Even if he stayed with one Hijra, the other would be able to slip in past his guard and deal the single maiming blow which the Hijras desired to inflict. Just one blow. Sever the bicep muscle, disabling one arm. Hack at the collarbone, disabling one arm and making it impossible to use the other without excruciating pain. Cut at the upper brow – deep enough to hurt badly as face wounds always did – making blood pour into the eyes of the opponent, blinding him. Pierce the armpit, slice the tricep muscles ... there were a dozen other points. None critical or mortal in themselves, but when faced with two men attacking at once and two more following close on their heels, that one disabling cut or piercing was all it took to make a man open to a lethal strike.
But their entire first attack strategy depended on the upper body. On striking at the head, shoulders and upper arms. Hence the leaping and dancing and shrieking to make the opponent look up, swing around, and keep his guard high, enabling them to come in under his guard and inflict that one strike. Their chaotic and wild animalistic approach was in fact perfectly rehearsed, choreographed and coordinated. As one Hijra leapt high, his scream rising at that precise moment to force the opponent to raise his weapon and line of sight, the other one slid in to deal the vital blow.
So accustomed were they to this strategy, so habituated to finding success with it that they knew all possible reactions and counter-attacks intimately.
So Kamsa did the one thing they were not prepared for, or expecting.
He ignored them completely.
Even as they came spinning and leaping at him, shrieking like death criers at a king’s cremation, he turned around and dropped to the floor in one swift motion, thumping on his buttocks, jarring his spine hard enough to feel the impact all the way up his neck and in his skull. And then he dropped his upper body back, lying flat on the floor as the Mohinis leapt and slashed above him. Several feet above him, in fact. There was a fraction of an instant when the Hijras realized that something extraordinary had occurred. Their opponent had not only failed to react in any of the usual ways adversaries usually reacted, he had done something they had never encountered before in any one of several hundred encounters to date. He had turned his back to them, then fallen down at their feet while they were still leaping in the air, their weapons slashing through empty space where he had been, where he ought to still be!
By doing so, not only had he removed his entire body from their field of attack in a single instant, he had also effectively put himself below their own high line of defence. He didn’t even need to slip in; the Hijras’ headlong forward movement brought him within reach of their defenceless bodies which were vulnerable even if only for that one fraction of an instant before they adjusted and changed their angle of attack. They were fast. But even the fastest warrior needs a fraction of an instant to adapt to a completely new development.
In the fire of battle, such moment is all the advantage a man needs. It is all he gets, and often he doesn’t get even that much. To any warrior, it is a gift. To a champion, it is a gift from the gods themselves.
To Kamsa, operating at the highest level of skill he had ever accomplished in his entire life, it was a great field of opportunity crying out to be ploughed with a blood-axe!
In that fraction of a second, his hands shot out and grasped a single ankle of the Hijra who had been on his left. His new densely packed body strength made the leaping warrior seem no heavier than a straw in his fist. In the same action, Kamsa slammed the Hijra down, onto his fellow Hijra, the one who had been facing Kamsa directly.
The two Mohinis crashed into one another and then onto the marble floor hard enough for the sound of breaking bones and shattering cartilage to be loudly audible, crunching and crackling. Their shrieks ceased abruptly, and where two superb dealers of death had been leaping through the air in a balletic display of warcraft mastery, two crushed and dazed cripples now lay upon the marble floor.
From the position in which he lay, on his back, looking backwards at the chamber, Kamsa could see the twin coals of Jarasandha’s eyes glowing from across the room. He took another brief instant to flash a grin and drop a lewd wink at the Magadhan.
Then, without waiting to see the response of the ‘god emperor’, he regained his feet with a single leap. He had been practicing this move as well, and was pleased at his body’s response. He landed with a jarring thud and caused the chamber to shake, and due to his body having gained density, left spider webs of cracks beneath each foot. He was growing in density even now, and was yet to reach his full potential; but he had other things to concentrate on for the moment. Such as staying alive a few minutes longer.
The third and fourth Hijras were already moving in for the attack. Stunned though they were by the unexpected manoeuvre and by the downing of their comrades, they were now deadlier than ever. Before, they had been part of a quad that had been emasculated, raised, groomed, trained, punished and rewarded together since birth. Now, with two of their comrades crippled, perhaps dying, they were doomed. Even if Kamsa did not kill them now, Jarasandha would. They had nothing to lose or gain, except for one thing.
Jarasandha barked a single word across the room.
Kamsa knew its meaning well, it was so commonly yelled among Magadhans that it might well be considered their battle cry:‘Avenge!’
The Mohini on the verandah touched one short sword to the marble floor, raking it across sharply enough to cleave the soft decorative stone visibly by a half centimetre. He held out the other sword in an unusual backhand that Kamsa knew would spring back to pierce at the least expected moment. Partly due to the sword held to the floor, he came at Kamsa in a low loping stride. Sparks flew from the point where the deadly sharp blade met the polished stone floor. The other Mohini, the one who had been on Kamsa’s right but still inside the chamber proper, somersaulted forward once, twice, then kept coming in that fashion. The bedchamber was palatial, but Kamsa knew that a fighter somersaulting in a closed space always held an advantage over one standing still. For one thing, the somersaulting fighter could change his trajectory at any time and still strike with considerable force – too much force for a standing man to easily fend off without being thrown off balance. The two Hijras were coming at him from the front centre and the extreme right, in two very different yet extremely rapid and forceful attacks that no ordinary mortal soldier would have been able to resist. Coming at him from two different directions, they had turned Kamsa’s geographical advantages against him: pinning him against the closed door and wall, and covering both the upper as well as the lower field of attack.
There was no shrieking this time. Just the soft thuds of the somersaulting Hijra making brief contact with the ground each time, and the shirring sound of metal scraping and cutting stone as the other Hijra’s sword threw up a shower of golden flaring sparks as he came loping at Kamsa.
Kamsa stood his ground.
Had he been any normal warrior, that would have been a mortal error.
The impact of the somersaulting Mohini striking him with such momentum would have slammed him back against the wall, even as the somersaulting eunuch reversed his movement and bounced off, leaving Kamsa, slumped against the wall and momentarily stunned, an easy target for the second Hijra who would have swung sideways, slicing upwards with the lowered short sword, then stabbed deep and hard with the backheld short sword. Kamsa would have died impaled against the wall.
But he was not the Kamsa of yore. His weight was several times that of a normal mortal warrior. He could not be certain how dense he had been able to make himself right now, but he was certainly at least nine or ten times denser, and weighed proportionately that much more than his usual weight.
For a somersaulting attacker to strike a man weighing a hundred kilos was one thing; but to strike a man weighing a ton or more, with skin like steel, flesh like iron and bones like alloy ...
The Hijra somersaulted right at Kamsa, twisting his body with expert grace in mid-air to bring himself into striking position, his
feet landing squarely on Kamsa’s chest.
There should have been a loud thud, perhaps the cracking of a few ribs, and then the thump of Kamsa’s body hitting the wall.
Instead, like dried sticks under a heavily laden wagon’s wheels, the Hijra’s feet shattered beneath him due to his own momentum and force. It was as if he had crashed into a stone wall, but since he had not been expecting a stone wall, the force he used worked against him, breaking his feet. They bent and bent again grotesquely, and the Hijra fell in a broken heap on the floor, silent even in his terrible condition, but only because Jarasandha’s ruthless discipline had conditioned him not to express pain through sound. His face screamed his terror and pain instead.
A fraction of a moment later, the second Mohini struck. In a manoeuvre designed to accomplish terrible, irreparable damage, his sword rose up from the marble floor and slashed viciously at Kamsa’s upper thigh, groin and lower abdomen at a diagonal. Without waiting to see the effect of this first strike, the warrior swung around, dancing in a diagonal turnaround move that took him from one foot to the other, and stabbed his other short sword directly into Kamsa’s solar plexus, aimed at punching through the softest part in the torso to penetrate right through.
Both swords snapped and broke.
The Mohini’s action left him at a sideways angle to Kamsa. He turned, expecting to see Kamsa vomiting blood and dying. Instead, he saw the Mathuran standing exactly as he had stood before, and his own short swords broken and useless. He raised them and stared, unable to believe his eyes, then snarled and attacked again, stabbing out with the edges of the broken blades. They were still dangerous enough to cut through normal human flesh.
But when they struck Kamsa’s skin, they simply broke again with the impact.
The Hijra stared at Kamsa in disbelief.
Kamsa smiled, reached out, and caught hold of the Hijra’s bald pate in his left hand. He took hold of it in a grip so tight, the Hijra was suspended an inch or two in mid-air.
The astounded fighter lashed out with the broken swords, his feet, and every ounce of strength and skill he had left.
Kamsa squeezed, barely exerting more effort than if he had been squeezing a ripe grape.
The effect on the Hijra’s skull was much the same. Kamsa tossed him aside, then waggled his eyebrows at the others.
‘So let’s see if you men fare better than your Hijra comrades,’ he said.
Everyone stared at him. There was hatred in their eyes now, not the superior smug contempt that had been there before. Even Jarasandha had lowered his chin further, his eyes barely visible beneath his heavy forehead and brow, and was examining the slaughter with a mind expert in strategy and tactics. His tongue flicked out and back inside.
Nobody said anything.
Kamsa sighed wearily.
‘Come on then, get a move on. I’ve got a kingdom to run and things to do.’
nine
Even through his surprise and rage, Jarasandha could not help but feel a certain astonished pride at his protégé. Some nameless rakshasa might have sired Kamsa, and Ugrasena might have fostered him to adulthood, but it was Jarasandha who had turned Kamsa into a warrior. Until he met the Magadhan, the Yadava had been little more than a rough-houser, winning fights through brute strength, and with a disdain for fighting protocol as well as sheer arrogance. It was Jarasandha’s mentorship that had transformed the lad into a carefully honed weapon of war.
But now, it seemed that weapon had grown beyond
Jarasandha’s own ability to hold or wield.
Initially, he had assumed that Kamsa’s cocky arrogance and high-handed attitude was the final stage of the breakdown of the Mathuran’s damaged mind. Now he saw that it was in fact the opposite. Somehow, Kamsa had outsmarted him, if only briefly. He did not know how the Yadava had managed to gain such formidable powers or what exactly those powers entailed, nor could he comprehend how the man had managed to overcome the effect of his daily potions. Those potions were enough to drive Kamsa insane by now, or at the very least, make him the same irritable, frustrated but otherwise quite malleable idiot he had been of late. But somehow, Kamsa had dodged the arrow and slipped the noose. Then again, perhaps that was the essence of Kamsa’s life story. Jarasandha recalled his spasa’s report on how Kamsa had been under the executioner’s axe when his rakshasa blood first heralded itself in an astonishing display. Jarasandha had played some part in that as well, secretly feeding Kamsa certain potions which enhanced his rakshasa qualities; it was only a matter of time before nature took its course then. But the fact that it had taken a near-death experience to make Kamsa finally transform suggested that perhaps the Yadava needed that ultimate level of threat to finally effect his change.
And now again, it seemed, he had done the unthinkable, transforming when faced with certain death once more. Except that this time he had accomplished it without Jarasandha’s knowledge or understanding, and that intrigued the Magadhan. Like any purveyor of violence and power, he was fascinated by any use of these that he could not comprehend.
‘Are we going to stand around all day and stare at each other?’ Kamsa asked with just the right touch of irony.
That was another thing that surprised Jarasandha. Until not long ago, Kamsa was little more than a loutish, selfish, pleasure- seeking dolt. This was something new. This was not the result of a potion or even training, it was a change from within. How it had been achieved greatly intrigued Jarasandha.
Bahuka and the others looked at him again, waiting eagerly for him to give the command to attack. The fate of the Mohinis had only angered them, not scared them in the least. Superb fighters though the Hijras were, they were still subject to the vagaries and weaknesses of mortal physic. The others, however, had powers which were rarely displayed in public, and about which few even knew. On Jarasandha’s instructions, they were to be used only in the battlefield and only on his orders. Unauthorized use would lead to the same penalty as any other form of disobedience to Jarasandha: instant death at the Magadhan’s hands. Now, each wanted desperately to be given the opportunity to put his powers to use, to teach the impudent Yadava a lesson. His last lesson.
Jarasandha had no doubt they could do it. Well, perhaps one or three of them might fall too, not quite as quickly as the Hijras had, but fall nevertheless. Whatever transformation Kamsa had wrought upon himself, it was no mere muscle- building or special training. There was real power there. Power that fascinated Jarasandha, made him want to know more, study it further. Whether or not the combined power of his accomplices in the chamber could overcome Kamsa’s power could only be determined by an all-out fight to the death. And that would leave either Jarasandha’s men or Kamsa dead or damaged beyond use.
He did not want either to happen. Not now at any rate.
For one thing, he wished to examine and understand Kamsa better. To know what had wrought his transformation and whether it could be repeated.
But more importantly, he sensed a greater opportunity. The earlier Kamsa, the giant rakshasa who had all but destroyed his own capital city single-handedly and driven his people to revolt, that Kamsa had been useless as an ally. That was why Jarasandha had had to come to Mathura himself, step in and take charge of matters. He had plans for Mathura and the Yadava nation. Long-term plans. And Kamsa the rakshasa was disrupting them with his reckless abuse of power. It had taken Jarasandha the better part of the year past to repair some of the damage, rebuild the city and palace enclave, build ties with the populace, seed future alliances and trade deals, and generally set Mathura back on the path of prosperity and growth that he needed it to stay on. A Mathura at war with itself, destroyed from within by its own mad ruler, was of no use to him in the long run. A strong Mathura with a king who would do his bidding – for a price, of course – and who would rule the powerful and prosperous nation as a proxy for him ... well, such a king would be of great use to him.
This Kamsa just might be capable of being that king. His transformed manner, and m
ental and physical powers added up to a man who was a far cry from the insane rampaging rakshasa of a year ago, or even the adolescent marauder who enjoyed slaughter too much to even care who he was killing or why. Neither of those were fit to be kings, let alone rule Mathura.
This man, on the other hand, this Kamsa, facing a chamber full of some of Jarasandha’s most lethal fighters, yes, he could rule as Jarasandha’s proxy.
There was a third, crucial reason why Jarasandha did not give the order to attack Kamsa.
All said and done, Kamsa was his son-in-law. And Jarasandha loved his daughters dearly. He wanted them to bear him heirs. And heirs who would inherit the Yadava nation as well would be invaluable in future. Like any truly wise emperor, Jarasandha knew his itihasa. No liege, however strong or empowered with the greatest army, can rule indefinitely by force alone. Statecraft, kingship, diplomacy, or call the blend simply politics, were essential to long-term governance.
Kamsa, as the blood heir to the throne, would ensure that. As would Kamsa’s offspring from Jarasandha’s daughters.
And if Kamsa had regained his senses indeed, acquired formidable new powers, and even gained a modicum of wisdom and maturity in the process somehow, well, in that case, he had suddenly removed all possible reasons for extermination and made himself an extremely desirable son-in-law and ally once more.
It was with this in mind that Jarasandha shook his head, refusing to give the order that his men craved. They stared at him in disbelief, unable to take in the turn of events.
KRISHNA CORIOLIS#2: Dance of Govinda Page 18
