1637: The Peacock Throne

by Eric Flint

  “One of the sons of Samarjit Khan, I believe,” Smidha supplied after a moment’s thought.

  The veranda had become a triage area for the wounded. Three quarters of the pallets set out in preparation for the injured were already full, and the men out here were those the medics deemed would survive without immediate care. The stretcher-bearers of the corps had been bringing them in, first in a trickle, but in the last hour the flow of wounded had become a continuous stream.

  “I thought they’d all declared for Aurangzeb,” Jahanara said.

  “They did.” Monique had just entered the pavilion proper. “Your brother has decreed all wounded will be treated for their injuries, those who served the pretenders just as those who fought for Dara.”

  Like her older brother, Jahanara considered herself a student—even a disciple—of the teachings of the great Sufi saint Mian Mir. So she could appreciate Dara Shikoh’s mercy while at the same time stifling a curse at his impracticality. Their medical capabilities were already on the verge of being overwhelmed, just treating their own wounded. If they had to treat those of the enemy as well…

  She thrust that issue aside. They would just have to do as best they could. At the moment, she was more concerned over her brother’s own well-being.

  “Have you heard anything of Dara?” she asked Monique. “He’s alive, or he couldn’t have given that order. But is he injured himself?”

  The young Frenchwoman shook her head. “No, I haven’t. But—”

  A stir at the entrance to the pavilion drew their attention. Another stretcher was being brought in. Pushing his way ahead of the stretcher-bearers was a man whose vigor indicated that the blood that covered much of his armor was not his own. Not most of it, at least.

  When he looked up, searching for a space to set down the stretcher, Monique could see his face.

  “Bertram!” she cried out, rushing toward him.

  Bertram fended off her attempt at an embrace. “Careful! You’ll get blood all over you.”

  Most of the blood was already drying, but he had a point. So she satisfied herself by leaning forward to give him a quick kiss. To hell with Mughal notions of propriety. She could manage that because he wasn’t wearing a helmet any longer.

  Unless—

  “You did wear your helmet out there, didn’t you?”

  Bertram ignored the question. “Where can we set John down?”

  For the first time, Monique looked down at the man on the stretcher. Sure enough, it was the up-timer John Ennis. He was very pale and didn’t seem conscious.

  By then, Jahanara had arrived. “Over there,” she said, pointing to an adjacent pavilion whose entrance was flanked by two of her personal guards. She’d kept that in reserve for wounded men of high rank, not so much due to concerns over status but simply because the survival of such men and their quickest possible recovery was likely to be important. She’d stationed two of her best medics there for that reason also.

  Speaking of best medics…

  She looked around and spotted Priscilla in a corner of the main pavilion. Turning Monique in that direction with a hand on her shoulder, she pointed. “Get her,” she commanded.

  * * *

  When Ilsa saw her husband lying on the medical bench where the stretcher-bearers had placed him, her face grew tight but she gave no other indication of concern other than a quick hissing intake of breath.

  Priscilla arrived just moments later. She turned to Bertram. “Where is he injured? Injured worst, I mean.”

  Before Bertram could answer, John himself did. “My back,” he mumbled. But his eyes remained closed.

  “It’s a wound in his back,” Bertram confirmed.

  “Help me turn him over.”

  Once Pris got a good look at the wound, the expression on her face seemed to ease. “It’s bad,” she said, “but I don’t think it’s fatal, although if infection sets in it will get nasty. Ilsa, see what you can find in the way of disinfectants.”

  After Ilsa left, she turned back to John. “Can you move your legs?”

  His left leg shifted a bit, then his right. “Sorta. Hurts, though.” He managed a soft chuckle. “Of course, they already hurt. Everything hurts.”

  Pris wasn’t surprised. The wound in John’s back was the worst one he’d suffered, but there were several others. More than anything else she’d seen, that drove home to her just how savage the fighting must have been. He was lucky that no vital organs seemed to have been pierced, even if he’d lost a lot of blood.

  Thankfully, she had plenty of one of the trade goods they’d come to India to find.

  “Opium,” she commanded.

  What she was actually handed by an orderly was what would have been called “laudanum” by Americans—those of them who knew their history, anyway—although it didn’t bear much resemblance. It was a tincture of opium in distilled palm wine, a reddish-brown liquid that was roughly eighty proof in terms of alcohol content.

  And very bitter.

  “Shit, that stuff is horrible,” John complained.

  “Take another swallow,” Pris commanded. “What I’m about to do is going to hurt.”

  John did, grimacing.

  “And another.”

  Despite his anxiety as he watched, Bertram was a bit amused at this further example of Mughal tolerance—perhaps flexibility was a better term—when it came to Islamic prohibitions. In theory, only non-Muslims were allowed to drink any sort of alcoholic beverages. But the empire had a history of looking the other way given any sort of reasonable excuse. A bitter drink taken to help a warrior recuperate from his wounds easily cleared that rather low bar.

  Bertram was glad he wasn’t the one who had to drink it, though. The stuff tasted awful.

  “And another,” Pris commanded again.

  Aurangzeb’s command group

  “You have no choice, Sultan Al’Azam,” said Sidi Khan. He pointed to the battlefield that was becoming more visible as a breeze cleared away the gun smoke and dust. “Our losses are great, the walls of Red Fort still stand, and we no longer have Carvalho’s experienced gun crews.”

  Aurangzeb’s jaws, already tight, grew tighter. He glared at the abandoned guns before him.

  “We no longer have Carvalho, for that matter,” added Sidi. He gestured with his head toward a group of men some distance away who were tending to the wounded. “I think he will survive, God willing, but his wounds are enough to end his life as a soldier. He will lose the foot, for a certainty.”

  Aurangzeb started to shift the glare onto Sidi, but managed to restrain himself. The Habshi leader was simply doing what any good subordinate would, giving his best advice to his commander. After a moment, the young Mughal prince exhaled.

  He hadn’t even been aware that he’d been holding his breath. At the end, it turned into a soft sigh.

  “Yes,” he said. “But where do we retreat to? Our men are too exhausted to build fieldworks—and I don’t trust my brother to keep the truce he agreed to.”

  The truce was to hold for hours only, at Aurangzeb’s own insistence. Had that been another mistake?

  “Gwalior,” said Sidi. It was more of a statement than a suggestion.

  Impertinent, perhaps, but Aurangzeb didn’t bridle. Today, after his blunders, he had no right to resent advice.

  “We can’t all fit into Gwalior,” Sidi continued, “but it will shelter us well enough. It’s a very strong fort, and—”

  He pointed again at the battlefield. There were bodies everywhere. Some were moving, some even with vigor. But many were not.

  “—Dara Shikoh has suffered losses of his own.”

  It was a good suggestion, Aurangzeb decided. Gwalior was no more than a two-day march, or perhaps three. There was no chance of pursuit, he thought. His brother’s strongest forces had been those damned Sikhs, and they were mostly infantry.

  That left—

  “What about Shaista Khan? Can he intercept us?”

  Sidi shifted his shoulder
s slightly. The gesture was a shrug, but not one of uncertainty. It was that of a man dropping a weight from his shoulders.

  “He’s coming from the east and we’ll be going south. Not impossible, maybe, but…not likely.” The Habshi’s chuckle was dry—harsh and cynical. “He’s not moving quickly. At all. I believe he intends to keep his own army intact and untouched to further his agenda.”

  Aurangzeb nodded. That made sense. Shaista Khan would be able to negotiate the best possible terms for himself if he had forces that were still strong and unbloodied. The bastard.

  “We will do it,” he said. “To Gwalior.”

  That left some unfinished business. “Bring Nur Jahan to me.”

  Aurangzeb’s camp

  Nur’s tent

  “Whatever you wish done must be done now, Nur Jahan,” said Tara.

  She did not give any explanation for the statement, but none was needed. Nur squinted toward the battlefield, wishing she had eyes that were thirty years younger. Her sixtieth birthday had been in May and everything at a distance was no longer very clear.

  Then she turned her gaze toward Red Fort. That, at least, she could still make out well enough. The walls were imposing both in size and color. The striking red sandstone that Emperor Akbar the Great had used in its construction a few years before Nur’s birth shone wet with blood in places where it wasn’t shattered by cannonballs.

  “There,” she said, nodding toward it. “We will go there.”

  Tara turned in her saddle. “You are certain, Nur Jahan?”

  “I have no choice. Lahore is too far away. If we try to reach Shaista Khan, we will be intercepted.”

  That last wasn’t certain, but it was not a risk she was prepared to take. And judging by Tara’s head nod, she was in agreement.

  Nur didn’t bother to explain the rest. Tara knew more than enough to understand the peril she was now in.

  Perils, rather. There were at least two in Red Fort—Jahanara as well as Dara Shikoh. Both had reasons to want her dead. But she might be able to negotiate something with them. Whereas with Aurangzeb…

  Now? After the disaster—which is what the battle was, even if the boy didn’t understand that yet because of his pride—which he was sure to blame at least in part on her faulty advice?

  And it had been her failure, incorrectly assessing the information she’d obtained. Her own pride resisted the admission, but her intelligence would have none of it. She had been fooled—badly fooled—by Dara Shikoh and Jahanara.

  Mostly by Jahanara, she was sure. Only the most powerfully confident woman would be ruthless and brave enough to risk her very reputation for the sake of a daring military maneuver. It was a wonder she’d managed to persuade her brother to allow it.

  Nur had no chance with Aurangzeb. Not now; probably not ever again. He would surely have her executed.

  “Get me to Red Fort,” she commanded.

  Red Fort

  Pavilion of the Healers

  Jahanara had not stayed to watch Priscilla clean and sew up John’s wounds. By now, the pavilion was spilling over with wounded men. There were no benches or cots left. The newcomers had to be placed on the floor—and then on the ground in the gardens outside. She found herself doing what Priscilla called “triage,” knowing full well she didn’t have the medical training or knowledge to do more than make rough estimates of what a man’s chances of survival were.

  Inevitably, she was more inclined to give the benefit of the doubt to their own sowar rather than to those of the pretender. And if that strained the spirit of Mian Mir’s teachings, so be it. Rulership had its demands as well as its privileges. Whatever Dara’s faults might be, she had no doubt—had never had any doubt—that he would make a better emperor than either Shah Shuja or Aurangzeb.

  There was another commotion at the pavilion’s entrance. She came over to find out what was causing it, but could not see over the heads of the guards clustering there.

  “Follow me, Shehzadi,” said Firoz Khan. The armored eunuch started pushing his way through. Strong as well as fat, he had little trouble opening a way forward. Those who turned to snarl or curse at being pushed aside fell silent when they recognized Firoz—and she who came in his wake.

  Moments later, Jahanara was past the throng at the entrance and into the garden beyond.

  “Dara!” Her brother was sitting astride his warhorse, both hands clutching the ornate pommel of his saddle. His expression seemed vacant, his eyes staring at…nothing, so far as she could see.

  She hurried forward, with Firoz Khan now following in her wake. “Dara!” she said, more loudly.

  With a bit of a jolt, her brother’s head turned to look at her. His eyes seemed to come into focus. “Jaharana,” he said. That was almost a murmur; she could barely hear him.

  She came alongside. From a quick examination, she was relieved to see that he seemed to be uninjured. She could see no blood, at least. He might be bruised somewhere. Probably was.

  “Dara—”

  “I can’t move,” he said, again in that semi-murmur. “If I try…I will fall off the horse. I’m…exhausted.”

  Judging by the strained look on his face, Jahanara thought her brother was more than just “exhausted.” He seemed as brittle as thin glass.

  She turned to Firoz Khan. “Can you…?”

  The eunuch came forward. Jahanara stepped aside to give access to the emperor. Firoz Khan raised chubby hands and more or less lifted the emperor out of the saddle. It might be more accurate to say Firoz gave the appearance of assisting the emperor by turning Dara’s collapse into some semblance of a dismount.

  Jahanara was pleased. Her brother’s dignity had been protected. Well enough, anyway. No one watching would think poorly of Dara; certainly not sowar who had their own experiences with battles.

  “Get him into a litter and to the harem,” she said softly. “I will find Priscilla.”

  * * *

  Priscilla was where Jahanara had left her, still working on the wound in John’s back. Ilsa was there as well, hovering with her fists balled as if she might beat her own impotence into submission.

  Jahanara was struck by memory then. Father as he stood waiting for the physicians to ease Mother’s pain, her cries growing steadily weaker and weaker until that horrible silence came.

  Blinking tears and memory away, she crossed the last few steps to the trio.

  “I need you,” Jahanara said to Priscilla. “Now.”

  She turned toward Ilsa. “I am sorry. But…my brother. I must have Priscilla examine him.”

  Ilsa drew breath, no doubt to shout a refusal, but Priscilla interrupted her, “Ilsa, you can handle the rest of it. The sutures are finished. None of what’s left requires me.”

  She came to her feet. “Lead on, Shehzadi.”

  Chapter 51

  Red Fort

  Harem

  After rubbing her eyes to provide some ease, Jahanara looked back down at the note she’d started reading. It was perhaps the hundredth—so it seemed, anyway—she’d gotten from various commanders in the field or on the walls. Most of them were addressed to her brother, but Dara Shikoh had been in no condition to give any coherent responses, so Jahanara was handling it for him. Her eye strain was certainly not for lack of light—a sunlit balcony was always easy to find in the harem—but rather the result of poor penmanship from most of Dara’s subordinates. Usually they would use a munshi, but the crises of the last few days made everyone wish to use their pens, if only to hurry their reports along. Few such reports were directly military in nature, and those that were almost always addressed the needs of the fortress itself. Logistics was a subject she was quite confident she could handle—better than Dara Shikoh himself, actually.

  The fighting had ceased entirely. While the cease-fire had ended the day before, Aurangzeb had begun withdrawing a few hours before it was over. Not thinking it wise to disturb her brother, Jahanara had ordered his officers to avoid any clashes unless they were directly attacke
d. Only two minor tactical questions had been raised in the missives, and in both cases her reply had been do what seems best to you.

  None of the replies were sent in her own hand, of course. After she wrote them out, they were passed along to Dara’s munshi for copying and distribution. The officers would readily accept orders written in his hand, where they would question anything written in Jahanara’s. Most of them wouldn’t even recognize Jahanara’s handwriting unless they’d had commercial dealings with her or their wives had furnished some of her poetry for their pleasure.

  It was an irritating subterfuge, but she had no choice. Dara Shikoh’s sally had gained him great prestige and stature among the umara and, perhaps more importantly, his sowar. Indeed, that he had gone against his advisors and prevailed was also a sign to Dara’s followers the emperor was his own man. For all intents and purposes, the shadow cast over him—not quite a stigma, but close—by his defeat the year before at the hands of the Sikhs had been erased. Completely erased, she thought; the fact that the Sikhs had proven reliable and incredibly effective allies had helped a great deal in the restoration of Dara’s military reputation. So much so that she expected some of Aurangzeb’s people to begin making discrete overtures to Dara soon.

  Was it true that the Guru himself had been in the battle? she wondered. Rumors were spreading that he had been. Whether true or not, those rumors also helped Dara’s reputation.

  But however much better her brother’s reputation was today than it had been before, it would come under severe stress if it became known just how fragile his health remained. Dara Shikoh had become almost comatose after he’d been brought into the harem. Priscilla had told Jahanara that none of his injuries were dangerous, physically speaking. He was simply beyond exhausted, the demands of his condition and recent days having drained him of the meager reserves of strength he’d managed to build since Father’s assassination. And Dara had never been one to seek exertion even before his injury.