjan and left.
Arjan did feel out of place. Sometimes he wanted to be Kalki’s sparring partner since he often felt left out from Bala and Kalki’s adventure plans. He liked to travel as well, but violence was not an inborn trait that he had. Arjan sat on the ground, tossing away his book in frustration.
He wanted to have the same adrenaline rush like Kalki, the superhuman drive that he had. He wanted to, but he knew he could not ever match him. Besides, he had never liked fighting.
“I presume you didn’t plan on throwing it away.” His book was handed back to him.
He looked at it and then turned up to see his father, Vishnuyath, smiling warmly at him.
“Papa.” Arjan smiled as Vishnuyath sat next to him on the ground.
“He ran away again, eh?” Vishnuyath bobbed his head in disagreement. “I’m telling you, your brother is not at all serious about the household. I told him particularly to stay here.”
“He’s meeting Bala.”
“Oh! That barbarian!” scowled his father. “Anyhow, why are you in such a dull mood?”
Arjan lowered his eyes. “Why am I not a fighter, Papa?”
“Why do you want to be a fighter?”
“I want to be but I can’t. I don’t like it.”
“Doesn’t that answer your question?”
“Yeah, I know, but um . . .” Arjan blinked hard. He was confused. “I want to be manly, you know. I want to fight. I want to have rippling muscles. I want to be an untamed force in battle. What will all these books help me with? Nothing! I won’t have any practical knowledge. I will be just stuck in my home, reading all the time.”
Slowly Vishnuyath wrapped his arms around Arjan. “Well you shouldn’t really care to be violent, son. Don’t we already have enough of it? We need readers . . . knowledgeable people who could guide us in the right direction.”
Arjan shook his head. “But how does reading add to that?”
“I don’t think you understood my point. It teaches you about the little things, the kind things, and the brave things.” He paused. “Never forget real strength is not here,” he touched Arjan’s flaccid muscles, tickling him in the process to which Arjan giggled. “It’s here,” he signalled at Arjan’s head, where his brain was. “You can have all the strength in this world, son, but if you don’t know how to use it, what is the point of it?”
“But all the fighters in the stories are heroes, the ones who battle in the forefront of the army, the fables. Isn’t that what the stories tell us?”
“Never forget the Pandavs wouldn’t have survived without the intelligence of Lord Govind to win the Mahayudh.” His father smiled; there was a certain charm and warmth to the way he pulled up his lips. “Fighters change the outcome of a battle, but a reader can change someone’s world by his knowledge.”
Arjan woke up with a jolt, sweating profusely as he stared into the pitch black nothingness in front of him. He turned his head frantically, his neck throbbing in pain as he looked up to see iron bars from where the moonlight had slipped through, letting it dance over the ground. Scampering about in his cell, he felt a sense of elation as he recalled how he had been dreaming about the conversation he had had with his father when he was young. And how everything had changed. He had decided not to be a fighter like Kalki and here he was, thrust into the lion’s den, living the life of a wrestler.
“Psst!” He heard a sound.
Arjan slowly moved to the iron bars. On the other side stood the plump, fat-faced Vikram was staring at Arjan, wide-eyed.
“Sorry fella, how are you doing? I heard you were in a pretty darn bad condition.”
Arjan would know. He had been knocked out by Rudra and the next thing he had seen was his cell. After being treated in the infirmary, he had been thrown into the cell again where he had begun to have lucid dreams. The dream, though was so alive and vivid, he could still feel the fragments of Shambala ebbing from his thoughts. Perhaps it was the influence of the drugs and the leaves that he had been forced to eat to recover.
They were making him delusional.
“I didn’t know they’ll let a newbie like you out there. That never happens.”
Arjan glumly nodded. Yeah, you sure didn’t know, fat-face.
“I just want to apologize for giving you false hope, fella.”
Arjan waved him off. “You aren’t the first one.”
“The champion, Rudra was congratulated though.”
Of course he was!
“Where is he now?” Arjan asked, gritting his teeth in anger.
“In his cell, of course, fella.”
“He was congratulated by the king. He even feasted with him but was then thrown back in this gutter?” Arjan guffawed.
“Short-lived happiness I suppose, heh,” Vikram grunted as he laughed.
Arjan couldn’t help but grin at the way Vikram was—the one adorable boy you always have in your gurukul class who everyone bullies, but you end up liking him in the end.
“You never went out into the field?” Arjan asked him about the arena. Professional wrestlers participated in different matches which was a different form of entertainment altogether, but surprisingly not frequent. Wrestling in Indragarh had become a popular sport for the wrong reasons. The system exploited the prisoners to flourish the gambling business. Most of it had been conducted under Vedanta’s nose who hadn’t given it much thought or perhaps hadn’t known, but Kali had made it mainstream to the public. He had put the show out in the open, inviting more nobles, ministers, and Apsaras to add glamour to the show. It was quite a clever tactic, now that Arjan thought about it.
“Truth be told ya, I want to. I really do, heh,” he grunted again. “It’s just that, my weight, you know. No one cares to throw me out there.”
“Never volunteered?”
“Doesn’t matter.” He frowned, getting embarassed. “Even if I did, they will overlook me. Truth to be told ya, no one wants to see a fat wrestler fighting to the death. They want to bet on the strong ones, you know.”
Arjan wouldn’t know. He wasn’t a strong one and yet Kali had thrown him out there. It was a matter of personal vendetta.
“Why have you been locked inside?”
“Ah well, my father was a criminal,” said Vikram.
“So?” Arjan didn’t understand.
“Oh, you don’t know? The sins of the father are passed down to the sons.”
Arjan detested the very idea of it. “But there’s no rule.”
“Ah yes, there isn’t, but um . . . you know, fella, it’s a strange world. Even if there are no official rules per se, there are some internal ones that these officials follow, who make up their own stuff to huddle people together like sheep.”
“Who was your father?”
“None of that really matters, fella,” Vikram shook his head. “He was a minister, did treason, you know.”
“Treason, you say,” Arjan mumbled.
“There’s been a great number of revolts, you know, fella, before all these Tribal thingies,” Vikram raised his voice as if he was announcing something, but realized what he had done. He kept his voice low now in an attempt to not let the other prisoners hear their conversation. “One of them concerned with the idea of democracy, give power to the people, hee-yah, one thing is about it fella, it’s a beautiful thought, even though it might never be real, isn’t it?”
“Seems like it. Kings are a dying breed causing more harm than good.”
“Now Vedanta, our dear old king was an honourable man, but an idea of democracy, naw, naw.” He was speaking to himself more than to Arjan now. “He killed my father and made sure his young son didn’t exact vengeance. So he put me in here, thought the democratic influence on me would be far too risky in the near future. Many were imprisoned along with me—three soldiers, friends of my father who were Dakshinis, my younger brothers, and a sister as well. They were then killed. Vedanta ensured no one from that revolt lived to tell the tale, felt that each one of them had seeped into an infectious democratic idea and it would build up like a tumour, infecting the entire state with undesirable ideas. Detestable fella, eh?”
“Why did he let you live?”
“I didn’t seem much of a threat,” he quipped with pride. “I was even fatter then, so much so that I couldn’t walk properly. He pitied me. He felt that killing me wouldn’t do much good since I anyway didn’t have the strength to to attack him, and he’s right. Even if I’m out there, I won’t be able to take my revenge,” he said matter-of-factly.
Arjan recalled how Kalki had taken revenge by killing Keshav Nand, the head of the Mlecchas, who had killed his father. One man is willing to shed blood, another sits in the jail and rants.
There are all kinds of people in the world.
“How did your father rope in a Dakshini?”
“You know how,” he smiled, “they were friends, almost like family. The eldest and my father were buddies, you know, fella. They wanted similar things, but I tell you, I had my suspicions about them.”
“Why?”
“Aw . . . well they were Dakshinis, of course, and they were of royal heritage.”
“Royal?”
“Family of King Vibhisana, I should say, fella, cousins or something, don’t know much. They left for Udaiyas for . . . well, you know all that jibberish from the south.”
Arjan nodded. Vikram’s tale was getting interesting, but at that moment the candles were lit and the soldiers entered with cuffs and bonds. The iron cages were opened as soldiers entered every cell, even Arjan’s. They pinned him against the brick wall, as his hands were tied behind.
With Vikram behind him, he was dragged outside. He followed the other prisoners as they walked in a line.
“Must be the practice for the good old sport.”
Arjan sighed. His bones ached and he wanted to sleep. But it was night and night was when they practised the most. Arjan was thrown on the field now. The chains were opened so he, like the other prisoners, could begin practising. Looking at the barriers above the prison walls, Arjan recalled his escape through sticky situations while trying to find a way to free the trapped Kalki. Though now, Kalki won’t be here. Arjan was alone and the very thought of no one coming for him, let alone knowing he was alive, made him sick in the stomach and burned his eyes with tears. He wanted to go home and he wanted to cry and hope his mother would come and take care of him. There was no one to send her notes anymore. She must be worried sick. How would she survive while knowing that one of her sons was in prison while the other was either dead or was out there in the wild, fighting every day to stay alive?
Master Reddy began to line them up, commanded them to jog around the place. Arjan did all of that. Then, they were asked to arm themselves with maces, which they were supposed to use as per their body weight and swing them to gauge their arm strength. As Arjan did all of that with Vikram, he turned to see Rudra. He was walking towards Arjan.
Arjan ignored him while Rudra stood there for a while.
“What I did was a show, kid,” he said. His voice had a cutting edge of hoarseness to it—a thick, grave, salty air. An air of regality surrounded him and yet here he was, a mere prisoner. “You are not going to stay furious with me, are you?”
Arjan clenched his jaw.
“You are smart. You knew how to unlock my grip and work your way out. It was difficult taming you and believe me, I never had the intention of hurting you.” Rudra winked at Arjan.
Arjan sighed. The moonlight was harsh, unforgivable, even the wind seeped with coldness inside Arjan, but with the amount of exercise he was doing, it yielded some warmth in him.
“I was glad Lord Kali stopped me. It’s not my fault. I have been at it for years now, so I knew what to do to defeat you.”
Arjan flared his nostrils and with sweat trickling from his face, looked impassively at the stubborn, persistent man in irritation. “What do you want?”
“Business,” he said. Arjan noticed that Rudra had a dusky complexion and his face and neck were glistening due to the s
weat from the exercise.
By the gods, I need to stop looking at him that way.
“Business? Of what?”
“I’m looking for strong men on my team, and uh, you are obviously a candidate who I would appreciate working with,” he said with a charming, disarming grin. Rudra continued, “Lord Kali hates you. That means you did something to piss him off in the gutters. That means you have the biggest motive out here. You want to escape.”
“Business of what?” Arjan prompted again.
Rudra came close, the smell of his sweat made Arjan feel a lot of things inside his stomach as he avoided any unwarranted contact with him. Rudra whispered, “Business of escaping this godforsaken place, kid. All of us have had enough. I have been gathering men for weeks. All that’s left is to figure out how we are going to escape.”
Arjan narrowed his eyes, but before he could say anything, the loud noise of Master Reddy interfered their moment of secrecy.
“What are you two pimpleheads doing out there together!” he yelled.
“Sorry, Master,” bowed Rudra innocently and turned to Arjan, almost irresistibly. “I’ll see you around. Think about it,” he winked, brushing his hand calmly over Arjan’s hand as he left.
Arjan stood there for a moment, contemplating over what had just happened. He was yet again included into a plan that involved an escape.
And this time, he didn’t have his brother to look out for.
Manasa had pledged that the only place she would stay in will be where Sambhavi had died. She had to build the walls, put the ceiling back up again, and have the outside area cleaned. Manasa didn’t talk to the carpenters, for they were at the lowest rung of the caste system, but she was hoping that she would get to hear their conversations. She might learn more about the Suparn attacks that way.
And none bore her the answer she wanted.
She sat on the chair, looking at the complex that held the family blood, the same family she had longed to visit and hug and laugh with. There were little things in life that one must cherish before they wither. Manasa shed tears, wiping them off as carpenters walked in front of her. She didn’t want her vanity to be lost, to show that she was weak. She was the king’s sister. She was the heir apparent to the power of this entire city.