He decided he would be very careful about controlling his thoughts and actions. It would not do to show off his newly developing abilities before these humble brahmacharyas. They were obsequious enough because of the presence of Vishwamitra and their awareness of his and Lakshman’s royal status. Besides, he was hardly aware what his new abilities entailed. Tossing dead tree-trunks and making roses appear was all very well; but there had to be much more to the maha-mantras than these tricks.
He glanced sideways at Lakshman and saw from his brother’s expression that much the same thoughts were passing through his mind as well. They nodded subtly, a tacit agreement passing between them.
Let’s just be normal boys tonight.
Their meal consisted of a piece of johar ka roti and a little rock salt. Rishi Adhranga had a fire built outside in their honour and invited them to sit awhile and sip a little berry juice. The juice tasted sour to Rama, as if it had been kept standing too long, but to see the brahmacharyas drink it, you would have thought it was the finest soma nectar in the kingdom!
Rama caught sight of the youngest one, Dumma, holding his empty mud-cup and staring longingly at the single jug from which they had all been served—barely a mouthful each. Nudging Lakshman surreptitiously, Rama conveyed his intention; a few moments later, Lakshman slipped the young acolyte both their portions of berry juice. Rama enjoyed watching the brahmacharya novice relish the sour juice with the satisfaction of a palace Brahmin finishing his tenth glass of bhaang at a Holi feast.
The night had turned cold after sundown, and Rishi Adhranga inquired if they would prefer to sleep out of doors beside the fire or indoors without a fire.
To Rama’s relief Vishwamitra chose the former option: he would rather have slept in a blizzard than endure the odour of cow’s urine all night.
‘Yesterday my young companions slept on beds of satin and silk; tonight they sleep on darbha grass mats,’ Vishwamitra told the assembled rishis. They nodded approvingly, glancing shyly at Rama and Lakshman. Several of them were still nervous in the presence of such exalted company.
‘Austerity is the first step towards embracing Shiva,’ Rishi Adhranga said solemnly. ‘That is the only shiksha we teach our brahmacharyas for the first five years. How to do without, in order to grow within.’
The rishis spoke of matters spiritual, the virtue of penance, the importance of abstinence, the correct way to invoke the Lord Shiva’s name during a long fast and meditation. They evidently sat every evening discussing such questions, the only time in the day when they took a pause from their grinding routine of work and meditation. They seemed to be pleased to have visitors to share their thoughts with, and for Rama, it was refreshing to be with men of religion after a year of attending banquets, diplomatic convocations, war councils and a hundred other lavish events on Ayodhya’s crowded royal calendar.
He was surprised at how nostalgic it made him for Guru Vashishta’s gurukul.
Those were the best years of our lives,
he thought with a small shock of insight.
But I had to go away from the gurukul to realise it.
He smiled at the irony
. Why is it that we always have to leave the people and places we love in order to understand just how much we love them
?
He felt a strange affinity with his surroundings. Even though south of Sarayu, the place seemed more like his favourite northern grove than the fabled Southwood forest of terror. Except for the faint chirring of nightbirds and the occasional insect, there was none of the clicking of crickets or roars of predatory beasts he had expected to hear. The air was pleasantly perfumed with the scent of wild flowers and berries. And somewhere in the darkness, perhaps a hundred yards from the hermitage, the gentle gurgle of the Sarayu was audible. As always, the sound of flowing water soon lulled him into a state neither fully awake nor asleep. But when the sage spoke quietly, he snapped back to full alertness instantly.
‘Rajkumar Rama, do you have a thought you’d like to share with us?’
Rama looked up at the sage, resisting the urge to blink against the bright blaze of the fire. His pupils must have dilated as he drifted off, because although the flames were no higher than they had been before—the rishis only used as much wood as was absolutely necessary—they seemed to glow with much greater intensity. Did Vishwamitra’s voice carry a faint inflection of irony?
The sage seemed to know everything he was thinking. Rama was fairly certain by now that the mantras formed some kind of link between himself, Lakshman and Vishwamitra, giving the brahmarishi access to their innermost thoughts and feelings.
Oddly, he didn’t mind it very much. After all, he had nothing to hide. Least of all from his new guru.
‘Mahadev, my brothers and I were weaned on such terrifying stories of the Southwoods. The so-called Bhayanak-van. The forbidden forest, domain of the asuras. The desolate place, lair of demons and darkness.’
He gestured at the rishis gathered around the fire. ‘This grove is on the periphery of that same dreaded Southwoods, within reach of its evil influence. Yet the rishis of this ashram don’t seem troubled by rakshasas or other asuras. Here they live outside the protection of Ayodhya and of the rakshak rangers, beyond the boundaries of the Arya nations, unmolested and unharmed. I don’t understand it. For hundreds of generations, our people have believed these Southwoods inhospitable and uninhabitable. We have travelled unchecked as far north as the Norselands and the frozen wastelands of Siber, yet our supremacy has never been able to extend south of the Sarayu. And yet, here we are, in this beautiful glade that is as tranquil and fragrant as any flower grove of Ayodhya. An idyllic grove, a heavenly grove, apparently safe and free of all evil influence. It flies in the face of everything known about the Southwoods. How is this possible?’
Vishwamitra was seated directly across from Rama, his face barely visible through the heat-haze from the fire. ‘Well asked, rajkumar. A puzzling conundrum that deserves a satisfying reply. And you shall have it. Rishi Adhranga, I believe you would be the best one to respond to Rajkumar Rama Chandra’s question. Please, would you grace us with your knowledge?’
The rishi nodded sagely, bowing his head and folding his hands to the seer. ‘It would honour me to share my vidya with these proud princes of Ayodhya, mahadev. I am fortunate that you deem me worthy.’
He stroked his beard steadily for several minutes, evidently a favourite gesture when preparing to speak. Rama noticed that the rishi’s pepper-and-salt growth was shiny with spilled berry juice but it didn’t seem polite to mention it.
Adhranga’s dark eyes glistened in the light of the fire. He seemed able to stare directly into the flames for any length of time without blinking. Rama could imagine him staring at the sun until his pupils turned white: he had that hardened look of the pure penitent about him. A man who welcomed the blasting heat of the desert or the bone-numbing chill of winter merely as notches on an endless sugarcane rod, to be marked off without care for how many were done or how many more lay ahead. What little flesh he had on his bones was all sinew and gristle, so tightly stretched that his limbs appeared to curve slightly, in the way that a great longbow carved from stubbornly hard wood bent with great difficulty.
When he spoke, his voice was clear and soft, with the tone of one who believes in conserving every breath to offer in the service of his deity.
A word spoken needlessly is a missed opportunity to say the name of the Lord
. The voice that spoke the words in Rama’s head was Adhranga’s, but the rishi himself was still silent, stroking his beard in the same steady rhythm, rocking slightly on his folded legs.
Rama was suddenly flooded with flickering images of Rishi Adhranga seated before his pupils, in the shade of an enormous banyan tree, the same tree beneath which they now sat. Except it was early morning, almost sunrise, and the rishi was younger, his hair completely black, as was his beard. But the rhythm and manner in which he stroked his beard were identical.
He does it when delivering his morning pravachan, and when he sits with his fellow rishis and shishyas every night at their prashna-uttar sessions, and every time he’s posed a particularly difficult philological query. He strokes it like this for a long time, and all the rishis wait patiently, knowing that he’s about to deliver some special wisdom
.
With an effort, Rama struggled to empty his brain of the sensations flooding through like a river in spate. He silently spoke the first mantra that came to mind. It happened to be the Gayatri mantra, that most sublime of all verses, the sloka that paved the way for all auspicious beginnings. He sensed another consciousness doing exactly the same thing, like an echo.
Opening his eyes, he saw that Lakshman was moving his lips silently as well.
We are both struggling with the change wrought by the maha-mantras. Becoming something other than human.
As suddenly as the sensations had flooded his mind, they drained away, like water vanishing down a gutter.
He sighed, relieved.
At that moment, Rishi Adhranga began speaking aloud.
NINE
Shatrugan and Bharat waited restlessly outside their father’s chambers. There seemed to be an endless coming and going of serving girls and vaids, all of whom walked past with quick anxious steps. Finally, after some hours, the traffic slowed, and everyone else had left the maharaja’s chambers except for Guru Vashishta, Kausalya-maa and the royal vaid. Susama-daiimaa came thrice to ask them to come to the bhojanshalya for their evening meal, and thrice they refused. They understood from her nervous entreaties that nobody else had eaten either, except for Kaikeyi-maa. The hour grew very late, but even so, they could hear sounds outside the palace walls. Sumantra came by at one point and told them that the sounds were from a crowd collected outside the gates. Although no official word had been given to the people, the news of Dasaratha’s collapse had spread throughout the city and many Holi revellers had left the celebrations to gather at the palace gates where they waited for news of their maharaja.
The princes leaped to their feet as the royal vaid emerged from their father’s chambers. He was a tall, fair-skinned northerner with a long face lined with age, and bushy white eyebrows.
‘Vaidji? How is he?’
He looked at the faces of the two princes, his brows knitting together anxiously.
‘Rajkumars,’ he said gently. ‘I will not give you false hope. Your father’s condition is precarious.’
Shatrugan asked with unexpected belligerence: ‘Can’t you give him something? A neem potion maybe? We learned in Ayurveda that a weakness of the heart can be treated with—’
‘Rajkumar Shatrugan,’ the vaid said patiently. ‘I appreciate your knowledge. But there are some conditions that are beyond the scope of Ayurveda. Even the great body of Arya medical science has limits when issues of life and death are concerned.’
‘What are you saying, vaidji? That our father—’ Bharat struggled to finish. ‘That he may not have long to live?’
The vaid looked at him sympathetically. ‘That is what I was trying to avoid saying, but yes, it is true. He may last a week, a month, or even more than one month. But I am afraid his time is coming.’
Shatrugan’s face darkened with anger. ‘There must be something you can do. Guru Vashishta can do something. He has lived seven thousand years! He must know how to prolong Father’s life.’
The vaid sighed. ‘I can’t speak for the mahaguru. All I can tell you is that our medical knowledge has exhausted itself. Now, whatever happens, it is out of our hands. Aagya, Rajkumars.’
Shatrugan watched the vaid leave, his face tight with anger. ‘What good are they then? If they can’t help him at a time like this? What good is all that knowledge and learning?’
Bharat put his arm around his brother. ‘Shatrugan, calm down. This is not a mace-fight. You won’t help Father by getting angry.’
Shatrugan struggled with his anger. Finally he nodded. ‘I know you’re right, bhai. But I can’t seem to make myself understand it.’ He thumped his chest with a clenched fist. ‘It’s as if something inside me refuses to accept that Father is … mortal.’
‘Only his body, young prince. His atma is immortal.’
They looked up at the imposing figure of Guru Vashishta.
‘Pranaam, guruji,’ they said in unison, folding their hands before the guru.
‘I understand your anger, Rajkumar Shatrugan,’ he said kindly. ‘When faced with something as omnipotent as mortality, our first reaction is fear. And in a healthy being, fear always manifests itself first as anger. You are right to feel angry. But you must learn not to vent that anger. Instead, channel it into a more useful emotion. Turn it into prayer.’