The War of the Realms

by C Steven Meldrum

  “Then I have merely returned the favour. But it wasn’t completely here. It seemed to struggle to hold its form– its edge crackled and flickered in and out, like, like a failing lüum ball.”

  “And that was lucky for you. Had it been able to secure its form in this realm, it would have destroyed you.”

  “I don’t think it wished to kill me. I think it wanted to subdue me. But more, I think I saw what it was.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “It seemed to me once I had shot it, and was momentarily blinded and sent flying off the backwards off the mount by the shockwave, I saw two creatures;one the thing you are speaking of, but the other which seemed … I cannot describe it any better … a mount or a host, like the mequus on which I sat. As the Cimmerii was destroyed, so was the host. Whatever it was, it, I think it was of this realm.”

  “That is important council which we will try to decipher in time. But now I want to ask: why?If it wasn’t trying to kill you, why did it want you? From what you have told me, the other raiders pursued your fellows and seemed intent on killing them all. And two of the Sidus plus this creature followed you?” I nodded. We were both quiet for a while before she spoke again.

  “Have you heard the story of the fall of the demon lord,Narakasura?”

  She saw me looking at the ground, weighing internally the story of the struggle of the gods against their own and comparing that to my own experiences of late. I fought a losing battle to come to terms with this idea that the physical ground on which we stood was only one part of a much larger multiverse. And in that larger universe a war had raged between the gods above and the gods below and in the middle stood man. This insignificant ball on which we trod with sandaled feet had been the battle ground in a mighty contest.

  “But that is only a story – a children’s story, to teach them humility and compassion and the difference between good and evil.”

  “I would have agreed with you had I not seen what I have seen.” She looked at me and continued.

  “The sardus; holy men of a thousand scattered worlds who came from the great southern continent far to the west of here, also tell the story of the fall of Narakasura. I have heard many versions. In some tellings, the young heir of the black land, whom I shall mention in a moment, was taken by Lord Krishna and his queen; Bhagadatta’s grandmother. In another tale, Krishna rode to battle not in a chariot pulled by five pure white horses, but on the back of the winged god Garuda with his wife Satyabhama. Narakasura’s eleven Ashtaunis, or battalions, were each slain by Lord Krishna himself. And Narakasura's general, the fiveheaded serpent beast Mura, was also beheaded.” My breath caught suddenly hearing that name but I said nothing, eager to hear what she had to say.

  “But the way my people tell the tale, it does not end with the Queen’s victory over the lord of darkness. There was one who survived the battle of that day and who did not flee to the abyss. The young dragonlord, Kusunda, now in the seeming of the boy called Bhagadatta, sat upon the tumbled and broken ruins of his father’s decimated fortress and held his father’s ruined corpse close to his breast, weeping over the quietus of all his father’s dreams and hopes. His armies had either been destroyed or had fled the scouring which followed Vishnu’s victory and here he sat, alone as it were, lamenting what might have been. But as his own sorrow and rage threatened to overcome him, he espied a new chance for victory. Still on the field of battle, covered in the blood of his kin and half buried in the armour-clad carcasses of demons and ghosts that even now had begun to fade into the dreams of legend, lay the black blade of eternity called the Jaya Sri, which some call the Preah Khan, the sword of power, its gleaming pommel, quillons and guard protruding above the bloodied ruination below it.”

  She thought for a moment. “You think you seek a city, which you will come to. But that is not your end goal. It is the sword of power that you need to heal the breach between the realms and save your universe.” She saw the questions in my eyes and said, “Hear my story and then we can talk.”

  She breathed deeply and as though she were about to recite a muchpracticed mantra she began.“And with tears streaming down his face, he gently lay down his father’s broken body, now that of a man, in peace upon a dais at the foot of the fortress steps and retrieved the ancient and powerful symbol of the dominance of the Supreme Being from the ashen mire. As the last vestiges of the battle of eons evaporated in the swirls of a grey dust that whipped at his cloak and all evidence of the fortress that was thereby faded into nothing, he held it and turned it over in his hands, amazed at how it shone with an unearthly hue. A dim and aethereal light emanated from the darkness of that blade, which was blacker than the abyss and seemed to drink in all life even while it glowed, and, flowing from it he felt suddenly a new power and dominance and the will to achieve what his father could not. For the black blade of the Jaya Sri held the very power of creation, balanced with the power of uncreation– it could be used to unmake the universe.

  “Before returning to his kingdom as the new king of a new Pragjyotisha, he looked at the sky which had rained fire and death upon his foes and which in the end had rained with blossoms of white flowers and lotus petals that still littered the ground at his feet. In anger he ground them into the dust around him and brandished the sword at the heavens, proclaiming towards the sky, ‘You think you have won! You think that my Father’s labour was in vein! Laugh now– for I will rise again when my time is nigh, and before the end, I will bring down the walls of Heaven and see your devas enslaved for all eternity and your king impaled upon this sword and Vishnu, the God of all Gods will kneel before me and call me God King, Supreme Being and Master of all creation!’”

  It took a moment for me to absorb the impetus of her story. I looked at her. “Never have I heard it told that he lived on. In my understanding, the son of Bhumi Devi was destroyed, and so were his legions, and his seed was forever wiped from existence. It would be grim tidings indeed if your story was true.”

  We continued walking.

  “Oh but it is true. All too true, I am afraid. You have seen my sword. I modelled it on the Jaya Sri. It is not the true sword, sadly. It was not fashioned by the gods. But, by the arts of my people it can pierce time and space and has allowed me to travel between the planes. I have been to Naraka. With my own eyes have I seen the cursed land and the mighty black fortress that houses the sword of power. And nearly did I die and remain forever there, for it is not a place for the living to venture gladly.

  “Tashi, hear me. The dragon was destroyed, yes, but his seed endured. Narakasura’s son vowed vengeance. As for his legions, you cannot kill what is already dead, or what is beyond death, and even if you could, the dry land has swelled over the eons with the ignorant, the greedy, the hateful and the false. The guardians of the dry land accept many times more of Irth’s sons and daughters than those who guard the gates of Devaloka.

  “As for Narakasura's general, the fiveheaded serpent beast, Mura,” She rolled up her sleeve and showed me an intricate tattoo on her upper arm that disappeared under her clothing and must have stretched across her back. “I am a soldier. I fight for Krishna. I am one of theMurāri, or enemy of Mura. And unlike the story, she is very much alive, if it can be called that, and every bit the fell captain of Naraka’s armies. She is the Witch-Queen of Garbhodaka, a serpent and sorceress of incredible might, Captain-General of the Legions of Darkness and all the armies of daemon-kind. It was she who nearly killed me on my mission to retrieve the sword of power from the clutches of the vile worm. I barely escaped the black land with my life, the only one of an elite force that thoughtto bring the war to an end and so save creation.”

  We stood at a high point on the road a mile from the orchard that looked out over the valley with the azure lake as the magnificent centrepiece. My thoughts reeled and I felt giddy with knowledge of matters that are beyond those of a mortal understanding. We had stood in silence for some time before she continued.

  “I have searched for ma
ny years for the one sword. And to have found it once and know it is forever beyond my reach is impossible to bear. And now I find one on a quest to find the same thing. The gods have truly sent me a message– do not give up!

  “But there are other mighty artifacts I seek also, for our foe cannot be harmed by any of the arts that you or I possess. In another telling of the story Narakasura launched a great weapon, the thunderbolt Sataghini at Krishna, and rather than his queen’s victory over the serpent god, Narakasura was beheaded by Krishna’s great weapon, the Sudarshana Chakra.

  “I spent many years searching for evidence of either the Sataghini or the Sudarshana but to no avail. “ Where I come from, all who remember Queen Satyabhama's victory over the wicked Naraka light lamps to brighten the long dark of the winter solstice. If we cannot achieve victory, we will be consumed by the long dark of Kali Yuga– the night without end. She seemed to look off into the distance and I could see for a brief moment the shadow of some loss come over her, a pain that I knew had driven her to be the person she was but which I would not have the opportunity to know of, yet, and maybe not at all.

  I looked at her and said, “I am a person of great faith and carry strong beliefs but … but may I ask, why do you travel across time and space as you do? Why are you here, now?”

  She looked back at me with such look of loss and woe that I could not but feel utter sorrow for her. “You do not remember me Tashi, do you?”

  I looked at her askance. “Of course you don’t. This is our first meeting for you: I forget. In another future it will be my first meeting. In all our adventures I never expected to be talking to you again as a stranger; how cruel the gods can be.” She looked at the scars on my face and was silent for a moment and then said something I didn’t understand.

  “I ran up and down the halls of the Horologium to find the place at which you would need me the most. The Intercarlate said I would find you but I would not know you and you would not remember me, which is true. I find him– but he is not you! It is your eyes I see though and no matter the flesh: you are he.

  “And that is the reason I am here. I have waited a long time for the Rinpoche to be revealed, at this nexus between all that was and all that is yet to come. There has been so much blood and death! And a lot more to come. I need to do something before we leave. Let us go back and we can talk on the way.”

  As we headed back to the town, with the sun now consumed by the mountains and the lake seemingly a darker blackness in the caliginous hue of night, she continued speaking.

  “You have tal ked with the gods and while you have revealed some things, there is much that is yet unknown. I have followed the clues and hints across time and space and my trail has led me here, where I find a boy who converses with the infinite and the shadow people come to life. There is some preternatural devilry at work here. I must know everything!”

  She sounded almost desperate. I did not understand what she had to do with all this or what part she had to play but I did not feel that she might suddenly attack me if I did not tell her. These matters were too high for me and I was glad to have someone to tell everything I could to.

  I thought about the dream I had had while immersed in fever and sickness and near death.

  “I stood before the goddess of the lake and held a magnificent sword in my hands. A phoenix was on one side of the blade and a dragon on the other. It was black and shone with an unearthly light.”

  “The sword of power. What else do you remember?”

  “She said – ‘You hold that which was lost – seek it.’ And then, ‘TheKośa Sastrais your key’ … then ….‘the dragon awaits.’”

  In my mind’s eye sprang the image of the brilliant emerald against the lighter blue of the crystalline palace beneath the waters and the symbol that was both man and bird.

  “Of course,” she said. “The Kośa Sastra. The famous Javelin taken by Lord Krishna,” she said.

  “Let us seek it then,” I burbled without the least understanding of what that meant.

  “The way is harder than you know. While the Jaya Sri is jealously guarded by the master of the Black Land, who covets it against the day he will take back the kingdom of Heaven, at least we know where it is. But never in all my wanderings did I find a clue as to the final resting place of theKośa Sastra. It is as legendary as the sword of power but I think we would need to stand before the very King of Dwarka himself!”

  “Then we must ask the gods.” She stopped and looked at me as if I was mad. I explained, “You don’t simply walk into the Black Land, stand before the Lord Kusunda and ask him to return the sword that promises him victory over Heaven. I must find the one weapon that in the past helped the gods to overthrow his father, theKośa Sastra: the mighty spear that shines … with the combined powers of the highest and lowest of the realms, the fulcrum of the universe, the balancing point between all that is best and all that is most foul, overflowing with the blinding power of the realms and the beauty of the gods and balanced with the sadness of sorrow and regret. It is the ancient and magical weapon that changed Queen Satyabhama into the magnificent golden dragon that slew the fell dragonlord. The weapon that was that of Narakasura before it was changed will be the one thing that balances the power of the Jaya Sri.”

  I remembered what Vajra had told me. I knew where my quest lay. But my legs remained rooted to the spot. A fear overcame me as quickly as the rushing torrent that had dragged me into the depths of the churning Drzakar. I started to laugh, suddenly listening to myself talk of mighty weapons and the gods themselves, as if a foolish mortal was going to take on the might of all the realms to save this one.

  “They … you, have made a mistake. I am no soldier. You have the wrong person. I know a few good moves and have won some bouts against friends and students on the combat floor. But … what can I do? I am hardly even a man yet. Why not Master Panuaru or Dorje? They are the best fighters I have ever seen. They are much better suited to this task!”

  “You think to know the will of the gods better than they, young Tashigang?” I turned and saw Ussuri, carrying a lantern, approaching us. My legs shook and even in that dim light her piercing stare was almost more than I could bear. I looked to Tetsuko and was surprised to see that she quite plainly saw her also. I felt such relief that I was not going mad until it confirmed for me that all of this was really happening.

  She stopped a few yards from us and I was surprised to see her dressed as any other townsperson. I gathered myself and looked at Tetsuko. She and Ussuri stared intently at one another and I believe I could have simply walked away without either realising it, such was the intensity of that moment.

  “Tetsuko, may I introduce Ussuri, friend and protector.”

  Tetsuko bowed low, a great feat being as tall she was. The goddess gave her an almost imperceptible nod in return. The same knowing and secretive smile gleamed from Ussuri but from Tetsuko I saw a look of knowing. She either knew or suspected who or what Ussuri was but said nothing.

  “So, the last of the Murāri shows herself again. You cannot save him. But, the more the merrier, as they say.” She smiled that terrible, knowing smile and tilted her head over her shoulder to indicate the township.“I have done what I can. He will need all the arts of your people also to undo what was done and to prepare him.”

  Tetsuko looked at her with a knowing expression, almost as if some disagreeable but necessary task had to be performed. I had no idea what was happening and before I could ask either of them, she bowed to Ussuri and to me and said, “I must go.” Without waiting she dashed away.

  We watched her disappear into the distance. “Do you believe me now, my Lord?”

  “I don’t know what just happened there and I don’t think you’ll explain it to me if I ask. But I see a chasm opening beneath us and all that stands between us and oblivion is a thin cord across the chasm that we have to balance on to navigate across. Just one slip from anyone and everything we know will fall.

  “And, to answer
your question, I always believed you my lady. I just didn’t believe in myself.”

  Chapter 11: Partings

  “I dreamt there was silence in the cave, except for the faint tinkling of bones as the skeletons danced.”

  The dance of the Cittipati at the Festival of the Senses I stood with Vajra, who mewed quietly behind me, the warrior-priest Jigme (which meant “fearless”), Pemba, and the last two fit attendants that had started out with us, called Purba and Sibu. Several of the townspeople gathered around us also as we watched the tiny caravan slowly snaking its way along the trail back down into the valley, parallel to the shoreline of the lake. I felt sad seeing the column disappear into the distance carrying Dorje, Rogel, Tetsuko and the injured.

  It had been decided that the caravan would never make it back without at least some people capable of defending it and since only Tetsuko, Rogel, Jigme, Pemba and myself were skilled combatants and still healthy, and I needed Jigme with me if I was to survive further on this journey, that Rogel should accompany Dorje back, which he was glad to do to ensure his friend had as good a chance as possible of surviving the journey.

  The grizzled old abbott of this outpost, called Yönten, which he assured me was the name of an ancient king, did not initially want to let Rogel go because he was young and fit and a good worker. I found him to be a belligerent old misanthrope. He ranted and raved, saying that our quest was a waste of time and karma was karma. After an hour of arguing and using my rank to no effect, I eventually asked Vajra to make an appearance. He was halfway through an important monologue about the brashness of youth when suddenly he was pinned beneath the softly mewing amur, her giant paw resting casually on his sunken chest, such a look of fear on his face that he could not breathe. He saw reason after that.