The Twentieth Wife

by Indu Sundaresan

  Anklets tinkled by his door, and Ghias smiled. So much had happened in the past four years. Abul and Muhammad were both married now. It had been a little early for Muhammad, but Ghias had hoped to settle his wild ways with the marriage. Unfortunately, that had not happened. If anything, Muhammad had grown more distant, more unreachable. Ghias sighed. Perhaps if there were a child . . . fatherhood would surely bring some calmness. Once Muhammad was settled, a very good rishta had come for Abul, and he too had been married. But before that, Saliha had been married to a nobleman named Sadiq Khan. It would not have been right to marry the sons with an unwed of-age daughter still at home. Saliha’s new family was a good one, and Ghias was not upset at leaving his older daughter in their hands when they returned to Lahore.

  As for the other girls—Mehrunnisa, Manija, and Khadija—they continued their education as usual, along with Shahpur.

  Mehrunnisa—ah, she was now sixteen and seemed to live up to her name, Ghias thought. Sun of Women—she was a beautiful child, physically as well as in spirit. In all their years of marriage, Asmat and he had never shown undue partiality to any one child, but with Mehrunnisa it was difficult not to do so. Her smile, her laughter, the mischievous glint in her blue eyes filled Ghias with a paternal contentment. If it were socially acceptable to have a daughter live at home all her life, Ghias would choose Mehrunnisa to be by him without hesitation.

  Ghias suddenly sobered at the thought. Mehrunnisa was sixteen. Where had time flown? She was now old enough to be married.

  • • •

  THAT NIGHT, WHEN the servants had bowed their way out of the room after extinguishing the lamps, Asmat and Ghias lay side by side in a comfortable silence.

  Asmat spoke first. “It is time we think of Mehrunnisa’s marriage.”

  Ghias turned to look at the shadowed face of his wife. “Yes. She is already sixteen.”

  “We shall miss her,” Asmat said softly.

  Ghias felt for her hand and held it fast, choosing his words with care. He did not want to communicate the sudden emptiness that had descended on him at Asmat’s words. “She will be an asset to us and to her future husband. We have brought her up well.”

  “It must be a brilliant marriage, Ghias. Someone who will understand her needs, encourage her spirit. I know she will make a good wife.”

  “And so it shall be, my dear. I will contact my friends for a suitable husband, and when I find him I shall request permission from the Emperor.” As with any marriage that took place in the vicinity of the court, Ghias had to request—at least formally—permission from Akbar.

  With that, Ghias fell into a restless sleep.

  Across the courtyard, Mehrunnisa lay awake on a cotton mattress in her room. Somewhere in the night, a dog barked at a passing stranger, then yelped with pain as a stone found its mark. Mehrunnisa lay still, hands clasped on her stomach, her mind revolving with thoughts. Back to Lahore at last. Back to the court, to the imperial zenana, to the Empress with her quick mannerisms and her biting sarcasm. But most of all, most of all, back to Salim.

  Mehrunnisa turned on her side, pillowed her head on her arm, and closed her eyes, a smile on her face as sleep claimed her.

  • • •

  THEY EMBARKED ON their long journey back to Lahore, where the Emperor held court. As Ghias rode his sturdy mountain horse, its measured hoofbeats brought memories of another day, so long in the past, when they had made their first trip through the Khyber Pass into Hindustan. Life had been uncertain then, each succeeding day void of security. The winter’s cold had bitten into their tired bodies. Now he went at the Emperor’s invitation. At the end of each day, they settled into thick canvas tents, slept on feather-stuffed mattresses, rested their heads on silk-covered pillows. His sons rode beside him—men now, no longer children—and the women of his family traveled in a howdah set atop camels.

  Upon reaching Lahore, Ghias hurried immediately to pay his respects to Akbar. When he straightened up from the konish to look at the Emperor, a mild shock coursed through him. Akbar’s hair was almost completely white, and though his face was the same, calm and kind, a hint of sadness touched his eyes. Ghias glanced quickly at Prince Salim, who stood next to the throne. The same sadness appeared to echo through him. So it was true, Ghias thought. He had heard rumors about the Emperor’s illness and hakim Humam. Such things never stayed secret.

  “You have done the empire a great service at Kabul,” Akbar said.

  Ghias turned to him. “Your Majesty is too kind. I only did my job.”

  “Still,” Akbar continued, “we are pleased with your work.”

  At a sign from Akbar, an attendant came forward, bearing a large gold tray on which reposed a jeweled sword and a garment of honor. Ghias knelt. Akbar lifted the jeweled sword and the coat and presented them to him.

  The imperial harem watched the proceedings from an overhead balcony screened from view. As soon as the short ceremony was over, Ruqayya Sultan Begam spoke from behind the screen. “Your Majesty, please ask Mirza Beg to send his wife and his daughter Mehrunnisa to wait upon us.”

  Akbar looked at Ghias.

  “It shall be done, your Majesty.” Ghias turned toward the balcony. “They will be honored to hear that you have commanded their presence.”

  He moved back to his place in the darbar, glad to be at Lahore again. At the end of the morning audience, the Emperor’s face crumpled suddenly with fatigue. Ghias saw Prince Salim reach out a hand to his father, then withdraw it when Akbar turned away. It was done so quickly that only a few courtiers saw it happen. The court bowed as the Emperor left, followed by Prince Salim. Ghias returned home, thinking about the darbar. During the next few weeks he would talk with the other nobles to find out as much as he could about the Humam incident. Was it true? Or just a fabrication by courtiers who did not like Prince Salim? What a burden the crown was, he thought. Kings had always fought brothers and fathers and sons for it.

  • • •

  WHEN MEHRUNNISA ENTERED Ruqayya’s apartments the next morning, a game of chess was in progress between two of Akbar’s concubines. A few ladies sat around them in silence, following the game. Incense burned in gold and silver stands, swirling blue smoke around the room and perfuming the air with sandalwood. Slave girls and eunuchs stood or knelt around other women, offering wine and sherbet, plying peacock feather fans. A bird tweeted, and Mehrunnisa turned to the sound. One of the Emperor’s concubines lay on a divan, elbows propped on a velvet bolster, a yellow and red lovebird perched on her fingers. She made kissing sounds to the bird, and it promptly put its beak forward for a kiss. Its reward was a sliver of almond. The bird chirruped happily and flapped shorn wings. Mehrunnisa turned away, wondering whether she should attract the Empress’s attention.

  Just then, Ruqayya noticed her and beckoned from her divan, where she sat smoking a hukkah. Mehrunnisa walked slowly to the Empress, suddenly feeling shy. She had not seen Ruqayya in four years; it seemed a long time. Ruqayya’s hair was now liberally sprinkled with gray, and a few more wrinkles creased her round face, but the eyes were the same as ever—dark, lively, darting around the room incessantly.

  “So you are back?” Ruqayya said by way of a greeting.

  “Yes, your Majesty. We returned yesterday,” Mehrunnisa replied, falling back into the relationship as though she had not left. Ruqayya possessed the talent to put everyone at ease, from the most menial servant to Akbar himself. A talent she should learn too, Mehrunnisa decided. One day Salim would value her as much because of it.

  “How was Kabul? I hear your father has distinguished himself there.”

  Mehrunnisa opened her mouth to answer, but before she could, a curly-haired little boy toddled into the room and flung himself onto Ruqayya’s lap.

  “Ma, sweets,” he said peremptorily, stretching out a chubby hand.

  Mehrunnisa looked at him in surprise. Ruqayya had no children, so who was this boy? To be sure, there were hundreds of “mothers” for every baby born in the zenana
, but she had never before seen any child wrap the autocratic Padshah Begam around his little finger as this one had.

  Ruqayya’s face was wreathed in smiles. She leaned over to the silver dish at her elbow and fed the burfis to the boy herself, unmindful that his sticky fingers were clutching her choli, smearing ghee all over it and her bare midriff.

  “Meet my son, Mehrunnisa.” Ruqayya smiled at her over the little boy’s head. “This is Khurram.”

  “Your son?” Mehrunnisa blurted out, unable to stop herself in time.

  “Yes, he is mine. All mine.” Ruqayya wrapped her arms around Khurram. He squirmed in her lap. She kissed the soft curls on his head and let him go. As he ran out of the room, followed by his attendants, she turned to Mehrunnisa and said defiantly, “I may not have given birth to him, but he is nonetheless my son.”

  “Of course, your Majesty,” Mehrunnisa mumbled.

  “Tell me about your stay in Kabul.” Ruqayya lay back on the divan and picked up the mouthpiece of the hukkah.

  For the next hour, Mehrunnisa talked in a low voice so as not to disturb the chess players, prodded every now and then by a question from the Empress. Before she left, Ruqayya had returned to her normal good humor. She reached out and touched Mehrunnisa’s face lightly. “You have turned into a beautiful girl. How old are you now?”

  Mehrunnisa told her.

  “Well, it’s time you got married, my dear. Soon you will be an old maid.” The Empress waved her hand in dismissal. “Come tomorrow at the same time.”

  At home, Mehrunnisa learned about Khurram from Asmat. He was Salim’s third son by his wife Jagat Gosini, and he had lived the last two years in Ruqayya’s apartments, believing her to be his mother. Akbar had named him Khurram, “Joy,” because his birth had brought much happiness to the court and the aging Emperor.

  Upon his birth, Ruqayya Sultan Begam had demanded custody of Khurram. Akbar, unable to deny his wife anything, commanded that the child be weaned from his mother and put in the care of his Padshah Begam Ruqayya. But why this child, Mehrunnisa wondered. Salim had other sons, but Ruqayya had wanted this one, born of Salim’s second wife—the iron princess, the one who had always defied Ruqayya’s authority. Even as her mother talked on, Mehrunnisa smiled to herself. Ruqayya was cruel, merciless, and dangerous. Princess Jagat Gosini should have taken more care to appease her when she had first entered Salim’s harem. Now, for her arrogance, her child had been whisked away from her.

  • • •

  A FEW MONTHS passed. Mehrunnisa visited the imperial harem every day after finishing her studies, eagerly leaving her books. Her relationship with the Empress had changed subtly. Ruqayya no longer treated her like a child. She let Mehrunnisa stay in the room when her stewards came to visit, bringing with them the accounts from all the lands the Empress owned in the empire. “Listen and learn, Mehrunnisa,” she said. “A woman must not be completely reliant on a man, either for money or for love.”

  Ruqayya also began to depend more and more on Mehrunnisa, especially when it came to Prince Khurram. The Empress guarded the little boy jealously and would allow no one to come too close to him in case they stole his affections. One of the noblemen’s wives was his appointed nurse. Each morning, she rose at sunrise and came to the zenana to start her duties, leaving only at night after Khurram had been put to bed. But some days she could not come because of her responsibilities to her husband and children. On those days, the Empress grudgingly let Mehrunnisa take charge of Khurram, and as time passed, she came to trust her more.

  The usually levelheaded Ruqayya was obsessed with the child, to such a point that his mother, Princess Jagat Gosini, was permitted only brief weekly visits. Mehrunnisa usually stood to one side and watched as Jagat Gosini came to see her son under Ruqayya’s alert scrutiny. The princess ignored Mehrunnisa, as she did the other waiting women, but finally Mehrunnisa came face to face with Prince Salim’s most influential wife.

  Khurram had been in a particularly boisterous mood one afternoon; he refused to take his nap and insisted on playing. The Empress’s nerves had frayed with his incessant chatter. She sent Khurram out with Mehrunnisa to the gardens attached to her apartments, with a reminder to keep him in the shade.

  They sat together on the verandah, watching as the sun made rainbows around a fountain in one corner of the garden. In another corner, a huge peepul spread its dense branches. A few zenana women sat under the peepul, ghagaras gathered over their knees. They were piping henna patterns on their feet and legs, drawing intricate curved designs with the thin black paste. Mehrunnisa saw one woman lean over to another and bare her shoulders, pushing her choli down her arms. Then, using a cone-shaped leaf filled with henna, she drew a pattern across one shoulder, curved it down into the woman’s cleavage, and drew it up the other shoulder. When the henna dried and was washed away, the woman would have a forest of red flowers glowing on her skin. She was one of the Emperor’s slaves and would dance that night for Akbar, clad in very little but henna designs. The Emperor, busy as he was with matters of state, always had time to enjoy his inventive slave girls.

  For those few minutes they could be rewarded with jewels of unimaginable beauty and value, grants of lands and estates—enough to make them comfortable for the rest of their lives. They did not all have Empress Ruqayya’s advantages. Ruqayya had known Akbar all her life, for they were cousins. They had grown up together, knowing they would marry one day. The Empress never talked of her early days of marriage to the Emperor. Had he looked at her then with lust, perhaps? Had he sought her with a hunger no other woman could satisfy? Or had their relationship always been thus: comfortable, steady, strong, with an implicit trust that nothing could shake?

  There was only one other woman in Akbar’s harem whose intimacy with him came close to Ruqayya’s: Salima Sultan Begam, who was Akbar’s uncle Gulrukh’s daughter, and who was first cousin to Ruqayya, too. Akbar was Salima’s second husband, and Mehrunnisa knew, from rumors in the zenana, that Ruqayya had given her blessings to the marriage. The relationship between the two women was one of utmost friendliness and respect. They had known each other all their lives, too, but there was no jealousy, no spite. They divided Akbar’s affections, with a larger part—unsaid and unacknowledged—going to Ruqayya, for she was a wife of longer standing. But unlike Ruqayya, Mehrunnisa did not think she could bear to share Salim with anyone else, no matter how well she knew or loved her.

  Mehrunnisa watched as Khurram got up and went running to a flower bed. He picked up a stick and began digging around the poppies, throwing clumps of dirt over his shoulder. She looked down at her hands, bare of henna. On her wedding day, she too would have designs on them. And one day, she would dress her body in henna for Salim. She flushed and put her hands behind her back.

  A shower of dirt fell over her, and she looked up. Prince Khurram was still digging furiously in the dirt. He howled when she rushed over and tried to pick him up.

  “Let me go, Nisa. Let me go! I command you.”

  “Your Highness, please, you cannot play in the dirt. You know it is forbidden. Please come back to the verandah.”

  “No!” he yelled again, screwing up his small face to cry.

  Mehrunnisa set him down hurriedly. Khurram’s cries would wake the whole zenana. “All right, let us do something else. What would you like to do?”

  “Play a game with me, Nisa.”

  Anything to keep him from bawling. “What shall we play, your Highness?”

  “Hide-and-seek,” Khurram said promptly. “I go hide.”

  Mehrunnisa groaned. Khurram’s idea of hide-and-seek was to crawl behind the short hedges lining the stone pathways or climb the big chenar trees in the courtyard—anything that would get him dirty. And would get her dirty too, she thought ruefully, glancing down at her impeccably washed and ironed ghagara and choli. But she had to obey him. He was the prince.

  “I shall count to fifty. Go hide, your Highness.” Mehrunnisa turned to one of the pillars, leaned her he
ad against the cool marble, closed her eyes, and started counting.

  “. . . Forty-eight, forty-nine, fifty. Ready?”

  “Yes,” a little voice piped up.

  Mehrunnisa smiled when she saw the heron’s feather on Khurram’s turban bobbing along the hedge to her right. She went down on her hands and knees on the opposite side and started crawling, calling out as she went, “Where are you, your Highness?”

  A few minutes later she was hot and filthy. Her ghagara had grass stains; her hair had escaped from its pins and clung damply to her forehead. Mehrunnisa wiped her sweating face, leaving a streak of dirt on her cheek. She would have to pretend to search for him a little longer, she thought, dragging herself along the damp grass.

  Khurram giggled, and Mehrunnisa turned to peer at him through the hedge. When she turned back, she first saw a pair of feet clad in jeweled kid-leather slippers. Her gaze traveled slowly upward, taking in the pearl-studded pale blue ghagara, jeweled hands clasped in front, thin muslin veil billowing in the breeze. The woman’s face was classic in its beauty. Her complexion was a rich brown, her eyes a glittering ebony under bow-arched eyebrows, her mouth well formed; the whole was set off by high cheekbones.

  Mehrunnisa scrambled to her feet in a hurry, almost tripping over her long skirts. “Your Highness, I did not see you coming.”

  “Obviously,” Jagat Gosini said. “Who are you?”

  “Who are you?”

  Both turned to see Prince Khurram standing up on the other side, his plump arms resting on his hips. Mehrunnisa smiled involuntarily; it was a pose Ruqayya often adopted when she was irritated. She turned to look at Jagat Gosini.