Harappa - Curse of the Blood River

by Vineet Bajpai

  Vidyut loosened his grip. He was feeling giddy himself and wanted to reach Govardhan as soon as possible. Without immediate medical aid, the devta knew he wouldn’t last long.

  ‘Thank you, thank you, Vidyut…’ muttered Romi, who was now sobbing like a child who had just been thrashed by his father after failing an exam. He was a pathetic sight. Vidyut almost felt pity for the scoundrel.

  Just as Vidyut was taking a breather, giving time to Romi to recoup, the master assassin moved with the speed of a wild cat. Before the exhausted and wounded Vidyut could react, Romi had pulled out a gleaming surgical scalpel from nowhere and glided it at the speed of a bullet towards Vidyut’s throat. But this time his adversary was not the burly man in the train or the young Sonu. This time it was the devta. Vidyut responded with lightning speed and blocked the attack, the scalpel’s edge now only a hairline away from his throat. The expression on Romi’s face had changed. He was scowling and his features contorted in a manner as if he were evil personified. This was his real face. Vidyut twisted Romi’s wrist sharply that made him drop the scalpel and twist his torso in pain.

  ‘This one’s for Sonu,’ whispered Vidyut as he clenched his teeth and tightened his grip. In one swift blow from his open hand, Vidyut rammed into Romi’s badly twisted arm and dislocated his shoulder. Romi’s hand dropped limp as he fell on the stairs of the ghaat, yelping in pain.

  Holding him by his collar, Vidyut was now dragging the crumbled Romi back towards the Dashashwamedh ghaat. Much as he wanted to end the life of this ruthless and unscrupulous killer, he decided otherwise. There always had to be a difference between the good side and the bad. Always. That is what held the world together.

  ‘What…what are you going to do with me, O great devta?’ asked Romi in a broken, struggling voice. Vidyut did not answer.

  ‘Do you know why the Maschera Bianca wants to kill you, Vidyut?’ offered the assassin. ‘Because you have no right to disrupt what has been lying dormant for fifteen hundred years!’

  Vidyut kept walking, pulling Romi along. He did not answer, but was listening keenly.

  ‘Do you even know why you are here in Banaras after three decades? Why they didn’t kill you years ago? It is because eleven days from now an ancient prophecy will come true, O devta - a constellation and juxtaposition of planets in the night sky awaited since 1,700 BCE. You have been kept alive for a reason, Vidyut, and you don’t even know it!’ said Romi as he tried to laugh. He spat more blood and moaned in agony.

  ‘I saw you fight today. You truly are the demigod they believe you to be. But even you cannot fight them, O mighty devta. Their power and reach is beyond your imagination. The Order will change the world. You cannot stop them!’ continued Romi, nearly delirious with pain.

  Vidyut had to stop. The excruciating agony from his wounds was now unbearable. He took out his mobile phone and dialed Balwanta’s number. The warrior-chief was relieved to hear Vidyut’s voice. Vidyut requested Balwanta to pick them up from the pier where the aghori taantrics sat for their night rituals. It was just a few steps away and Vidyut was going to wait there along with his prisoner.

  ‘They are coming for you, Vidyut. They are coming for the Black Temple,’ whispered Romi.

  Vidyut started dragging the killer towards the ghaat of the taantrics. He suddenly felt Romi breaking into wild convulsions. His body was twisting violently and he dropped to the ground writhing in agony. Vidyut turned him over to notice thick yellow foam coming out from Romi’s mouth. His eyes were rolled up completely.

  That was the end of Romi. A capsule of potassium cyanide that he had bitten into at the taantric ghaat sucked out his evil soul. This was the assassin’s funeral.

  Vidyut sat on the ghaat’s steps, with Romi’s twisted body lying a few yards away. Two aghoris had taken great interest in it. Balwanta had called again, reassuring Vidyut that they were reaching him in a couple of minutes and were equipped with immediate medical aid for him.

  The night was now darker than before, with lights of the ghaats, bajdas (houseboats), shops and boats much fewer. A fragrant breeze laden with the scents of marigold and ritual incense whiffed across Vidyut’s face and hair. The Ganga was flowing in its loving and sacred path, kissing and touching the ancient ghaats gently on its way. Tonight, the Ganga aarti had indeed blessed the devta in his quest against evil.

  Vidyut stared into the night and the Ganga, with the breeze soothing his nerves. He had no idea what the New World Order was and what their ominous designs were. Neither did he know who was this Maschera Bianca that Romi was referring to. What was the mystery of the Black Temple? His instinct told him that a long and hard battle awaited him in the coming days. But there was one thing the devta was sure of. No matter how potent and treacherous the forces of evil may be, they can never defeat the power of love, the supremacy of goodness.

  Kashi was, after all, Lord Shiva’s own city.

  Harappa, 1700 BCE

  THE GREAT BLOOD BATH

  The ten gigantic prison guards hauled Vivasvan Pujari on the rough ground of the Great Bath of Harappa, ready to drag him all the way to Harappa’s dreaded mrit kaaraavaas or dungeons of the dead. The bath of Harappa was in tradition with the townplanning of the time. Despite the fact that Mohenjo-daro was also a powerful province and was Priyamvada’s home before she wedded Pundit Chandradhar, the Great Bath of Harappa was by far the biggest community bathing and assembly facility across all of Aryavarta. It was over twenty times the size of the great bath at Mohenjo-daro.

  Just that today the beautiful and wicked Priyamvada had turned this public bathing and assembly pool into a torture arena. And all of Harappa was invited.

  The last devta was by now drenched in thick layers of sweat, blood and tears. He had never imagined such brutality. Vivasvan begged incessantly, pleaded, even folded his hands at the commoners he passed. He could do anything to save his beloved Sanjna and Manu. A thick wooden beam crushed him under its weight, even as he was whipped to pull its backbreaking bulk along. As he was pulled brutally by nearly a dozen thick chains and ropes, these shackles strangulated him from head to toe like the embrace of a hundred pythons. Yet no one responded. Vivasvan Pujari was not just alone in his suffering. He was a spectacle of sadistic entertainment for the Harappan people.

  After hours of torture, public stoning, spitting and cheering, Vivasvan Pujari could now sense the hopelessness of his situation. Gradually, one kick after another and one stone too many, his mental state changed rapidly from disbelief to desperation to that of pleading, and finally to one of demonic hatred. Vivasvan stopped begging. His hands slowly unclenched themselves and clasped the thorny ropes instead. He started digging his wounded heels into the ground and began exerting counter pressure against the ten enormous guards that were guffawing as they dragged him like a dead animal.

  Vivasvan Pujari was now pulling them all back into him. And they were losing ground, their strappy sandals scrubbing against the dry soil. Suddenly, the entire circus came to a silent standstill.

  The devta was finally resisting.

  The ten guards were dazed at the sheer strength of this man they had so easily written off a couple of hours ago. Vivasvan Pujari was pulling at the ropes and chains with the power of twenty horses. The guards doubled their effort and called in reinforcements. Some of the new entrants added hands to the ropes, while the others attacked Vivasvan’s knees with clubs and staffs. To no real affect. By now the lacerated and breathless Vivasvan Pujari had upped the ante. He was now harnessing the power of a hundred horses. He could not be stopped.

  Finally a guard’s baton came crashing down on his head from behind, splitting his already bleeding scalp like a knife. Vivasvan Pujari fell with a painful gasp. They then pounced on him like hyenas and began showering him with hits from multiple batons and clubs.

  Chandradhar could not hold himself back anymore. He knew he had participated in perhaps the worst sin ever committed under the Sun. He knew the Gods would never forgive him for this horr
endous crime. Any which way, he was not going to let it go on. Without looking at Priyamvada, Chandradhar ran out of the counsel pavilion and sprinted towards his oldest friend and dearest brother-in-law. He dived to cover the devta with his own body, unmindful of the scores of blows that came crashing down. The manic soldiers took notice and immediately held back as they saw the first King of Harappa lying under their mindless assault.

  Vivasvan Pujari appeared lifeless. Chandradhar could not hold back his tears. He held his friend’s bleeding head in his lap and could utter only three sobbing words into the apparently dying devta’s ears.

  ‘Forgive me, Vivasvan…’

  From under his robes Chandradhar took out a small leather pouch filled with spiced vinegar. He unknotted it and pressed it on the devta’s lips. ‘Drink this, Vivasvan’, whispered Chandradhar. ‘This is the only help I can provide on this cursed day my friend. Drink this vinegar and it will all be over. My men are carrying cartloads of ayurvedic aloe and myrrh to resuscitate you. A cave in the estate adjacent to this arena is ready to see you rise again.’

  Vivasvan Pujari suddenly opened his eyes like a man possessed. He could not speak clearly as his cracked teeth had filled his mouth with bone, blood and mud. But his eyes, filled with tears and pain, shone like those of a vindictive serpent.

  ‘Go now, Pundit Chandradhar. I give you the opportunity to bid farewell to your loved ones…and to this entire ghost town.’

  If there was anyone in all of Aryavarta who knew the real power of Vivasvan Pujari, it was Chandradhar. He had never seen that manic look in Vivasvan’s eyes, and he now knew that apocalypse was near for the people of Harappa. All he could muster the courage to say was, ‘Don’t do it, Vivasvan. Punish me. Punish Priyamvada. But spare the rest.’

  Vivasvan Pujari did not pay attention to Chandradhar’s plea. He tried to get up, and was greeted with more blows on his face and neck. He could hear his own collarbone cracking. And then one of the prison guards tore into his rib cage with a spear. Vivasvan Pujari screamed in agony, but forbade the blood from his body to spill any further. All that emerged was the weeping water of the Saraswati…thick and colorless. The pain was excruciating. Vivasvan got up nevertheless. The time had come. Chandradhar shouted an order to the guards to stop their brutality. Then there was a pin-drop silence.

  The devta lifted himself in a labored struggle, the soil around him reddened with his dripping blood. Even before he could stand up fully, his body started shaking. To the disbelief of the maddened audience, Vivasvan Pujari began laughing maniacally. He stood up and looked around the entire Great Bath complex, pausing a moment as his eyes met Priyamvada’s. With the heavy wooden beam still strapped to his shoulders, and his arms outstretched in a prophesizing gesture, he screamed out an agonizing pronouncement –

  ‘Hear me one and all! Hear me you city of sinners! I, Vivasvan Pujari, the Surya, will come back with devastating vengeance you ungrateful, bestial people of Harappa. I devoted my entire life in the service of this metropolis. And today you stone me like a rotten animal!’

  Vivasvan now broke into loud and uncontrolled sobs. He could not believe this was happening to him. Even as he said these last words, a sharp rock came flying and smashed into his left eye, which started oozing thick, deep-red blood profusely.

  ‘Aaaaaarrrrggghhhhh…’ Vivasvan yelled again, weeping continuously in extreme pain, and almost passed out. Only the thought of Sanjna and Manu was keeping him alive even after such ghastly punishment. And it was only the devta who could hold on to life even after his body was broken in every way possible.

  The ten thousand people in the crowd cheered in gleeful unison. Something thus far unfamiliar and alien to the righteous Harappans was showing itself this blood-red morning. The individually calm and pious citizens were now displaying uncharacteristic mass hysteria. The animal, the jealousy, the raakshasa in each one of them was rearing its ugly head, as they collectively witnessed and enjoyed Harappa’s tallest man writhing and struggling in inhuman suffering.

  As the chains dragged the devta’s body like a wretched animal against the dirt of the Great Bath compound, Vivasvan Pujari gathered the last ounce of his strength and let out a final, frightening warning for all to hear.

  ‘Remember my words, you cruel Harappans! My revenge will be as ruthless and as brutal as your collective conscience is today. No loving mother among you comes forth to save me. No son raises his arms in my defense. No kind brother comes to my rescue. Not even a child sheds a tear. So be it. So be it! Every son, every mother, every child of Harappa will suffer in the same manner as my pious wife and my beloved son do today. You all will be mercilessly destroyed you undeserving children of the Saraswati, you scoundrel flock of the Saptarishi!’

  Vivasvan Pujari now rose against the weight of the wooden block, against all the whips and chains that bound him from head to toe. His eye was still oozing a repulsive mix of blood and flesh, his torso was all but skinned, he wept with powerful jerks of his bleeding chest and he was soiled in a slurry of dark mud and of his own sweat and blood. He raised both his arms against the pull of the ten prison guards and his biceps appeared ready to burst. His chest muscles stretched like iron cables as he beckoned every drop of physical and spiritual strength from within him. A man once known for his glowing and God-like appearance, looked ghastlier than the devil himself. He looked up to the sky and sent out his last, bloodcurdling words to the masses of Harappa –

  ‘Listen you who are already dead. Listen you congregation of corpses.

  Listen you fools.

  I am half-human, half-God!’

  TO BE CONTINUED…

  TO BE CONTINUED…

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  Vineet is a first-generation entrepreneur. At age 22 he started his company Magnon from a small shed. Today Magnon is among the largest digital agencies in the subcontinent, and part of the Fortune 500 Omnicom Group.

  He has led the global top-ten advertising agency TBWA as its India CEO. This made him perhaps the youngest ever CEO of a multinational advertising network in the country.

  He has won several entrepreneurship and corporate excellence awards, including the Entrepreneur of the Year 2016. He was recently listed among the 100 Most Influential People in India’s Digital Ecosystem.

  Vineet’s second company talentrack is disrupting the media, entertainment & creative industry in India. It is the fastest-growing online hiring and networking platform for the sector.

  He has written three bestselling management & inspirational books – Build From Scratch, The Street to the Highway and The 30 Something CEO.

  He is an avid swimmer, a gaming enthusiast, a bonfire guitarist and a road-trip junkie. He is 39.

  www.VineetBajpai.com

  www.facebook.com/vineet.bajpai

  Write to Vineet at vb@vineetbajpai.com