The Crown of Seven Stars

by Gitanjali Murari

  ‘What . . . who are you?’ He felt a tingle of excitement and approached her slowly.

  She raised a hand in greeting. ‘I am Nirmohi and this is my abode.’

  ‘The Abode of the Detached One,’ he exclaimed.

  ‘That is right,’ she said with a throaty laugh. ‘Welcome to the place of eternal spring.’

  19

  ‘You must be Meghabhuti’s son.’

  Saahas started, looking at her in amazement. She was a picture of sweet unworldliness in a brown, loose-flowing garment falling to her feet, and bracelets of flowers wrapped around her wrists. But when he glanced into those grey-green eyes, a shock jolted through him.

  ‘Yes, I was there when you were barely a day old,’ Nirmohi ran a light hand through her silver hair. ‘Your mother’s eyes were identical to mine. I am your mausi . . . your mother’s sister.’

  ‘Mausi!’ His heart thudded, his mouth dry. ‘Why, why haven’t I heard of you before?’

  ‘Because that was my wish and it would have remained so if you hadn’t set out to find me,’ she said with an enigmatic smile. ‘I claim no earthly bonds, Saahas, for in relationships, as we know them, lie the seeds of bondage.’

  A shadow crossed his face. ‘I understand,’ he said haltingly. ‘You don’t wish to be embroiled in my affairs. My father told me you could rule the earth if you so wished, and so I set out to find you, in the hope that you would help me.’

  ‘Help you with what?’

  ‘I need to prove my innocence,’ he burst out, angry tears flooding his eyes. ‘I’ve been accused of a terrible crime, mausi, and I must wash off the stain, or else I can never return home to my people.’

  Nirmohi shot him a keen look. ‘Come with me,’ she said and turning away from the forest, led him into a meadow full of sheep, their coats tinted a bright blue. ‘Those are bharal,’ she told him, noticing his astonished expression, and pointed to a cliff. ‘What do you see?’ Mystified, Saahas looked. It was a white rock with a few circular tufts of blackened grass.

  ‘Look again,’ she ordered.

  And it was then that he noticed the slightest of movement. The spotted rock rippled faintly, then stopped, resuming again to ripple after a while. Slowly, it slid off the cliff, like melting snow slopping off a ledge, and disappeared into the meadow.

  ‘Keep watching,’ Nirmohi whispered.

  The bharal continued to graze and the birds continued to sing oblivious to the imperceptible movement in the short grass. The wave circled the flock in a wide arc, slowly becoming tighter, drawing closer to a bharal. As soon as the ripple touched the sheep, the snow leopard leapt out, sinking its jaws into the neck of its prey. The attack was silent, the flock remaining unaware of the fearsome predator in their midst.

  Saahas turned to Nirmohi. ‘A silent killer! Are you suggesting that I prove my innocence by launching a quiet attack on the new rulers of Aum?’

  ‘Do you think the leopard needs to prove anything? It does what it has to do, quietly, efficiently. Your mind is so busy grappling with inessentials that you are losing sight of your goal. Remember, you are not a general anymore.’

  ‘You are right. I am a fugitive.’

  Nirmohi’s smile was serene. ‘I was going to say, now you are a king.’

  The brigade immediately brightened when Saahas divulged his plans. They wanted to accompany him, and it taxed his patience to convince them otherwise.

  ‘This trip is only for reconnaissance,’ he explained, struggling to contain the excitement in his voice, ‘to assess the situation in Aum and meet the regiments in secret. Like the snow leopard, I will do it alone. All of us together will attract attention, putting our lives at risk. You will all wait for me here.’

  ‘But you will be recognized instantly, my lord, and I can help disguise you,’ Lushai’s voice was full of hope.

  ‘Look at this,’ Saahas laughed, pointing to his overgrown locks and heavily bearded face. ‘Even my reflection wouldn’t know me!’

  ‘And to complete the camouflage, here are a couple more aids,’ Nirmohi appeared, leading a horse by the reins. ‘A wooden leg to give you a decided limp,’ she said handing over the contraption, ‘and this nag in place of your magnificent horse, or you will arouse suspicions.’

  ‘You’ve thought of everything, mausi,’ Saahas smiled, the smile reaching his eyes for the first time since his escape.

  Nirmohi inclined her head, holding out a skin bag. ‘This contains a therapeutic oil known to cure even death. Now go, Saahas, your destiny awaits you.’

  Joy surged in him when, after several weeks of hard riding, he reached the highway to Aum. The old, familiar terrain welcomed him in a half-hearted manner. Summer had set in, not gently but in waves of dry heat, sapping the freshness of tender shoots, browning the leaves. Sluggish and slow, the rivers seemed old, exhausted and birds and animals barely made a sound, staying out of the blazing sun.

  ‘Where are you off to, bhai?’ The owner of an eatery cocked an eyebrow, flipping hot breads out of an earthen oven.

  ‘To Aum,’ Saahas mumbled between bites.

  ‘Aum?’ The owner looked amazed.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘. . . but . . . don’t you know there is no Aum now? It is called Aham.’

  ‘Aham?’ The morsel stuck in his throat and despite the heat, he shivered. Hastily paying for the meal, he urged his horse into a gallop and at close of day discerned the hazy outline of the north gates.

  His heart began to beat fast and allowing the horse to slow down, he approached at an easy pace. A curtain of dust hung over the imposing gates and instead of the muted gold flag of Aum, a black one fluttered atop the battlement, a gold dot in its centre. Instinctively seeking reassurance, he looked at the bare hills flanking the gates, his father’s voice coming back to him, ‘These manmade hills will protect the north entrance,’ Meghabhuti had told him. ‘Cleverly designed interlocks connect the iron inside them with the stone walls of the gates. If the gates are ever attacked, the interlocks will tighten, making it harder to break them down. But, as with all perfect things, there is a key, the key to the destruction of the entire structure.’

  ‘Of course, Aum exists,’ Saahas patted his steaming horse. ‘People talk such nonsense!’

  ‘Hey you,’ a voice shouted from the watchtower, ‘what are you doing here?’

  Putting on a guttural accent, Saahas answered, ‘I come from a distant land, sir. I’ve heard your great kingdom has enough work for poor migrants like me.’

  ‘Come back in the morning, when the gate opens.’

  ‘But, sir—’

  ‘I said begone!’

  ‘He has forgotten his manners, uncouth fellow,’ he swore under his breath, turning his horse off the road. Unable to sleep a wink, he spent the night watching the sky, waiting for dawn and when the first sunbeam pierced the darkness, he was back at the gates. They groaned open at sunup and he pressed inside eagerly.

  ‘Where do you think you are going? Give your name.’

  Nonplussed, Saahas quickly gathered his wits. ‘Khanjji. My name is Khanjji.’

  The guard looked at the wooden leg and snickered, ‘Very appropriate,’ and entered the name in a register. ‘What work can you do?’

  ‘I am strong, sir. Try me with anything.’

  Waving him inside, the guard instructed, ‘Make your way to the temple site. There is plenty of work there.’

  20

  Saahas looked around in bewilderment. Aham lay before him, its landscape blackened and charred as if by a forest fire, a sooty mist hanging in the air. Gusts of hot wind picked up the loose, fine soil and flung it in his face. It got in his eyes, hair and mouth, tasting gritty on his tongue. Even the sky that had once stretched high above, blue and free, appeared lower, as if dragged down by the weight of its dreariness.

  Riding through the tiny hamlets he knew so well, he saw the same burnt out devastation. When he tried to talk to people, they hurried on, their faces strained and wary. At the inns, w
ayfarers ate their meals quickly, keeping their gaze averted. Soldiers passed him frequently and he wanted to cry out to them, ‘Look, it is me, your general.’ But their shuttered faces filled him with foreboding and his words remained unspoken.

  And as the days went by, he began to notice ominous, shrouded figures stealthily appearing out of nowhere, keeping a close watch on every movement.

  Saahas patted the nag. ‘Slow down. I think this must be the place.’ He had reached the halfway point between the north gate and Sundernagari, a barren place ripped apart, great mounds of dirt everywhere. Hundreds of workers, goaded constantly by soldiers in black and gold uniforms, dug the earth frenziedly. Others carried building materials, piling them up in huge heaps. ‘This used to be so green,’ he said, his voice full of dismay, ‘and full of nesting birds.’

  ‘Don’t dawdle,’ a guard barked at him, thrusting a leaflet into his hands. ‘Go directly to the construction supervisor. His name is Jokat. He will assign you a job.’

  Saahas looked at the paper. It was a command, disguised as a poem, Princess Hussuri’s cramped signature below it.

  We like you strong and fit

  So don’t just stare and sit

  Exercise, the Aham way

  Build the temple night and day

  Someone pointed out the supervisor to him, the only man on the site lolling in a tent. ‘You are not from around here, are you?’ Jokat appraised the sinewy man before him. Saahas shook his head.

  ‘Is your horse lame too, like you?’ He laughed at his cruel joke, but something about the impassive face dried up his mirth. ‘Start ferrying bricks to the masons over there.’

  Saahas joined the stream of workers, toiling alongside them. By dusk of each day, the men erected camps and the women began cooking, the children watering and feeding the animals. At nightfall, groups of people huddled together after dinner, singing in hushed voices of their homes, of their childhood, of the trees and meadows that were no more.

  Every night, Saahas heard the same story, of how the workers had been plucked from their homes, their workshops and brought to the temple site. ‘It is the queen mother’s pet project,’ he was told in whispers with many a nervous glance over the shoulder, ‘our Queen Manmaani. And this temple will be dedicated to her. She is our goddess. Jokat says that her snakeskin dress rustles like the tongues of a thousand kraits. Each tongue whispers your fate, granting your most cherished desire, but only if you do as she says.’

  He was delivering materials to a mason one day when the latter suddenly addressed him ‘You don’t seem from around here.’

  Saahas looked at him. Misery had dulled the wholesome features, his frame, thin and undernourished. ‘Someone told me you are an outsider,’ the mason continued, ‘like us.’

  ‘Us?’

  The young man nodded towards a petite girl breaking stones. ‘That’s my wife, Dharaa, and I am Riju. Will you join us for dinner tonight? Please do come. It will be a relief to talk to someone without constantly watching our backs. No one here can be trusted.’

  In the privacy of their cart, the couple put out a sparse meal. ‘It isn’t much, bhaiyya,’ Dharaa said shyly.

  ‘But it tastes as fine as a king’s feast,’ Saahas assured her, relishing the plain food.

  Riju sighed, ‘We came to Aum, not Aham, a year ago.’

  ‘Aum,’ Saahas echoed, his heart lurching uncomfortably.

  ‘Yes, Aum, and how happy we were.’

  Dharaa nodded, her doe eyes wistful, ‘It became our home and we were certain we would live here forever.’

  ‘But then terrible things happened,’ Riju said. ‘And now we cannot leave because Jokat won’t permit it. We are at his mercy.’

  A knife twisted in Saahas’s gut.

  ‘Let us not frighten our new friend,’ Dharaa scolded her husband.

  He pinched her chin, ‘All right. Let’s sing to lighten our spirits,’ and struck up a gentle melody.

  After some hesitation Saahas joined in, his mellifluous baritone rising on the smoky air, the song helping to ease his heartache.

  They sang one song after another, united in the memories of Aum, when a deep cough cut them off abruptly. A hulking figure intruded into their circle, its presence hostile. Saahas bit off an oath. Under his shirt, Shakti vibrated, feeling the intensity of his emotions. The sullen features of the stranger were unmistakable even in the dim firelight.

  Ashwath scrutinized the trio, his eyes lingering on Saahas’s wooden leg. ‘Your voice resembles someone I once knew, a traitor, a rogue,’ he sneered. ‘If you weren’t a khanjja, I would have arrested you for impersonating him.’ Shooting a contemptuous glance at the frozen faces, he turned on his heel and vanished as suddenly as he had arrived.

  Early the next morning, Saahas slipped away from the site unnoticed, riding west. Wrapping a cotton turban around his head, peasant style, he became one of many on the road. Stopping only to rest his horse, it still took him days to locate the forest of the Gondi, for it had altered too, charred stumps and thorny bushes, the only reminders of what it had once been. The tribe, famous for its skill at camouflage in the thickets, was living in the open now, in squalid little huts standing amidst filth. Hens scratched the dirt for bits of grain and insects only to have their find stolen by the cunning drongo.

  No one paid any heed to Saahas. ‘I am looking for Bukkal,’ he told one grizzled Gondi.

  The man looked up at him, surly and suspicious. ‘And who might you be?’

  ‘I . . . I am a friend.’

  ‘Ha! Bukkal has a friend come to see him,’ the old man announced in a loud voice. Other Gondi men got to their feet, slowly circling Saahas like a pack of wolves. A shout from beyond broke them up and they moved away, darting resentful glances at the approaching tribal.

  ‘Bukkal,’ Saahas exclaimed, striding forward, but the chief raised his bow, the arrow pointing at Saahas’s chest.

  ‘Stand back. My friend you say you are?’

  Smiling ruefully, Saahas stroked his beard. ‘Yes, that is true,’ he answered, speaking in his normal voice.

  The Gondi gasped, growing pale. ‘Return you have from the dead!’

  Hustling Saahas into his hut, his bloodshot eyes took note of the limp. ‘Talk we must, but not in the open for guessed I have, yours is a secret mission,’ he nodded at the wooden leg. ‘Murdered the king you did, so they say, brother. But I believe it not.’

  Saahas flinched. ‘What has happened to Aum, Bukkal? Why are the forests burnt to the ground?’

  ‘To find you and your brigade, set fire they did to every woodland. Smoke you all out like jungle rats they hoped,’ the Gondi cackled.

  Blood rushed to Saahas’s head. ‘So, they savaged my Aum. God rot their souls!’ After a moment, he whispered, ‘Everything has come apart so fast. Why? Why this fear? I can see it in people’s faces, hear it in their voices.’

  The Gondi’s gaze wavered. Taking a long swig from a dried gourd shell, he smacked his lips. ‘Changes, everywhere you look changes there are. Nothing the same. Not you, not I. To the beautiful city you go and see for yourself. Sundernagari gone, changed it has to Andheri.’

  Andheri, the City of Darkness. Saahas hugged his arms around himself, aware of a terrible urge to weep.

  Bukkal leaned close, his breath fetid. ‘Fear you say, brother? In Andheri smell it you will. Anyone displeases Shunen, next day in the main square they hang. Everywhere they are, the king’s spies, the commander’s men. Escape no one can. So as they say, we do.’

  Saahas drew a shaky breath. ‘I couldn’t live like that, like a slave.’

  ‘Slaves we all are, brother,’ Bukkal shot him a sidelong glance. ‘Destiny’s slaves. Before her, we must bow our heads.’

  ‘Your destiny awaits you,’ Nirmohi’s words reverberated back to him. It had sounded like a benediction then, but now he wasn’t so sure. ‘I must be off,’ he said, getting to his feet.

  ‘You head to where, brother? Maybe one more time I see you?’
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  Something about Bukkal’s expression perturbed Saahas. ‘I’m not sure which direction I will take,’ he shrugged, ‘but I’ll be in touch.’

  No sooner did he duck behind a broken shed than Bukkal appeared, whipping his bullocks towards Andheri. A queer sensation wrapped itself around Saahas’s heart, squeezing it. ‘Bukkal has traded his soul for gold,’ he whispered. Shunen would soon learn of his return and then he would be hunted, again.

  21

  Manmaani frowned in disbelief, certain the Gondi was hallucinating. ‘Are you drunk?’ Her voice was sharp with repugnance.

  ‘No, no, Your Majesty, not dare I in your presence. If I lie, my tongue you may cut out.’

  ‘I’ll let Raja Shunen be the judge of that, and you know him. He will not be satisfied with just one little part of you,’ she warned.

  ‘Why would he return to certain death? It is impossible!’ Shunen broke into a sweat.

  Manmaani shook her head, ‘Bukkal is not lying.’

  ‘Did he say whether Saahas was alone? No, of course he wouldn’t be alone. He must have brought his men.’ Suddenly, Shunen smote his forehead. ‘I am a fool to believe you. The Gondi is mistaken. He may have seen someone who reminded him of Saahas. Didn’t he tell you that the man wore a wooden leg? Ha! There you go. This is someone else altogether.’

  ‘Saahas has every reason to be in disguise.’

  ‘But what does he hope to achieve with just a handful of his men?’

  Manmaani raised her eyebrows, her expression arch. ‘What won’t a man do to reclaim what is his, especially when it’s the throne of a kingdom? Besides, I suspect the people still hold him in affection.’

  Shunen instinctively clutched the pagdi on his head, the seven emeralds reset in a circle, the largest winking in the centre. ‘They have affection for that murderer? Then they all deserve to die with him. Traitors!’ He turned on his brother suddenly, ‘What have you been doing about the border security, Ashwath? If this is indeed Saahas, how did he get past your men?’