KRISHNA CORIOLIS#1: Slayer of Kamsa (12 page)

It doesn’t matter. Some day I shall return, in person, and demand of you guru-dakshina, as is my right, and you shall grant me my wish without hesitation or question. Does that answer your ‘why’?

Kamsa, eyes wide with shock and fear, nodded several times more than necessary. Passing soldiers glanced at him curiously, then looked at each other. Their commander was known for his eccentricities and extreme behaviour, but this was unlike even him: standing in the middle of the woods, staring white- faced at nothing, and making absurd gestures! Perhaps defeat at the hands of Vasudeva had loosened the last hinge on the door.

For now, all you need to do is listen and do as I say. Exactly as I say. Precisely as I say. Do you follow me, boy?

Kamsa nodded vigorously again, his chin striking the armourplate on his chest more than once.

Narada nodded, satisfied. Then he began to speak:

The first thing you will do ...

eighteen

Days later, Kamsa stood on a rocky escarpment and looked out towards the distant spires of a great city.

Magadha.

A kingdom so rich and powerful and strong at arms that the thought of ever overrunning it by force had never even occurred to him. Yet, because of its strategic position, Magadha was a crucial player in the politics of Aryavarta.

Ever since his mortal father Ugrasena’s days of warmongering, Kamsa had heard its name uttered with respect, fear or frustration, often all three in the same breath. He had often fantasized of standing on this very rise, with a great army behind him, akshohinis upon akshohinis spread out for yojanas, sufficient to cast terror into the heart of any king; of falling upon the great city like a bear upon an unsuspecting prey, crushing it before it could utter a single cry or flail out. For that was the only way that Magadha could be taken: by an enormous force and completely by surprise. Anything else would result in failure and ruin.

Now, here he was, alone, exhausted from the long
ride. He hadn’t told anybody where he was going. The instant Brahmarishi Narada’s instructions were completed, as per those very instructions, he had turned his panicked horse and ridden off without a word, gesture or backward glance.

Several of his rioters had caught up with him shortly after, shouting to ask him what he desired of them. He had waved them back furiously, and, when they still followed, he had shot arrows at them from his shortbow, turning in the saddle and aiming above their heads. They had understood then, and had slowed to watch him ride on.

Had the encounter with Vasudeva not occurred a short while ago, they would almost certainly have tailed him despite his violent objection, if only because it was their sworn duty as well as their dharma to protect the heir to the crown and the king-in-waiting. But the encounter had unnerved them, and his behaviour made them assume he needed some time to himself.

Kamsa suspected they would have set up camp and would be waiting for him to return, and might even send out regular patrols to see where he had gone and to observe him from a distance.

The thought of riding into Magadha on his own, without anyone to back him up, was so far removed from anything he had ever thought or dreamt of, it seemed absurd now. And foolish. He actually feared for his life. The shifting politics of the northern kingdoms made it difficult to be certain of one’s relationship with one’s neighbours. Without a specific treaty or alliance between Mathura and Magadha, he had no way of knowing if his unannounced, unaccompanied arrival would be regarded as an act of hostility or perhaps even an insult. Arya society thrived on parampara and sanskriti – tradition and culture – and the preparation for a royal visit, as well as the pomp and ceremony of the visit in itself, was an important ritual which enabled both lieges to observe, prepare for, judge and measure one another. The royal processions through the streets of the city were, in effect, a parade for the citizens to view and gauge the visiting king’s net worth and military strength. A holiday was always declared to enable all to view a royal visit.

Yet, here he was: alone, bearing no gifts, unannounced, and with unclear politics. He knew almost nothing about the ruler of Magadha apart from the fact that he must be a strong and violently decisive ruler, because he wouldn’t be able to hold the reins of a kingdom this strong and unwieldy if he was not. But that was like saying a Kshatriya could use a sword.

Yet, Narada-muni’s instructions had been crystal clear:
The first thing you will do is go to Magadha ...

He shivered as that echoing voice reverberated in his memory again. Kicking his horse, he drove it down the slope of the escarpment.

Beast and rider stumbled downwards, leaving a curling trail of dust that rose lazily into the clear light of afternoon. At the bottom of the slope, they broke into a shambling trot that soon turned into a canter, heading towards the city.

Their progress was noted and then marked by shielded, slitted eyes behind curved visors.

As they approached, the tips of arrows fixed in strung bows followed the head of the rider, eager to be loosened and to embed themselves in his skull.

But the orders were clear and had come from the highest level, down through the ranks:

A single horse and rider will come. Both as pale as milk. They are to be permitted to pass into the city unharmed, untouched. Nobody will speak to the rider except I. Anyone who attempts to speak with him or slow his progress is to be killed on the spot.

Orders were obeyed without question in Magadha. Men were executed for looking too sharply at those giving the orders, let alone questioning or disobeying them.

At the city gates, a pack of dogs that strayed into the rider’s path, barking at the stranger, rolled over yelping, then lay still in the dust, their thin bodies riddled with arrows.

People in the streets gave the rider a wide berth, windows were shut hurriedly, doors barred, livestock brought indoors, children shushed.

The soldiers who enforced the curfew – Magadha was constantly under curfew, around the clock, all days and nights of the year – glanced briefly at the
dusty, saddle-weary man of obvious royal bearing and garb, careful not to meet his eyes and to look away instantly. Even their horses shied away from the stranger’s mount, which was frothing and almost at the end of its strength.

His horse collapsed on a street, eyes rolling back to reveal their whites completely before shuddering one final time and then lying still. The rider kicked it several times, too tired to flay it as he usually would have done back home, then walked the rest of the way. It was obvious that he had neither received food, nor drink, nor rested or slept for several days.

He wandered through bazaars bursting with produce and wares, an explosion of colour and commerce, in open defiance of the curfew. He was too exhausted to marvel at the richness of goods on display or the profusion of choice. As princes were wont to do in those times, he had lived mainly within the circumference of his father’s power, the risk of attack or assassination being too great outside his own kingdom for him to travel far. In his childhood years, Kamsa’s father had been at war with most of the world, his ferocity tempered only by age and prudence as he had finally given up the campaigns, the conquests and finally even the rivalries and clashes with neighbours, to sign the recent peace treaty. Those long decades of war had made it unwise for Ugrasena’s young to be permitted to go very far from Mathura. The end result was that Kamsa had seen very little of the world, and almost all that he had seen, he had either owned or had some power over.

Here, he had no power, no protection, neither any friends or servers.

Had a thousand pairs of eyes not watched him every step of the way, he would have been waylaid a dozen times and killed well before he reached even within sight of the enormous palace gates. Thieves, crooked merchants, corrupt guards ... Magadha seethed with dangers and threats.

Finally, he reached the palace and even his exhaustion and dehydration couldn’t stop him from noting that he was neither questioned nor stopped. Spears were turned away, gates opened for him, shields lowered, eyes looked aside ...

At last, he stood in an inner courtyard of the king’s private palace, beside a great fountain.

The enormous, carved doors – inlaid with precious gems and decorated with a great sigil worked in battered gold sheets that were so fine as to be embedded in the grain of the wood through great artisanship – swung noiselessly, and were shut and barred with a booming echo.

The first thing you will do is go to Magadha and meet privately with Jarasandha.

He had done as the saptarishi had instructed.

He was in the private palace of one of the most powerful kings of present-day Aryavarta.

He waited to see what happened next.

nineteen

After a fair amount of time, during which the sun passed from one side of the courtyard to the far end, a giant of a man appeared, treading slowly, as if stepping on sharp stones, and stood before Kamsa.

In a shockingly boyish voice, the man said, ‘Come.’

He turned and walked away in large strides, legs wide apart. Kamsa understood he was to follow and passed through to another courtyard, this one festooned with silks of every colour and other lavish decorations. The feminine nature of the adornments suggested that he was entering a queen’s or concubine’s chambers, and he was soon rewarded with glimpses of women.

They sat, lay, stood, and reclined in various poses, some on seats or beds, others on marbled floors, several cavorting in pools and fountains. There were hundreds of women, each one more attractive than the other. Never before had Kamsa seen such variety and range of feminine beauty gathered in one place. He had heard of seraglios, of course, and it was said that once even Mathura’s kings had palaces filled with beautiful concubines. But that was in ages past. Now, Ugrasena was loyal to his queen to a fault, and, had Kamsa not been born, Padmavati would have been permitted to cohabit with a maharishi in order to produce offspring. The men of Aryavarta were brothers, husbands, sons, lovers ... never patriarchs. All bloodline and inheritance was through Arya women and they were too proud to ever permit themselves to be used as mere objects of pleasure. Kamsa felt a surge of disgust for this wanton display of womanly flesh. He had no doubt that he was deliberately being taken through these parts of the palace in order to be shown the wealth and power and luxuries of the king, and he resented it every step of the way.

Kamsa passed through the palace of women and then through a number of passageways and corridors and courtyards. It seemed to take forever. He was exhausted from the journey and from the bitterness of his humiliation at Vasudeva’s hands, and desired nothing more than to eat and drink himself senseless and sleep for days. But that very humiliation and defeat also drove him on, for he was not accustomed to losing, and Narada-muni’s extraordinary words had intrigued him and awakened hope in his breast. He felt that his salvation lay here in Magadha, for surely a ruler this powerful and wealthy could be of use to him, the future emperor of the world, if Narada-muni was to be believed.

Finally, the giant with the boy’s voice brought him to another courtyard. This one was bare and bereft of any decoration or sign of luxury. It was little more than an enormous rectangular space with overlooking balconies and what appeared to be doorless chambers on every side. He smelled the rank stench of human sweat, blood, piss, shit and the other unmistakable odours of death and battle, and knew at once that he was in a place where soldiers trained, fought, lived, and died. In a sense, this was home to him, for he lived and breathed war and such places were as natural to him as a mother’s breast to an infant.

He stood, blinking in the bright sunlight, and tried to see who was sitting in the shadows of the balconies, watching, but the angle of the sun was in his eyes and he could only see outlines and the gleam of eyes, telling him that several persons were watching from above.

The giant turned to face him, bending down and grabbing a fistful of powdery dirt with which he rubbed his palms as one did to prevent one’s grip from slipping in combat. Then he slapped his bulging pectorals, his biceps, his swollen inner thigh muscles, and charged directly at Kamsa.

Kamsa was not taken by surprise. He had been expecting something along these lines ever since he had entered Magadha’s city limits. Indeed, he had been surprised that nobody had accosted or challenged him until now. The giant’s attack came almost as a relief.

He sidestepped the giant’s onrushing advance, turned, kicked at the larger man’s legs, dropping him to his knees, then sent him sprawling with a cry of outrage. The giant landed face down in the dust. Kamsa was on his back instantly, grasping his shaven head. The sweaty oil-slicked scalp slipped from his grip the first time but he crooked his elbow around the man’s neck, and took firm hold before yanking his arm upwards. The bicep strained as the giant gasped and struggled, feet and arms drumming in furious protest. A cracking resounded and Kamsa felt the massive neck give way. The large body went limp as the man’s excretory organs depleted themselves involuntarily. Kamsa lowered the man’s head to the dust slowly, extracting his hand, and rose to his feet.

He stood, gazing up at the shadowed balcony, shielding his eyes from the sun which was directly over the balcony and in his eyes.

‘Magadha-naresh!’ he shouted.‘How many more of your eunuch champions do you wish me to kill before you grant me an audience?’

There was silence at first. Then a soft chuckling came from one of the shadowy balconies. He saw a movement in the shadows and a man’s shape took form.

‘Mathura-naresh,’ a clear mid-pitched voice replied, ‘I thought to offer you only a small snack to remove the dust of the road from your palate. Now, if you desire, you may enjoy a fuller repast by feasting on my concubines whom you passed on your way here. They will feed any hungers of the belly you have as well as slake other needs, and bathe and wash you in scented oils and waters and provide you fresh anga-vastras. Then, when you are rested and refreshed, we shall meet again and talk.’