Tantrics Of Old Read online

  ‘Look, storyteller. I allow you to come here, I allow you to stay, to sleep. I grant you shelter, but that doesn’t mean you feed me your foul legends. I think you’ve been out in the sun too long.’ The headman looked at the old man in disgust bordering on anger.

  ‘No,’ the old man shook his head sadly. ‘You must send out a messenger in search of a travelling Tantric. If you do not get a Tantric here in time, you are all undone.’

  ‘Leave this Settlement, old man,’ the headman replied. ‘I have no use for your stories of doom, neither do any of the people here. Leave now. I do not kick you out because I respect your age.’

  ‘I am bringing the first Tantric I might be lucky enough to find,’ the old man spoke, turning around and hobbling out. ‘And if you are fortunate,’ he said, his back towards the headman, ‘then it might not be too late.’

  The headman said nothing. Leaning against his doorway, he watched the old storyteller walk the lonely deserted road for a couple of minutes. Then he shouted out loud, ‘What should I watch out for, storyteller? What threatens us?’

  The storyteller slowed down and turned halfway. ‘Do not approach the little girl in the mask,’ he said with finality, and continued walking.

  The headman watched him go in silence. No one needed to know any of this—and he would be damned the day he let a dead-talker cross the gates of this Settlement. Little girls were not what he was afraid of. It was magic, something he did not understand.

  ‘Magic is everywhere,’ Adri spoke. ‘In the air you breathe, inside the ground your boots are stepping on. Inside that statue, to the brim’ —he pointed—‘pretty much everything you see around you has magic. And the thing about magic’ —Adri paused as he, Maya, and Gray crossed a busy road and continued walking—‘is that it is chaotic. This is what most Necromancers and Sorcerers do not grasp. Magic is not out to help you; it’s there to make things go wrong. It’s a powerful, destructive force. There is nothing good to be found in magic in its purest form.

  ‘We try to wrestle with something that isn’t rightfully ours, and in all our hypocrisy, we trivialise it. Sorcerers and Necromancers have tried to control and channel magic the most. Their work has led to the channelling of magical artefacts as energy sources, of all things, in day-to-day life, in things you see everywhere and use every day.’ He stopped. In front of him was an arch, white marble like everything else, with steps leading down. The passage was illuminated in bright neon. METRO—broad letters declared at the head of the passage. ‘The Metro, for example, runs on magical energy,’ Adri said, descending the stairs. Maya followed, and so did Gray, hanging on to every word.

  The Metro was almost empty; the last train was due in a few minutes and there were no more trains to be caught after that. A few people lingered here and there, the occasional beggar sleeping on the landing. They walked past the ticket counters and Adri vaulted over the ticket machines. Maya looked around for Guardians and Law-keepers, only to realise that Adri would have sensed them before her. Gray had already vaulted over the machines, copying Adri, and without so much as a glance at her. She followed.

  They headed down to an empty platform. Clean, white marble, with the occasional wall-mounted television broadcasting films; news channels had been down for years. There was no one else on the platform. Adri took a seat. Maya followed suit, while Gray preferred to remain standing, taking off his backpack.

  ‘So it’s a Metro train?’ Maya asked.

  ‘Yes,’ Adri replied. ‘They will never open the gates of New Kolkata for anyone. This is how people travel in and out.’

  ‘When does this train come?’ Gray asked.

  ‘One hour after the last one,’ Adri replied.

  ‘One hour to kill, then,’ Gray said.

  The siblings had packed fast without complaint, while Adri sat in their apartment and played with Maya’s kittens. He had not seen either of their parents in the house and he did not ask. His only objection, though, was to Gray’s violin case. ‘Wait, wait. You’re taking a violin along?’ he had asked, his head swimming.

  ‘I thought we could do with some good music at times,’ Gray had replied.

  ‘I’m sure the Demons will love it.’

  ‘Look, I need practice. It’s been a really short while since I started.’

  ‘Which means you probably play horribly,’ Adri had sighed.

  Gray had slung the damn thing alongside his bag, while Adri had been left to rethink his decision of taking these two along. Maya, meanwhile, had been trying to decide what books she should carry. Finally they wore their boots, ready for the journey.

  The nearest subway station was only a little far off, and they had to change two buses and then walk a bit, avoiding Guardians all the while. Adri had explained to Gray how Guardians functioned. Maya had spent her time wondering how much of the information was true, whereas Gray drank everything in.

  Adri looked around the deserted platform once again to make sure there was no danger, even though he didn’t really expect any until they reached the Old City. Seeing no one, he leaned back with a tired sigh and put a cigarette to his mouth. Maya and Gray looked at him, their faces blank.

  ‘I know it’s not allowed here,’ Adri said. ‘A lot of things aren’t allowed in New Kolkata. Both of you, for instance, are not allowed to go to the Old City, but here you are, waiting for the train to Old Kolkata, and here I am, smoking in the new.’

  ‘You said you have been banned,’ Maya said.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘So you’re not supposed to be here in this city?’

  ‘Correct.’

  ‘So why are you here?’

  ‘I wonder about that myself,’ Adri murmured.

  ‘Pardon?’

  Adri did not answer, and continued smoking. Maya looked at him, and then looked the other way, her hair covering her eyes with the sudden movement. Adri let the silence brew for a few moments more before he spoke.

  ‘Maya.’

  She turned to look at him.

  ‘What’s your branch of study?’ Adri asked. ‘In college,’ he added, clarifying. Maya remained silent. Adri did not prod again, and Gray, looking up and down the Metro tunnel, got steadily uncomfortable about the silence. No one spoke for the next half-hour or so, and Gray’s footsteps echoed through the empty platform as he walked its length. They heard the sound of the metal shutters clattering shut at the entrances. It was time, and the maintenance people never checked the platforms. One never knew who, or what, was bound for the Old City.

  ‘Will the lights go?’ Gray asked Adri. ‘Cause, you know, I kind of hate the dark.’

  ‘The lights should stay on,’ Adri replied.

  And they did. The silence maintained itself as well, and Gray wondered if he should get some violin practice done. He hated complete silence almost as much as he hated darkness. He tried making conversation with his sister, but she was taciturn. Giving up, he finally sat down next to Adri.

  ‘This will not be easy, Gray,’ Adri said.

  ‘I know. She’s really mature, but extremely moody at times.’

  Adri looked slightly annoyed. ‘I wasn’t talking about your sister.’

  ‘Oh.’

  ‘Old Kolkata is not what you are expecting it to be. I have no expectations from the both of you, but you will see things magical, unbelievable. Remember your sanity, and hold on to it like a precious thing. You might see things that will catch your beliefs by the collar and throw them right out of the window.’

  Gray looked a little uneasy. ‘Things like what?’ he asked.

  ‘I can’t prepare you for it, believe me,’ Adri replied. ‘Old Kolkata is a city that does not forgive. Neither does it forget. It is dark.’

  Gray felt a tiny buzz start in his tummy and make its way up to his brain. Anticipation. His life in New Kolkata had been more eventful than his sister’s, but it had never been enough for him. He had always wished to see the much spoken about Old City. He wanted to breathe in its secrets, to understand h
ow his ancestors had lived there. His city of dreams, unapproachable in its distance, its silence, its invisibility in the city new. Until now. And yet he was apprehensive. His sister’s safety was important, and perhaps it was the nudge he needed to embark on this journey—he asked himself if he would have gone otherwise. He did not find an answer. ‘Can one photograph magical beings?’ he asked Adri after a moment.

  ‘Yes, most of them.’

  ‘Good. I’ve taken my camera along. I’m a student of photography, actually,’ Gray ranted on. ‘And being able to photograph the Old City . . . well, it’s something I’ve thought about often.’

  MYTH had banned all visual representation of Old Kolkata; and the citizens of New Kolkata had never gotten to see the city. Of course, there were the occasional rebel photographs that leaked out; but no one could confirm whether they were really of the Old City. Speculations, therefore, ran amok.

  Adri raised an eyebrow. ‘Photographer? I took you for a musician. With your white hair and everything.’

  ‘I was born with the white hair. It is random genetics, nobody’s been able to explain it. The violin is a hobby.’

  Adri nodded. Most curious. But then he didn’t have any friends or acquaintances of his own age. People he knew were much older, some a few centuries old; he couldn’t remember the last time he had tried talking to a college-goer. He didn’t understand this generation, neither did he want to, for that matter. But it was interesting nonetheless. He hoped he could keep both of them alive while they negotiated the Old City. Adri lit another cigarette. This was going to be stressful, this whole affair. Had to happen to him, of all people. If the Fallen ultimately confirmed that all of this wasn’t a conspiracy of some kind and that he had been chosen randomly by Death, he wouldn’t be surprised. Not at all. He’d only be angry at his typical dumb luck.

  The worst part was that he couldn’t instil the fear of the grisliest things that could happen in Old Kolkata into the siblings; he needed them to come along. He couldn’t scare them off. And yet his conscience would not let him push them into the city unprepared. Small warnings, he decided finally. Small tidbits of information to keep them on their toes.

  And then, soundlessly, the lights started to dim. Slow, steady.

  ‘The lights!’ Gray yelped.

  Adri stood up, grabbing his bag. ‘Our ride’s here,’ he said.

  Maya had heard it coming before the two of them. She had been walking up and down the length of the platform once her brother had sat down and she was near the mouth of the tunnel when she heard the noise. Before she had time to walk back to Adri and Gray, the train zoomed in, screaming right past her. It wasn’t what she had anticipated, though she wasn’t expecting the typical New Kolkata train.

  ‘It’s not air-conditioned?’ Gray asked, looking at it with bulging eyes, as Adri, still smoking, fitted three rounds in his shooter.

  The train was a wreck. It looked like a tangle of disfigured metal with rough holes punched in, held together with nothing but prayers. The compartments were old and beginning to rust; most of the windows had no safety bars, and old tube lights struggled to stay alight inside. The compartments were endless, they continued down the tunnel till they ran out of sight. The train stopped with an almighty sigh, the clanking and cluttering finally coming to a stop as age-old brakes screeched. The platform lights remained dim, making the train look creepier still, with its devastated exteriors and lights within.

  ‘Does this thing actually run?’ Maya asked incredulously as she picked up her bag.

  ‘There’s no AC,’ Gray groaned.

  Maya spotted what Adri was holding. ‘Hey, is that a—’

  Adri entered a compartment without answering, sliding open a rusty door. Shooter raised, he walked in, surveying the seats and the overhead baggage compartments with sharp eyes. Apart from a man sleeping in a far corner, the compartment was empty. The siblings crept in after him, and stared as Adri approached the sleeping man, weapon raised.

  The man appeared to be a homeless—old clothes, cap pulled over face. Adri stood in front of him and slowly eased his weapon barrel towards the man’s forehead. The siblings watched, frozen. Adri gently lifted the cap with the barrel until he got a glimpse of the man’s face. Then he turned around and lowered the shooter.

  ‘It’s okay,’ he said.

  A chair car. The seats weren’t in as bad a condition as the train itself, and Maya and Gray sat on the other side of the aisle from Adri. Every available inch of the compartment was covered with old, frayed leaflets and posters, scratched messages, and amateurish graffiti. The windows were open; the shutters had long broken away. The platform lights were so dim by now that they could see nothing but darkness outside.

  ‘How long is the journey?’ Maya asked, peering out of a window.

  ‘About six hours,’ Adri replied.

  ‘Not that long, huh?’ Gray commented.

  ‘Gets boring,’ Adri said, leaning back into his seat, his bag on the empty seat beside him.

  Gray turned around to look at the man in the back row, still sleeping. ‘What did you suspect him of being?’ Gray asked. ‘A Demon?’

  ‘He could have been a lot of things, Gray,’ Adri replied, shifting in more comfortably.

  ‘You mean the train isn’t safe?’

  ‘Even New Kolkata isn’t safe. Nowhere is safe.’

  Maya spoke up. ‘You’re always so vague.’ She wondered if the Tantric was concealing information, or hiding his ignorance. Either way, it was about time she got to know a bit more about him than he intended to reveal. His origins or background wouldn’t be a bad start. Any information was crucial, just in case he turned on them later on. She had already bound Adri’s diaries in brown paper—now she readied one inside her bag, keeping a watchful eye on the young Tantric. He looked ready to sleep off. She would wait until he was, in case he felt any magical vibes from the book or something—she could never be too sure. The train started, sluggishly at first, picking up speed soon. They rushed into an endless tunnel, the darkness outside deepening. Gray peered out of a window, while his sister seemed to hunt for something in her backpack. All he could see was black—the New Kolkata tunnel lights had clearly not been installed on the way to Old Kolkata. He wondered if this train was a secret from MYTH, or if they allowed it to run. The next instant, he froze. A figure was moving towards them through the aisle. A huge man in a blue uniform, the cap pulled over his head, casting his face into shadow. He was built well, his muscles pushing against the uniform’s fabric as he walked. He blocked the lights with his size as he approached.

  ‘A-A-Adri!’ Gray stammered, looking to his left. Maya was staring at the figure, while across the aisle Adri was sitting straighter and searching his bag for something.

  The figure stopped in front of them. Then, in a voice that was more like a grunt, something Gray heard over the noise of the train, he spoke. ‘Tickets.’

  The siblings looked at the man with their jaws hanging, eyes wide in surprise. In the darkness of the man’s face, something moved.

  ‘Here you are,’ Adri said.

  A red cloth bag, tied at the mouth. The man took it, felt its weight, and grunted.

  ‘All three of you?’ he asked.

  ‘All three,’ Adri replied, praying he hadn’t miscalculated.

  The figure moved past them towards the sleeping man in the back.

  ‘Who was that? You paid for us?’ Gray asked, while Maya looked on.

  Adri took a moment before he replied. ‘He’s called the Driver,’ he said. ‘We do not talk about the Driver while we’re on the train.’

  ‘What was in that bag?’ Gray persisted.

  ‘Later. Believe me, now is not the time. His hearing is quite sharp,’ Adri replied, leaning back again. Shuteye. This was probably the last opportunity to grab a few hours of good sleep. If only sleep would come, if only that infernal ticking would leave. Tick, tock, tick. Every second. Leading to the dawn. His death. Death. A Fallen’s promise; what was
it even worth? He could not sleep, how could he, when his life was literally in the hands of someone he could not trust? Adri frowned, despite himself. He counted the seconds with mad helplessness.

  Gray turned around and looked behind him, at the door that the Driver had gone through. It was solid metal. For an instant, just for an instant, he had a mad urge to run to the door and throw it open. He looked outside again. Darkness. It was going to be a long trip.

  Adri wasn’t happy. He didn’t trust Demons and he didn’t like summoning them. Besides, under more normal circumstances, no boy his age would be expected to summon Demons. But then he had seen things not normal. Things he would remember for life.

  ‘I don’t want to trust a Demon,’ Adri spoke with finality. His voice was young. Untarnished. Innocent.

  ‘It’s like a formula, Adri. A mathematical formula. You put things on the board, you do it right and perfect, and there is no reason why the Demon won’t carry out your task,’ Victor explained for the hundredth time.

  ‘My Familiars can handle my tasks, Father,’ Adri spoke with the air of someone clutching at straws.

  ‘Familiars? Ha!’ Victor scoffed, turning away towards a giant window, as big as an entire wall. ‘They can’t even keep your secrets, can they? Not to mention their amazing fighting skills.’

  ‘I don’t want to call Demons,’ Adri insisted.

  ‘Are you afraid of them?’ his father asked.

  ‘No.’

  ‘Really, Adri?’

  ‘I’m not afraid.’

  ‘This is the age you have to start at, my boy. By the time you are my age you shall be perfect, you shall be flawless. Undefeatable.’

  Adri remained silent.

  ‘Adventure is the ultimate aim, Adri. Experience. See it all. Do it all,’ Victor spoke with enthusiasm, turning back to his son.

  ‘I’m interested,’ Adri admitted. ‘I’m interested in what I learn, Father.’

  ‘Then why not Demons?’

  Adri was silent once more. ‘I’ve heard bad things,’ he spoke at length.