The Queens of Hastinapur

by Sharath Komarraju

  The darkness of the evening deepened, and the stream seemed to gurgle with more assurance, now that the sun had set. People left the clearing in small groups, some of them looking over their shoulder at the still red coals. Pandu and Madri walked up to Pritha, hand in hand.

  ‘You should not have come here all the way, Lady Pritha,’ said Pandu. ‘The wound on your foot, I am told, has caused you a lot of discomfort.’

  Pritha bowed to the king, holding on to the tree for support. ‘It has healed somewhat during the afternoon, my lord, king. I thought that as your queen, I must partake at least in the viewing of the final rites of Dileepa, if not in the performing of them.’

  ‘If you will, my lady, I shall take your arm and lead you back to the hermitage.’

  Pritha had half a mind to take his offer, if only in the hope of seeing a black cloud cover Madri’s pretty face. But at the same moment, she caught sight of the sage by the stream. Once again she felt his gaze on her.

  ‘I shall commiserate with the sage for his loss once again,’ she said. ‘I have not had a word yet with him since the morning.’

  Pandu followed her glance back toward the pyre and nodded. ‘So be it. Adhyasi, I imagine, will take your arm and see to it that you do not hurt yourself further.’

  Adhyasi bowed. ‘I shall, Pandu.’

  He seemed to be taken aback for a moment by the address, but he did not comment on it. Madri had already taken a few steps forward and was pulling on his hand. He fell into step with her, and in a few moments they disappeared around the bend in the path.

  The last few sages brought bunches of marigold in their hands and set them on the four corners of the pyre. Then they took a handful of ash each and smeared it on their foreheads. With a final bow at Sage Kindama, they took their leave too. When they passed Adhyasi and Pritha, one or two of them nodded in acknowledgement.

  ‘Come, my lady,’ said Adhyasi. ‘The High Sage beckons.’

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  A

  s they approached High Sage Kindama, he tipped his brass vessel over his curled-up palm and sprayed water droplets on top of the carcass. Pritha and Adhyasi stood to his side and bowed. The sage took another handful of water and sprinkled it on them. Cold water beads fell on the back of Pritha’s neck and slid down to her spine. The pain in her foot stilled a little, and she found that she could rest more of her weight on the wound.

  ‘Your foot has begun to heal, Pritha,’ said Kindama, looking far down the stream into the darkness, ‘but your heart still bleeds.’

  ‘Not any more, High Sage,’ said Pritha. ‘Sometimes words have to be said out loud for one to know the truth. It is not I but Madri who is the true queen of Hastinapur. It is she who shall sire the first sons of Pandu.’

  ‘But you too have sons in your future, my dear.’

  And a son in my past, she thought, as the image of the five strands of hair stuck together in the gum jar flashed in front of her eyes. ‘Perhaps my turn shall come after Madri has had hers, O Sage. If that is so, my sons will serve hers as regents, perhaps. There is nothing to frown at regents, is there?’

  ‘No, there is not.’

  ‘After all, Lord Bhishma himself has never sat on the throne.’

  ‘He has not.’

  ‘All the name he has earned for himself is as a regent.’

  ‘That is so.’

  ‘Perhaps my children too shall follow in his footsteps, protecting the throne but never ascending it.’

  ‘And if it were to come to pass that way, you shall be happy?’

  Pritha followed the sage’s gaze, down the stream at the dark clump of trees and bushes. The air seemed to have washed away the smell of burning wood. Now all she could pick up was a light scent of cinnamon. Her head grew airier with each breath and she found her spirits lifting.

  ‘No man or woman is happy every moment of every day, perhaps,’ she said. ‘But if that is what the gods have in store for me, then I shall accept it with deference, High Sage.’

  ‘Hmm,’ said Kindama, and turned to look at her. ‘None of us know what the gods want from us, Pritha. All we can do is follow the thread of ambition wherever it leads.’

  ‘But, High Sage, that ambition is causing me to poison my own sister.’

  For a moment, Kindama did not speak. They let the gurgle of the stream have its say. Then he said, ‘Is that so?’

  Pritha nodded. ‘I am not proud of what I have done. Nor should I repeat that it is Lady Gandhari who placed the idea in my head. She told me Madri should be prevented from getting with child, and she gave me a herb to feed her once every fortnight or so.’

  ‘And you have been feeding her that herb,’ said Kindama.

  ‘Yes, High Sage.’

  Next to her, Adhyasi took a sharp indrawn breath. Pritha looked at her and tried to smile.

  ‘I understand that Madri has not been entirely fair with you either, Pritha.’

  ‘No, High Sage,’ said Pritha. ‘She has not. But she has not stooped to my level. She has not poisoned me. She has not robbed me of my fertility.’

  ‘But she has robbed you of your husband.’

  Without her knowledge, Pritha’s eyes smarted at the sage’s words. Yes, she did, she wanted to say. She has robbed me of my husband, and she will see to it that she becomes the queen mother. She is a wretch, a witch in the guise of a beautiful maiden.

  But aloud she said, ‘Some would say if I had known how to keep my husband, she would not have been able to steal him.’

  Kindama smiled. ‘She is the more beautiful maiden between you two. Of that I am certain.’

  ‘That is so. While Madri and I fight, while I keep her infertile and she keeps Pandu away from me, over in Hastinapur, Lady Gandhari has already lost her first child to her womb. Perhaps I must rise above my pettiness and let one of us – let it be Madri if she wishes it so – have a child, lest the throne is handed over to the sons of Lord Dhritarashtra.’

  ‘Yes,’ said Kindama, taking a step toward the woods and waving them along. ‘When two cats fight, it is the third that benefits the most. But have you thought about this, Pritha? Pandu has not lain with you as much as he has with Madri, I understand, but he has lain with you enough to get you with child, I suspect?’

  Pritha fell into step with the sage and her heart sank at his question. Was he questioning her fertility? How ironic it would be if she, who had the five potent strands of hair Surya had given her, could not make use of them because she was no longer fertile? Then she would have to surrender the incantation, too, to Madri. That would be a tragedy she could scarcely bear to contemplate.

  Some women had just one child in them, she had heard. Could she be one of them?

  ‘I … I know not what you hint at, High Sage,’ she said at length, holding tightly to Adhyasi’s hand.

  ‘I mean that perhaps it is King Pandu who is not capable of bearing children,’ said Kindama.

  ‘But that is impossible, O Sage. He has lain with waiting women ever since he was a youth of twelve, they tell me.’

  ‘He may have lain with them, my queen. He has lain with you two as well, and his enthusiasm has never been in doubt, has it?’

  Pritha thought for a moment. Pandu had never been particularly enthusiastic about laying with her, but he had not been reluctant either. Their lovemaking had overall always been gentle and satisfying for both of them. So she said, ‘No.’

  ‘It is possible for a man to lose the ability to sire children in spite of a great love for the act of union. Why, was it not the same with Vichitraveerya?’

  ‘Yes, High Sage.’

  Two torches had been mounted on the corners of the gate to the hermitage. The three of them walked in silence along the path lined with fern trees, and at the end of it, where Pritha had first seen the covered body of Dileepa that morning, they had planted a basil sapling inside a ring of smooth black stones.

  In front of each hut, on either side of each doorway, sat a lit earthen lamp filled to the brim w
ith oil. Even with the steady breeze the flames stayed steady, Pritha saw, and wondered if these hermitages were indeed imbued with Kindama’s magic.

  Kindama stopped at the entrance of his hut and said to Pritha, ‘I shall have my dinner now. Perhaps you could come with Pandu after the moon rises to the zenith. I shall try to put your minds at rest.’

  Pritha bowed. ‘Yes, High Sage.’

  Pritha and Madri sat leaning against opposite walls, and ate their blackberries and raw mangoes in silence. The berries had a bitter aftertaste, and the sourness in the mangoes pricked Pritha’s tongue, but with every bite and swallow the knot in her stomach loosened, and before long she found herself thinking of Madri with some fondness in her heart.

  She raised the pitcher of coconut milk to her mouth and finished it in one gulp.

  Madri had cleaned her plantain leaf too. She looked up at Pritha with a guilty eye, and when Pritha smiled at her, she said, ‘I am deeply sorry for all the words I flung at you, sister. I … I know not – it was as if a demon had taken hold of me.’

  Pritha shook her head. ‘I have already forgotten what you said, Madri,’ she lied, and gave her the most agreeable smile she could.

  ‘I know what it was,’ said Madri. ‘It was the hunger! I had never felt such sharp claws tighten around my stomach, sister. And it clouded my mind, what can I say? May the lord have mercy on my soul for having mouthed such obscenities at you. Do you think you can forgive me?’

  ‘I already have, Madri.’

  Madri looked down at her hands. ‘And … do you think you can keep this between you and me? Without the king knowing about it?’

  Pritha smiled. ‘Of course.’

  ‘Not that I am ashamed about him hearing about it,’ Madri hastened to add, ‘but he has much on his mind already. Why must we trouble him with our womanly woes?’

  ‘Why indeed.’

  ‘The sage had asked us to start a vow of silence at sundown.’

  ‘Yes,’ said Pritha, ‘Adhyasi told me we can refrain from it tonight, and rest early. We will start it from tomorrow’s sundown.’

  ‘Ah, that is well! My eyes have turned so heavy and every muscle in my body seems to ache with the need for sleep.’

  ‘Mine too.’

  ‘I know not about you, sister, but I cannot wait to get back to our palace. They say you know the true value of something only after you lose it.’

  Pritha thought of a straw basket carrying a child down the Yamuna, ‘Yes,’ she said. ‘That is so.’

  ‘What did you speak with the High Sage about, sister, at the stream?’

  Pritha’s eyes went out of the window and she stared into the distance, still thinking of the boy who was growing up somewhere (she hoped) in North Country. ‘Hmm? Nothing. He was reminding me that I must go to his hut along with the king at moonrise.’

  ‘Oh.’ Hesitation crept up across Madri’s face. ‘Do you think I should accompany you?’

  ‘Only if you wish to,’ said Pritha. ‘I dare say it will benefit you to hear the sage’s words, wise as they are.’

  ‘No doubt, no doubt. But today I am so tired. I promise I shall ask you everything about it tomorrow morning. And from tomorrow we shall hold the vow of silence together, and I shall come with you to the sage’s hut.’

  ‘Would you like to sleep now, then?’

  ‘Yes, if I could be permitted!’

  Pritha smiled at Madri with genuine affection. The girl sometimes said more than she should, but at heart she was but a child. Like a child she was quick to emotion, and quite incapable of plotting and of nurturing a dark spot in her heart for someone else. Lady Gandhari had been right – Madri did steal Pandu away from her – but she did not do so out of malice, just out of a child’s envy.

  Her own sin against Madri was graver, for it was cold-blooded. She had poisoned her womb with such calculated effort all these days, and she had not even felt guilty until this morning, until the girl had torn into her with abuses. Only then had she realized she deserved it all, perhaps more.

  Even now she could not bring herself to ask for Madri’s forgiveness. Perhaps this was not the time. Perhaps the future would give her a better opportunity.

  ‘Of course you are permitted,’ she said softly, watching Madri put the plantain away and unroll the mat in the middle of the room, so that she would catch the breeze from the open door. ‘You are the queen of Hastinapur.’

  Madri lay on her back on the mat with a sigh and pillowed her head on a folded right arm. ‘I just wish we could all be happy, sister,’ she said. ‘You, the king and I. I scarcely think that I wish to be queen mother even, if it were to come at the cost of our love.’ She paused a moment, as though thinking of what she had just said. ‘We do love one another, sister, do we not?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Pritha.

  ‘And you do forgive me for today, do you not?’

  ‘I do. Now sleep.’

  In the silence of the night, Pritha sang a poem she had not sung in years. It flowed into her mind and on to her lips with the ease of water gliding over bare rock. She made her voice mellower than usual and she slowed the tune down so that it would not scrape on Madri’s ears. In front of her eyes stood the smiling face of Surya as she had last seen him on the Yamuna’s shore, and she felt tiny fingers grip her forefinger and the suckling of a ravenous mouth on her left nipple.

  After Madri’s breathing became steadier, Pritha got to her feet and left for Kindama’s hut.

  ‘Enter, Pritha,’ said the voice of Kindama, when her shadow covered the doorway of the sage’s hut. ‘Did Madri not want to accompany you?’

  Pritha bowed to the sage first, then to Pandu, who was seated by his feet. There were two empty mats laid out next to the king, one for her and one for Madri, she guessed. She went to the one next to Pandu and sat on it, her hands joined.

  ‘Sister Madri has gone to sleep. Please forgive her, High Sage – she is but a child, and this day has been exhausting for us.’

  Kindama nodded. ‘It has been exhausting for all of us here at the hermitage. Dileepa was a much-loved deer.’ He looked at Pandu. ‘You must not think, O King, that we begrudge you your actions. But you must atone for your mistake, as we all must for our own.’

  Pandu sat erect and cross-legged, with his hands on his knees. He inclined his head and said, ‘I shall do all that you ask, High Sage.’

  ‘Once the fortnight has passed, you must think of where your journey may take you.’

  ‘I do not understand, O Sage. After the fortnight, it has been my thought that we shall go back to our camp, to our kingdom.’

  ‘And ascend the throne and be king to Hastinapur?’

  Pandu sighed and nodded. ‘Yes, that is so.’

  ‘You do not seem enthused by the idea, Pandu. Is there something that troubles your soul?’

  ‘I … you would think it unbefitting a king to say these words, High Sage,’ said Pandu hesitantly, ‘but the court of Hastinapur tires me.’

  ‘It is tiring, is it? I have forever been under the impression that kings lead such lives of privilege. You have servants in every corner eager to attend to every whim, and there is opulence everywhere you look. Is it possible to live in such grandeur and yet be unhappy?’

  ‘It must be, High Sage,’ said Pandu, ‘for I am unhappy.’

  ‘What causes this unhappiness, may I ask?’

  ‘I am taught as a Kshatriya that fighting ennobles me, that taking the life of another makes me a god to my people, that I must forever be on the ready to draw my weapon from its sheath before the other man draws his. There is valour in the battlefield, I am told, and a true hero is he who breathes his last with his armour on.’

  ‘That is so,’ said Kindama.

  Pritha noticed that Pandu gazed with a child’s wonder at the silver streak of moonlight that flooded into the hut through the open door. She had heard rumours in Hastinapur that he had no yearning for the throne, and she had dismissed them as false. How could anyone not want to be rev
ered as a god, as the sovereign of a great kingdom, an immortal in the history of North Country?

  ‘But I have come to see that before I am a Kshatriya, High Sage, I am a man. My brother Dhritarashtra had always been keener for a fight than I – even if it is a staged one within the safety of the palace walls – and I had always flinched when I landed a blow on another man’s arm, when an arrow from my bow pierced another’s flesh and extracted a howl of agony. During my campaign of annexation,too, I have had to settle skirmishes by the tip of my sword, and each time I killed another man, I have felt that a bit of me has died.’

  ‘But you do not feel the same kindness for animals, do you, Pandu?’

  Pandu lowered his head, ashamed. ‘Only because I have never thought of an animal as one of us, High Sage. But coming here and seeing how you have given your animals names, and how you speak of Dileepa as though he were a person, how you mourn him, how you perform his final rites on a pyre of wood – after seeing it all, I have come to realize that we are all one.’

  ‘Indeed,’ said Kindama. ‘And it is right that you should feel the touch of death when you kill another, for all life has come to us from the same place, Pandu.’

  ‘Even the smallest of animals.’

  ‘And the weakest of plants.’

  Pandu looked up at the sage. ‘I do not wish to be a god, High Sage. I wish to be a man instead. I wish to learn more about this endless mystery we call life, and I cannot do that by killing. I cannot do that by being king.’

  Kindama’s eyes travelled to Pritha and rested on her for a moment. ‘You should have been born a Brahmin,’ he said. ‘Do you know your queens’ minds, what they wish to be?’

  Pritha turned to look at Pandu, who – deliberately, it seemed to her – did not meet her gaze. He looked away at the open door again. ‘I know not,’ he said. ‘Like all maidens they must have dreams of sitting on the throne as queens and siring sons that shall grow up to be kings and great warriors.’

  Pritha said, ‘But a queen is accorded status only by virtue of being seated next to a king, my lord.’

  ‘Then let Lady Gandhari be the queen, and let Brother Dhritarashtra rule Hastinapur as he has all this time. He has the yearning for it, and he is better at it than I am.’