The trio had been instructed to meet their contact at an address in a suburb that catered to technology companies. The steel and glass skyscrapers which sprang upward from acres of palm trees, jogging paths, and carefully-tended flower beds gave the impression of a Silicon Valley business park. A high-speed elevator shot them to the top floor where the trove keeper’s office was located.
The tyro staffing the reception area acknowledged their arrival by a curt nod. “Please go in. She’s expecting you.”
Erik strode forward and opened the door to the inner office. “Anybody home?” he asked tentatively.
The room was decorated along post-modern minimalist lines in shades of black and grey. Seated at a sleek desk against a curtain wall of windows, the trove keeper glanced up from her computer. A delighted smile spread across her face.
“Erik, my goodness, I haven’t seen you in ages.” The woman rose, crossed the room and hugged the paladin, kissing him on the cheek before releasing him. “I’d always hoped you’d find a reason to visit my country one day.”
Cassie stiffened at the welcome her teammate was receiving. A girl in every port. Even the southern tip of India. So typical!
To her surprise, the trove keeper gave the same treatment to Griffin. “And you!” she exclaimed in mock-surprise. “Somebody finally pried you out of the vault, I see.” She hugged him and then, standing on tiptoe, pecked him on the cheek.
Before Griffin could perform any introductions, the woman spun on her heel and fixed Cassie with her full attention. “You see I saved the best for last. Our new pythia!” She rushed forward to give Cassie’s hand an enthusiastic shake. “I finally get the chance to meet you!”
“Cassie, this is Damini Pandala,” Griffin interjected. “She’s the Malabar trove keeper.”
“Malabar?” Cassie echoed.
“It’s rather a catch-all term for anything matristic that happened in southern India,” the scrivener explained. “Since this area used to be known as the Malabar Coast in ancient times, the name stuck.”
The pythia gave the trove keeper a tentative smile. “Hello, Damini, it’s nice to meet you.”
“Oh please, call me Dee,” she replied breezily. “Everybody does.”
“That’s not an Indian name, is it?” Cassie was struck by Dee’s accent. It was American English with only the slightest wisp of something foreign in the inflection.
“No. I earned my degree in anthropology at UC-Berkeley. I’ve probably spent more years in the States than I have here.” Dee paused to give Cassie’s face a searching look. “There’s just a hint of your sister in your eyes. She had unusual eyes too, you know. All the better to see what the rest of us can’t.”
The pythia stepped back, flustered by the keen observation.
Addressing the trio, Dee said, “Everybody, come in. Sit down, and we’ll have a nice long chat. You have to tell me the latest gossip from headquarters.” She gestured toward an alcove which had been fitted up as a conference area with couches and chairs surrounding a central coffee table. The alcove’s windows offered a spectacular view of the garden belt below. Late afternoon sunlight glinted off the windows of high rises sprouting above the green canopy in the distance.
As they were sorting out the seating arrangements, Cassie took a moment to study the trove keeper. Dee must have been in her early forties. Not much taller than Cassie herself, she was quite attractive—dressed in a tailored pantsuit which did little to hide her curvy figure. Her thick black hair was styled in a smooth pageboy, her nails were perfectly manicured in a subdued shade of red, and her make-up gave her skin the texture of bisque porcelain. Cassie remembered Griffin’s explanation about skin tone and social rank in India. Dee’s family must have come from one of the upper Hindu castes—Brahmin or Kshatriya. Not a hair out of place, she appeared to be a typical buttoned-down businesswoman, but there was something more to her. She exuded an odd combination of flirtiness and intensity. What would you call that? Cassie remembered an old-fashioned word that seemed to fit—vivacious. The pythia blinked herself back to attention when she realized Dee had asked her a question.
“Can I offer you some refreshments?” the trove keeper repeated.
“I wouldn’t mind a cup of coffee,” Cassie suggested weakly. Bouncing around from one end of the country to another had aggravated her old friend—jetlag.
“Oh, I can do better than that.” Dee smiled archly. She walked out to the reception area and murmured instructions to her assistant.
“It will take just a few minutes,” she explained, returning to her seat. She swept them all with a bright gaze. “I don’t get many visitors. What an exciting day this is.”
“Is your trove stored onsite?” Cassie asked doubtfully as she glanced at the ultra-contemporary surroundings.
Dee gave a slight moue. “Yes and no. The physical artifacts are all stashed away in a secure location in the Western Ghats. That’s a mountain range to the east of here. These days, my job consists of collecting other things—the kind that can be stored digitally.”
“Like what?” Cassie registered surprise.
Without answering, Dee stood up and returned to her desk. She selected what looked like a piece of parchment encased in plastic. Bringing it back to the alcove, she handed it to Cassie. “Like this,” she replied.
Cassie scanned the document, but it was written in some ancient language she couldn’t decipher. She handed the sheet back to Dee, still puzzled.
“I’m in the business of collecting legends, myths, fragments of folk tales,” the trove keeper elaborated. “Anything that will help me to reconstruct the matristic origins of the people of the Malabar Coast. There are megalithic sites in Kerala dating back to 6000 BCE which show a connection to the IVC. It may well be that the matriarchal traditions which are present here can trace their roots to the Indus Valley. I’ve only just begun to tug on that thread. Time will tell if I can establish the connection.”
At that moment the office door opened, and Dee’s assistant entered bearing a tea tray.
“Ah, here we are!” the trove keeper announced. She helped the tyro set the items down on the coffee table. He departed wordlessly, allowing Dee to act as hostess.
“No coffee for you today, Madame Pythia,” she joked. “Kerala is one of the major tea-producing regions of India, so you have to try one of our local specialties. White tea.”
“I’ve never heard of that,” Cassie said as Dee poured them all cups of the pale liquid.
“It’s a different harvesting and drying process. The flavor is more delicate than black tea.” She passed around a plate of cakes. “And try some of these.”
Aside from almond cookies, there were fried pastries that looked like a cross between an apple fritter and a muffin.
“They’re called unniappam,” the trove keeper said. “Made with sweetened rice and coconut.”
Cassie bit into one. It was doughy and sweet with a hint of a spice she couldn’t identify.
“Cardamom.” Dee anticipated her question. “Kerala was famous for its spices centuries before it became famous for its tea plantations. Most of the local cuisine is flavored with things like chili peppers, cardamom, cloves, ginger, nutmeg, cinnamon, and turmeric.”
The trove keeper’s assistant returned with another tray containing small dishes of what looked like rice pudding.
“And, of course, you must sample a little of the payasam.” Dee dismissed the tyro. She unloaded the tray and placed a dish in front of each of her guests. None of them needed any urging to dive in.
The payasam didn’t taste as bland as any rice pudding Cassie had eaten before. It too was flavored with coconut and a complex array of spices. “Yum,” she murmured.
Her teammates were too busy eating to comment.
***
It wasn’t until half an hour later when the tea things had been cleared away that they all settled back comfortably in their seats and turned their attention to
business.
“So why is there a trove here in Kerala anyway?” Cassie began. “From everything I’ve seen, Kochi is a totally modern city. What’s the Arkana’s interest in this particular corner of India?”
Dee and Griffin exchanged knowing looks.
The scrivener spoke first. “Because this area bears the distinction of successfully preserving traits of the matristic culture which once existed everywhere in India before the overlords arrived. It’s much like the Basque region of Spain— a matriarchal anomaly in an otherwise rigidly patriarchal country—and for much the same reason. Kerala’s geographic isolation protected it. Bordered on one side by the Arabian Sea and on the other by a coastal mountain range, it was a singularly difficult area for Aryan horsemen to conquer. Horses provide no tactical advantage over mountainous terrain nor are they very helpful when staging an attack by sea. This part of India was able to retain its customs long after the rest of the country had succumbed to overlord ideology.”
Erik chimed in. “I remember hearing that people in Kerala trace lineage through their mothers instead of their fathers. Up until the beginning of the twentieth century, they lived in big family groups that reckoned kinship from a common ancestress.”
“Marriage was also an offhanded affair,” Griffin added. “Couples could marry and divorce at will since preserving a patriarchal bloodline was meaningless.”
“That’s all quite true,” Dee agreed. “In the old days, the eldest female was the head of the family, and her oldest daughter was the second in command like a prime minister. A man’s primary affection was for his mother’s family more than for his own wife and offspring. Families lived in large groups, sometimes as much as a hundred individuals all related by blood through the female line. Males who married into the family made overnight conjugal visits but otherwise lived in their own mother’s compound. Everyone in a family shared all the resources in common. The eldest brother of the head of the family acted as a steward to manage the family’s property.” The trove keeper sighed and shook her head. “Of course, that all changed once the overlords arrived.”
“You mean the Aryans?” Cassie asked.
“Not simply the Aryans. It’s a little more complicated than that,” Dee countered. “You have to remember that Kerala is a coastal state bordered by the Arabian Sea. As far back as 3000 BCE it was already active in the spice trade and attracted traffic from everywhere. There’s a long history of foreign presence here—some peaceful, some aggressive. Aryan Hindus, Arab Muslims, Semitic Jews, Chinese explorers, Dutch, Portuguese and English merchants. All of them left a trace of their own overlord traditions behind. Over time, the Malabar Coast changed. While the matrilineal inheritance laws continued, patriarchal customs crept in and took over. The eldest uncle was no longer a steward for the family’s resources. A legal system which increasingly favored males over females allowed him to become a dictator who arranged marriages and controlled the family’s riches. The only vestige of a bygone time was that the senior uncle couldn’t sell the family property outright without the common consent of all its members—both male and female.”
“Then it was like a democracy. Everybody had a say?’ Cassie asked.
“Yes, a democracy several thousand years older than the Greek version which is the only one anybody ever hears about.” Dee’s voice was sarcastic.
“Just like the IVC inventions,” Erik observed. “Overlords are never shy about claiming credit for stuff they didn’t create.”
The trove keeper laughed grimly. “In spite of the erosion of maternal authority in Kerala, just enough of the old ways remained to safeguard women in these parts. The Malabar Coast escaped the worst atrocities of overlord culture in India.”
Cassie sat forward. “What do you mean by atrocities?”
Dee sniffed with disgust. “Female infanticide, for one.”
“Yes, selectively killing female babies simply because they are female is an appalling practice that happens to this day in some parts of the country,” Griffin explained.
“Yeesh!” The pythia shuddered involuntarily.
Dee continued. “And if infanticide isn’t bad enough, there’s the hideous custom of suttee.”
Erik turned to face Cassie. “That’s burning widows alive on the funeral pyres of their dead husbands. Supposedly, the suicide is voluntary, but most of the women are coerced. The idea of slaughtering widows wasn’t invented in India. It started with the Kurgans. Of course, the Kurgans usually slit the widow’s throat or bashed in her skull. Burning her alive, that’s a whole new twist on a nasty ritual.”
“I know what suttee is,” Cassie replied. “I just can’t believe that anybody with an ounce of empathy would stand by and let it happen.”
“It’s amazing what people will tolerate when it’s sanctioned by religious tradition.” Dee’s tone was solemn. “A more recent variation is when the in-laws of a new bride set her on fire if her dowry is too low. Not surprisingly, most cases of bride-burning, infanticide, and suttee occur in the northwest part of the country. That was the Aryan stronghold when they first arrived and, to this day, the greatest number of crimes against women are committed there.”
“I believe suttee never caught on in Kerala though,” Griffin remarked.
“Yes, you’re right,” the trove keeper affirmed. “It was outlawed here from the start. With inheritance through the female line, women still held a certain value as something more than two-legged livestock. Their property rights were a bargaining chip that kept them out of the fire.”
Griffin chuckled unexpectedly.
The others stared at him in shock.
“I never would have pegged you for insensitive.” Cassie scowled at him. “Til now.”
“Forgive me, everyone,” the scrivener said. “I was just thinking of an amusing story related to the practice of suttee.”
“Hard to believe there’s anything funny about widow-murder but go ahead.” Erik waved him on.
Griffin glanced up at the ceiling, apparently trying to recollect the anecdote. “During the 1840’s, Sir Charles Napier was the Commander-In-Chief of British forces in India. A delegation of Hindu priests came to him to complain that the colonial government had outlawed the practice of suttee. The priests claimed that the British were interfering with their religious customs. Napier heard their arguments calmly and ended by telling them to prepare a funeral pyre in accordance with their customs. Then he informed them that his nation also had a custom. When men burned women alive, it was a British custom to hang them and confiscate all their property. He said his carpenters would construct gibbets on which to execute all the parties who had a hand in burning the widow. His last words were, ‘Let us all act according to national customs.’”
“I’m guessing no widows got burned that day,” Cassie observed archly.
“Amazing how fast a blood sacrifice gets shelved when it’s the priest whose neck is in the noose.” Erik grinned sardonically.
“As I am a countryman of Sir Charles, I humbly accept your thanks on his behalf.” Griffin made a small bow.
They all laughed.
Dee grew pensive. “Women in Hindu culture have always been the expendable sex. Mahatma Gandhi once wrote that the way India treats its women is an indicator of its barbarism. I find it interesting that the divergent legacies of overlord barbarism and matristic humanism are being played out side-by-side in India to this very day.”
“How do you mean?” Erik shot her a quizzical look.
“Kerala is the only state in India that maintained any semblance of female influence down through the centuries,” the trove keeper explained. “As compared to the rest of the country, this state is a beacon of progress. Let me quote you some interesting statistics. Of all the states in India, Kerala has the highest human development index, highest life expectancy, highest literacy rate, highest sex ratio because baby girls aren’t killed and highest GDP. Now for the lows. Kerala has the lowest homicide rate. The
city of Kochi is the safest port on the Arabian Sea. We also have the lowest government corruption rate, lowest birth rate, and lowest population growth. Low population growth is a good thing in a country as overcrowded as ours. In addition, there’s surprisingly little religious intolerance here in spite of the state’s ethnic diversity.”
She paused to let those facts sink in, all the while intently searching the faces of her listeners—compelling their attention. “Compare that with the crime, overpopulation, political corruption and sectarian violence of the rest of the country. Those woes are the legacy of patriarchy. Kerala today is only an echo of its matriarchal past, and it still surpasses the rest of India by leaps and bounds in promoting the welfare of all its citizens.”
“That’s why we do what we do, isn’t it?” Griffin remarked quietly. “The Arkana is trying to preserve what remains of that humanistic legacy of matrism. To remind people that there is a better way to treat one another.”
Dee nodded in agreement. “Speaking of which...” She rose from her chair abruptly and rifled through a desk drawer, searching for something. Returning to her seat, she held out an object so the trio could see it. “This is why I called you here. It might help in your efforts to nudge the world back into balance.”
Chapter 21—Say It with Flowers
“Oh, my goddess!” Cassie exclaimed, peering at the object in Dee’s hand.
“It’s one of the Minoan lilies!” Griffin’s tone was equally excited.
Erik shook his head in amused disbelief. “Didn’t see that coming.”
Dee beamed at them. “I thought you’d be pleased. All the trove keepers have been alerted that you’re looking for sculpted lilies. I was contacted a few days ago by a private collector who wanted to sell me this artifact. When I received it, I remembered to compare it to the photos of your Minoan lily, and it was a perfect match.”
Arkana Archaeology Mystery Box Set 2 Page 12