The Queens of Hastinapur

by Sharath Komarraju

  ‘We shall speak of it when you return with an heir,’ said Gandhari, at last. ‘After you do, once and forever, you shall have all of us to do your bidding. All I ask, dear Pandu, is a period of patience, a period of peace, both for your mind and the minds of these two young ladies.’

  ‘Yes, Lady Gandhari.’

  They turned as one and left the room. As she heard their steps recede, Gandhari felt the threads in her mind tighten and strain. With an effort of will she held them together, knowing it would not be long now. Everything seemed to be in control. All that remained now was to wait for her third moon to pass, and for her belly to protrude just enough to prove that she was with child.

  Then, once Bhishma returned from Gandhar, she would have all the ammunition she needed to face him in open court and fight for the right of her child to the throne.

  She clenched her teeth together and swallowed. Patience, she told herself. Patience for a fortnight, and it shall all come to pass.

  ‘I do not feel like eating, Shubrasi. I feel like I have grown twice my size already and my stomach feels so full.’

  ‘You are entering your third month, princess,’ said Shubrasi, stirring some mutton broth. ‘I have asked the cook to flavour this with cinnamon, just the way you like it.’

  ‘Shubrasi! Put that away and I shall have it for dinner.’

  ‘Princess,’ she said. ‘You need to eat, and you need to eat well.’ The maid kept her voice soft, but stern. Gandhari was reminded of the younger Shubrasi, who had once spanked both her and Shakuni for throwing balls of rice at each other.

  ‘My body has eaten enough already.’

  ‘Whether it has or not, I shall decide.’ Shubrasi sat next to Gandhari now, and pulled her close to plant a kiss on her cheek. ‘You want your son to grow strong, do you not?’

  Gandhari nodded.

  ‘You want him to be the foremost warrior in the land, the best king that North Country has ever seen.’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘If it is a girl, you wish her to have the same beautiful eyes as you, the same olive skin, the same sharpness of mind.’

  Gandhari sighed. ‘You will say she will get all those if I drink the mutton broth.’

  ‘She will, princess,’ said Shubrasi. ‘I have no doubt in my mind whatsoever.’

  ‘Is it wrong of me that I wish so fervently for a boy, Shubrasi?’

  ‘No, my lady. Every princess in every kingdom craves a son. After all, it is sons who become kings and shape the destinies of their kingdoms.’

  ‘And yet I am a woman myself. I was once a girl.’ Gandhari thought of the grey beard on her grandfather’s face, against which she had loved to nuzzle as a child. ‘Did my mother also dislike me when I was born? When she first laid eyes on me, her first words would have been “Why are you not a boy?” Is that not so?’

  ‘It is, my dear.’ Shubrasi turned Gandhari’s face toward her and thrust a spoon between her lips. Gandhari gulped it down and found that the spice soothed her throat. ‘It is the way of the world, alas.’

  ‘I shall still love my child even if I have a daughter,’ said Gandhari. ‘It is just that I would love a son more.’

  ‘I understand, princess. You should know that there have been great queens in the history of North Country. You are one.’

  ‘Ah, but I lost to Bhishma, and now I am nothing but a member of the royal house.’

  ‘Not for long, princess,’ said Shubrasi, and another spoonful of broth made its way into Gandhari’s mouth. ‘Your son shall grow up to be king, and you shall be queen mother of the greatest of the Great Kingdoms.’

  ‘Do you think that day will come?’ Gandhari rubbed her stomach meditatively. ‘The cinnamon reminds me of Gandhar.’

  ‘It will come in its own time, my lady. But it will come one day. You shall sit on the throne next to King Dhritarashtra, and Lord Bhishma will attend to your every whim.’

  Those words pleased Gandhari. If she had her way, she would see to it that Shakuni was present to watch that spectacle. She had been humiliated by Bhishma just once, but Shakuni had had to endure defeat at his hands twice. I shall avenge all of our wrongs together, brother, she thought. Bhishma will pay for all that he has done to us, to our mines, to the people of Gandhar.

  ‘I have pushed you into the land of dreaming, princess,’ said Shubrasi.

  Gandhari opened her mouth. In went the spoon. ‘Ah, this does taste nice. I am happy I let you persuade me to eat this.’

  ‘Always remember, Shubrasi knows best. Now, have your final mouthful and I shall put you to sleep. The night is a clear, pleasant one. Perhaps I shall sing you a song.’

  ‘Not the song of the mountains,’ said Gandhari. ‘Sing me something I have not heard before.’

  ‘Right after this.’ Shubrasi brought the spoon up to Gandhari’s mouth. As she chewed on the curried pieces of meat, Shubrasi’s croaking voice took wing. The open window ushered in a moist, heavy breeze, reminiscent of the light summer rain on the rocky hills that dotted Gandhar’s western border.

  Gandhari took a gulp of water and sighed in quiet contentment. She lay on her side such that her cheek came to rest on the soft part of Shubrasi’s thigh. The old maid’s wrinkled hand covered her eyes. ‘Have you heard the story of the king of Ayodhya?’ she said. ‘The central kingdoms of North Country never tire of repeating his legend.’

  ‘I have heard the name,’ murmured Gandhari, ‘but not the story.’

  ‘They say he is the most loyal son a king ever had. Perhaps if I tell it well, the child in your womb will hear it too, and perhaps he shall grow up to be as dutiful as Rama.’

  ‘Rama,’ said Gandhari, even as her mind wandered.

  ‘Once upon a time, in a different era of men, when gods walked among us, when virtue walked on all four legs, there lived in the kingdom of Ayodhya a noble and fine king by the name of Dasaratha …’

  The vision of her son holding a mace and ascending the steps to the throne came back to Gandhari. She watched him from behind and beneath him, so he looked like a giant, much larger than the frail Pandu, even larger than Dhritarashtra. She wanted to see what he looked like, so she picked her lower garment up to her shins and ran after him, pounding the soft, white earth under her bare feet. He walked with unhurried grace, but he remained two or three feet in front of her and above her, in spite of her pumping legs, racing heart, parched mouth, sweating face.

  She stopped and bent to her knees to catch a breath. She looked to the side and saw the black hollow of the broken oak. On the patch of grass, as before, the old woman sat cross-legged, hunched over the ground. As before, she inserted the twig into the hole and twisted it, round and round. As before, she looked back over her shoulder at Gandhari.

  But this time, the old hag wore Shubrasi’s face, not Pritha’s.

  Gandhari woke up with blood between her thighs.

  She kicked the sheets away with a cry, and when she felt herself her fingers touched something soft and torn and viscous and she knew at once that her womb had broken open before it was time. She cried out again, this time with enough anguish to bring the maid at the door running into the chamber.

  Disgust filled her. The smell of her own body sent worms crawling into her mouth. She wanted to jump away from the bed, but her leaden legs refused to budge. Her head slumped down to smell her fingers, sticky and dry now but stinking of a corpse. In the same moment she was overcome by loathing and love, for she knew these were the remains of her child who had been growing inside her body. What had Shubrasi said? Did she not want him to grow up strong and handsome, just like a king?

  Shubrasi.

  ‘Shubrasi!’ she said to the waiting woman who had come in. ‘Get me Shubrasi.’

  ‘My lady, the maid’s quarters are empty. She seems to have left the palace during the night.’

  ‘Left the palace! Left the palace …’ A heavy knot of dread began to squeeze the bottom of her heart. ‘How could she leave the palace …’ She threw away the sheets an
d got to her feet, feeling some of the blood trickle down her thighs, over the shins down to her ankles.

  ‘My lady!’ said the maid. ‘You need to be cleaned. Oh, my lord!’

  Gandhari took no notice of the girl. ‘Her home is here,’ she said. ‘She is my nurse, my mother …’ No, no. Shubrasi had not gone anywhere. This girl – this foolish girl – had been mistaken. Perhaps she had checked in the wrong room. Perhaps Shubrasi had gone out for the morning, just for a walk. She would come back any moment now, and she would cradle Gandhari’s head on her thigh and recite the tale of the king of Ayodhya.

  She would feed her mutton broth spiced with cinnamon and cumin.

  A group of them came running into the room now, and Gandhari retreated toward the corner at the clattering footsteps. They came armed with towels and rose water. Three of them cleaned the bed. Three of them cleaned her. Hands slurping all over her thighs. Fingers combing her pubic hair for dried bits of blood. Voices asking her if she felt any pain, whispering to one another that perhaps she ought to lie down.

  Spiced with cinnamon, she had said, just the way you like it.

  ‘I need to meet Shubrasi,’ she said, to no one in particular. The touching hands stopped for a moment. She heard a pair of feet patter away out of the room. Her voice level, but cracking at the end of each word, she instructed the women at the bed to take away all the sheets. ‘The smell will never leave the bed. Oh, I need to meet Shubrasi.’

  The cleaning resumed. If she could tear off the blindfold and look at this scene, she would laugh – a queen naked from the waist down and bleeding from between her thighs was being scrubbed by so many hands in the middle of her own chamber. None of them had thought of taking her to the bathing room. She did not blame them; it had not occurred even to her.

  The pattering feet returned, and she heard the same words in a different voice. ‘The maid is nowhere to be seen, Lady Gandhari. Her quarters are empty.’

  Her own voice, when she told Pritha of the herb, came back to her. The taste is quite indistinguishable, she had said. It burns on the tongue just a little bit, nothing you could not hide with a bit of cumin or cinnamon. No, no! What was she thinking? Shubrasi, the woman who had tended to her as a child. Shubrasi, who had taken all her messages to Shakuni. Shubrasi, who had nursed her back to health when she had had the hollow cough for weeks as a five-year-old. Shubrasi, who wanted her to give birth to a king.

  This could have been natural, she thought. The Goddess took from men in mysterious ways. Perhaps she had decreed that Gandhari was not to bear a child this year. But then, why did Shubrasi flee? Was there a message somewhere? A rolled-up scroll, perhaps, hidden under the mattress of her bed?

  ‘All empty?’ she asked.

  ‘All empty, my lady,’ said the maid. ‘The bed has not been slept in. None of her belongings were present in her room.’

  The hands slowed down. Gandhari felt herself wrapped in dry clothes. As they cleaned her up, Gaurika came in, sobbing. She grasped Gandhari’s hand and gave her a cotton lower garment to wear. ‘Lady Gandhari,’ she was saying and sniffing. ‘Lady Gandhari, what has happened?’

  Gandhari took the garment. She licked her lips. She turned toward the open window. She swallowed.

  ‘I need to see Lord Dhritarashtra,’ she said. ‘Tell him that he must come to my chambers as soon as he can.’

  A whole hour passed before she heard Dhritarashtra’s step in the corridor. Gandhari sprang to her feet and stood facing the door, her hands clasped in front of her. Her maids had washed her clean and had dabbed sandal powder on her inner thighs to kill the smell of blood. They had replaced the bed sheets. They had swabbed her hands in rose water and soap.

  But when she rubbed her fingers together, she felt the sticky texture of dead tissue that had been her child. Her nose twitched with the stench of murder. Her thighs felt greasy. Before she knew it a heavy lump appeared in her throat, and although she swallowed with all her might it did not go away.

  Shubrasi. How had he turned Shubrasi against her?

  The front door opened and the maid announced Dhritarashtra. With a raised hand she cut the girl off mid-sentence and waved at her to leave them alone.

  ‘You have called for me, my queen,’ said Dhritarashtra, and for the first time in her life Gandhari noticed that the heavy voice carried the timidity of a rabbit. ‘The waiting women seemed to be agitated, and I hurried here to make certain you are well.’

  ‘Well, my lord?’ said Gandhari, her voice rising and echoing in the empty room. ‘You ask me if I am well on this morning, this very morning on which they killed our child.’ Her voice threatened to tremble, but with a force of will she caught hold of it. ‘They killed our child inside my womb, my lord, and you ask me if I am well.’

  His large hands were on her in an instant, fingers pressing down on her shoulders and upper arms. ‘What is this that you say, Gandhari? I did not even know that you were with child.’

  ‘I told no one, my lord, king. I thought that if no one knew, I would save our child.’

  ‘But who? Who do you say has killed our babe?’

  ‘Who else but Bhishma, my lord?’ said Gandhari. ‘He must have known it all along. He must have instructed Shubrasi to keep a watch on me. The fiend! He would not wish to see me become queen, nor you king.’

  ‘Gandhari,’ said Dhritarashtra, ‘we must not speak of Uncle Bhishma in that manner.’

  ‘You are the only one in this court who thinks of such things as love and family, my lord. Pandu does not. His two wives do not. And Bhishma most certainly does not.’

  ‘No, no, you know not if he has truly killed our child, my queen. Perhaps this is the gods’ will. Perhaps it is your womb that has not been blessed yet.’

  Gandhari calmly said, ‘I was in my third month, my lord. My bleeding had not come for ninety full days, and you say my womb was not blessed?’

  After a moment of silence, Dhritarashtra said, ‘Still. I do not think we must throw accusations at Uncle Bhishma about which we have no proof.’

  ‘You are an utterly spineless coward.’

  ‘Gandhari!’

  Gandhari’s eyes burned under the satin band. ‘A spineless coward,’ she repeated, her voice now rising. ‘All these months I thought you were a man of valour. What if you cannot see, I thought, you are a man strong enough to hold your own against ten raging bulls. Is that not what the song writers on the streets of Hastinapur say about you?’

  ‘Well—’

  ‘Well, they are wrong!’ Gandhari shook his disgusting hands off her body with a shrug. ‘Do not touch me, you wretch. May your ancestors watch this moment with shame, their scion tamely blaming his wife’s womb when it is so plain there are darker forces at work.’

  ‘What would you have me do, Gandhari? I am just a blind man.’

  ‘You were born blind in the eye, O King. But you have made yourself blind in the mind too.’

  ‘I cannot challenge Uncle Bhishma. I cannot! He is stronger than I am. The people of Hastinapur love him. If anything were to happen to him, they would all turn on me. They would all say it is I who is to blame.’

  ‘Do you not understand, my lord?’ Gandhari felt her heart soften toward Dhritarashtra for a moment. ‘Do you not understand that he has killed our child? Do you not see that he has robbed you of an heir to the kingdom? The blood that flowed down my legs this morning is yours too, O King. Do you not smell its rotten stench in the air?’

  ‘Gandhari, my queen,’ he said, ‘it is but an unborn child. We must not allow ourselves to weep so bitterly about a life that had not yet left the womb.’

  Something went cold inside Gandhari at those words. The lump in her throat froze into a sliver of ice. She took a step backward, away from her husband.

  ‘One must not curse the gods about lives lost before they begin. Indeed, how many maidens must endure what you are going through today? How many of them have gotten with child only to wake up one morning with their bellies lighter? It is the w
ay of nature, Gandhari.’ His voice had faded into that distant, desolate tone now. She did not know if he even heard what he said. ‘It is the way of the gods. Soon, very soon, they will bless us, I know. They will bless us with a hundred sons—’

  ‘Leave,’ said Gandhari.

  ‘My lady?’

  ‘Leave my chamber, O King, for otherwise I may kill you in my fury.’ Her own voice seemed dead to her ears, but she knew she meant her words. ‘I shall summon you again, when I am more prepared to listen to your nonsense.’

  ‘I … ah … as you wish, my lady.’

  His steps receded, and the door opened and shut. For a long moment Gandhari stood unmoving, as if the sliver in her throat had frozen her entire body to the granite floor. Then, from deep within her a shudder broke out, and her eyes filled with tears. Frantically, she opened the knot on her blindfold and flung it against the wall. She dropped to her knees with her hands covering her eyes, spasm after spasm of grief lashing her body as it crumpled like a burned piece of parchment.

  A life that had not yet begun, he had said. A life that had not yet begun.

  But she had felt its breath deep within her womb, had she not? Gandhari’s body stopped trembling. She lay on her side. With her cheek cradled on her upper arm, she watched the polished marble floor. Yes, she had felt its breath in her womb, its touch deep within her, its sway each time she swallowed something. It was the movement of a living thing, however small; only a man who had never felt that stir could say that a foetus inside a woman had not yet begun life. It ate, it breathed, it moved – what else did one need?

  With her palm pressed against the floor, she pushed herself to a sitting position. A heavy, brooding quiet had descended upon the chamber. She bit her lower lip hard enough to draw a drop of blood, then picked it off with the tip of her tongue and swallowed it. She got to her feet and clapped her hands. The door swung open and two frightened-looking girls came running in. To them she said, ‘Light all the lamps in the chamber. Open the curtains.’