Vikrama was not pleased at the second lease he had been given to guide the destiny of his people. He wished he could remain content in his forest sojourn for the rest of his life rather than fight for a nation that had discarded him. Had his counsel been followed, Veera could have staved off the invader, but by ignoring his warning, he had led his people to a cowardly exile.
As Vikrama entered the fort of the exiles, he was witness to a dynasty in the course of a transformation. Their sorrowful silhouettes struck him. Like lowly sentinels, they had been watching the horizon for his arrival. There were no welcoming words. It was similar to a house where death had visited, where the visitor would not be given a word of welcome.
Vikrama called for the prime minister and laid a hand on his shoulder. The hand reassured him that he wanted an unvarnished account. Vikrama grimaced to learn that the empire was overthrown by Mohammedans from Delhi. He pieced together the fact that several events had come together to hand the Pandyans their most inglorious defeat ever.
Malik Kafur had responded to the overtures made to him by Sundar, and Veera had refused to foresee the signs. The absence of strong Pandyan allies would have helped the Turks. What made the campaign easier was that other nations had entered into agreements with the invaders and their tracts of land were spared since Malik was in pursuance of the wealth in Pandyan land. And a third of the Pandyan army – in essence, the cream of it – was far away in Lanka. To top it all, Veera’s exit had disheartened the remaining army. Profiting by the disappearance of the inhabitants, the Turks had simply walked into Madurai. Unlike the other countries where they had exacted tribute with some effort, the largest of them had been the easiest to conquer. With Sundar’s desire to improve the fortunes of his life and Veera’s reluctance to fight, they had managed to lose Madurai, a city whose gates were once more secure than a miser’s purse.
Vikrama could imagine the Turks breaking into the city. The gates would have crashed to the dusty ground and a gushing wave of bloodthirsty and brutal soldiers would have spewed out. Their temples, embellished for a thousand years, would have disappeared under the trampling boots of a hungry army, leaving only a few scattered ruins.
He was roused to indignation. The words trembled on his lips as he turned to Sundar, ‘You misbegotten spawn, you cavorted with the devil for your own selfish reasons.’ And then turning to Veera, he said angrily, ‘You call yourself a king? A Pandyan? Your own recklessness hid all common sense that would have hindered your exit. Nobody wants the empire to fall apart, but do you have any idea how your vassals as far as Lanka will react when they hear of what you have done? You both have undone in a couple of years what your forefathers took almost two hundred years to build!’
Vikrama called the two kings the most unrepeatable of names, for he had always found their statesmanship too self-centred for his taste. The two brothers sat silently, shoulders slumped in hopelessness. For a few moments they were lost in thought, considering what new methods might be tried to make the invader withdraw without them having to seek Vikrama’s support.
*
The leader of the Turks kindled Vikrama’s curiosity. As a youngster, he had heard of the Mohammedans from Delhi. All leaders of men, Vikrama knew, were interested in land and power, and perhaps a place in history. None of the three had mattered to the man who now led the Turks. Only gold did, which was why temple towns were particularly chosen by the enemy. Most of his victories were from sustained sieges and not open warfare – victories by threats of what he could do than what he actually did.
Vikrama’s mind was analysing every bit of the recent past. Should Veera have made a last stand? Perhaps he could have defeated the invader. Even if he had left after a stubborn fight, his people would have viewed him differently, as a fighting king driven to refuge.
But then, one couldn’t really blame him. A powerful army had materialized before his walls, their sudden appearance proclaiming inevitable defeat, not because they had the numbers on their side but because they had his brother as a guide.
Pandyans had lived too long in a world of make-believe; they had thought they were undefeatable. They had listened far too long to the poets’ praises and grown far too fat on the vassals’ tributes. And now, after living off plenty for nearly two hundred years, those who had swayed the destinies of millions were finished as a force.
*
Vikrama sat down to chart the course of action and was immediately faced with distressing facts. A week, which in military terms was considerable, had elapsed since the Turk’s entry into Madurai. The new owners must have entrenched themselves firmly by now. The Turks must have posted guards on all the bulwarks, beside strengthening their defences.
The two kings were certainly not a source of strength and by their personal squabbling were destined to paralyse the empire. Within a day of his arrival, Vikrama could sense the lack of amity between the two. He thought of the two brothers with disgust. If a throne was placed amidst burning biers in a cremation ground, they would still fight for it. They looked to him for guidance to lead them back to their land and give them back the thrones they had not earned.
Interacting with the kings whom he had taken pains to train, Vikrama learnt one thing: one could train an individual but could not vouch for him adhering to his indoctrination. He didn’t mince words about it. The war council watched Vikrama’s dark frown as he glared at the two kings. His words were distorted by anger and his dilating nostrils trembled with rage. ‘You two have created a disaster.’ He spat on the floor. ‘If the Mohammedan has walked into Madurai,’ he thundered, ‘there is cause enough. The two of you fought like mongrels on the street and treated our holy land as a carcass.’ The council stood still. The man was addressing two of the last living kings of the Pandyan empire as if they were street urchins.
Sundar tried to explain why he had met with the invader. ‘I knew they were powerful. I sought Malik Kafur as an ally. He had not burnt Deogiri or Dwarsamudra. If he had not been led here, he would have come anyway. I tried to stop him and come to an arrangement.’
Vikrama was ashamed at Sundar’s logic, and wanted to fling him from the ramparts of Madurai for his deeds. But he had no choice; he was the only man among them to have moved with Malik Kafur, and therefore the only one who could inform the council about the general’s strategies. A pinch of information was worth an elephant’s weight in strategy.
Veera wasn’t pleased at all. He had earlier satisfied himself with Sundar’s temporary importance. But Vikrama did not seem to be too perturbed by his track record of patricide and collusion with the enemy. Suddenly, Sundar’s presence made sense to him; he had no intentions of being left out of any deals that were going to be made with the enemy.
Veera was shocked. His retreat now seemed more ignominious than Sundar’s conniving with the enemy. But he had only fled from his dominion because his brother had guided the enemy to his doorsteps. His council of ministers had prevailed upon him to lay aside all thoughts of battle. Despite these truths, Vikrama sided with Sundar. Once again, old insecurities made their way up his gut.
If Vikrama had worried about the demoralized forces, Parakrama’s arrival accorded one last succour. His armies would soon follow. He had been assaulted by rumours the moment he had landed and had rushed headlong towards Madurai. Vikrama, with foresight, had him brought to Paramkunram.
Parakrama found his uncle Veera, the emperor of Madurai, had aged tremendously in the last month. He turned to look at his father; Sundar looked very different from the man he remembered from his childhood. On a chair between the two sat a man who seemed to dwarf them. His instinct told him this was the Vikrama who they had all learnt about in military school and whose name was heard only in whispers in the corridors.
Parakrama had gathered details about the enemy and the capture of Madurai on his way. His patience had worn out. ‘My forces will be here the day after tomorrow. We should attack immediately,’ he said to no one in particular once all the formalities wer
e over with.
Vikrama replied, ‘It will not be that easy. Entering a city without any walls could be easy, but in case of hand-to-hand combat, it will leave us all dead. We will have to take on the enemy where he is least familiar with and has no place to hide.’
Parakrama judged the men around him. Men become men during crises; otherwise they are as inert as clay. With Sundar’s help, Malik had saved a few days of marching time, but he would have invaded the city anyway. It was Veera who had left the field wide open for the Turkish marauders. He should have obstinately defended the city. Both the brothers had reacted without balance or perspective. Vikrama’s act, after being out of touch for so long, was beyond all praise. He had nothing to offer except his courage and would receive nothing as reward except having his loyalty proven. It was extremely lucky that the Pandyans had found a new leader who immediately proceeded to think of a way to disrupt the Turks’ designs.
Vikrama too realized the boy was different from any of them. Nobody would follow the two kings any more. At least the boy could not be blamed because of his absence. Parakrama was different from the other members of his impulsive family. He himself had rebelled, Veera had fled ahead of the enemy and Sundar had brought the enemy to Madurai hand in hand. They had all acted on impulsiveness.
It would raise Parakrama to distinction if he could learn from his family’s mistakes.
CHAPTER 31
A PREMATURE RETREAT
Dark clouds greeted Malik and Rayan as they exited the temple. Malik’s heart was weighed down with a bittersweet emotion unlike any he had felt before. He had just found the greatest treasure in his career, but who was the old man? How did he know about the horses in Khambayat? And had the stone elephants really come to life?
As they walked out into one of the four streets around the temple, the sky came to life with lightning. Each crack unnerved Rayan, who by now was at his wit’s end. Malik held him firmly by the hand lest he make a dash for it. He could feel his frightened companion shiver. It was natural, Malik knew, for someone superstitious to construe lightning as fire from the wrathful heavens.
But Malik didn’t worry about Rayan’s mental anguish; instead, he was elated at the treasure he had just seen: statues exquisitely carved and overlaid with burnished gilding, gems glowing in the richest of hues, jewellery of all sorts and sizes. Still, a nagging doubt remained – what if the treasure was an illusion, too? He had seen too many tricks for a day; he hoped the treasure wouldn’t disappear overnight.
The Turks had camped in the streets around the temple square, which was now plunged in darkness. The storm seemed like it would continue till late in the night. Men struggled to light their torches until their efforts defeated them and they finally shrugged and sat down in the darkness. As Malik and Rayan walked in the middle of the street, wading in the torrent that now rushed towards the river, Malik’s usually steady flow of thoughts was disturbed by Rayan’s moaning. His words lacked coherence, which suited Malik well. He did not want Rayan to tell anybody what had happened within the temple premises. An instinctive dread of the occult and of the unknown would cause rumours to fly. Malik furiously replayed the memories in his mind. A creeping feeling returned in the pit of his stomach. What had he missed?
He stopped in his tracks; the conversation with the old man came back to him in all its clarity, and suddenly, he realized Rayan had stopped translating halfway. The old man had spoken to him in chaste Tamil and yet he had understood all of it.
An old priest’s face flashed in front of his eyes; an old man with a wrinkled, bearded face that tilted towards the skies. A camphor lamp blowing out on a windless night. Then it came to him: the old priest who had betrayed him. The priest had foreseen his role in destroying temples, which is why he had betrayed him to the Rana – it wasn’t for the gold coins. Memories swirled around in his head and Malik for the first time felt he was but a lowly pawn in a cosmic chess game.
He let the rain drench him. The statue felt cold under his arms, and the rain was a fortunate cover for he did not want the soldiers to see him in this troubled state. He walked into a room in a large mansion he had claimed for himself. Outside, the rain continued to pour down violently. The fierce winds rattled the land all through the night, until it cleared up in the morning and bright sunlight pierced through the clouds to cast an unearthly glow on the land. Malik looked out of his window and found trees had had their branches stripped. Most of the tents had been carried away to the treetops.
Late in the morning, a group of soldiers was led to the treasury. The gates were broken without much ado, the fragile wood giving way easily to the metal that struck it. The fear of God was all that the people of Madurai had trusted to guard the treasures.
Malik half-expected the treasure to have vapourized overnight. It hadn’t; the diamonds, pearls, sapphires, rubies and emeralds were all there. Even the gold seemed to fade before the other riches. There were crowns and armour for the idols in solid gold, encrusted with gems that dazzled in several colours when the torch flickered over them. Most of the jewels were packed in crates by the men and a solemn procession of sixty palanquins made their way back to the camp. The soldiers who had not been allowed inside stood on the sides and watched the procession make its way. Several trips were made before Malik was convinced that the treasury was wiped clean.
The next was the palace treasury, where as much wealth as in the temple awaited them. Twenty Pandyan soldiers had decided to make a last stand at the gates of the treasury. The first Sultanate soldiers who entered the treasury paid for their overconfidence with their lives. Once they were warned, the Turks were more careful. In an hour, the guards had been killed. Stepping over their corpses, Malik and his team entered the treasury.
It had been a most lucrative trip after all.
*
Never in his life had he been so tired. He should have been vastly pleased, for this was the greatest treasure he had come across. Despite the allure of more wealth, he did not want to be detained at this godforsaken place.
Malik intuitively knew that the temple and the palace had been drained of their wealth. Perhaps he could find more if he decided to continue the onslaught. Whenever he saw the temple towers, his mind would tell him to go in and solve the mystery once and for all, but his feet wouldn’t cooperate with his head.
It was then that he noticed that Rayan, who till then had clung to him like a shadow, was missing.
‘Where is Rayan?’ he enquired.
Malik was informed that he wasn’t keeping well. He walked to Rayan’s tent, where the doctor immediately stood up in a surprised hurry. Malik saw Rayan writhing on the bed with his eyes wide open. He was down with a fever, his forehead was burning and his eyes looked possessed. He murmured something that Malik couldn’t hear, and he came closer to understand what he had said.
‘My friend, my friend, I saw him, I saw him.’
A stream of tears flowed down his cheeks.
‘You don’t know how lucky you are, Malik, you saw him too.’
Malik was shocked. Rayan had always treated him like a king, with deferent courtesy. He had never called him by his name before. And who was the fool talking about?
Rayan now whispered, ‘Lord, you waited for me’, repeatedly. Malik thought he was delirious because of his fever. ‘Get well soon, my friend,’ Malik patted Rayan’s hand. It felt hot. He got up stiffly and walked out. He could Rayan hear screaming behind him, ‘You saw him, Malik, you saw him too.’
*
The mood in the Turkish army was upbeat. They waited for orders to march southwards, to the temples and the wealth that lay beyond. Ulugh Khan wanted this energy to be converted to an onslaught. The army, which was tired last week, was raring to go now. But there was a marked shift in Malik’s attitude. His interest in further conquest began to flag and he thought it better to save what he had than to seek for more.
When Malik expressed a wish to turn around, Ulugh Khan found it difficult to hide the scorn in h
is reply. But any amount of disdain would not dissuade Malik. He had made up his mind. Khan was astounded. What was his general so afraid of? It was as if they were an army on the run, not an army that had struck fear in the hearts of a hundred kings.
When the news spread, it sounded incredulous to many. Many of Malik’s words and decisions had stung them in the past. But this was the limit. The abrupt end to their looting hurt them more and there was a widespread feeling that there could be a mutiny. Malik had pledged to bring the richest land in the whole world under Turkish yoke. Now, he was jeopardizing the aim for which he had led the force so far, thereby doing his Sultan a disservice.
Nevertheless, orders were issued for the army to pack up. The soldiers were sullen, for they had never met an easier foe – one who had assembled all his wealth and conveniently left no guards. The same could be expected of the lands in the south, which offered a wide field for the invader. But they had no choice.
While watching the reluctant bustle of preparations, Malik felt strangely removed from it all. He was determined not to remain in Madurai any longer than needed. Something seemed very wrong. An alarm inside his head shrilled a warning call, drowning out the noises around him. The handicapped always have their other senses heightened; a blind person can hear a worm wriggling yards away, while a deaf man could read lips. Malik’s sharper intuitive powers had contributed to his rise in court. He could sense an opponent’s move just as he thought of one. To him, intuition was like an itching feeling in his brain. Something gnawed and then things went wrong.
His intuition now told him the Pandyans would regroup and attack. The rule he followed was to never wait for scattered armies to strike back with vengeance. Having lost their wives and wealth, death would be no big deal for them, and they would use all their power to really hurt them. The Pandyans loomed ominously and the entire city now felt oppressive to him. His intuition was warning him of the dangers of staying in Madurai and now prompted him into initiating the army’s hurried departure from the premises for another place.
Gods, Kings & Slaves: The Siege of Madurai Page 41