It seemed in those first few years he was destined to cast a shadow longer than any of his peers. The invitations came from small temples and prestigious sabhas. Everyone wanted him. Koman was Balabhadran. Koman was Bheema. Koman was Dharmaputran. Koman was Krishna. Koman was a hero many times over. Koman was a veshakaaran like no other.
In the nights, when Koman didn’t have a stage to set himself upon, or an audience to capture, he lay in bed hugging a thought: I did it. I did it. I am making a name for myself.
Some days, it would come to him that despite all the offers, he was yet to receive public acknowledgement of his artistry. ‘Aashaan, I wish a critic would come to one of my performances.’
They were sitting in his room. Aashaan poured himself more toddy. Koman by now was used to the reek of alcohol and, as long as Aashaan wasn’t performing, he seldom objected.
Aashaan put his glass down. ‘I hope you don’t mean that,’ he said quietly.
Koman’s eyes widened. ‘I do. I would like an evaluation of myself.’
Aashaan shook his head, bemused. ‘Don’t you know how good you are?’
Koman laced his fingers and looked down at his clasped hands. I know you think that I ought to. But you don’t understand that I am not you. I need to know. But Koman didn’t voice his thoughts. Instead he said, ‘A critic would point out the good and bad …’
‘Don’t I do that? Or don’t you trust my judgement any more?’ Aashaan’s voice was soft but dripping with acid.
He started to explain, to apologize. ‘No, no, I didn’t mean it like that.’
‘One of these days your wish will be granted and you might not be so pleased. I always think you must be careful what you wish for.’
The trees shivered.
It was a month later that Koman received the invitation to play Keechakan in Keechaka Vadham. He read the letter a few times. The organizers were the Fine Arts Club at Thrissur. They would be visiting him soon to discuss the performance and terms.
Koman walked to his room. His hands shook with excitement as much as nervousness.
For the first time he would play a katthi vesham. He would be an arrogant and evil man redeemed only by the noble blood in his veins. With red and white markings on his face, he would represent all those who disdained refinement and heroism. He would bear as the emblem of evil two white bulbs, one on his nose and the other on his forehead. Koman touched the tip of his nose. Suddenly he wasn’t sure. He stared at himself in the mirror. How could he be Keechakan?
Keechakan was arrogant. Keechakan burnt with lust. Keechakan desired to make love to a married woman. Keechakan thought it was his right to do so. Keechakan was vile and base. When he didn’t have his way, he threatened and became violent. Keechakan was unlike all the heroes Koman had been. How could he be a convincing Keechakan then?
In the mirror, a face stared back at him. A broad-browed, brown-eyed face with high cheekbones, shaggy eyebrows and a straight nose that curved into a slight hook, bearing testimony to his Arab lineage. As if to offset the brutal strength of the upper half of his face were his lips, fleshy and pink, finely defined, the curve deep and inviting. His mouth suggested softness. It was a mouth that would only know how to kiss and perhaps nibble. The chin was studded with a dimple. I can be either, the face suggested. Don’t you see that? The heroic pachcha, or the brutal katthi.
His body was a mirror. He was a reflection, not an imprint, Koman heard Aashaan’s voice whisper in his ear.
Koman ran a finger over his face. I am both pachcha and katthi. Man and beast. Why then do I doubt myself? I can be anybody I choose to be.
At the performance venue, the pettikaaran sidled up to him with mounting animation. ‘You won’t believe who I spotted in the audience.’
Koman was seated on a stool in full costume, his eyeballs acquiring a patina of red. With every passing moment, Koman was transforming into Keechakan—vile, arrogant, lustful. When the crown was placed on his head, the metamorphosis would be complete.
The pettikaaran was whispering in his ear, but the voice emerged as if from a great distance.
He felt a crack splinter the process of his transformation. He turned with a barely reined-in impatience.
‘What is it?’ It was Keechakan who snapped—or was it Koman?
The pettikaaran’s eyes gleamed. He didn’t even register Koman’s rudeness in his excitement.
‘He is here. Nanu Menon, the art critic, is here. You are blessed, truly blessed. Now everyone will read about this performance. Your Keechakan will be world famous.’
Koman felt air rise from his toes to his chest. He knew his breath as a thread connecting his heart to his head. His eyes widened. The wonder of the moment. It was Koman who spoke now. ‘Where? Which one is he?’
‘You can’t miss him. He is a thin man with a beaked nose like a
parrot’s, sunken cheeks and a receding hairline. He is sitting in the third row, in the middle.’
Koman felt a curious trembling. It was his favourite place, as well. Being too close to the stage foreshortened the dancers and robbed the gestures of their ability to stoke the imagination. Too much distance from the stage distanced the magnificence. Nanu Menon choosing that particular place was an omen, he thought. A good omen.
Nanu Menon. They said one word of praise from him could change a veshakaaran’s destiny. He seldom went to see young dancers perform. Tonight he was here.
The pounding began in his temples. He could hear the rhythm of the wrestling scene: Mallan matching his prowess against Vallan. It was a tremendous scene to open with. For the first time, Koman wondered if he should have demanded to be Vallan. For Vallan was, after all, a synonym for Bheema, the hero of the story. In the wrestling scene, he could have displayed his sense of rhythm by dancing the sequence where he had to move seamlessly from one timing to another, without missing a step. Later in the evening, as Bheema, he would have emerged as Raudrabheeman, the epitome of fury.
No, no, he shook his head to dispel the thought. ‘A veshakaaran should never let doubt cloud his mind. There are no heroes or villains, only characters. It is not who you are, but how you are that makes a veshakaaran,’ Koman thought he heard Aashaan say.
‘You are Keechakan. You have to be him. You have to forget Vallan, or that Nanu Menon is here,’ Aashaan’s voice continued to murmur. ‘All you must think of is Keechakan and how you are to be him.’
Koman felt his disquiet settle. He touched the white balls at the tip of his nose and the centre of his forehead. With their presence, they told him he was Keechakan.
It was Keechakan who looked at the pettikaaran and said, ‘Bring me my crown.’
Keechakan. The noble being who stood holding the middle of the tirasheela that separated him from the world. Above it, his face alone emerged. Here is Keechakan, it said. Bearing the mark of the knife. By itself the knife is not evil. But as a blade, it draws blood, causes
pain and instigates terror. It is this irony that Keechakan is cursed with.
Keechakan went to sit on a stool placed for him in the centre of the stage. The lamp lit his face. Beware, the markings on his face said. This is no ordinary being to be toyed with.
The two men holding up the curtain moved away and so Keechakan was revealed to the world. Sitting, holding the end of the two red sashes slung around his neck, his face grave. As the rhythm changed, his eyes suddenly spotted Malini. His gaze fixed on her; his eyebrows rose. Beautiful, he said, with a movement of his neck. His eyes widened with interest. Who was this woman? This beautiful woman?
For a moment Keechakan’s eyes glazed. It was Koman who searched the third row of the audience seated before him. Are you there, Nanu Menon? Is that you I see sitting there craning your neck? Are you looking at me? Do you see how well I can be Keechakan?
Then Keechakan thrust aside Koman and took over.
So who are you, pretty woman, Malini? Where are you from? I don’t know how it happened, but just looking at you makes me want to touch you, caress you, romp through the valleys and shadows of your curves. Are you Lakshmi whom Vishnu cradles to his chest? Or are you Parvati whom Shiva cuddles on his lap? Or perhaps you are Saraswati whom Brahma with his four faces and four sets of lips kissed again and again? Who are you, pretty woman? Earthly creature, or heavenly nymph? You heat my blood, you fill my senses, you, you, you …
What use is it being a man, and a man as valorous as I, if I can’t fulfil my desire to feel your body against mine? To make love to you. To have you pleasure me. If I can’t have you, I might as well be dead.
Why do I get the feeling that I have seen you before?
Yes, of course. I know now. This is the woman Sairandhari, my sister Queen Sudeshna’s handmaiden.
You, my lovely, I shall call Malini.
Malini, you who seem to be blessed with beauty, listen to me. You will never know what it is to want again, you will know no sorrow. Your hair, dark and dense as thunderclouds, has turned me into a dithering fool. Lust makes me tremble. Just looking at your
curved eyebrows, Kama’s jasmine bow, makes me weak with desire.
You have to let me love you.
Malini-ruchira-gunashalini
. Keechakan began his first amorous move. The night deepened. The story began.
When the Pandavas were exiled for the second time, one of the conditions laid down by the Kauravas was that they should pass the thirteenth and final year incognito. If they were discovered before the year came to an end, they would be exiled again.
In the thirteenth year of their exile, the Pandavas disguised themselves and entered the service of the king of Virata. Yudhishtira, as a brahmin, became a gamester in the court; Bheema became a cook; Arjuna as a eunuch taught singing and dancing; Nakula became a horse trainer; and Sahadeva a herdsman.
Draupadi, who pretended that she was in no way related to the five new servants, became an attendant and needlewoman in the service of Queen Sudeshna. She took on the name of Sairandhari and told the queen, ‘Did I ever tell you about my husbands? They are Gandharvas and, even though I live here under your protection, they guard me all the time. They are so possessive that they are jealous of any man who dares to look at me even twice.’
The queen smiled, content with this new maid of hers. For a while Draupadi and the Pandavas led a quiet life, immersed in their new roles. Then Queen Sudeshna’s brother, Keechakan, a wicked and powerful man who was the chief commander of the army, saw Draupadi and was bewitched by her beauty. He began to waylay her at every opportunity and make improper advances. Draupadi complained to the queen, but the queen ignored her. So Draupadi appealed to Yudhishtira. Instead of reassuring her, Yudhishtira scolded her for behaving like a child. ‘You shouldn’t take offence so easily. Besides, you can’t keep running to us every time he mocks or insults you. Don’t you realize that if we interfere, our true identities will be revealed?’
Draupadi went away quietly, but she decided to appeal to Bheema who she knew would listen to her demand and fulfil it as well. So later that night, she went into the royal kitchens where Bheema resided. Bheema looked at her tear-stained face and asked, ‘What is it, Draupadi? Why are you crying, darling?’
Draupadi wiped her face and said, ‘It is the queen’s brother, Keechakan.’
She told Bheema about how troublesome Keechakan was.
Bheema bristled with anger. ‘How dare he? Don’t you worry. I’ll get rid of him.’
Draupadi smiled, relieved. But she remembered Yudhishtira’s words of caution and said, ‘You have to be careful. We don’t want anyone discovering who we really are.’
Bheema nodded. He scratched his chin and said, ‘This will have to be done secretly. Tomorrow you must set up a meeting with Keechakan in a quiet place. Ask him to come to the dance hall after midnight and I will take it from there.’
The next day, Draupadi as Sairandhari did not move away when she saw Keechakan. Instead, she smiled coyly and whispered, ‘Come to the dance hall after midnight. I will be there waiting for you. Come alone or my Gandharva husbands will know.’
Keechakan was so besotted by her that he didn’t suspect a thing. That night, he went to the dance hall. He saw a veiled woman seated at the far end of the room and his heart beat faster. ‘My lovely woman, why are you hiding from me?’ he whispered. ‘Come here, let me show you how I feel about you.’
The woman didn’t budge. So Keechakan shut the door and went towards her. Could it be a ruse? But no, Malini wouldn’t cheat him. I will lie down beside her and then I will know what it means to be truly alive, he thought.
When the final scene began, the curtain was held up by the two men again. They moved it ever so slightly, allowing only a fleeting glimpse of Keechakan as he lay suddenly paralysed, the object of his desire beside him. All he had to do was turn and take her in his arms.
But what was this? A muscular arm had reached over and grabbed him. The vice-like grip dragged a howl of pain out of him.