1637: The Peacock Throne

by Eric Flint

  Part Six

  July, 1636

  Joys of the sense, delights of eye and ear

  —The Rig Veda

  Chapter 28

  Asirgarh

  Red Tent

  “It is done, then?” Aurangzeb asked. He had only just come from morning prayers and, as ever, was feeling refreshed, reinvigorated, and ready for the day. He had decided, on Nur’s sound advice, to make a habit of granting private audiences—on short notice—to his diwans and others whose characters he wished to directly assess. And with the need to placate and fully seduce his brother’s supporters to his cause, Aurangzeb thought carving out the time necessary to do so was time very well spent.

  “It is, Sultan Al’Azam,” Ghulam Khan answered.

  “That was quick work.” That the tall, darkly handsome and freshly appointed diwan of the Imperial Mint did not have an actual physical mint to direct did not signify. All things happened at the place and time mandated by God, and God would provide. In the meantime, Aurangzeb had promoted Ghulam, one of Shuja’s many erstwhile supporters, to the post. The move had been carefully considered, as Ghulam was well connected with other umara, but not so well connected he must be given a field command. Thus, he’d been raised to the nearly empty office yet given the prestigious task of creating the silver rupees that would mark the regnal year of Alamgir Aurangzeb according to his specifications.

  Aurangzeb seated himself and waved permission for Ghulam to do the same.

  “Your kharkhanas had several worthy silver smiths and engravers ready and eager to practice their craft on your behalf, Sultan Al’Azam,” Ghulam Khan said as he sat at the proper distance and artfully arranged the gem-encrusted robes Aurangzeb had awarded him upon promotion to the post. That done, he removed a slim sandalwood box from one sleeve.

  “They were able to read my calligraphy, then?” Aurangzeb asked, gesturing his body slave to retrieve the box.

  “Of course they were, Sultan Al’Azam. Your skill with the qulam was recognized by all the court.” Ghulam smiled at Aurangzeb as the slave returned to his master with the small box held before him.

  Do not think I fail to see how that smile does not reach your eyes. Upstart. Fakir.

  The experienced courtier must have read something in the emperor’s eyes, because he quickly bowed his head low. “I have said something to displease you, Sultan Al’Azam?”

  “It is nothing,” Aurangzeb dissembled. “Only that I must be cautious of letting such flattery incite unseemly pride.” His slave knelt to one side and slid the small box open in front of his master, revealing its contents. Aurangzeb ignored it, staring at Ghulam Khan.

  “I beg forgiveness, Sultan Al’Azam. I merely intended to make you aware of the esteem not only I, but many other members of your court, hold you in. Not just for your piety, which everyone recognizes as a fine example, but for the small things…”

  “The small things?” Aurangzeb asked.

  “Indeed, Sultan Al’Azam,” Ghulam said, bowing again. He waited, head bowed.

  Aurangzeb could not decide if the humble pose was genuine, decided it did not matter. “Say on,” he commanded.

  “My father, before fleeing that country under the present sultan, was one of the many courtiers who served the court of Shah Abbas, Sultan of Persia. There, he claimed to learn that one could judge a sultan’s character far better from the small works they produced than the great ones.”

  “How so?” Aurangzeb was intrigued. He had not planned on giving much more of his valuable time to this interview, but found his interest snared by the man’s smooth manners and articulate speech, even in the face of displeasure from his emperor.

  “The small works, the ones from a ruler’s own hands, from his own pen, those are examples of what matters to the man seated on the throne, while the large works, the ones visible to all, and commanded into being by them, tend to represent the concerns of the monarchy, not the man. So, when I see the fine calligraphy laid down by your pen”—he gestured at the open box between them—“and the thoughtful selection of the sura you choose to place upon your regnal coins, I believe I see something of the man the Sultan Al’Azam is.”

  “And if a ruler should avoid creating things by his own hand?”

  A smile. “Then he may avoid such assessment…and possibly, any feeling of fulfillment in life.”

  “And what does my calligraphy show you is in me, then?”

  “A man of many parts.”

  Aurangzeb sniffed. “Hardly an answer.”

  “Forgive me, Sultan Al’Azam. The tongue is slow to articulate the thoughts of the mind.”

  Aurangzeb, disinclined to play the man’s game any longer, said, “Then perhaps you should simply say what is on your mind.”

  “As you command, Sultan Al’Azam, so shall it be. I believe you to be quiet, alert, serene, and thoughtful as you prepare…something like a lion waiting for the proper moment to strike, or perhaps a falcon on the verge of stooping…”

  “And what did you compare my brother to when you served him?” Aurangzeb said, staring at him with the blank expression he’d cultivated.

  “Shah Shuja has ever been inclined to indolent pleasure. You do not give in to such pleasures of the flesh…” The man’s mask of affable calm slipped and his voice trailed away as Aurangzeb continued to stare.

  After a long, uncomfortable moment, Ghulam cleared his throat. “It seems I cannot please. What I intended to say was that I was never in a position to observe any of Shuja’s accomplishments.”

  “Accomplishments, you say?” Aurangzeb said, feeling a smile threaten to break his firm demeanor. “I think that might be the very first time anyone has mentioned my brother and accomplishments in one breath.”

  Ghulam, fighting to keep a smile off his face, said, “And there is the first reason I serve you and not him today.”

  “God willed it,” Aurangzeb said, retrieving the coin and rolling it across his knuckles to examine both sides.

  “God willed it,” Ghulam Khan confirmed.

  “This is excellent work. Convey my congratulations and contentment to the craftsmen.”

  “I shall, Sultan Al’Azam. Thank you.”

  Feeling he had the man’s measure, Aurangzeb dismissed his newest diwan.

  He sat a moment, brow furrowed in concentration, as the umara departed. Shuja was much on his mind. A prickly problem that would not, could not, be resolved comfortably.

  I can’t exile him. He would only return and drain my strength as the first group of umara disaffected with my decisions would rally around him, not to mention what the Safavids might do with a pet pretender to the throne in their hands…

  Yet, there has to be a solution that does not include fratricide, even at the hands of those not specifically ordered to it, as Father’s umara presumed to when Father ordered his cousins imprisoned. Besides, I am not in a position to leave him in some fort where my own best supporters might repeat history and ki—

  The firing of one of Carvalho’s guns interrupted his thoughts. Not in anger, but signaling the dawn, as one of his first commands as emperor had been a cease-fire and an invitation to talks with the garrison commander, Lahore Raja. The man was a Rajput, and considered prickly in his honor. He was older than any of the imperial family, but not by much, yet had obtained a fine martial reputation for good service with Father’s forces from Bengal and the Afghan territories. The Rajputs wouldn’t have been in the fort, but for Shuja’s insistence on reducing Burhanpur when he could have negotiated a settlement and moved on, pressing the timetable…

  But he is in the fort. A loyal, proven general. One of the few Dara has at his disposal.

  Aurangzeb paused. Felt his way around the edges of an idea, gently nudging it rather than trying to seize it and lose it all.

  Oh.

  Of course.

  Shuja cannot die in my custody. Not at the hands of my supporters.

  Aurangzeb considered the idea, bringing all his mental resources to
bear. And still could not find a flaw.

  God inspires.

  He praised God and called for Nur.

  There was much to organize, and time was in short supply.

  * * *

  “The boy wants what?” Amar Singh Rathore said, twisting one end of his majestic Rajput mustaches into an even tighter curl.

  “The emperor Aurangzeb only wants to be your friend, Amar Singh Rathore,” Nur corrected, her enjoyment of the moment unsullied by Rathore’s weak attempt to belittle Aurangzeb by calling him a boy. Amar Singh’s mother had been a member of Jahangir’s court when the prideful Rajput princeling had been but a spoiled and somewhat sickly child, so she knew better than to engage him further on a point they both knew to be of very little import. No, she was enjoying herself too much.

  That negotiating on behalf of kinsmen was a traditional role for senior Mughal women made little difference. The exercise of real power was the only thing that mattered, the only intoxicant that enticed her. These moments were as the pipe was to the opium addict: a tool to reach the place where the gods dwelt.

  “He wants to be my friend, you say?” he asked.

  “He does, and I do,” Nur replied, waving off a slave presenting her with a tray laden with food. Her host had already offered refreshment and been refused, but the repeated offerings were Rathore’s attempt to gracefully indicate the fortress was in possession of all the stores necessary to last any but the longest siege.

  According to Aurangzeb’s reports, he was also overstating the garrison’s supply situation, but such was expected of a besieged commander.

  She was less sanguine about the finger he waggled at her. “Does he think me so without honor that I would abandon my sacred duty simply for the mere promise of coin? Because it is just that, a mere promise. He has no mint, barely a treasury to supply cash payments, and no access to the proper imperial bureaucracy in order to administer and distribute the jagirs he claims to possess. Even the experienced men of his personal staff have less than a decade in service.”

  “All true. You are most perceptive, Amar Singh.” She kept a straight face as she delivered the words. She was here to broker a solution, not pour oil on a fire, and flattering a man’s wisdom could be almost as effective as flattering his manliness.

  He sat back, trying to cover a suspicious glance with another drink.

  Nur smiled. He was fairly astute, but young. She would best him as she had so many others.

  “Your suspicious glances lead me to believe you think I but flatter you. I do not. Nor do I dissemble or seek to inflate your sense of self-worth. Everything you have said about the current state of the emperor’s court is true…” She let the statement trail off. Best to let the prey think it freely ran its own path than know the huntress lay waiting.

  “What, then?” he asked, expressionless once again.

  She waggled her head, made a face as if eating bitter melon. “As if Rajput honor could be purchased with coin!”

  His smile was sly. “So he would give me title to more zamin?”

  “No.” She pointed to Heaven with one hennaed hand, gold bracelets clinking. “For what is receiving land but coin in a different purse, and therefore beneath men of honor?”

  Amar’s first genuine expression of the day was a smile that made his mustaches quiver at their waxed tips.

  “No, Sultan Al’Azam Aurangzeb bears too much respect for you and your followers to ask you to betray his brother.”

  “What, then, is the purpose of your visit, if not to entice me to abandon honor?”

  She found his betel-stained smile less than fetching, but returned it nonetheless. “We return, then, to the friendship and love of the Sultan Al’Azam, Aurangzeb.”

  “An emperor whose friendship and love will prove expensive to Rajput honor.”

  She pretended ignorance. “In what way?”

  He sighed, set his goblet down. “He must ask that I abandon honor if I am to surrender this garh to him, whatever he told you to tell me.”

  “And if I told you that Aurangzeb knows the predicament honor and duty place you in?”

  “I would not be surprised. He may be young, but I remember no talk at court of him ever playing the fool.”

  “No, never that.”

  “Well, then?”

  “He has come upon a solution that preserves honor and does him great service.”

  “I will not abandon—”

  Nur waved him down, not wishing to allow him to verbalize—and therefore reinforce—the position he had already claimed to hold. “Such will not be required. No, Aurangzeb has something different in mind, something rather…brilliant.”

  “Brilliant, you say?”

  “Indeed. It has to do with prisoners—”

  “I have taken no prisoners from his army,” he interrupted, picking up his drink with an air of disappointment. “So I have none to exchange.”

  Nur smiled again, knowing she—and Aurangzeb—had him. “The Sultan Al’Azam does not have an exchange in mind.”

  “Oh?” he asked, no longer trying to hide his thoughts, which were obviously bewildered.

  “What if I were to tell you that all Aurangzeb wishes of you is that you follow Dara’s orders and hold this fort for him?”

  “For him? Aurangzeb?”

  “No, Dara.”

  “But that—makes no sense…”

  She could see his confusion, and it warmed her heart.

  “God willing, there will come a time when you will serve Aurangzeb, but for now, he requires only that you continue in your duty to Dara. And one thing more.”

  His smile grew wry, dark eyes glittering with humor. “And here is the moment where you ask for the first small transgression. The one that hardly counts, being so small,” he said, delivering the words as though he were a would-be lover asking a reluctant bedmate for some special, forbidden act to show her love.

  She hid her pleasure at winning against such a game opponent and sat up straight, as if offended at the very notion. “Nothing of the sort, I assure you. Indeed, Aurangzeb believes that, should you agree to this thing, your duty to Dara will require your continuance in your duties at the fortress here.”

  He shook his head, confusion on open display. “I confess, I do not understand what it is he desires, and cannot see any way a warrior can serve two masters honorably.”

  “Not two. Just one. Dara has commanded you here in order to garrison the garh and hold it against all enemies, no?”

  “Of course.”

  “And if some of Dara’s enemies should fall into your hands, what would Dara’s orders require of you?”

  “That I keep them until such time as he decides their fate.”

  Trench lines outside Asirgarh

  “He denies us audience?”

  “Only for the time being,” Carvalho said, and not for the first time this morning. Methwold suspected the Portuguese gun captain’s patience grew less from any practiced virtue than the distraction provided by the goings-on at the foot of the fort. If so, the Englishman did not think poorly of him for it. It was hard to ignore the pomp and ceremony of the ritual going on in the no-man’s-land between the fortress and the entrenchments it had cost so much time, treasure, and blood to build.

  De Jesus was scowling. “How long must we endure this?”

  “As long as necessary,” Methwold snapped. He regretted speaking so harshly the moment the words escaped him, but the papist’s constant petulance set his teeth on edge. “We are closer now than ever before to getting what was promised.”

  Carvalho turned his gelding’s head toward camp and without another word, rode off.

  “What has him so surly?” De Jesus asked.

  Oh, I don’t know, perhaps your constant whinging?

  “It seems the fortress, so long his nemesis, has fallen, and not under the weight of fire from his guns culminating in a storm, but to a simple overture from Aurangzeb.”

  “Oh?”

  “With res
pect, my young friend: if you complained less, you might hear more,” Methwold said, striving to keep his tone light yet convey some urgency.

  The priest opened his mouth to answer only to clamp it shut with a wet clomp. From the deepening color of his cheeks, Methwold surmised the priest was struggling to contain a bitter retort.

  He turned away, ceding the priest a moment to master his anger and hoping—against all previous experience—the man would learn something from the experience this time. The imperial panoply on display provided excellent distraction: elephants, banners, streamers, drums, all of it made for a most impressive show. He squinted, but the scene was too crowded to determine who was at Aurangzeb’s side as he greeted the garrison commander, a Rajput named Lahore Rathore.

  Perhaps it was Nur Jahan with the fresh-made emperor. It was rumored she’d been instrumental in the negotiations. He looked for the great beast with the ornately decorated howdah Nur used perched on its broad back. Sure enough, the enormous bull elephant Aurangzeb had gifted her upon her escape from Agra was partially blocking their view of the proceedings.

  On second thought…He squinted bad eyes, and when that proved insufficient, shaded them from the unrelenting sun with one hand. The lady’s howdah had the heaviest of its curtains drawn back to reveal a vaguely feminine silhouette seated within, leading his thoughts to linger on her…

  It was rumored Nur was as beautiful as she was clever, having survived the turmoil in the wake of the deaths of two—no, three—emperors now. Certainly her voice and manner had been cultivated and graceful, leading his thoughts astray when Carvalho had secured audiences with her. Then there had been her eyes. The delicate scent of her. And her shape, even under the layers of silk decorum demanded even of elders and widows. Most intriguing.

  “Do you think Shuja dead, then?” De Jesus asked, the quiet question jolting Methwold from pleasant daydreams of lovely women of experience in perfumed gardens exhibiting a healthy interest in him.

  The bloody papist probably never thinks of women as anything but the whores, mothers, and saints contained in scripture.