Path of the Eclipse (63 page)

11

Twice she was nearly thrown from the saddle, and had clung to the mare’s mane with terror-tightened hands; once the mare, startled by a sudden noise in the forest, had almost bolted. Riding was exhausting and her muscles, unused to such rigorous exercise, tugged and ached. She dared not ride on the roads, for she had seen the guardsmen at her house and feared that they searched for her as well as for the foreigners she had welcomed. The paths and tracks which she was forced to use were narrow, winding, ill-kept and steep. Several times she lost her way and had to retrace her course, and often it was more by accident than design that she stayed on the right way.

Padmiri was more than halfway to her brother’s palace—she could think of it in no other way—when she came upon a band of villagers trudging along the rutted, dusty path. She pulled in the mare, inexpertly guiding the animal to the side of the road so that the small procession could pass. She saw that everyone of the group was wearing wreaths and necklaces of dark flowers, and all carried woven baskets containing live things.

“Wait!” Padmiri called out, her hand extended to the elder at the front of the band.

“We dare not, Reverend Lady,” the elder answered back over his shoulder. “It is near sunset already, and there is a great way to go.”

“But where are you going?” She had only seen the strange flower wreaths twice before in her life, but recognized them with foreboding.

“To the temple on the Kudri,” the answer came back faintly. “For sacrifice.”

Padmiri dragged the mare back onto the trail and pushed through the throng. When she was abreast of the elder, she said, “Tell me what will happen at the temple. What is the nature of your sacrifice?”

“The Rani has proclaimed that everyone must offer,” the elder said rather wearily. He held up the basket he carried, and small, bright eyes peered out through the slats. There was a snuffling whimper.

“And the Rani herself?” Padmiri demanded, irritation and worry building in her.

“She officiates,” the elder said, adding, “I do not wish to offend the Reverend Lady, but we must not linger.”

“Of course.” Padmiri stopped the mare and let the people file past her as consternation grew in her. Tamasrajasi had ordered sacrifice and would officiate at the ritual. The villagers wore dark flowers and carried live animals to the temple on the Kudri. She remembered the rumors she had heard of Thuggi and at the time had thought nothing of them. Now her mind was crowded with suspicions, all of them increasing her anxiety. She tried to still her apprehension. Tamasrajasi was a young, beautiful and powerful woman. What would worship of the Black Goddess give to her? Tamasrajasi might bow to one of Kali’s other faces, the loving Parvati, but to Kali herself? She could not convince herself it was impossible. Disheartened, she started back along the track toward her own house. There was no reason to go to the palace now, not today. She would have to present herself to her brother’s daughter the next morning. The prospect of spending the night in the forest terrified her, yet she did not know whether it would be wise to return to her house, for if there were guardsmen there still …

The mare shied, whinnying loudly, and Padmiri was rudely jerked out of her reverie. It was almost dark now and Padmiri had no idea where she was. The trees seemed gigantic, threatening. She had no way of telling what had made the mare frightened, but whatever it was had not departed, for the horse skittered, sidling on the trail, unwilling to go forward and too afraid to run. Her eyes rolled and her coat was flecked with foam. Padmiri, who was almost as frightened as the mare, patted her neck uneasily and wished she could recall the phrases her brother had used to quite his horses.

There was a sound of something on the path, something fairly large that scraped and slithered. The mare danced on her front legs, attempting to rear, but was not able to because of the way Padmiri clutched her neck. The sound came nearer, and Padmiri thought she was able to discern a slightly lighter patch of wavering movement on the darkened path.

A low, agonized wail came from the shape and it was only then that Padmiri realized it was a man. She dared not dismount, for she did not think she could get back on the mare again: her body was too sore and in this wild place, anything might prevent her from climbing into the saddle again.

“Help … me…” the shape groaned mindlessly. His words, more than his accent, revealed him as a foreigner, for no Hindu would ask for or expect to receive aid.

“Who are you?” Padmiri asked harshly.

“A traveler … Oh, Lord of Fire…” He dragged himself nearer Padmiri’s mare. “I didn’t know … I didn’t know…”

“What?” She was repelled and fascinated at once by this half-seen stranger. If only she were able to ride expertly so that she could guide the mare well, or could remount with confidence!

“Help me!” He tried to reach a hand out to her, but the arm fluttered weakly and it was only then that Padmiri realized that the tendons in his knees and elbows had been cut. It was too dark for Padmiri to see him clearly but she felt his torment. “Reverend Lady!
Help me
!”

“How?” she asked helplessly.

The man sobbed roughly, deeply, and then lay still. At first Padmiri thought he had died, but then she heard him murmuring, “I didn’t know. For Kali, they said.” The words grew more jumbled. “Kali sacrifice. No. No. Another one. Skulls. Arms, Lord of Fire! All foreigners. Two others.”

“What others?” Padmiri asked sharply.

It was with considerable difficulty that the maimed man was able to speak now. “Others. Two. One first. Then another. It was the second one…” His voice became much softer but the words were clear. “The second one was the one they wanted. Once they had him, they took me away from the temple. They got out their knives. Lord of Fire, the knives! They would not kill me here on the road.” The voice trailed off and the man moaned. Then he made one last effort. “Reverend Lady, help me. The others are lost. They are given to Kali. Help me. Help me.”

“How did you get here?” Padmiri was trying to decide whether or not the two foreigners were Saint-Germain and his servant. Rogerio had been taken by guardsmen, but not his master. She did not want to believe that Saint-Germain had been caught. She reminded herself that there were other foreigners in Natha Suryarathas. The man lying on the road was a foreigner. It must be someone else who had been taken for sacrifice.

“They took me away from the temple.” He seemed to doze a moment. “They didn’t kill me. They cut me. They left me. There was a … a shrine. Shiva. They said … his creature…” The voice faltered again. “I’m … cold.”

The mare snorted, whickered and then sprang forward. One of her hooves struck the figure in the road as she began a headlong plunge down the narrow dark pathway.

Branches lashed at Padmiri’s arms and face, and no matter how she tugged on the reins, the mare did not respond. Had she been less terrified, she would have screamed, but fear robbed her of her voice, and she would do nothing more than hang on until the mare stopped from exhaustion.

When that finally happened, Padmiri knew she had come a considerable distance from where the maimed Parsee lay, but she had no sense of where she was. The foreigner had mentioned a shrine to Shiva or one of Shiva’s creatures. She drooped in the saddle, not wanting to think anymore, the aftermath of her ordeal flooding her with shivering weakness. It was full night now, and the moon had not yet risen. She let the mare pick her way down the track as she regained her wind. Padmiri did not want to wander in the forest all night—she knew too well the fate of many of those who became lost—nor did she want to encounter the Rani’s guards. Fatigue was rapidly draining both fear and judgment out of her. She longed for sleep.

“Ah!”

The startled cry brought Padmiri fully awake and until that moment she had not realized she had been dozing. There was someone on the path ahead of her. Her first inclination was to demand of the speaker who he was, but she mastered that. She brought the mare to a halt.

“Who is here, brother?” asked a voice out of the gloom.

“Another worshiper? You are late, brother,” said a second voice.

“Where are you bound, brother?” The third voice was distinctly malign. “Answer us.”

Padmiri did not know what to do. She must answer the men or come to harm, but if they learned she was a woman, she might risk greater hurt. Almost before she actually realized she had done it, she responded in the fluting accents of her own eunuchs, “I am not worthy to attend the sacrifice. My master, however, is there.”

The men on the trail chuckled. “And you wanted to see done what you cannot do,” the third voice suggested.

“I have seen that,” Padmiri answered with the petulant quality she had heard Bhatin use when speaking of the men she had taken as lovers.

“Not this way, you have not. Tonight,” the voice grew boastful, “a creature of Shiva will—”

“Quiet!”

“Impious one!” The two voices hissed at once, and the third one said in an undertone, “The eunuch might find the Pars—”

“Don’t!” the second insisted.

There was a slight pause, and then the third voice said with overelaborate casualness, “How far have you come along this road, brother?”

“Some distance,” Padmiri said truthfully, and her mouth was dry.

“Was there anyone else on the road?” the first voice inquired.

“Men from the village bringing sacrifice. It grew dark soon after that.” She was finding it more and more difficult to speak in imitation of a eunuch.

“Brother,” said the third voice, “dismount and walk a way with us.”

“It would please me,” she said, and was shocked to hear a tremor in her words, “but my master would … beat me if he learned of it.” She hoped that they might assume her fear was not of them, but the fictitious master. Eunuchs as a group, she knew, had the reputation of being cowards.

“Not tonight. Your master will have more than enough of beating if he is at the sacrifice.” It was the first voice again, pride making the man speak more loudly.

“Who is your master?” the third voice demanded suddenly, and the three unseen men waited for her answer.

Padmiri paused an instant too long. “Bisla Ajagupta,” she said, disasterously uncertain, selecting a wealthy upper-caste scholar as her abusive master in the hope that he would not be known to these men.

“He is not among those at the temple,” the second voice said in an undervoice that Padmiri was not intended to hear.

“My master left at a late hour. He bade me follow him as soon as I finished my assigned duties.” No, that was not the way a slave would speak, not even a high-ranking household slave.

There were a few muttered words, and then the third voice spoke again. “Is it that you wish to see the temple, brother? Do you wish to make sacrifice? We will assist you.”

Padmiri felt rather than saw the two other men move toward her in the darkness. She wanted to flee.

“Tamasrajasi herself will offer a creature of Shiva on the altar to Kali,” the third voice went on insinuatingly. “There will be other sacrifices before that.”

With an abrupt, angry scream, Padmiri clapped her heels to the mare’s sides and slapped her with the ends of the reins. The mare lurched once, then broke into a gallop.

There were shouts and oaths and the third voice yelled, “A woman! It was a woman!” before the forest around them erupted in sounds from the animals disturbed by this sudden outbreak of noise. Padmiri did not stop to listen. She urged the mare to a run, and only when the way grew suddenly steeper did she let her mount trot, and then walk. The mare was panting, and though Padmiri was inexperienced with horses, she knew that the mare was near the limit of her strength. As they crested a rise, Padmiri brought the mare to a stop as she listened for any pursuit. The three men had been on foot and she knew she had long since outdistanced them. But there had been others on the road and she did not want to meet with them. The silence reassured her and she allowed herself to relax in the saddle for the first time since she got onto the mare’s back, which now seemed to be days ago. She was growing stiff and the ache in her legs and back fatigued her. How did the guardsmen do it, day after day? How did they grow accustomed to saddles and horses? She chided herself for triviality, and admitted that she did not want to think about what the three men had said. Yet she must. There was no one else to do it. If what the dying man—he must have been the Parsi the three men mentioned surreptitiously—had told her was correct, there were two foreigners who would be sacrificed. The three men as well as the Parsi had spoken of a creature of Shiva. She did not think of Saint-Germain as such a being, but there was reason to designate him that way.

All her life Padmiri had been taught that the world followed the course made for it by the gods and the Wheel. Nothing she or anyone could do would change that. She had learned at an early age that interference was always disastrous. And she had been taught that as a member of the ruling military caste, she had certain absolute rights that could not be denied. She had seen sacrifices offered to Kali when she was eleven years old, and the recollection made her wince. Nothing she could do would change what the gods had ordained. She looked up sharply. Anything she did must be the will of the gods. Her face lightened to a half-smile, and she began to feel strength return to her. The sacrifices would be offered at the temple on the Kudri. Somehow she would have to discover where she was, and quickly, for she had much to do before the middle of the night.

It was by accident that she came upon a clearing some little time later. Untouchables lived there, in huts that were little more than earthen dens. Two old men tended a fire. One was a leper and most of his face was gone; the rags around his hands covered the stumps of missing fingers. The other was skeletally thin. Both abased themselves profoundly as Padmiri approached.

“Exalted One, forgive us for speaking, but you must not come here. We are Untouchables.” The emaciated old man had a voice as thin as his body.

“I have lost my way,” Padmiri said, shocked at herself for telling anything so degrading to an Untouchable. “Tell me where I am.”