Rama shook his head sadly. ‘But it cannot be as you wish. I must rise tomorrow at daybreak and go into the Dandaka-van. It has been decreed, and it shall be done.’ His face brightened momentarily as a new thought struck him. ‘Yet listen, Guha. When I return fourteen years later … ‘
Guha released Rama, turning away roughly. ‘When … and if … you return, I do not know if I will be here. We ordinary mortals cannot predict our lives as clearly as you can, Rama. We live from day to day. Our bellies must be fed each day or we pine and waste. Do not speak of what will be or might be fourteen years hence. I speak only of tonight, of the here and now.’
He turned suddenly to face Rama once more. ‘Yet reconsider but once. Is it so wrong? You will be in exile from Ayodhya. You need never set foot within the seven-walled city until the end of your time. Stay here with me, with the Nisadas; we will eat fish and honey and meat every day, and at night by the fire we shall partake of this wonderful mead and laugh and speak of happy things. You will bring great prosperity and enlightenment to our people, Rama. I know this as surely as I know that going into the Dandaka-van will sour you and turn you into a pale shadow of the man you are now. Stay! For the sake of your brother, stay with me here! I do not ask for whatever I desire. Just this one thing. By your father’s oath, grant me this one wish, my brother Rama.’
Rama was silent too long. Guha’s stance changed from imploring to dejected as he waited for the answer that never came. The next person who spoke was neither Rama nor Guha, but Lakshman.
‘Bhai,’ he said uncertainly. His eyes glistened in the light of the fire. Not with tears, Sita thought, but from the mead which he had drunk two goblets of in quick succession. He had needed it in order to work up the courage to say these words to Rama. ‘It is not my wish to attempt to change your mind from its fixed path … ‘
Rama turned his eyes to Lakshman. ‘Then what is it you wish, Lakshman?’ His voice was soft and calm, yet Sita saw Lakshman wince.
‘Only that … ‘ Lakshman seemed to search for the right thing to say, revealing in that brief pause how desperately he wanted to persuade Rama. ‘That you give due consideration to our brother Guha’s words. You need not reply at once. Tomorrow morning … ‘
Rama sighed. The log Guha had put on the fire not much earlier shifted and settled as it burned, issuing a flurry of sparks that rose in a spiral, swirling around the three men. None of them blinked or moved to avoid the sparks, even though Sita clearly saw some settle lightly on their bare shoulders and torsos.
‘Tomorrow morning,’ Rama replied, ‘we have a long way to go. We must retire early to keep our strength. I will take your leave now, my brothers Guha and Lakshman. Come, Sita, if you will, let us take our rest. Tomorrow we go into the forest of exile.’
Sita rose from her place, carrying the shawl that Rama had left behind when he stood to embrace Guha. He took it from her and both of them walked to the spot they had prepared earlier by laying down grass pallets.
Rama began spreading his shawl over his pallet. Sita followed his example with her own. In moments they were done. Rama lay down upon his pallet and she did the same. She glanced briefly back at Guha and Lakshman. They were not far away, but they might as well have been a hundred yojanas distant. The look of abject sorrow on both their faces, in their very stance, was heartbreaking. She had guessed that Lakshman and Guha had had a great deal of discussion while on their hunting trip earlier that afternoon. She had seen it on their faces when they returned, bright-eyed and red-cheeked, bearing proudly their spoils from the hunt.
She turned her face to Rama. He was still awake, she knew. She could sense it from the way he lay, stiff and ill at ease. He was profoundly disturbed by the passion of Guha’s argument and the desperation of Lakshman’s last, half-coherent plea. ‘Rama,’ she said softly, too softly to be heard by Guha and Lakshman.
He did not reply but she knew he was listening.
‘Don’t worry,’ she said. ‘I’m not going to add my voice to the argument. I know your mind is made up about going into the Dandaka-van, and I agree with you on that count. It is the only honourable thing to do. What I wished to say to you is that I fear for Lakshman. Perhaps you should speak to him. Perhaps he might be better off staying with Guha during the time of exile. After all, he finds solace in the idea, clearly. And he is not taking this with the same equanimity as yourself. See the way he is sharing Guha’s mead even now. And weeping openly while Guha puts his arm around his shoulder and comforts him. He is very troubled, Rama. It may not be the best thing for him to go into exile with us.’
Rama was silent for so long, she thought he would not answer her. She had given up all hope of a response when he said, ‘I will talk to him in the morning.’
That was all he said. It was enough. She nodded silently, then realised he could not see her in the near-darkness. Over by the fire, Guha said something in a bitter tone and Lakshman issued a laugh that was more a cry.
Both men echoed each other hollowly, and Sita heard the sound of another flask being uncorked and more mead being poured. She lay a long time, listening to the sounds of their voices, unaware of when she finally drifted off into sleep.
FOUR
The hill Nikumbhila rose like a lush green miracle, a stark contrast to its surroundings. The ground around it was the same reddish-black as the rest of the island, a crustacean amalgam of rock and earth fused together by the unholy forces wielded by the kingdom’s lord and master. The cliffs of Lanka rose sheer and jagged on the northern coast, half a yojana beyond the sacred hill, barring the way to any who sailed from the sub-continental mainland that lay but thirteen yojanas distant in that direction. Any such unfortunate sailors approaching Lanka would see only the dark hellish face of those forbidding cliffs, winding their jagged way around the coast on both eastern and western sides of the island until they reached the black fortress and melded into its sorcerous stone. Even the sparse patches of rocky beach at the foot of those towering cliffs were lined with black sand that shifted and bubbled like an unnatural quagmire. To the seaborne observer, all was the same unrelenting black, craggy volcanic hell that Lanka was famed to be.
But nestled within the hammer-shaped northern head of the island-kingdom was the hill of Nikumbhila. Seen from the vantage of the Pushpak’s aerial approach, it shone like a jade stone set in black opal. The hill was lushly carpeted with dewy green grass, a startlingly normal contradiction to the unnatural menace of its surroundings. Vibhisena made a gesture of genuflection as the Pushpak sped him close enough to glimpse the small stone structure on the very top of the gently sloping hill. That was the shrine of Shiva, the patron deity of all rakshasas, as of their lord Ravana. For Shiva was the Destroyer, and were not rakshasas dedicated to destruction?
As the Pushpak slowed and began to descend gradually, Vibhisena mused on the irony of the present circumstances that brought him and his catatonic brother Ravana back to Nikumbhila. It was on this sacred hill that Ravana himself, long millennia past, had performed his fabled tapasya. Those terrible penitential meditations, some lasting several thousands of years, had resulted in Ravana being offered fabulous boons by Brahma and Shiva. From those great boons had come the power and invulnerability that enabled him to embark on his unprecedented spree of conquest, invading the kingdom of the very devas who had granted his powers, wresting the island-kingdom of Lanka from Kubera, his yaksa half-brother, who dwelled in the foothills of the Himalayas. Since Kubera was also the treasurer of the devas, invading his northern retreat and defeating him had secured for Ravana fully half the immense celestial treasury and many other rich prizes, including this very Pushpak itself. After which Ravana had returned here, to remake Lanka in the image of his dreams … or more accurately, his nightmares.
Yet it was the tears and sweat and spilled blood of those long penances that had preserved the sanctity of the Nikumbhila hill long after Ravana had recast Lanka into the effigy of hellishness that he desired, transforming the beautiful island par
adise of Kubera into an unspeakable volcanic nightmare and a gateway to the nether-worlds. Even now, after all this time, the sentient stone of the black fortress, forged from Ravana’s own living flesh, had been unable to corrupt the natural grassy lushness of Nikumbhila. This supreme irony brought a small spot of hope to Vibhisena in this moment of abject depression. It proved that Brahman did and would triumph in the end, despite all odds. If these tender blades of grass could still grow and flourish mere yards from the corrupt sorcery that pervaded Lanka’s soil, then what might not a living, sentient, mobile being like himself be able to achieve?
As the Pushpak descended to a relatively flat spot on the top of the hill, the downwind generated by the celestial vehicle rippled across the grassy slopes, like waves rolling across an emerald ocean. In those waves, Vibhisena spied the flash of a tawny hare’s long ears, twitching, then swinging as the little creature leapt nimbly downhill. A cluster of butterflies, succouring themselves in a patch of sunflowers, rose in confusion, dispersed by the force of the Pushpak’s displacement.
The sky chariot came to a halt so gentle Vibhisena had to look down to be sure he was indeed on solid ground once more. He descended the extruded ramp alone. He would return in a while for Ravana. His brother remained as mindlessly comatose as when he had first emerged from the stone cage, with not a flicker of change in his slack visage. He would be safe here alone in the protection of the Pushpak. There was something Vibhisena wished to do before disembarking him.
Vibhisena stepped on to the springy surface of Nikumbhila with a sigh of relief. He was still shaken from the sight of Lanka’s destruction. It was hard to accept the fact that the only land he knew as home was destroyed. His thoughts flashed again to his sister-in-law Mandodhari and the rest of Ravana’s family. They would be safe, he knew, nestled deep in the protective heart of the black fortress, guarded by rakshasas whose loyalty was guaranteed by sorcery: those poor fools could no more turn against their master and mistress than plunge a heated blade into their own vitals. Ravana’s near and dear would survive the holocaust of Lanka without question, sequestered by the sorcerous protection of the fortress. Later, when the fires had died out and nervous peace had returned, Vibhisena would return in the Pushpak and seek them out. Then would begin the painful task of restabilisation and, eventually, reconstruction.
But that was later. Now, he had only one purpose.
To find a way to heal his brother.
He strode across the whispering grass-covered ground, approaching the monolithic structure that rose from the centre of the hilltop. It was not particularly large or imposing. In times past, one did not build ostentatious structures for public worship, nor did one gild idols with gold and precious stones or clothe them with gold-embroidered finery as many did now, for such things were considered vulgar and contrary to the spirit of simple devotional prayer that was the heartstone of Brahmanism. One simply provided a stone shelter from the elements, a little corner of quietude where the true believer could immerse the self in the vast contemplation of Brahman. The specific deity housed in that shrine was also not significant, for all deities were merely perceptual forms of the same One God. But over time, it had become accepted that the presiding deity here at Nikumbhila was Shiva, if only because it was Shiva who had become manifest in answer to Ravana’s epic penance, granting him the great boons that spelled the salvation and eventual rise of the rakshasa race.
He touched the exterior wall of the shrine. The stone was cool and granular, only slightly weathered by the elements over the millennia. Ravana himself had carved this shrine from a single great granite boulder. Even the boulder had not been in this place: he had rolled it all the way from its original home, several miles away. Merely bringing the stone here and carving it out painstakingly had taken one hundred and five years, more than an entire mortal lifetime. And even back then, Ravana was not without power; he had only to command it, and his followers would have toiled night and day to roll the boulder up the slope. But he had accomplished that arduous task himself; then, once the boulder was on the highest point on Lanka, he had proceeded to carve the shrine with his own hands, working with such reverence and application that the finished structure vied with any monolithic mandir in the world. The fact that it stood here, solid and majestic despite the passage of time, was testament to the demonlord’s dedication. That was one thing Vibhisena had always admired about his rakshasa brother: whatever Ravana did, he did with such utter devotion, even the devas watched and wondered.
Vibhisena removed his sandals and climbed five steps up to the threshold of the temple. Five steps led down again, into a rectangular pool placed precisely beneath an identically sized gap in the roof of the temple. Rain water collected here and remained a long while in Lanka’s humid climate. Vibhisena waded through the ankle-deep water, his feet washed without any effort on his part, then stepped up on to the temple floor, cleansed and purified by this simple yet ingenious architectural design. The granite floor was surprisingly warm underfoot, perhaps because of the coldness of the water. The approach to the deity was purposely oblique, encouraging the worshipper to walk around the little palanquin-shaped carving that housed the statue. He performed a full circuit—a parikrama of sorts— and found himself facing towards the north-eastern end of the shrine, the most propitious place for the deity to be housed. Rows of slender pillars, their heads carved to resemble the heads of various beasts, for Shiva was also Pashupati, Lord of Beasts, marked his progress down the last stretch. The palanquin, exquisitely carved from the floor of the rock, blossomed before him like a creation of nature herself. His eyes filled with spontaneous tears. What art, what devotion, what love you poured into the making of this temple, my brother. Where did all that love, that devotion go? What happened to that Ravana?
He approached the central pandal, lowering himself to his knees, and prostrated himself full-length, touching his forehead to the floor. Then he rose and went forward, close enough for the sacred act of gazing reverentially upon the face of the deity himself: darshan. The stone idol was as simple and basic as could be. Another significant difference between the ancient ways of worship and the more modern, emerging trends. In those days it was not considered seemly to carve a humanlike effigy, as some cults now preferred. To cast the devas in the image of their worshippers was not only foolish and needless, it bordered on sacrilege. Vibhisena himself abjured the methods of some believers, who even went to the extent of clothing their deities in little doll-like garments, adding jewellery and accessories. That was against the spirit of darshan itself, he felt. To have a rough image carved of stone, suitably placed and ritually propitiated, that was what the Vedic rites prescribed. Perhaps some day, when the rites and prayers were all collected and bound together in one comprehensive manuscript, it would be possible for all followers of Brahman to stick to the letter of the laws of dharma, neither exceeding the prescribed methodology of rituals nor avoiding the more arduous parts. But who would undertake such a great and difficult task? It would take a great seer to collate the scriptures of Vedic learning and write them down in one complete book. Or two books, or even four …
Until then, true believers like himself would hold those rituals in their heads and follow them to the letter, knowing that in the perfect practice of ritual the soul found the freedom to soar free of the cage of flesh and bone, to explore the mighty infinity of Brahman.
He would have lost himself in prayer and contemplation for hours then, completely detached from his physical self, feeling neither hunger nor thirst, not any other bodily need. Achieving a oneness with Brahman that only the most pious achieved, and that too rarely. A rakshasa he might be by birth, but by vocation he was no less than a Brahmin. After all, he was of the line of Pulastya, one of the first Brahmins, they who first spread the knowledge and practice of Brahmanical worship.
But a voice cut into his worship at the very outset, before he could immerse himself so completely in the ocean of Brahmanic contemplation that to emerge
would itself take a long while and considerable effort. The voice spoke with just the right intonation and inflection required to hold him back, like a hand placed gently but urgently on his shoulder.
‘Vibhisena.’
FIVE
Vibhisena opened his eyes, seeing only the effulgent vision of Shiva atop Mount Kailasa with which his darshans always began. Lord Shiva, with his matted locks piled high on his head, the king of serpents Takshak wound round his neck like a living garland, tiger furs wrapped around his waist, seated cross-legged in yoganidra, the sacred transcendental contemplation of Brahman, upon only a thin worn fur-mat on the ice-encrusted peak. Distant snowy peaks were visible in the backdrop, and somewhere, not far from here, Vibhisena could even sense the Lord’s wife Parvati and their sons Ganesha and Kartikeya, as well as Shiva’s vehicle of choice, the bull Nandi, borrowed from its original master Yamaraj. So intense and vivid was the darshan he was blessed with.
Then his vision cleared and he saw again the simple black-stone Shiva-lingam carving, its sloped head anointed with red-ochre stripes like the forehead of any Brahmin would be, nestled in a pestle-shaped open-ended circle. He smelled the unmistakable fragrance of devil’s orchid blossoms, the trademark of only one woman he knew … his sister-in-law, Ravana’s wife.
‘Mandodhari?’
He turned and saw her standing by the pillar that had concealed her from his view when he had approached the deity. So great had been his desire for darshan that he had failed to allow the meaning of that fragrant odour to penetrate, but now that he was aware of it, it pervaded his senses, filling his olfactory channels with the same pervasive authority with which Mandodhari filled any chamber she entered.
She took a step forward, then another, stepping into the light, the silver payals on her feet tinkling melodiously. She was clad in the same manner as always, except for one notable difference: her sari was white with a simple blue border. Had that touch of blue been absent, her garb would have been indicative of the status of widowhood. He did not think that her choice of sari was accidental. Few things were not carefully thought out by Ravana’s wife.
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