Meanwhile, Vibhishana stood up and gave a long speech about Asura chivalry and the humane treatment of prisoners-of-war. He managed to bore and irritate all those present. I had already decided what punishment should be meted out to the dreaded pirate. I waited. The ascending waves of murmurs and the heavy cloud of anticipation had created a surreal quality.
Finally, after what seemed like an eternity, Prahastha began, “Your Highness, we believe that the pirate-King should be executed. He is too dangerous to be let off and he might turn against us when we are weakest. Prudence dictates that he should be given the harshest punishment in order to send a lesson to other enemies of the State and the Council. . .that is, we ministers suggest that he should be summarily executed.”
I was stunned. This was quite unexpected. I saw Sumali, Vajradhamstra and Malyavaan furiously discussing it amongst themselves. Kumbha and Vibhishana were debating, while Dhumraksha sat in a corner, morose at being ignored. I was sure I was in a fix. If I let off Varuna, it would be like siding with my brother Vibhishana, and if I executed him, it would seem I was being controlled by Prahastha. Oh boy, what a mess!
Prahastha’s steely glare bored into me as if challenging me to contradict him. The pirate-King was standing there unfazed. Not an emotion crossed his impassive face. I almost admired him for his coolness. The man was brave, definitely much braver than me. I had ended up in a deep mess. It would have been easier to abide by the Council’s wishes and execute Varuna. But then, I needed to assert my supremacy over them. At the same time, I could not let off the pirate-King with great honour and respect; I could not let him walk free.
“I am not going to execute him.” The murmuring stopped suddenly. After a few moments of stunned silence, my ministers stood up one after the other. “I think I owe you an explanation. It is not my intention to let this pirate go free. I’ve ordered that his entire fleet of ships be confiscated and added to the royal navy. The pirates must be given proper military training and absorbed into the navy. And as for the pirate-King. . .” I walking towards Varuna. He towered over me by at least half a foot. I stared into his eyes and through my teeth I said, “I am going to drag him through the streets, shave his head partially, and then take him around the city on the back of an ass. Then I am going to conduct the marriage of this pirate-king with a pig. This will be at the expense of the royal treasury, a state sponsored wedding. It will be conducted along with my marriage.”
A small smile twitched at the corner of Varuna’s mouth. He matched my stare and said, ”Ah the day when all pigs will get married.”
I hit him across his face, the laughter of my ministers burning my ears. Then I also caught the humour of Varuna’s repartee and started laughing. Only Prahastha remained still, without the trace of a smile on his aristocratic face.
“Your Highness, if you will not execute this prisoner, may I suggest that he be imprisoned for life in a dark cellar, and no further insults be meted out to him in public?”
“I will do as I wish. You have given your opinion. Keep your council to yourself.” I snubbed Prahastha and the matter ended there. Or that is what I thought. I walked out of the durbar with my ministers following me, while Varuna was dragged out so his head could be shaved partially and for ial>withother abuses and tortures.
Maricha and Kumbha caught up with me on my either side. “I thought you were going to execute him, Ravana.” ‘That was before I entered the durbar.’ I could see surprise in Maricha’s eyes but I did not reply.
“I have a suggestion.” Kumbha struggled to catch up with me. “Why not make Varuna our admiral?”
“And what‘s the guarantee that Varuna will not attack our ships once he is out of Lankan territorial waters?” I asked him.
“At heart, Varuna is more of a businessman than a pirate. If he is offered favourable terms, he will stick to them. Of course, we should always remain alert and not trust him too much.”
“And what do we gain by striking a deal with a pirate?”
“A secure trade route, ports free from pirate attack, revenue from security for foreigners, and plenty of goodwill with the outside world.”
“The idea doesn’t excite me.” I was bent on insulting the pirate-King. His jeering laugh during his duel with me inside his cabin, still rankled.
“I am with Prahastha in this matter,” Maricha intervened. “It is too dangerous. I don’t know why you took such a stupid decision.” I remained silent. How could I say that I too had wanted what Prahastha advised, but took an idiotic decision just to assert myself?
Mother was standing at the end of the corridor. The fumbling professor Mayan, was also there, scribbling something furiously on a palm leaf. “Maricha, please leave the children and come with me. We have important things to discuss.”
Maricha gave me a wink and disappeared with my mother and the professor. I knew what they were going to discuss. So this was it. My bachelor days were about to end. It was almost noon. Outside the palace, the market was slowly emptying as the city prepared for its afternoon siesta. A few kites circled high in the sky, again and again and again. Somewhere outside, a fishmonger yelled in a last ditch attempt to sell off his day’s basket of fish. The sea shimmered in the sunlight and reflected the afternoon sun in a thousand little mirrors. Clouds were forming on the distant, western horizon. The humidity was intolerable and the air hung like a thick, wet carpet over the city. Standing at the balcony of my palace, I reflected on my life.
The wedding was fixed for Friday, four days hence. I personally supervised all the arrangements, not for the marriage, but for the meting out of the greatest possible humiliation and torture to the pirate-King. I could not help admire the courage of the man – he took it all without a murmur. With blood-caked lips, Varuna smiled, showing off his broken teeth, when he saw me. I raised my hand to hit him, looked into his eyes, and stopped. I was disgusted. What sort of a hoodlum was I?
The marriage preparations were like a constant toothache. Hoards of Asuras landed from the
mainland in boats and motley ships. I had never suspected that we had so many relatives. Where were these mobs when we were starving? Obese uncles and aunts sailed into my bedroom just to see how ‘our boy Ravana’ had grown up. One even dared to joke that the last time he had seen me, I had looked like something the cat had chewed out. I promptly called my guards and threw the old man out. Children ran around breaking crystal vases and smearing the walls of the palace, babies howled in the night, fat black Asura women lay on the floors, sofas, beds and steps – anywhere they could find a place. They woke me just to tell me how very lucky I was to have achieved so much and what a fine lady I was marrying. Some came with their good-fornothing sons and demanded employment for them in governmeem w very lnt. Food was free and wine flowed like a river.
21 Happy family
Ravana
My sister fluttered around showing off her newly made jewellery and escorting all and sundry to Mandodari’s chamber to show off her new sister-in-law. For once I pitied the professor’s daughter. I had to keep my temper in check and smile at everyone and act as if I was the happiest man in the world. The strain of keeping a smiling face when I was seething inside, started telling on my nerves. By Friday morning, my smile was almost a grimace. I looked in the mirror and felt sorry for myself. What kind of marriage was this? There was no love, no romantic courtship, no whispers under the moon, no stolen kisses; in fact it was clinical. Not even my fertile imagination could conjure up a romantic relationship with Mandodari.
I was woken up at some godforsaken hour on Friday morning and almost dragged for a ritual bath at the palace lake, amidst peals of laughter. Gaping men and women; elders commenting; girls giggling around corners; a cacophony of noises; the aroma of flowers, sweets, fried meat, fruit and rotting garbage in the streets of Lanka; milling crowds outside the fort jostling and screaming and getting fried in the humid tropical heat; cow dung – fresh, old, dried, burnt; incense; spices; fish; the sickly smell of the creek, and a
million other things, assaulted my senses. I was led to a room where, like a girl, they applied mehendi on my toes and palms. Old women sang suggestive songs – old women who were shrivelled like sun-dried betel nuts, sang about the pleasures in bed. These came from the depths of the human soul and glorified an eternal truth – procreation, the only tool for the survival of human beings. I should have tried not to laugh at them.
I was escorted to the palace hall where a stage had been erected. It was gaudy and yet beautiful. Garlands of marigold and jasmine hung all over. A huge painting of Shiva and Parvati formed the backdrop. And of all things, three Brahmin priests sat croaking like frogs around a fire. What was this? That was a Deva custom, Asura marriages were always simple affairs. I did not know whose idea it was. Then I saw my father had come and was sitting in a huge chair. My mother sat on the floor, massaging his feet. My brother Vibhishana was also reverently standing by. All my ministers, except Prahastha, were present and standing in marked obsequiousness, as if paying obeisance to a visiting Emperor. Soorpanakha was desperately trying to impress our father, who was barely listening. The old lecher’s eyes were roving over the body of the maid watering the plants in the garden.
“The proud father meets the great achiever. Aha! What a melodramatic scene.” Kumbha was grinning.
“So you did not join the grand reunion?” I could barely conceal my anger.
“I chose to give it a miss. I think I forgot the lines of the family song.” Kumbha was laughing now. The smell of country liquor hit me like a blast. I eyed him with contempt. Fat, ugly, with a huge beer belly, he looked forty and not twenty. I screamed, at him, “How dare you drink like this?” I grabbed his hair and banged his head on the wall. “You good-for-nothing. You scoundrel. . .” I kept banging his head and he ineffectually tried to parry my blows.
Hearing the ruckus, the family reunion broke up and they all came running into the room. Kumbha had collapsed on the floor like a heap of manure. Blood dripped from his nose and he moaned in pain. Maricha held me back. Soorpanakha screamed at the sight of the blood. Smack! My ears burned, and I saw with astonishment that my mother had cut her hand on my ear stud. She had hit me – in front of my ministers, my servants, and now the story would spread through the country like wildfire – a king who walked in the shadow of his mother’s pallu. A king who was treated like a baby by his mother.
I pushed Maricha aside and saw him fall backwards and hit his head on the floor, from the corner of my eye. I could not have cared less. I grabbed my mother by her hair and dragged her out of the hall. The sight of Prahastha standing with his hands folded behind his back, staring at me, stopped me dead. The grip on my mother loosened and she scrambled up. The horror of the crime I had committed hit me like a thunderbolt. I was both shocked and shattered, but in some corner of my mind, satisfied and happy.
“The prisoner is ready for the punishment, your Highness,” Prahastha said, with a slight bow. For a moment I went blank. Prisoner, which prisoner? It seemed the Varuna affair would follow me to my deathbed.
“First you finish with me. I’m your first prisoner!” yelled my mother behind me. “Shave my head and make me ride round the town naked on an ass. Why did you stop? You scoundrel son!”
I hung my head in shame. My mother’s screaming had tuned into hysterical sobs. My hands trembled. I could not face anyone. Someone put a hand on my shoulders. “Kaikasi, he has not changed. I’m ashamed to say I sired this demon. I thought I would grace this occasion and brought my learned friends to perform this devil’s marriage. And this Satan hits his mother and almost murders his brother in front of my friends!”
I felt the anger rising in my veins. I held onto the balustrade of the verandah with a deadly grip. Where was this good-for-nothing Brahmin when we were hungry? Where was he when my mother begged for food and clothes? Where was he when held precariously to live in our tiny cottage, swaying in the monsoon squalls? And all the while this lecherous Brahmin had perhaps been sowing his wild oats in the brothels of the mainland
“I should not blame him alone. He is, after all, an Asura. A more blighted race I have yet to see. Debauchery, sodomy, avarice, you name any evil and this devilish race can easily claim monopoly over it. Black-skinned, ugly creatures. . .“
“If we are so bad, then why did you marry my sister?” I turned in surprise at the sound of my uncle Maricha’s voice. He was cool but I could feel his anger.
“Shut up, you stupid Asura, I’m talking to my wife and son and I do not answer to anyone like you.” A drop of red betel nut juice oozed from the corners of my father’s mouth.
Maricha looked at him with contempt and then turned to me. I drew to my full height and stepped menacingly towards my father. He began to cower. I towered over the poor fellow by almost two feet. I was angry enough to kill him with a blow but I was still ashamed at what I had done to my mother. My mother understood this was the decisive moment and stepped between us. She put her hands on my chest and shoved me back. I looked at her face and again the shame of hitting her struck me.
My mother spoke. “I am leaving. Your father, brothers, sister and I, will never again step into your home. We do not want to see you again. And when we die, do not come to see our dead bodies. Power has made you into a demon. You. . .you. . .will never find peace. . .”
I staggered back and grabbed the pillar in the corner of the room to stop me from collapsing to the floor. I saw my mother grab Soorpanakha’s hand. She was sobbing as my mother tugged at her. My sister lo. M the pilloked at my face and saw the tears flowing down my face. Slowly, deliberately, she freed herself from my mother’s grip. I could see the shock in my mother’s face. Mother walked to Kumbha, who was sprawled on the floor. He had passed out.
“Kumbakarna, Kumbha, wake up! Wake up!” But all my mother’s screaming could not wake Kumbha from his drug-induced stupour. I almost smiled. “You have murdered him, Ravana. You have killed your own brother.”
The situation now bordered on the hilarious. “He is not dead, mother. Your son is dead drunk. You could ask your fair and handsome husband to carry him on his shoulders.” I laughed out loud as I imagined the fat buffoon carrying his jumbo-sized son on his shoulders.
“Vibhishana, do you want to go with this great Deva gentleman, this learned Brahmin?” I asked my younger brother, as I walked towards him
“No no brother. . .I mean. . .” Vibhishana stammered. I came so close to him that I could smell the sacred ashes he had smeared on his forehead. He was sweating.
“Why will you not accompany your Brahmin father? He could teach you all sorts of mantras and make you into a high class robber. You could perform all your usual mediations and have Vishnu or Indra or some Deva God as your personal protector. He could teach you all that and more.” I walked towards my father, who was now ashen with fear. I saw the Brahmins had stopped chanting mantras and one of them was actually packing whatever he could lay his hands on. The greed of that Brahmin for other men’s possessions was greater than his fear of death. I laughed out aloud. One of the Brahmins jumped out of the window with two of my good brass lamps held to his chest. The other one had a few vessels with him and tried to sneak out. I grabbed him by his top knot. He fell at my feet and started mumbling something. I thought he would take out his holy water from his jug any instant and curse me and I’d be hopping around the garden as a toad.
It took some time for me to register that that he was praising me. By Shiva! I had to pack this joker off before he spewed a mega poem in my praise, delivered extempore, and that too from the extremely difficult position of being sprawled flat on the floor. I kicked him and he scrambled up and ran for dear life. My father wanted to utter some curse, but because of his fear, he was unable to even open his mouth. My mother, with whatever dignity she could muster, took my father’s shaking hands in hers and in her best melodramatic style, proclaimed, “I will not step into this hell even when I am dead. I will not allow you or any of your siblings to see my dead body. And because
of the insult to your parents, you will pay. I do not know in this world or the next, but you will surely pay dearly for this.”
She walked out of my palace with my father trailing behind. The onlookers and palace servants, the dregs of society who had assembled to peek and secretly enjoy the palace drama, moved over aside to allow this motley procession to pass. The two Brahmins and a few servants joined them. There was a muffled cry from the corner of the room and I saw my dear sister, sobbing uncontrollably with her face in her hands. Vibhishana stood awkwardly before her. I went to her and put my hands on her shoulders and she fell onto my chest and hugged me tight. Had I failed her? Had I wronged her? Something pulled at me. ‘My dear, dear sister, what have I taken away from you?’
“There. . .there. . .” The words sounded meaningless even to me, but I kept repeating, “There. . .there. . .” Maricha came and touched my shoulders gently. Prahastha sto Prbut I od like a pillar, with his eyes fixed on some unknown point in the distant horizon. I lifted my sister’s chin and said with all the love a brother could muster, “Soorpanakha, whatever happens, whoever walks away from our lives, I will be there for you, as a brother, a friend, a father, and mother. Don’t you trust your dear brother?”
With tears glistening in her eyes, she smiled at me and nodded. I felt afraid. Would I be able to keep this promise? I did not want to shatter her innocence, so I kept running my fingers through her hair and held her for a moment longer. Then my pride came back, my anger returned and I was myself again. Slowly but firmly, I walked out of the room. The guards at the door bowed. I knew they were sniggering inside, but I ignored them and walked past to stroll in the garden. An epoch in my life was over. I was sad beyond words. The image of my mother and her struggles to keep us fed and clothed, our struggles to stay alive, the inspiration she had been to me, all these, like indigested food, came up and choked me.
Asura- Tale of the Vanquished Page 18