“My dear mistress.” Mitu gathered Sakhi to her and led her inside to her chamber.
Choti was descending with an armful of dirty linens. She halted. Her eyes widened. Why did she stare like that?
Like a child Sakhi followed Mitu to the chamber Bhallika and she had once shared. He rarely spent the night there these days. If he was not with Ratna, he slept in the counting room on a simple pallet. Suddenly Sakhi didn’t want to be alone.
“But I should go to Bharata,” she said.
“No, no, mistress,” she said as she unwrapped Sakhi’s antariya. “You need your rest tonight. Choti and I can manage our little holy one, eh?”
“All right.” Sakhi was exhausted. “Comb my hair. Please.” She needed that intimate ritual which over the years had deepened their relationship almost to sisterhood, not quite replacing what Sakhi once shared with Dhara, but tender and true nonetheless.
She bit her lip. “In the morning.” She stroked Sakhi’s cheek. “Into bed now. Don’t worry about Bharata.”
Sakhi’s sobs poured out as soon as Mitu left. She muffled them in the cushions of her couch, crying herself to dreamless sleep. When a ray of pale sun woke her, she felt drained, empty, a cracked vessel, no use to anyone. Even the sharp anguish was gone.
The emptiness was a relief. Soothing waves of calm eddied around her. As they subsided, hope crept in.
She rose and went to her low table. The ivory comb carved with flowers that Bhallika brought her when their marriage was young was in its usual place. How she had loved Bhallika’s gift. It was worn and yellow from use. Instead of calling for Mitu, she reached for the handle of the round mirror lying face down on the table. She paused for a minute before picking it up. Its frame, cracked with age, matched the comb.
Her throat constricted a little. If only he would not stay the night with Ratna. Sakhi wanted the embrace of Bharata’s father, perhaps the only other person who grieved as deeply over their son’s tragedy.
They had been very happy those early years. Before—what? Jivaka? No, even before that. They lost each other in the Sakyan capital’s rich life, he with his courtesan, she with the boys, with charitable works, with anything but Bhallika. There were times she was relieved he was traveling or even in Ratna’s bed. Either way, she had pushed him away and then became lonely. Jivaka had filled her hours, but he was gone forever.
How she missed Bhallika’s generous laughter, his impatient lovemaking, his sly humor. Sakhi smiled sadly and reached for the tin mirror and held it up. When she saw her image, it clattered to the floor. She understood the startled looks of Choti and Mitu.
Her hair was pure white.
Part V
Nine months later
Return to Sakhi’s garden
Siddhartha watched, eyes wide and lips compressed, as Dhara descended the wooden stair, one hand on the tree trunk, the other on her large belly.
“The queen is right,” he said when she reached the last step and took his hand. “You’re in your last month. We should move back to the palace. Everything is on ground level there. You could wander to your heart’s content. The gardens, the music room—”
“I don’t need to go to the music room. The vina master comes every day.”
“And still your plucking is pathetic. Our son will have no musical talent whatsoever, given what he is hearing in the womb.” Sunbeams filtered through the trees, playing on his dark curls and burnishing the gold band that circled his brow.
“Unfair. It’s hard to hold the instrument with this in the way.” She frowned down at her body and began to rearrange her simple garments to cover her heavy breasts and ungainly belly. “But think of the other arts I’ve practiced with him. I was riding until my stomach started to swell. I was at archery and swordsmanship until the fifth month.”
“I was glad when you stopped,” Siddhartha said. “It worried me.”
She laughed to dispel her fears. “Well, it was time for less strenuous activities. Nalaka says that my long walking meditations will ensure that our son possesses the power to go directly to samadhi.” Siddhartha’s brow furrowed. “I was joking, beloved,” Dhara said.
“I’ve not been able to see his future. Perhaps he will be the great emperor-sage my father has sought,” he said, his face pensive.
“Anything’s possible, with you guiding him.” A muscle in Siddhartha’s jaw tensed. “But as to moving back to the palace,” Dhara continued, “I don’t think I ever want to go back there.” She patted the ancient banyan’s trunk. “As close to cedar groves on a mountainside as we can hope for here in the lowlands.”
“High praise from you.”
“Will Sakhi be glad to see me, do you think?”
“Without a doubt.”
She was thankful that he’d arranged this visit, but resistant and a little jealous, too. He spoke so much about Sakhi and her boys.
They threaded their way through the trees. Unseen guards followed discreetly in the cool green forest depths and emerged when they came to the main path. Against Siddhartha’s wishes, Prajapati had ordered it widened and groomed, so it wasn’t the secret route that Siddhartha, Kirsa, and Chandaka had used as children to escape the palace.
Chandaka. Siddhartha hardly mentioned him, though he missed him sorely. Dhara regretted coming between them. All because of a few reckless kisses.
Melancholy enveloped her. She didn’t have a friend at court, save well-meaning but powerless Tissa. Even with Siddhartha’s love, she was lonely. If only this visit with Sakhi would go well.
Despite the cool spring air, Dhara was sweating a bit. “Can we stop a moment?”
“Of course.” Siddhartha signaled and two guards rushed forward with a litter.
“No, no. Just let me rest a minute.”
He waved the guards back and put his arm around her. She rested her head against his chest. Bees hummed and circled in a column of light ahead of them, bobbing from blossom to white blossom of a bauhinia vine draping a tall tree. A male parakeet sang its heart out and sunbeams flickered as a gust of wind soughed through the high branches. “It’s perfect, this moment, isn’t it, beloved?” he asked.
That’s what they sought, to be present in these perfect moments. No one understood. Many among the court and the people blamed her for distracting their beloved prince from his royal dharma. They all knew the prophecy, yet they blamed Dhara for steering him on this path.
“Are you afraid, my dear?” Siddhartha kissed the top of her head. “Nalaka said the birth will go well. It’s just we can’t see, because creating a child is a mystery that the yogis haven’t penetrated, and somehow because the child is ours we can’t follow the thread of his future on Time’s loom. But with Kirsa and Saibya to attend you, I have no fears.”
They resumed their walk and soon left the park. “The prince!” someone shouted as they proceeded on the broad road through the merchants’ quarter. A crowd began to gather, and among it a few beggars. “Lord! Dana for a poor man, to feed my children.” “My prince, touch the wound I received battling in your father’s army. It has festered for months… ” “Beautiful prince, a coin, just a coin, so I may offer the goddess prayers for my sick husband.”
Siddhartha untied his silk sash and held out little squares of cloth filled with gold coins and tied tight. Needy hands stretched out to grasp them.
No one called Dhara’s name. Some Sakyans thanked her for her gifts to the houses of healing. Others acknowledged her efforts to restore the goddess’s worship in a kingdom that had too long made its most magnificent offerings only to the celestial warrior Indra. Her childhood dreams, though, when she was the great and victorious Princess Yasodhara, beloved by her people, had never come true. So be it. She had yoga’s path to peace.
Sakhi was waiting for them at the mansion’s entrance with two garlands of yellow, red, and orange marigolds. When she saw Dhara her eyes wi
dened. Of course Sakhi would be shocked at the coarsened hair, the bloated face, the pendulous belly. On her part, Dhara was stunned at Sakhi’s pure white hair.
“Namaste, Princess.” Sakhi placed the garland over Dhara’s neck.
Dhara’s loneliness carried her into Sakhi’s arms. “My dear, my heart’s sister.”
Sakhi gave a quick embrace and stepped back with an awkward smile. “Please, come. I have refreshments in the courtyard.”
Dhara inhaled sharply, cut to the core. She lowered her suddenly wet eyes. Siddhartha gripped her hand. She swallowed as they entered the courtyard, where the sunlit fountain splashed and bright flowers nodded in an eddy of cool spring air.
“My sons Nakula and Sahadeva, Princess.”
Two boys stood wearing dark antariyas covered with bright geometric patterns. Dhara had never seen the babies that Jivaka cut from Sakhi’s belly almost five years ago. The boys’ eager and shy smiles turned to laughter and shrieks as soon as Siddhartha released Dhara’s hand and took a step toward them.
“Let’s play Kurus and Pandavas,” Sahadeva said. “We’ll be the Pandavas.”
“Why am I always the wicked Duryodhana, trying to steal the throne?” Siddhartha said, laughing and drawing them toward the splashing fountain.
“You can’t pretend to be the king, because you will be in real life,” Nakula said.
Siddhartha winced. Dhara stumbled.
Sakhi came to her side and put an arm around her. “Is it the baby?” She clasped Dhara’s free hand.
Dhara searched Sakhi’s eyes for a sign that she, too, harbored secret hopes for renewed friendship, but saw only a general motherly concern.
“Princess—”
“Sakhi! Please. It’s me. Dhara.”
“Dhara,” Sakhi said, watching Dhara intently. “You must be exhausted. Your time is so close! You shouldn’t have walked so far. Rest here.” She led Dhara to the neem tree, which was much larger than Dhara remembered. How long it was since she’d been here.
They passed a shrine that Dhara did not remember from her last visit, right before the twins were born, a statue of Sarasvati in the new, more realistic style. She stopped to admire the graceful form of painted clay, tall and elegant, with eight arms, the limbs on one side holding Dhara’s current nemesis the vina, a palm leaf, a prayer mala, and an elephant hook; the limbs on the other holding a conch, a bell, a plow, and a spear.
Sakhi smiled like the old days. “Since Bharata’s illness, I’ve come to honor the Devi in all her forms. Remember how afraid I was of that old shrine to the Mother in Dhavalagiri?”
“How could I forget?” Dhara laughed, too loudly. Sakhi’s face closed up.
Under the tree’s dark shade were spread gaily-colored blankets dotted with silk cushions in gemlike rose, blue, and emerald. There was an unusual scent in the air, some strange but refreshing herb.
Ensconced on the cushions was Bharata. He looked up at her, one eyelid drooping slightly, a crooked smile on his face. Dhara held her breath. The wise little boy, possessed of such quiet intelligence, reduced to this inert creature.
His eyes drew her to take a seat on a cushion near him, but when she settled, Dhara couldn’t bear to look at him. She had seen the entrails of men and horses strewn on the battlefield, willingly engaged terrifying inner demons in her struggle to attain the highest knowledge, but couldn’t bear to look at him. What must Sakhi feel? All her hopes for her child dashed. Dhara was overwhelmed with sorrow.
Then she felt Siddhartha’s eyes on her. He sat on the edge of the fountain, a twin on each side. The boys’ heads were together and they were listening to Siddhartha’s low voice.
“You were never a monkey!” one of the boys said all of a sudden, letting out a trilling laugh.
“Oh, but I was, Nakula. And in my monkey life, I fooled a crocodile.”
“Ma, is that really true? Siddhartha was a monkey?” Sahadeva called out.
“If he says so. Perhaps he will tell us about it,” Sakhi said.
“Perhaps I will,” Siddhartha said, walking to the neem tree and settling easily in the lotus pose. The twins emulated him. “Bharata, my friend, shall I tell you about when I was a monkey?”
Bharata’s eyes shone. A light passed between him and Siddhartha. Dhara knew that light. It enveloped her when Siddhartha touched her mind. It would have a healing effect on Bharata’s consciousness that illness had surely harmed. Just to think of what the poor boy must feel made Dhara want to jump and run from the pleasant shade, which only emphasized his tragedy.
“Here is how it happened,” Siddhartha said. “I was a hungry little monkey, sitting high in a mango tree on one side of a river. I had eaten all the fruit on my tree, but across the river, there was one laden with red, ripe, juicy mangoes. It made my stomach rumble.”
The sun glinted off the boys’ dark heads and wide smiles spread over their faces as he told them the story.
“Now, there was a crocodile who lived in that river. My mother had told me he was dangerous and ate little monkeys, and I should stay away from him, but when I saw him swimming on the surface, I had an idea. ‘Friend Crocodile,’ I called out. ‘Can I ride on your back to the other side, so that I might eat those juicy mangoes?’”
“But your mother said the crocodile will eat you!” Sahadeva had been listening with rapt attention. “You should watch out!”
“You’re stupid. There’s no such thing as crocodiles,” Nakula said. “It’s just a story.”
“You’re stupid,” Sahadeva retorted. “Lots of people have seen crocodiles.”
“Boys.” Sakhi’s low, calm voice made them both sit up straighter.
“You say so. You don’t know. I have to see one. Then I’ll know.” Nakula frowned and put his lips to his cup.
“Not a bad way to live, Nakula,” Siddhartha said, “but it has its limits. My monkey self was thinking like you. I’d never seen him eat a monkey. So when he said, ‘I’d be glad to take you, hop on,’ I thought he seemed a very nice fellow who would do me no harm, and I jumped onto his back.”
“And then he ate you,” Nakula said with a wicked grin. “The end.”
Nakula’s insolence irritated Dhara but didn’t bother Siddhartha in the least. “Am I boring you?” he laughed. “Perhaps I should stop.”
“No!” Sahadeva said, glaring at his twin. “Please finish, Prince.”
“Where was I? Oh, riding Crocodile’s back across the river. About midstream, Crocodile dove deep into the river. I had to hang on with all my strength. He stayed under so long I thought my lungs would burst. Just as I thought I couldn’t hold my breath any longer, he surfaced. ‘Why did you do that? I nearly drowned!’
“‘And next time you will drown, and I’ll eat your tender little heart. Monkey hearts are one of my favorite foods.’ I was sorry I hadn’t believed my mother when she said crocodiles eat monkeys just because I’d never seen it happen. But a monkey has a quick mind, and I had another idea. ‘I’m very sorry, Crocodile,’ I said. ‘I hate to disappoint you, but I left my heart back in that tree on the other side.’
“‘What? Left your heart in a tree?’ I pointed high up where one small, unripe mango hung. ‘Up there. Take me back, and I’ll get it. You’ll have a nice treat.’
“‘That’s very nice of you,’ Crocodile said, and swam back. I jumped off and scampered as fast as I could to the tree’s highest branches.”
Nakula rolled his eyes. “If there are crocodiles, they’re more stupid than Sahadeva.”
Bharata opened his mouth and made a mewling sound. A little saliva dribbled from the corner of his mouth. It took Dhara an instant to realize he was laughing.
“Nakula,” Sakhi admonished him, wiping Bharata’s face with a damp cloth.
Sahadeva stuck his tongue out at his brother. “Tell us the rest,” he said to Siddhartha.
“Not much left to tell. I stuck my tongue out at Crocodile and went swinging off into the trees, looking for mangoes on my side of the river.”
“If I were the crocodile, I wouldn’t have believed that mango was a monkey heart,” Nakula said. “Not until I’d seen it with my own eyes.”
“You always ruin Siddhartha’s stories,” Sahadeva said.
“No I don’t. Not when they’re about warriors and fights. Next time, will you tell us about the prince who mastered the five weapons and beat up the sticky monster?”
“Maybe. First let’s see how you and Sahadeva are doing with your five weapons.”
The twins took off running into the storeroom. They emerged armed with wooden swords and were soon parrying each other’s blows by the fountain. The children and their laughter, the splashing fountain, being with an old friend—all should have given her joy, but instead Dhara was ill at ease.
“Would you like something to drink?” Sakhi bent over a wooden tray laden with bowls of fruit, yogurt, and little flat seeded cakes and reached for a jug. She poured cool mango juice into a cup and squeezed a lime into it. “A honey cake? Yogurt and fruit?”
Dhara’s hand shook as she took the cup. She managed a sip. “Nalaka told me Bhallika took Arjuna and Bhima on a caravan. That’s wonderful for them.”
“He promised them some time ago that he would take them on his next journey. He said this trip to the Vajji clan’s capital would do them good. Things… have taken a toll on them.” She reached over to pat Bharata’s hand. “It gave me more time to nurse my darling Bharata.”
His lopsided smile grew wider. Goosebumps rose on Dhara’s flesh. Compassion flowed from Bharata to his mother as much as the other way around.
“New experiences will lift Arjuna’s and Bhima’s spirits.” The words sounded awkward and false.
Sakhi glanced sidelong at her. “Yes, but I worry. The roads are not so safe these days, what with Angulimala allied to no one.”
Darkness came over Dhara whenever she heard that name; she’d heard it all too often lately. Nowadays, Angulimala’s army preyed on everyone, even the Sakyas.
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