by David Hair
Amanjit looked at Vikram, having given up counting the enemy on the walls. ‘Now what?’ he hissed. ‘There are thousands of them!’
Vikram was slowly shaking his head. ‘Something is wrong.’
‘Yeah, we’re going to be skewered by a zillion demons. That is clearly wrong! What do we do?’
Vikram opened his mouth to answer, but his words were lost beneath another blast of the trumpets. With a deafening shriek, the gates opened, and a massive chariot drove out, bearing a golden-armoured demon holding a white flag aloft.
‘Look, maybe they’re surrendering,’ Amanjit muttered hopefully.
They drew their bows cautiously. The chariot rolled closer, until they could clearly see the messenger. He was a twisted hunched thing with a warthog’s head and hooves, barely bipedal at all. But he leapt spryly from the chariot, waving his white flag desperately. ‘Parley! A parley, O Great Ones! I bring a message from the king!’ He stood waiting, visibly trembling as if terrified to be so close to them.
Amanjit eyed Vikram, frowning. ‘What are they doing, trying to lull us into a false sense of security or something?’
Vikram shook his head, just as puzzled. ‘Speak,’ he called to the messenger. He slowly lowered his bow and slackened his draw on the string. ‘What is your message?’
The warthog demon bowed gratefully. Evidently ‘shooting the messenger’ was still a clear and present danger in these parts.
‘O Great Lord Rama, and mighty Lord Lakshmana, I thank you for your graciousness!’ He stood up as straight as he could, and pulled out a scroll, unrolling it ostentatiously, and cleared his throat. ‘My Lords, the King of Lanka bids you welcome! He is overjoyed at your return to his realm, and sends me to escort you to his palace, where every care will be taken to ensure that your stay here is as pleasurable as can be conceived. We welcome our Liberators, our Emancipators, the divine heroes to whom our freedom is owed. We bid you cast care aside, and dwell with us for as long as it pleases you. We give you love and adoration, and open our arms to you. Let all be as you will it. The King himself trembles with joy at your coming, and abases himself. Let your path be strewn with flowers! Let palanquins of surpassing comfort bear you! Let maidens tend you! Let—’
‘Ahem!’
The messenger stopped his flow, and peered anxiously at Vikram. ‘My Lord? Are you not pleased? Is there a problem?’
‘Yeah,’ Amanjit began. ‘Tell Ravindra he can shove—’
Vikram put a warning hand on his shoulder, and shook his head. Then he turned back to the Asura herald. ‘Messenger, we thank your king for his kind greetings. But could you please clarify for us, as we have been out of touch for a long time—who is the present King of Lanka?’
The herald’s eyes popped out a little. ‘Er, my Lord …? You don’t know?’
Vikram shook his head apologetically. ‘We have been away a very long time. Centuries, in fact.’
The herald bowed. ‘Of course, my Lord! Of course! Has it really been so long? Then you will be pleased to know that the throne of Lanka is still in the possession of your great friend and most loyal ally, King Vibhishana!’
The Invisible Girl
Mumbai, Maharashtra, April 2011
Deepika wasn’t really invisible, but to the people around her, she may as well have been. Vishwamitra had taught her how to send out tiny, subliminal messages—they were as much body language and appearance as magic—so that people ignored her subconsciously. It was about being unmemorable, un-notable, and exuding ‘not worth looking at’ vibes. She wore dull clothing and her hair was tied up and unadorned. She wore no jewellery of note, and did not meet eyes. She walked in a slightly hunched and graceless manner, and didn’t talk to people. A muttered charm every minute or so helped sustain the illusion.
It was working all too well. Days passed in which she seldom spoke to another soul. After renting a room in the Juhu suburb of Mumbai that was upmarket enough to ensure there were reliable security guards to protect her possessions and herself, she spent her days prowling Nariman Point, where Meenakshi’s law firm was situated. It took a couple of days of lurking unnoticed until she was able to approach the woman she needed to speak to: Tripti Dharmanshi, the advocate who had read out Dinesh Khandavani’s will, and assigned Meenakshi to their case. The woman was not an Asura: Deepika had checked that by watching her through digital lens. She found where she parked, and slid from the shadows one evening when the woman was getting into her car.
‘Ms Dharmanshi!’
The lawyer half-turned, and looked surprised. ‘Miss Choudhary?! Is that you?’
Deepika stopped a few feet away. It had been six weeks since she had been attacked by Meenakshi, Prahasta and Imtakh. Since then she had been with Vishwamitra in the mythlands. She had seen no sign of Meenakshi in her prowling about the building, but she could not be sure that Meenakshi—Surpanakha—was not about. Uma’s apartment, wrecked during the attack that had taken Uma and Tanvir’s lives, was empty now. There was probably a missing persons report out on Deepika again. ‘Yes, Ms Dharmanshi, it is me.’
‘By the gods, girl! I’d heard that you were–’ The lawyer looked left and right, then gestured urgently. ‘What are you doing here?’
‘I need to talk to you. In private.’
Tripti Dharmanshi nervously jerked open her car door. ‘Will you get in? We can talk at my apartment. It isn’t far.’
It was a big step, to place herself in the power of another, even if physically there was not much the woman could do to her. Deepika paused, then nodded quickly, scurried to the other side and slid into the passenger seat.
The apartment really wasn’t far away, just a ten minute drive, not far from the Gateway of India, in a green-grey old building that looked like it belonged in the older parts of London. The interior had a stately, slightly antique feel, with yellowed walls and fussy little touches to the stair-balustrades and pillars from another era. ‘I live alone,’ Tripti told her. ‘My husband divorced me when my career outstripped his. He took the children.’ Her voice was flat rather than sad or angry, though it hinted at both. She ushered Deepika into a small and immaculate set of rooms that looked curiously empty, as if Tripti seldom went into them, or if she did, hardly did anything to disturb their slumbers. There were few photographs, just a couple of some children—one girl and one boy, and one of Tripti on a beach holiday with another grey-haired woman, a sister, perhaps.
Tripti poured wine, French white, and they sat appraising each other silently. The lawyer was silver-haired about the temple, with a tired face but alert eyes. Her clothing was black and grey western-style professional attire. She wore sober jewellery and no make-up.
‘You wear a wedding ring, and wedding bangles,’ Tripti observed eventually. ‘Amanjit Singh Bajaj, I presume?’
Deepika smiled inadvertently. ‘We got married last month, in secret.’
‘My congratulations. Does that explain why the media and police seem to believe you have been murdered, whilst your family do not?’
‘I guess so.’ She reminded herself why she came. ‘I need to keep my presence a secret, but I also need to stay close to the court case.’
‘Then why not work through your family?’
‘They don’t really understand it, whereas I was working on it closely with Meenakshi Nandita.’ It was hard to say that name without feeling her suppressed anger surge back to the surface. ‘And the police and media still watch them. It is dangerous for me to do anything openly. Someone tried to kill me, in March.’
Tripti took a deep breath, and swallowed. ‘Someone injured Meenakshi too,’ she said in a pained voice. ‘She has been off work since.’
I bet she has … She probably looks a mess … What she had done to the Rakshasa princess’ face still slightly appalled Deepika, despite everything the demon was. I cut her nose off … by all the gods, what happened to me? ‘Is she still assigned to our case?’
Tripti shook her head. ‘No. In fact, she has disappeared. The
police told me they believed you and she had been abducted or murdered. Her last diary entries mentioned meeting you. She left her building with two men, and was never seen again.’
Deepika thought about that. The truth, that Meenakshi and those two men were demons who tried to kill Deepika, was too far-fetched to be explained to this woman. ‘Who is taking our case now?’
‘I haven’t yet reassigned it. I was still hoping that Meenakshi would be back.’
‘She won’t be,’ Deepika said quickly. ‘And if she is, we don’t want her any more.’
Tripti Dharmanshi frowned, and narrowed her eyes. ‘Do I take it that your and her disappearances are related, but not in the way the police think they are?’
Deepika licked her lips. ‘That would be a fair conclusion. In fact, if she does return, I would thank you not to let her near our case, or to tell her that I’ve spoken with you.’ She paused. ‘Would you be able to take the case yourself?’
The lawyer thought for a while. ‘Yes, yes I could,’ she replied eventually. She half-smiled. ‘I’m somewhat intrigued, now.’
‘I will still be the family liaison,’ Deepika told her. ‘I will give you my cell phone number. My presence needs to be kept secret, though. I don’t want to be attacked again.’
Tripti nodded slowly. ‘That is understandable. Very well, Miss Choudhary … or should I say, Mrs Bajaj?’
Deepika suddenly felt herself blush with pleasure. ‘You know, we haven’t even talked about that! I haven’t given it a thought … Mrs Bajaj!’
The case work was dull and took days and weeks, many of which were so featureless Deepika never spoke to another person, apart from occasional calls from Amanjit that felt like heaven at the time and then left her in a lonely hell for hours afterward. Rather than giving her strength, they seemed to suck the energy from her. The last call had frightened her: they were just about to go to the mythlands, and cross the Bridge of Rama. She tried to picture it but couldn’t. It scared her that they were going into danger while her own days seemed so empty.
Occasionally Tripti called her, and they dined together. The Bajaj case was just one of hundreds to Tripti, but they made progress. Finally, as April waned, Tripti called Deepika and gave her a phone number that she needed. It was the most important thing she had handed on to Deepika to do so far: to make one very discreet call …
‘Hello?’ A nervous young male voice quavered down the line.
‘Hello, Lalit. Do you know who this is?’ She tried hard to sound calm. Lalit was Vikram’s younger half-brother and from what she had seen and been told, he had a very nervous disposition.
‘Uh, no?’
‘This is Deepika Choudhary, Lalit. Don’t hang up, please!’
There was a long silence.
‘Lalit?’ she asked anxiously.
‘I’m still here,’ he whispered.
‘Is your mother home?’
‘No. It’s just me.’ He was still whispering, though.
‘Good. Thank you.’ She tried to sound warm and friendly. ‘Lalit, can we meet? Please? It could be very important. But it has to be in secret. Just you and me. Please?’
There was no reason for him to agree, and no reason she could give him. She was trusting a hunch, and trusting the Ramayana, which had Bharata, the younger brother of Rama, remain loyal to his brother, despite his conniving mother. It was a gamble, but …
‘Okay,’ he said finally. ‘When?’
The Ghost at the Citadel Door
Lanka, April 2011
It was April, so Keke said. The little Rakshasa-maid told her that the seasons here corresponded to those of the real world, and the temperatures seemed to be rising daily. The lush green of the distant forests faded to a dirty brown, and the brilliant flowers began to look tired. But the roof-top swimming pool of the Citadel had become almost tepid, and Rasita couldn’t go outside without sunglasses (which mysteriously appeared on her dresser one morning after she expressed a need for them).
‘Have you worked out how old you are yet, Keke?’ she asked her maid one day, perplexed by the Rakshasa’s contradictory girlishness and wisdom.
‘I asked around,’ the girl responded eagerly. ‘I’m two hundred years old, mistress. We age differently, especially here,’ she added, striking a very girlish pose. ‘I think I’m like a teenager in your world, now …’
‘So you’ve been a teenager for at least a century! That must be awful!’
‘You are a teenager too, mistress,’ Keke giggled. Ras didn’t feel like one. With her memories of past lives, and all she had gone through, she felt like an old woman.
She swam and slept and read the days away. She finished reading the Ramayana twice, and thought about it deeply, but no inspiration came from the tale. She read the chapters about Sita’s time in Lanka almost desperately, seeking consolation, seeking a way out, but nothing came. She felt ill at the thought of what may become of her, if Ravindra lost patience.
Some days she watched the Asura warriors drilling at dawn and dusk, their weapons flashing. She saw the general of the Rakshasas, Meghanada Indrajit, a mountainous figure with a bull-head, fire burning arrows at targets flawlessly. Indrajit had sworn a holy pledge to avenge himself against ‘Lakshmana’—Amanjit—Keke told her. It made Rasita worry a little, that Vikram and Amanjit must face this mighty Rakshasa when they eventually came to rescue her. That they would come she never doubted, though weeks passed and there was no news.
Most days all there was to do was watch the hand-painted ceiling of her domed bedroom, as the painted figures moved and danced and sang, though she could not hear them or their music. The painting was somehow alive, the figures leading lives of their own, as boring as hers, it seemed to her. She watched them and sometimes they watched her. They gave her respite from the nights.
For if her days were long lonely idylls, her nights were cold sweats and ordeals of terror. She dreamt she was lost in a frozen forest, lurching stiffly from tree to tree, sniffing the air, seeking the one flesh and blood being that would satisfy her hunger and need. Taunted by memories of one life, as a queen. Driven insane by the relentless slaughter of animals and birds and even people, lost in the forests. Driven mad by the taste of blood and flesh. Filthy and dusty and desperate. Calling the name of that whom she sought … Rasita … Coming ever closer …
One night, after weeks of terrifying dreams and listless days, she was combing her hair on a balcony, as the setting sun painted watercolour swathes of crimson across the western skies. Suddenly the whole Citadel reverberated to a hammering blow, as if some giant had struck the walls with his fist. She quivered in sudden fright, her mind’s eye showing her the palace gates, shaking before her sight as if she had just struck them herself. She fell to her knees.
The ghost has come! There was no rational reason for the thought that seared her mind, but she believed it. She clutched the pillars and waited. Outside in the hall boots thumped, and then someone hammered on her doors. A cobra-headed Rakshasa in silks glided in, his reptilian features sending a thrill of fear through her, his hissing voice thin and anxious. ‘My lady, the Ravan requires your presence.’
She stared, heart suddenly pounding. ‘Why?’
‘He says that you will know, my lady,’ the snake-headed demon responded with a slight inclination of the head, his hood flaring slightly. Keke appeared behind him, her face scared.
‘Why? What is happening?’ Ras stared out over the plains to the south. There was a thin, dark, shrouded shape at the gates.
The faraway figure, too small to see clearly, looked up at her and shrieked, like a bereft seabird, calling against the oncoming darkness. She felt that call freeze her, all the way to her heart.
The Rakshasa trembled, his skin seemed slick as if he were perspiring. ‘Please hurry, lady.’
Ras looked at Keke, who nodded slightly, encouraging her to comply. It was the last thing she wanted, but she was frightened to be alone. She hurried after the Rakshasa, out from her room and down so
me stairs into a maze of corridors. He led her to an antechamber guarded by half a dozen of the largest Asuras that watched her with glowering eyes, and then they were admitted into a large throne hall. She sucked in her breath. The pillars and arches were carved with all manner of angelic and demonic creatures, the ceilings painted with the scenes of some conflagration, some apocalyptic event wherein the skies were aflame and the Asuras cowered, their faces panicked and beaten, but for one totally human figure standing alone against the tides of darkness: a painted Ravindra, protector of his people.
Ravindra himself sat on an ornate throne of crimson marble, surmounted with a naga, his three ghostly queens at his feet. Halika and the other queens looked near human now, and nothing could hide the cold menace they exuded. They sat enthroned amidst a court of the most bizarre and frightening figures Ras had ever seen. There were more than one hundred, male and female, all of them a parody of humanity. She saw Rakshasas that resembled every manner of mammal or reptile or bird, some fearful, some unsettling, and some just strange. All were dressed like royalty. None were armed, which seemed a good thing, for the entire room was in ferment, the air crackling with tension. As she entered, they all turned to her, and sighed or hissed.
She cowered inside, halting and clenching tight to her courage.
‘Here she is!’ snarled a tiger-faced hunchback whose leathery hide was awash with weeping sores. ‘Send her out there! She is no use to us alive!’
Meghanada Indrajit belched derisively. ‘Syhajeet, you coward! She is our queen! We must protect her!’
Syhajeet snarled and spat on the marble floor. A dangerous purple glow manifested in his right hand. ‘You might be prepared to die for her, Meghanada, but I am not, and I dare say most here would agree with me!’
His words were greeted with a surge of approval. ‘Aye! Send her out there!’ snarled the press of demons.
Halika leaned forward, and hissed at Rasita. She had an apple in her hand, not seeming to notice that it was rotting in her grasp. ‘Send her out to meet it, lord!’ The other two ghost-queens tittered malevolently. ‘Let her feel what these ages have been to us. Let her endure our condition.’