PRINCE IN EXILE Read online

  As a rising murmur from the Ayodhyan procession turned into a roar of exultation, Ayodhya lay clothed in a garment of benign flame, blazing brightly enough to turn the night just fallen into gaudy day once more. A day created by the power of human song.

  Guru Vashishta, his voice fallen silent along with those of the other singers, turned to face the procession. His eyes sought out and found Sita in the forelines.

  ‘I welcome all of you, Mithilans and Ayodhyans alike, to Ayodhya the beautiful, the unconquerable, the effulgent. Let this display of our passion and art be proof positive of this fact: that as long as we continue to light up this proud city’s name through adherence to karma and dharma, so shall mighty Ayodhya shine on eternally.’

  FIVE

  When the sound of distant shouts and cheers woke Manthara, her first thought was that Ravana had arrived at last. Her lord and master had finally triumphed and taken Ayodhya. She was filled with vindictive triumph: now these stupid mortals would learn what it meant to challenge the Lord of Lanka!

  The next instant she was filled with bone-numbing, heart-chilling terror. Fear at the realisation that she had not completed the task Ravana had entrusted to her. And when it came to fools and failures, as Ravana had often remarked to her, he suffered neither gladly.

  She groaned and sat up slowly, cursing her throbbing head. The first thing her eyes came to rest on, swimming into focus, was the guard by the door of her sleeping chamber. He stood with his left shoulder to her, sword held loosely in his right hand, pretending to be looking at nothing in particular.

  She cursed him and his sisters, then his mother as well for good measure.

  He ignored her. Like all the other guards assigned to guard her in her own chambers, he was used to her foul tongue.

  The sound of dhol-drums erupted from outside–they seemed to be coming from the palace courtyard itself. The dhol-drums were soon accompanied by the almost cheerful lowing of conch trumpets. Far in the distance, the sound of singing could be heard. She realised with a sinking heart that an asura invasion would hardly be greeted with celebratory music.

  ‘So what is it this time?’ she snapped at the guard. ‘Did some Arya raja father his five thousandth illegitimate child?’

  The guard glanced at her sharply, and made as if to answer her. Then he seemed to think better of it and turned his back deliberately on her, facing the outer chamber.

  She spat at him, the spittle landing far short.

  She lay like that sullenly, licking at her mental wounds and thinking of all the ways she could torture the man–and everyone else who had ever said or done anything to offend her in her lifetime. It was a long list and would have occupied her the rest of the day at the very least, but at some point something clicked into place in her mind. What better time to attempt an escape than during a celebration? She had already figured out that the jublilation outside was occasioned by the return of Rama and the rest of the royal family. It hardly took a genius to realise that.

  But it did take a genius to figure out what she had just come up with. A plan so simple yet devious that it might just work. There might yet be a way for her to fulfil her mission and propitiate the Lord of Lanka. Even if his invasion had not succeeded, he would certainly appreciate her loyalty. And who knew, perhaps her little scheme might even open a new door of possibility for the lord of asuras himself.

  Rising with difficulty, she shuffled with exaggerated effort towards the door, clearing her throat noisily to alert the guard. He turned at once, sword barring her way, eyes narrowed with suspicion darting to each of her hands in turn as if seeking out the weapon he half expected her to be holding. She kept her wrists bent, the bare hands twisted arthritically.

  Aloud she said, ‘I must needs partake of some nourishment. Pray, ask a serving girl to fetch me something from the bhojanshalya.’

  He looked at her warily. He wasn’t suspicious of the request– she hadn’t eaten since being confined and it was only natural that she should be feeling some hunger–but it was her unexpected politeness that was making him stare so. That was easily corrected.

  ‘Get a move on then, dolt. I’d like to have it for supper and not breakfast!’

  He grimaced and nodded curtly. Then he struck his sword hilt against his helmet twice, alerting his fellows throughout the chamber. Manthara rolled her eyes in exasperation. These Kshatriyas and their idiotic military rituals. She wished there was a spell she could use to simply vanish them all out of existence.

  The guard’s fellow from the outer chamber came in and both men spoke briefly, keeping their voices low–as if they were trading national secrets!–then the guard from the outer chamber returned to his post while the guard from her sleeping chamber left the apartments. She slouched her way to the door of the room, peering out. The guard at the outer door was standing with his back to her, facing outwards as he usually did. The bhojanshalya was a fair distance away, which meant it would take the other guard several minutes to return. She had that much time at least to attempt her escape.

  Now kill the remaining guard.

  For an instant, she almost turned her head to look around. The voice had risen so easily within her mind, it was almost like hearing Ravana speak again. The way he had spoken to her at her secret rites, cursing and torturing her, yet commanding and cajoling her as well. She shuddered, holding on to the memory of those encounters, and gathering her strength together for what she was about to do. This is for you, master. That you may see how I serve you yet.

  She licked her parched lips nervously. The guard still had his back to her. He was a large man, broad through the shoulders, and armed with the shortsword that the palace guards favoured. After all, as guardians of the royal family and attachés, any fighting they were likely to engage in would be at close quarters. Like this very situation. She took another step closer, unable to keep her mind from visualising how easily that gleaming halfyard of Kosala steel would slice through her reedy tendons and emaciated flesh, hewing through the thin bone beneath without much effort. Then, with a prayer to one of her nameless gods, she raised her forefinger and aimed it at the guard.

  A green flame shot out from the tip of her finger, streaking like a blowdart to the back of the guard’s neck. It entered the base of his skull, making a slight sizzling crackle. A faint, indistinguishable rotten odour filled the air briefly, and the guard clutched the back of his neck with his free hand, gasping once. He swung around, his sword still clutched in his right hand, and his eyes, very wide and afraid in his helmeted face, found Manthara. He staggered forward, stumbling as the spell rotted his brain. Already, greenish mucus was dribbling from his nostrils, mouth and ears, and as he took yet another step, Manthara saw greenish goo seep from the corners of his eyes.

  She backed away until her shoulderblades struck a wall, shuddering briefly in terror. The dying guard’s mouth opened and closed as he fought to release a cry to warn his colleagues outside the apartment. Only choked gasping sounds emerged from his dribbling lips, too faint to be heard over the raucous cheers that had broken out throughout the palace complex. He tried to raise his sword hand, to strike it against his helmet, but his arm seemed to be caught in a rictus, spasming with a life of its own. He stumbled forward again, closer to Manthara, now barely three yards away, then two yards, then … She raised her hands, biting back the urge to scream aloud. Just as it seemed he was certain to run her through, all awareness vanished from his face, his eyes rolled back in his head lifelessly, and he collapsed on the thick pile rug. The rug absorbed any sound his half-armour or weapons might have made striking the ground. The guard lay still, a puddle of greenish fluid seeping around his head.

  Manthara released a tightly held breath, lowering her shaking hands. She was shivering all over, like a leaf in a monsoon gale. Her brain felt wrung out, like a towel squeezed dry of all moisture. It was hard to use sorcery again, after the tremendous amount of energy she had expended to work that last illusion, changing the very architecture of t
his section of the palace to put a lie to Rani Sumitra’s words. The effort hadn’t succeeded entirely–Rani Kausalya had still had her placed under house arrest–but it had saved her from being proven outright guilty and executed on the spot. Now, even this minor death-spell had sucked her dry. She needed to hide, to recover her energies. And to work her magic from some hidden place away from prying eyes.

  She was shuffling towards the doorway when the guard jerked upright, rising from the waist, suspended impossibly without the support of either hands or feet, raised his sword-hand, and plunged the blade into the emaciated flesh of her thigh.

  It was all she could manage not to scream out with agony.

  The sword point entered her inner thigh, penetrating through the thin layer of flesh, passing right through her leg, emerging out the other side, and striking the wall behind her. It made a dull wet sound as it went through her flesh, ending in a metallic thump as it emerged from her thigh and struck the wooden wall.

  The dead guard bent his neck impossibly, raising his head to stare up at her. His face, oozing fluid and blood from every orifice, was a gruesome mask at some carnival nautanki sideshow. His eyes remained rolled up, the whites showing, his open mouth gaped, greenish-black tongue lolling to one side, and when he spoke, the words came directly from somewhere deep within his innards. ‘Jai Shree Ram.’

  Then he collapsed again, falling on to her right instep, the rim of his helmet cutting her foot as sharply as any kitchen blade slicing a mutton joint. The sword remained embedded in her thigh, pinning her to the wall.

  ‘My lord,’ she sobbed, barely aware she was speaking the words aloud. And lost consciousness for a moment.

  When she came to her senses again, she was looking down at the hilt of the shortsword sticking out of her thigh.

  Pull it out. Quickly. The other guard is already at the bhojanshalya, giving instructions for your supper.

  Manthara stuffed one hand into her mouth, biting down hard enough to draw blood. With the other, she reached down and took hold of the hilt of the sword. It still retained warmth from the grip of the dead guard.

  She clutched it as tightly as she was able, then pulled. It came out of the wall with a jerk. The pain in her thigh was excruciating; it felt as if an iron pike had been driven through her heart. She tugged again, and for an instant the sword would not budge. Then, with a liquid sound, the blade passed back the way it had entered, and popped out of her body. Because of the angle at which she was gripping it, the edge of the blade sliced upwards as it emerged, enlarging the wound further. The cut travelled all the way up to her hip, grating against the bone, causing another explosion of pain. She stared at the sword, its blade smeared with dark-maroonish blood. Her blood. With a grimace, she dropped it on the rug. It fell with a muffled thump, lost in the jubilation ringing out from all sides.

  Then she bent down, face contorting as the thigh wound screamed pain, and tugged at the dead guard’s helmet. Pulling it off her foot, she shuffled to one side. Finally, she was free.

  Now go. Get out of here quickly before the other guard returns and it’s too late.

  For an instant, in her pain and delirium, she forgot that it was only her own voice speaking within her head, not Ravana. She sobbed through clenched teeth, straining to keep herself from screaming out with pain. ‘But where shall I go? The guards at the entrance to my apartment—’

  And almost as if it was he replying, the answer came back at once.

  You won’t get out that way, old crone. Go to the south corner of the apartment. To the window.

  She limped and shuffled to the far corner of the chamber. Manoeuvring around each item of furniture was a chore in itself, even though her chamber was barely furnished. She reached the southern wall. An open window was set in the wall, looking out on to the inner courtyard. Through it she could see large numbers of serving girls, maids and untitled queens mingling together, expressions of great joy on their faces. Several women were preparing pooja thalis to anoint soldiers returning home. She didn’t have to be told what the scene meant: Maharaja Dasaratha and the rest of the wedding party were returning home from Mithila with the four princes and their new brides. She fought back the urge to put her head out the window and spew vomit over the jubilation, leaning against the wall instead, struggling to stay conscious through the pain of her wounds. Blood seeped steadily down her thigh, drenching her sari.

  Now go through the window.

  She raised her head and stared up. Only the ceiling met her dazed eyes. Go where?

  The window, hag. Climb through it.

  She stared out of the window again. It was a fall of perhaps fifteen yards to the courtyard below. That didn’t concern her in itself. With her shakti restored, she could cushion her own fall magically. What was puzzling her was why Ravana would wish her to leap down into the midst of that mélée. How could it possibly help to jump into a courtyard full of witnesses? Then she remembered feverishly that it wasn’t Ravana, it was her own voice telling her to do this insane thing. Or was it?

  Jump now.

  Manthara swallowed. Tears poured down her wizened face, almost as profuse as the blood dripping from her wound. She went to the window, holding on to the jamb as she tried to figure out whether it was best to go through head or feet first.

  Quickly, witch. The guard is returning from the bhojanshalya now. You must be gone before he arrives.

  She decided it didn’t matter either way. The fall would smash her withered bones no matter which way she went. And if this was the punishment Ravana had in mind for her, then perhaps it was best she go quickly and as decisively as possible. She stuck her head through the window, pushing herself through with an effort. Her hunch stuck for a moment, and she saw a young serving maid glance up. Their eyes met for an instant, and recognition spread across the pretty young woman’s face. Her mouth opened to say something to her companions. Just then Manthara applied one final burst of willpower and squeezed herself through the narrow window, striking her injured thigh on the upper jamb and crying out involuntarily with pain. As she fell, she saw the stone ground of the aangan below rush up to meet her head.

  ‘Oh master,’ she whispered. ‘Save me.’

  SIX

  Manthara.

  This time, she could not tell if the voice came from within her own fevered, tortured brain, or from some other source.

  She opened her eyes to find herself enveloped by pitch darkness. The absence of light was so complete, she could not see even her hands in front of her face. Her first instinct was relief: she had learned to love the dark ever since, as a child, she had begun to see through the eyes of others around her the hideous ugliness of her hunchbacked deformity. Darkness was her friend, her ally. It was the light that she feared.

  She clawed at the ground with her sticky, blood-smeared hands. Even without light to see, she could tell at once that it was tiled with the same immaculately smooth hand-polished redstone that adorned the floors of every chamber in Suryavansha Palace, not the coarser grey flagstones that were used in the courtyards and outer areas. This meant that she hadn’t fallen into the chaukat after all. She was still within the palace somewhere. But where?

  Then her fingers found the place on her thigh where she had sustained the sword wound, and she gasped with disbelief. The gaping wound was closed, the skin uncut and unblemished except by the normal parchment-like coarseness of age. Her hand flew to her face next; she touched her eye accidentally in the darkness and it began to water as she blinked rapidly. It was true. She was healed again. She could feel the strength returned to her limbs, the crushing void gone from her mind, life filling her veins and senses once more. She thanked him silently for the miracle: no matter how many times they repeated this cycle of torture and restoration, it never ceased to evoke her deepest awe.

  ‘Master! It is you, then! You have healed me. Thank you, swami. You are truly magnificent.’

  The room flared to life around her. Manthara blinked, dazzled. She forced
her eyes to open, squinting against the brightness. A figure stood before her, familiar in silhouette yet too brightly backlit for her to be able to focus her vision upon it.

  ‘Manthara,’ said a voice she knew almost as well as her own. ‘It’s me.’

  And the sari-clad figure of Maharani Kaikeyi strode toward her, heavy gold jewellery clinking noisily.

  ‘My lord?’ Manthara said shakily, almost doubting her own mental equilibrium for once. ‘Is it thou?’

  Kaikeyi paused, threw her head back and emitted a low throaty laugh, her mouth reddened with paan-chewing. ‘Very good, Manthara. You see through this guise then. But will anyone else?’

  Manthara raised and lowered her eyes, turning her head this way then that as she examined the Second Queen as closely as she could manage. ‘My lord, your art is beyond compare. The perfection of the illusion—’

  ‘Spare the superlatives, hag,’ Kaikeyi said with a startling red-toothed smile. ‘There’s work to be done. And since you’ve foolishly exposed your role in our great campaign, it’s up to me to finish the task we began.’