The Queens of Hastinapur

by Sharath Komarraju

  ‘How did you find it?’

  ‘They are reluctant to teach me,’ said Pritha, with petulance in her voice. ‘They stayed close to me, the two of them, and they held one rein each. They tied me by the waist to the horse’s back and my legs to the stirrups. What good is riding like that, I wonder.’

  Gandhari held one of Pritha’s hands and led her out toward the garden. ‘Let us move away from this terrible smell.’ They walked along a stone path that led them toward the palace quarters and stopped by a fountain. ‘You must not blame them for their excessive care,’ she told Pritha. ‘You are, after all, the elder queen of the High King, and therefore the future queen mother.’

  Pritha sighed and her hand twitched in Gandhari’s grip. ‘I do dislike being fussed over so. In my father’s land, nobody paid any attention to me. I was left alone, although even there nobody would teach me how to ride.’

  ‘Forget riding,’ said Gandhari, turning to Pritha. ‘A maiden ought to be good with her hands. I see that you have nervous fingers and that your grip wavers.’

  She heard a quick intake of breath. Pritha’s hand withdrew.

  ‘Yes,’ she said morosely. ‘I have often been told that, but I am not a bad hand at mending garments. And I have painted a fair few pictures, so I do have an eye for colour.’

  ‘Perhaps I could teach you to make clay figures.’

  They moved closer to the sound of running water, and when Gandhari’s side touched the marble edge of the fountain, she turned and sat on it, feeling the spray of water droplets on the back of her neck.

  ‘Come,’ she said to Pritha, ‘sit.’

  ‘Would you teach me how to make clay figures, sister?’

  ‘I would, my dear. After all, ever since I have tied this band around my eyes, time hangs heavy on my hands.’

  ‘Do you need strong fingers for it?’

  Gandhari once again took Pritha’s hand in hers and felt each finger, as if examining it. ‘Strength is not as important as proportion. Some people have short, fat fingers, and others have thin, scrawny ones. Yours seem to be just the right size.’

  ‘Oh,’ said Pritha.

  ‘Yes. But you must train them well. They must become certain and precise. My hands used to be similar to yours when I was young, but now you see how firm my grip is.’

  ‘I see, yes.’

  ‘I would think this is more important to a queen,’ said Gandhari, ‘than riding.’ When she did not hear a reply, she gave the younger girl a smile. ‘Do not think I am admonishing you, my dear. We can still ride together one morning out of every seven, but we must give more to the aspects of being a lady too.’

  ‘Can we ride together once a week?’ said Pritha, her voice rising in excitement.

  ‘Yes,’ said Gandhari, ‘but only if you learn your lessons well.’

  ‘I shall, sister. I shall, I promise.’

  ‘Then you will come to my chambers at the beginning of the tenth hour every morning, and for two hours I shall teach you to be a majestic queen. Will that do?’

  ‘Shall I bring Madri as well?’

  Gandhari frowned. ‘No,’ she said. ‘Madri wants the same things as you do, my dear, so you shall not be so foolish, I think, as to think her a friend.’ She leaned closer to Pritha and lowered her voice. ‘Are we surrounded by maids?’

  ‘Oh, but sister,’ said Pritha in her boisterous voice, ‘Madri and I do get along well. She braids my hair. She has given me some of her beautiful blue jewels to wear on occasion, and she is ever so respectful. Always speaks in a low, friendly voice—’

  ‘That is how it begins,’ said Gandhari. ‘If she has the first son of Pandu, you shall see how she will change. That reminds me, you have been feeding her the herb, have you not?’

  ‘Oh, sister, I could not!’

  ‘You could not?’

  ‘I could not do that to another maiden,’ said Pritha. ‘After I retreated to my chambers that night with the herb, I found my heart was as heavy as a ball of iron. Must we fight amongst ourselves, I thought. Must we treat each other like enemies so? Can we not leave the choice of who will be king up to the Goddess? If it is indeed Madri, then I shall be happy for her. I hope that if it is me, Madri would be happy for me too. We are both wives of one man, so why must we fight, I thought.’

  Gandhari licked her lips. She told herself to breathe. Nothing had gone wrong yet. Pandu was still as impotent as a mule. But Pritha had to be taught some lessons in statecraft too.

  ‘You may find that Madri will not share your thoughts on that subject, Pritha,’ she said, patting the younger girl’s hand. ‘You are much too naive yet to be a queen of Hastinapur. So you did not give the herb to Madri.’

  ‘No, sister.’

  ‘Are you certain, then, that neither of you are with child?’

  ‘Yes. Both of us have bled after Lord Pandu left.’

  ‘Ah,’ said Gandhari, leaning back in relief. She fought to keep her lips from spreading into a smile. ‘That is unfortunate.’

  ‘It will happen when the gods will it,’ said Pritha. ‘There is no reason to question fate, is there, sister?’

  ‘No, there is not,’ said Gandhari. ‘I am certain that it will be you who will give birth to the first son, Pritha. I shall see to it that you do, for it is only right for the older queen to become the queen mother.’

  ‘If that is so, sister, then you are older than the both of us. Should you not be the queen mother?’

  ‘Ah, Pritha, dear Pritha. You really are ignorant of the ways of the court. Now, let me tell you a secret.’ She lowered her voice again, and she could tell that Pritha was leaning closer, for the smell of her jasmines became more intense. ‘I am not with child yet, but even if I were, I am not the wife of the High King, so my son would not have a claim to the throne.’

  ‘Oh,’ said Pritha. ‘That seems to me a bit unfair.’

  Gandhari shrugged and said lightly, ‘I am not ambitious for the throne either, dear. Lord Dhritarashtra and I go through enough strife every day, in such mundane things as taking a bath and eating a meal. Governing a kingdom would be well beyond us.’

  ‘I do not think that is true, sister,’ said Pritha. ‘I have heard of many kings—’

  ‘Lord Dhritarashtra is not one of them,’ said Gandhari. ‘We must be content with what we have, must we not? We are the elders of the Kuru house. You, Pandu and Madri treat us with such respect. Lord Bhishma is correct – a blind king will lead the whole kingdom astray.’

  ‘I … I still think it is unfair.’

  Gandhari smiled at Pritha. They sat in silence for a few minutes. The birds had stopped singing, and Gandhari felt the first hot rays of the sun smart the skin of her arms. A tender warmth filled her from the inside. On the stone path on which they had come, she heard the sound of hurrying anklets. Then the rustle of leaves.

  ‘Your Highness,’ said the young voice of a waiting woman. ‘The morning is getting warm. It is time for your bath.’

  Pritha got up from beside her and sighed. ‘I must go now, sister.’

  ‘Of course you must,’ said Gandhari. ‘You are the queen. You must get used to being pampered so.’

  ‘Tomorrow, then, in your chambers?’

  ‘Yes, I shall be waiting, and ready.’

  CHAPTER FIVE

  G

  andhari saw shapes.

  Solid shapes, spheres and chains and swords and jewels. Shadowy shapes, slumping and melting, coalescing and combining. Liquid shapes, a black frozen river, yellow desert sand flowing through it, ice mountains dotting the horizon, threatening to melt and swallow the whole land in a large wave of white water.

  Amid it all she rode the horse of that morning – she imagined it to be coal black, although Uddalaka had told her it was brown – draped in a maroon cloak that covered her head from the rain. Every time a drop touched her skin it burned and plucked out a piece of flesh. She saw no blood – each small piece of her dropped into the white snow and disappeared, much like the horse’s
hoof-prints.

  Shakuni came out from behind the trunk of the tree from which he had fallen off as a child. He did not limp, and he grinned at her in that old way he used to when they were both kids, when he always had a toy horse tucked under the arm. He wore a short beard now. As she approached, he drew his sword and pointed it at the sky. When she looked up, she saw that gold dust was raining from the grey clouds. She cried out in delight and held out her hands, but as soon as the golden specks touched her, they turned into droplets of water that ran down her wrists and disappeared into the wet whiteness.

  She realized she was so cold that she shivered each time a breeze blew against her face. But on the back of her neck, under the cloak, was a layer of sweat. When she ran her fingers on her nape and looked at it, she saw that there was sweat on her palm, but then another gust of icy wind blew and froze it white.

  Under the tree where Shakuni stood, there was a tuft of green grass, the blades of which bent under the weight of just-forming dew drops. A woman sat on its edge, wrapped in a blue and white shawl, bent over a green twig. She broke it in two and tossed the smaller piece into the hollow of the tree’s trunk. Her hair was as grey as Shubrasi’s, and the hands were similarly wrinkled, the same pale yellow fingernails, but when she turned to look at Gandhari, she had Pritha’s face.

  A great heaviness came over Gandhari at this moment, and her shoulders, arms, head and legs, all slumped on the horse’s back; the animal sunk into the white depths a little more under the weight. He bore her in silence, though, without a neigh or a grunt of gripe. Her stomach grew in size into a giant mass of stretched, bloated skin, as though she were a fried snack tossed into a cauldron of simmering oil. A black shadow came out of her, wailing, and assumed the shape of a muscular young man with a glittering crown on his head.

  He held a mace to his right shoulder, in the same way Dhritarashtra did. But this boy could see. Even though his face was just a deep black oval, even though she could not see his eyes, something about the way he stood, with his head held straight – not twisted to one side, like Dhritarashtra’s – told her that her son could see.

  Behind him was the throne of Hastinapur, and behind that loomed the heavy dark shadows cast by the mines of Gandhar.

  Golden rivulets flowed out of the holes in every shape; they dripped on to the throne, coating it in a layer of liquid dazzle. Shakuni pointed his sword at the throne – or at the mines, she could not tell – and laughed. This was an adult laugh – head thrown back, chest puffed out, brimming with conceit. The old lady with Shubrasi’s body and Pritha’s face laughed as well, stirring the black air in the hollow with a larger twig.

  For the first time she raised her hands to her eyes and found her fingers touching not the soft satin of the blindfold but the warm skin of her lids. A thundering of horses’ hooves rose in her ears, and when she turned around she found herself surrounded by white-clad riders on brown steeds. At their head was Bhishma, brandishing a sword in her direction. They overtook her at a steady gallop and swept across the cold white earth toward the golden throne.

  I will forever stand in your path, he said.

  He will forever stand in my path.

  The shapes grew hazier, and as they retreated one by one from her vision and she traced her steps back to reality, back to the corner of her room where her palms had stayed pinned to the wall in front of her, she became aware of the sun’s rays on the back of her neck and a patient knocking on the heavy teak door.

  ‘Yes,’ she said, clearing her throat. ‘Who is there?’

  ‘Maid Shubrasi to see you, Your Highness.’

  Gandhari stood at the window, with her back to the door, as the maid entered. ‘I have been waiting to speak to you, Shubrasi,’ she said. ‘I learned of the cavalry unit that Lord Bhishma is in the process of building. My riding companion told me they are to ride out to Gandhar in a week.’

  ‘Aye, princess,’ said Shubrasi, coming up to the window and stopping to Gandhari’s right. Shubrasi reared pigeons in her quarters and sang to them every night in her croaking voice. Her hands stank of bird litter, more so when she stood as she was now, within arm’s reach. A few days back Gandhari had given her a rather large container of scented oil, to be smeared on the palms, but Shubrasi never remembered.

  With a signal, she ordered the maid to take a step back. She herself craned her neck forward so that she could better smell the outside air.

  ‘Prince Shakuni received your message three weeks ago,’ said Shubrasi, amid coughs and sniffles. ‘There is a demonic cold about in the air, princess, so pray keep away from me.’

  ‘I have heard he has made his first attack on the mines,’ said Gandhari.

  ‘Aye, that is what I have heard too. He has taken back the mines, they say, at least for now. The guards have fled to the barracks and they will mount an offensive soon.’

  ‘Do you think they can hold them back, Shubrasi? Will the mines be ours again?’ Gandhari knew the answer to that question, but she did not make an effort to subdue the rising well of hope within her. ‘Is there any chance, you think, that Shakuni would prevail against Bhishma?’

  ‘No, my lady,’ said Shubrasi. ‘He may gain victory against the guards from the barracks, but if Bhishma himself marches against him, I am afraid he must lie low once again.’

  Gandhari sighed. For a moment an image of Bhishma lying prostrate on the battered ground stood in front of her eyes. His customary white fighting clothes were smattered with blood stains, and his armour bore dents and cuts. Arrows stuck out of his body, his face bore a grim frown, and his eyes wore a strange, aged look. Gandhari then realized that his beard and the hair on his forearms had gone white. He turned his head, then, and looked straight at her. And he smiled.

  Gandhari shook her head to free herself of the vision, much as she liked it.

  ‘No matter,’ she said, drawing herself together. ‘This battle will be a mere distraction. Shakuni will lose, of that I have no doubt, but I do hope he will keep Bhishma away from Hastinapur for a moon or two, at least until my belly begins to show.’

  ‘Aye, that should be easily achieved, princess,’ said Shubrasi. ‘The journey to Gandhar takes seven nights each way, so once Bhishma leaves, he shall not return for a moon. Of that much I am certain.’

  ‘And he shall leave the throne of Hastinapur unattended.’ Gandhari allowed a smile to cross her face. ‘Pandu is on his way back, but we shall have a fortnight where Lord Dhritarashtra will rule as High King.’

  ‘And you shall be the queen.’

  ‘And I shall be the queen, yes.’

  ‘But only until Pandu returns.’

  Gandhari’s face turned grave. ‘That is so. But with the regent not present, one can think of a few ways around that predicament.’

  ‘How, princess?’

  Gandhari turned away from the window and counted the seven steps that took her to the bed. She sat on its edge and beckoned Shubrasi over. When the maid came closer, she took both her hands, in spite of the bad smell, and smiled up at her face. ‘I have never told you what a big help you have been, have I, Shubrasi?’

  The woman gushed, ‘My princess, you must not say things like that to your servant.’

  ‘Without you, life here would have been much more tortuous than it is. But you make it all bearable.’

  ‘I shall give all that I have for you, my lady.’

  ‘Come, sit by me, will you not, and let me rest my head on your lap for a while?’

  The feel of Shubrasi’s thigh under her neck had not changed in all these years, she thought. As she closed her eyes, she went back to her old library in Gandhar, walls lined with stacked scrolls, the velvet carpets on which she had whiled away many an afternoon, with her head pillowed on Shubrasi’s lap, her forehead caressed by Shubrasi’s gentle touch, her ears filled with Shubrasi’s soft song.

  ‘Does Shakuni ask after me?’ she said, knowing full well that the maid had been away from Gandhar as long as she.

  But Shu
brasi, dear old Shubrasi, said, ‘He does, my dear. He says that even today, on nights when he cannot sleep, he comes to your chambers to speak with you. And even today he speaks for hours to your bed, to your paintings, to the windows and to the candles.’

  ‘He will learn to be a good king, will he not?’

  ‘He already is, my dear. The best king Gandhar has ever had.’

  ‘Even better than me?’

  ‘Not quite as good as you, princess, although I am certain he shall one day equal your wisdom.’

  And so they went on, Gandhari asking questions, Shubrasi furnishing answers in her cracked, wobbling manner. She knew just the right words, and she knew the best way in which to say them. After some time Gandhari felt her eyelids grow heavy, and perhaps sensing that, Shubrasi began to sing a lullaby, the song of the mountain people who had descended the slopes and settled on the bank of the now dead river, Saraswati.

  ‘Ask them to bring lunch for me an hour later, Shubrasi,’ Gandhari murmured. ‘I should like to sleep awhile.’

  ‘Yes, princess.’

  The maids had just finished cleaning up her table of dinner plates and bowls, and she had just finished chewing on a juicy green betel leaf when she heard quick, purposeful steps in the corridor outside the door. She did not wait for him to be announced; she signalled to the guards to let him in.

  ‘Lord Bhishma,’ she said, when the visitor entered her chamber, ‘what a pleasant surprise it is to have you here.’

  ‘I hardly believe you have not been expecting to hear from me, Lady Gandhari,’ said Bhishma. ‘I trust you know what I have come to speak to you about.’

  Gandhari bowed and gestured him to a seat. ‘The messenger who announced your arrival did not tell me anything about the occasion of your visit, sire.’

  ‘Then allow me,’ said Bhishma. This was the first time in Gandhari’s life that she heard Bhishma’s voice carry an edge of anger. It still held that velvety quality, though, that made him sound more like a priest than a warrior. Indeed, she had heard from many others before that if Bhishma for some reason renounced the hilt of a sword, he would find himself quite at home at a hermitage, with a scroll in hand.