KRISHNA CORIOLIS#3: Flute of Vrindavan

by Ashok K. Banker

  The stallion’s forepaws crashed down on the ground, as if yanked by a ton-weight. The horse’s eyes rolled and he almost buckled from the impact.

  Kamsa had barely used any force to pull at the horse, he had tugged a finger’s length perhaps, casually. He seemed to bear no malice at the horse for having struck at him.

  He kicked open the untied gate. It shattered into fragments.

  Then he led the horse into the enclosure.

  He turned, grasped hold of the horse’s neck, and leaped astride it.

  The horse lurched, shuddering as if a man twice Kamsa’s size and bearing the heaviest armour had leaped onto his back from a height.

  Kamsa steadied it, used the slender length of rope to turn its head, then pressed in his heels to urge it forward.

  The horse began to ride around the enclosure.

  Kamsa slapped it on the rump, urging it to go faster, still faster.

  The horse shook his head from side to side, protesting, eyes still showing their whites, clearly still unable to understand how the human had survived that blow from his powerful fore paws. Most other men – indeed, any other man – would be lying on the ground with a shattered collarbone and a smashed shoulder blade, not to mean collapsed lungs and perhaps even a damaged spine. It was a killing blow and intended as such. Yet Kamsa had barely felt it.

  The horse on the other hand had definitely felt Kamsa when he leaped astride. And the slap on the rump. And the heels he was now digging into its flanks to urge it to go faster, always faster.

  Yadu saw the furrows.

  The horse was riding around the large enclosure. He had just completed one circle and was about to go over his own hoof prints again.

  The ungulate footprints in the ground ought not to have been particularly noticable. The ground was fairly solid and dry for the most part and where it was softer, it had been churned up by the hooves of any number of horses. The stallion’s prints should have been mixed up in the general pattern.

  Instead, they stood out as clearly as a furrow drawn by a plough.

  They were shallow and almost normal at the beginning, where Kamsa had begun his ride. But as Yadu glanced quickly around the enclosure, he saw the prints grow steadily deeper and wider until finally, by the time the stallion came around to complete the first circle, the hoofprints were inches deep, so deep that the ground was being furrowed by his passage. And as he thundered past, Yadu could feel the impact through the ground. It felt like a half score horses carrying as many heavy men riding hard and fast.

  Yet even a half score mounted horses could not make a furrow this deep.

  Because even a half score mounted horses probably did not weigh as much as this one, with only Kamsa on his back.

  Yadu watched as the stallion carried Kamsa around for the second time. This time the horse’s hooves were sinking so deeply into the ground, the old syce could see them buried upto the fetlocks before they emerged and ploughed ahead. The horse was straining impossibly to carry its unbearable load, its youth, virility and inbred pride enhancing its natural obduracy to the point of folly. Its head jerked upwards with each forward movement, its nostrils flared, eyes rolled up to reveal almost all white, and its hooves were furrowing through the ground like a plough-blade, throwing up a wake of sods. Kamsa sat calmly on its back, doing nothing more than urging it forward. The horse made one final tremendous effort then collapsed. The sound of it falling to the ground beneath Kamsa was exactly like the sound of a young sapling cracked by a powerful mace blow and on hearing this sound Yadu did wince; for while he cared little about what happened to Kamsa himself, he cared greatly about the animals under his care. The horse collapsed like a deflated leather bladder, its legs snapping like twigs immediately after its great back broke, and lay crumpled in a defeated heap.

  It had taken only one and a half round of the enclosure and a few minutes for Kamsa to destroy a horse that could carry almost as much weight as a young cow elephant.

  All he had done was ride it.

  Kamsa leaped off the back of the horse. The impact of his feet hitting the ground was audible all the way across the enclosure to where Yadu stood. It was a thumping sound. And when he strode away, Yadu could make out the imprints of his feet even at this distance. Those footprints were inches deep in the hard-packed ground.

  Kamsa strode away without a glance at Yadu. But the old syce knew he was aware of his presence. He had seen Kamsa in this state before although never this enraged. For despite the porcelain faced inscrutability and lack of ranting, shouting or other typical signs of anger, Yadu knew it was pure rage that fuelled Kamsa. Ever since his secret training under Putana’s guidance, the son of Ugrasena had changed his very personality; gone was the Kamsa of yore who threw people out windows or slaughtered infants, in his place was this Kamsa, a being that distilled all his rage into a cold relentless unstoppable juggernaut of rage and went on rampages that would have left swathes of bloody enemy dead in large numbers had this been a battlefield of war.

  At such times, Yadu knew, the young king seemed to withdraw into himself, compacting his consciousness until he appeared to be aware of nothing but his own existence, seeing, hearing, feeling nothing but what transpired within his inscrutable mind. But he was guarded by a survival instinct so powerful, not so much as an ant could attempt to nip at his toe without him being aware of the attempt before it could occur. Yadu knew that Kamsa knew he was standing there, watching. He knew also that he was the only human being alive that Kamsa permitted to witness him at such a time, doing such things, and still let live.

  Apart from Putana, of course.

  Kamsa strode away from the dead horse, towards the far fence of the enclosure. The gate on that side was several score yards away. Kamsa did not bother to walk towards the gate, untie it, open it, and walk through. Instead, he simply strode through the fence itself. The inch-thick wooden planks, designed to withstand the powerful kicks of rebellious stallions and strong mares in heat, shattered into splinters. Kamsa walked through half a dozen fences in similar manner, striding across the length of the training field, and by the time he had reached the far end, the trail of his footprints resembled the wake of a plough.

  Kamsa began running as he approached the woods at the far side of the training field, running with the heavy gait of an overly muscled man even though he was fairly slender and well-shaped. He moved as if he was running through wet sand, his feet churning as much as a foot’s depth of earth as he gained pace.

  He brushed against the trunk of a sala tree just before he disappeared into the woods, and a chunk of the tree was torn out of its body to land woodenly on the ground. The tops of trees shuddered visibly, and great clumps of birds rose up in alarm and flew wheeling over the woods, crying out in dismay, then the woods settled back to normal, and Kamsa was gone from sight.

  3

  Nanda and the gopas undertook the task of disposing of Putana’s body. They used wood axes to chop up the body into pieces. The task was unpleasant but not as much as they had expected: the body exuded no fluids, blood or otherwise, and instead of the usual stench of dead flesh, it gave off a pleasant aroma. This confounded the Vrishnis until Guru Gargamuni said that it was a sign that the demoness had attained moksha in death and ascended. This elicited further looks of wonderment from all present for it confirmed their conviction that God had played a direct hand in saving little Krishna’s life. Being slain by a god was itself one way of achieving salvation from the eternal cycle of birth and death, freedom from karma, and the perfumed odour and bloodless body of the giantess indicated that she had not merely perished but had been released.

  This made their task less onerous. They went about the grisly work with grim satisfaction. Piling the pieces onto wagons, they carted the remains to a distant ghat where they piled them with wood and burned it piece by piece, ensuring that not a scrap was left for carrior birds or vermin to feed on. Even the smoke rising from the remains smelled pleasantly. It was Nanda’s elder brothe
r Upanandna who identified the odour. ‘Aloe!’ he said, ‘it smells like aloe.’ And so it did, Sannanda, their younger brother agreed, and even Nandana, the youngest of the four brothers, concurred. They had been concerned about the ash and smoke travelling to fields and being inhaled by cattle but now they knew that there was not a trace of demon left on earth. Vishnu had ensured that the act of death was also an act of purification.

  When every last vestige of Putana was consigned to flame, ash and smoke, they returned to Nanda’s house. Yashoda was caught up in the usual hustle and bustle of catering and caring for the needs of so many guests and barely had time to think about the horrendous event. It was only much later, when she was alone in her cot with little Krishna by her side, sleeping on his back, limbs sprawled in that unique way only the very young can manage, that she was overcome briefly by a surge of anxiety.

  What if there are others? If Kamsa sent one assassin, surely he will send more! What if the next one is too powerful to overcome? What if harm comes to my little one?

  This time, there was no mind voice from her little Krishna speaking to her and reassuring her as before. He seemed to be sleeping more soundly than usual. That itself indicated that he must be exhausted from the encounter with Putana. It suggested there were limits to his abilities or to his endurance. After all, he was still a little babe. What if the next monster was beyond his ability to overcome? More than anything else, she knew that so long as Kamsa lived, there would be no real peace for her or her little son. The ruthless Usurper would never cease in his attempts.

  She fell asleep in a miasma of anxiety. For the first time, she wished – nay, she longed – for her little one to speak to her and calm her anxieties.

  But Krishna slept on soundly, even starting to snore a little.

  It was with a troubled heart that Yashoda finally lulled herself to sleep.

  4

  Kamsa increased his pace as he emerged from the woods north west of Mathura. This region was dry unforested land, too barren to farm and too hostile to inhabit. The dry ground suddenly gave way to plunging dry gulches here, many of them dangerously steep and narrow. The streams at the bottom of those steep gulches were barely muddy trickles and most were bone dry, carpetted with the bones of animals that had fallen to their deaths. They only filled up during the monsoon season and a few weeks thereafter. The area was too uncertain for inhabitation and as a result it had been overrun by predators. Kamsa came here to practice his newfound abilities daily, testing the limits of his transformed body, exploring the possibilities, developing his unusual skills further, finding new ways to use them for combat. There was one particular box canyon he had favoured at first. But he had long since demolished that canyon, reducing it to a heap of collapsed rubble. Later under Putana’s supervision, he had developed a regime that catered to his particular abilities and strengths. But today, following a daily regime was the last thing on his mind.

  He simply ran, feet pounding up chunks of earth, stomping noisily, leaving a dust trail bigger than that left by a herd of stampeding elephants.The ground shuddered beneath his increasing weight. The rage and anguish that filled his heart was unbearable. He could not resist expressing it any longer.

  Putana was dead.

  His first friend in years, his only female companion, his only genuine advisor, the one person he had come to rely on, to seek solace in, who comforted him and made him feel…almost human. The only one who had understood him, his strange urges and impulses, his newfound abilities and enormous power, his rakshasa lusts and his human longings. Gone. And only after she was gone did he realize how much she had truly meant to him.

  She had loved him and he had loved her, in a manner of speaking. As much as a being such as she and a rakshasa-mortal hybrid such as he could actually love anyone.

  She had accepted him as he was, whatever he was, and had befriended him, coming closer to him than anyone else he had ever known. She was a Maatr: one of a great ancient coven of Mother-Creators, demi-gods who had been present at the origins of the world, she had taken shelter among mortals and disguised her true form and power in order to survive and to atone for past transgressions. She had fed Kamsa the Halala milk from her own body, a deadly toxin capable of slaying humans with a single drop yet to him, with his newly reconstituted biology, an elixir and tonic. This itself bonded them powerfully.

  Now he would no longer have her milk to give him new strength each day.

  But more importantly, he would no longer have her strength of character, her great ancient wisdom and insight, her knowledge of so many things he could barely comprehend. It was she who had refused to let him go to confront the Slayer. He had wanted to go the instant she brought him word that the Slayer had been located at last, and was found to be residing in rural Gokula-dham. He had wanted to go at once and face his nemesis. The child of his sister who had miraculously survived his decade-long campaign. The prophesied one who would someday kill him, Kamsa, and take his place upon the throne of Mathura. He had wanted to go and crush that little tyke with a single blow of his mighty fist. But Putana had stopped him, had told him he was not yet ready, not strong enough to face the Slayer.

  Not strong enough! Hah!

  She could be very persuasive. She had chosen to go instead, and to use her deadly toxic milk to kill the Slayer. She said it was the best way. He had agreed then because it did seem ingenious. The Slayer was but an infant. Were he, Kamsa, to go and kill him, it would outrage the people again. No longer were they quiet and subordinate to his atrocities as they had been at first. The stench of rebellion was in the air. Such an act of outright murder might bring all the Vrishnis and Suras against him in one massive civil action. Puatana’s way was more sensible, he had to admit. She would simply go and nurse the infant, feeding him the most toxic substance in Creation. Nobody would suspect him, Kamsa. His hands would be clean.

  But now Putana herself was dead!

  Her own plan had failed. Kamsa did not know all the details. What he did know was what the dhoot, the spasa courier, had told him: a giant demoness of some kind had been killed by an infant in Gokula-dham. The infant had danced on her corpse after killing her. Danced! It was believed that the giantess was named Putana. The spy had not even known it was Kamsa’s Putana, the wife of the captain of his guard, he had merely reported what he had learned in Gokul-dham. But Kamsa had known at once. Putana was dead. She had attempted to slay the Slayer and had herself been slain. Now she was gone. And he was alone once more. And he could not bear it.

  He was approaching the edge of a gulch. He was running too fast to stop. Even if he slowed, his weight and momentum would carry him off the edge anyway. So instead of bothering to stop or slow, he ran faster. He launched himself off the edge of a ravine several hundred feet high. The far side was a good fifty yards away. He flew up into the air, wreathed in a dust cloud, and as he hung suspended over certain death for any mortal flesh, he beat his chest and roared his anguish to the skies.

  The sound echoed through the gulch below his flailing feet.

  His momentum carried him all the way across to the far ridge. He landed in an explosion of dust and shale, cracking the stony back of the ledge. A small avalanche’s worth of debris collapsed behind him into the ravine. But he was already racing away, across dry almost desert-bare terrain, his body so heavy now that his feet were imbedded a whole yard deep in the surface of the ground. He tore up earth and rocks and roots and stones the way a chariot’s wheels might throw up clods of supple soil. He barely felt his thighs ploughing through solid ground and stone with greater ease than a metal plough blade could churn through sodden earth. He felt his power, his strength, his invulnerability. It was a palpable thing, as real as the air pumping in and out of his lungs, the sunlight on his face, the scent of freshly broken earth in his nostrils. He felt the very cells of his body resist the onslaught of stone and earth as he tore through the ground, and at that moment he knew that there were no limits to his power. He only needed to learn
how to control his body, to focus long and hard enough to increase his density to the point he desired, and he could become strong enough to punch through stone if he desired, or withstand any force and survive unharmed. The only problem was, focussing that intensely, and holding his concentration long enough. But he would master that as well. He would grow stronger than ever before, stronger than anything else or anyone else upon this earth. He would do it for Putana. To avenge her. By slaying the Slayer who had slain her.

  He roared his fury to the skies. Then slowed as he saw something ahead. Something alive and mobile.

  He came to a halt. The dustcloud settling slowly around him, the long winding trail of furrowed ground stretching for a mile or more in his wake.

  He stared at the moving shapes ahead, milling about in confusion and hostility as they sensed the strange being that had approached so unexpectedly.

  It was a herd of rhinocerous.

  There were at least a dozen of them. It was unusual for them to be seen together in such numbers; they were mostly solitary creatures. But he did not question or think about the why or wherefore. He looked at them and they stared at him suspiciously, lowering their horns and stamping their feet and snorting threateningly, warning him to stay away. They had younguns. That meant they would fight to the death to protect them.

  Kamsa did not care about the why or wherefore.

  All he cared about was the fact that they provided an outlet.

  He was angry.

  He desired something or someone on which to vent his rage.