KRISHNA CORIOLIS#1: Slayer of Kamsa (7 page)

‘They call me a rakshasa,’ Kamsa said, unmindful of the blood still streaming down the side of his head. ‘They call upon Lord Vishnu to protect them from me. Let me see if Vishnu has the courage to descend to prithviloka in yet another avatar, this time to confront Kamsa. It will be good to have a worthy opponent to sink my sword into for a change. I am tired of stabbing cowherd flesh and slaughtering hairless boys.’

He raised his head towards the smoke-filled sky and bellowed: ‘YOU TOOK AN AVATAR ON EARTH TO BATTLE RAVANA. THEY SAY WHENEVER YOUR PEOPLE ARE UNABLE TO DEFEND THEMSELVES, YOU DESCEND TO PROTECT THEM. NOW DESCEND TO FACE ME, KAMSA OF MATHURA! I CHALLENGE YOU!’

Bana and Canura exchanged startled glances. Even the soldiers accompanying them looked shocked at Kamsa’s bold, blasphemous challenge.

As if in response, a deep rumbling roar came from the smoke-stained sky, followed by an angry crash of thunder. Canura winced, his horse neighing. The smell of imminent rain filled the air, along with a damp coldness. Thunder crashed again, far away in the distant horizon.

Kamsa listened, head cocked to one side like a curious hound, then threw his head back and laughed long and hard. The laughter echoed across the razed settlement, silencing the last desperate cries of the hopeless and the dying.

nine

Queen Padmavati listened with mounting horror as her spasa, a personal guard specially deputed to collect intelligence discreetly, recounted the many atrocities and war crimes perpetrated by her son. At last, she shuddered and interrupted him mid-sentence.

‘Enough!
Enough!
I can hear no more.’

She rose from her lavender seat and went to the casement, fanning herself. Summer had come down upon Mathura like a hot brand and even the coolest chambers in the palace were barely endurable. The whiff of wind from the window felt like steam off a boiling kettle.

She turned around to see maids watering down the flagstone floors to cool them. Her spasa waited, head bowed. The sight of him made her stomach churn. If she had not already heard rumours and other snatches of news corroborating parts of his report, she might have ordered her guard to drag him away to be executed instantly. As it was, she was tempted to give the command, if only to prevent him from recounting the same horrific tales to others in the palace. But, she reasoned with herself, what good would that do if these things were already known! In fact, it appeared that she was the last to learn of her son’s misdeeds – at least the extent and severity and sheer volume of those misdeeds. No, it was no fault of the spasa; the poor man had only done his job as she had commanded.

Even the fragrance of the water being sprinkled on the floors, drawn from the deepest well and made fragrant with the scent of roses from the royal gardens, could not calm her nerves. Her son? Doing such terrible things? How had things come to such a pass? Oh, that she should have lived to see such a day!

Suddenly, she lost her patience. Trembling, she shouted at the maids, the spasa, even at her personal guards standing at the doorway.

‘Out! Everyone out! I wish to be alone.’

A moment later, sitting in the privacy of her chamber, she broke down, sobbing her heart out. She thought of little Kamsa, a pudgy, fair boy with curly hair and a fondness for young animals of any breed. He had always had a kitten, a pup, a fawn, a cub, or some other youngling in his chubby arms, cradled close to his chest.

She remembered calling out to him on numerous occasions:‘Kaamu, my son, give the poor thing room to breathe. You’ll smother it with your love!’ And both Ugrasena and she laughing as Kamsa blushed, his milky-fair face turning red in the same splotched pattern every time as he ran away in that shambling hip-swinging toddler’s gait, his latest acquisition clutched close to his little chest.

She smiled, wet-eyed, remembering how adorable he had been, how proud Ugrasena and she had been of their son, their heir. What dreams they had spun, what plans, what ambitions ...

But then she recalled something she had almost forgotten, a seemingly insignificant fact suddenly made significant by the spasa’s report.

All those tiny kittens, puppies, fawns, squirrels, calves and other younglings ... where had they gone?

Kamsa had always had a different pet every few days or weeks. At first, they had stayed for longer periods, she thought, with one or two even growing noticeably larger and older. But over time, they seemed to change with increasing rapidity. Until finally, by the time he was old enough to play boys’ games and outgrew the toddler phase, he seemed to have a different pet every time she turned around, at least one every day, until it had become a matter of great amusement to his parents. She even recalled Ugrasena’s joke about Kamsa being an avatar of Pashupati, the amsa of Shiva who ruled over the animal kingdom.

What had happened to the earlier pets? Where did they go once Kamsa finished playing with them? Where did the new ones go each day?

A cold sword probed her heart, piercing painfully deep, her feverish blood steaming as it washed upon the icy tip.

Where indeed!
 

And there, with a lurch and a start, her memory threw up the recollection of a day when she had found Kamsa crouching in that peculiar toddlers’ way at something in a corner, something wet and furry and broken that had once been a kitten, or perhaps a whelp. Kamsa standing over a pile of burning rags and a tiny, charred carcass in the back corridor, eyes shining in the reflected light of the flames ... Kamsa carrying a stick with a sharpened tip sticky with fresh blood.

There were more memories. Many, many more.

She had dismissed all those incidents as accidents or merely the passing phase of a young boy’s normal growth pangs. But now, they sent the tip of that icy sword deep into her bowels, raking up terrible guilt and regret.

There
had
been signs. Kamsa had never been quite like other boys, other princes. Even when older, he had not made friends easily, had gotten into fights that ended with terrible consequences for at least some of the participants – almost always those who defied or refused to side with him – and there had been incidents with servants, serving girls, maids, a cook’s daughter ... A minor scandal over a young girl found dead and horribly mutilated in the royal gardens, last seen walking hand in hand with Kamsa the day before, which was his twelfth naming day.

Yes,signs.

Many signs.

But nothing that had prepared her for
this.

A mass murderer? A leader of marauders, ravagers, rapists, slaughterers of innocent women and children?

Her
Kamsa?

Her little boy with the fair, pudgy face and curls grown up to be the Rakshasa of Mathura, as they were calling him now?

It wasn’t possible! There had to be some mistake.

She stormed out of the chamber and went striding through the palace, her guards and serving ladies in tow. Curious courtiers and ministers’ aides watched her sweep imperiously through the wide corridors with the marbled statuary, brocaded walls and art- adorned walls.

She stopped outside the sabha hall only long enough to ask the startled guards if the king was alone or in session.

A dhoot had just arrived bearing news and the king was in private session, they replied with bowed heads, not daring to meet her agitated eyes.

She cut them off abruptly, ordering the sabha hall doors to be opened to let her in. They obeyed at once, without protest. Like most traditional Arya societies, the Yadava nations had long had a matriarchal culture. Women owned all property, from land to livestock, right down to even the garments on everyone’s back. Inheritance was by the matriarchal line, as was lineage. Every stone, brick and beam in Mathura was quite literally the property of Queen Padmavati.

She strode into the sabha hall, past the startled guards and surprised courtiers. There were not very many. Inside, Ugrasena and a few of his closest advisors and ministers sat listening keenly to a road- dusty courier – a dhoot – who broke off and peered fearfully over his shoulder at her unexpected entrance, as if afraid it might be someone else.

Padmavati strode up to the royal dais. Ugrasena frowned down at her, openly surprised.

‘Padma?’ he said, lapsing into informality.

‘My Lord,’ she said,‘I have urgent
private
business to discuss with thee. Kindly send away these honourable gentlepersons of the court.’

Ugrasena looked at her for a long moment. In the flickering light of the mashaals, she saw how he had appeared to age in the past few weeks. The peace treaty had taken a greater toll on him than the troubles of the preceding years, was what the wags were saying around court.

No, not the peace treaty. Our son’s devilry.

‘It is about Kamsa, then,’ he said, without a trace of uncertainty in his words.

She did not answer, not wishing to say anything impolitic in front of the others.

He nodded as if he understood.

‘Come, my queen,’ he said kindly, in a weary voice. ‘Seat thyself and listen to the latest tales of derring-do of our beloved son.’

ten

Ugrasena and Padmavati sat on the royal dais. Except for the mandatory royal guards at the far end of the hall, by the doors, they were alone. The dhoot had finished his report in Padmavati’s presence, recounting further episodes of Kamsa’s vileness. From the sighs, head-shakes, shrugs and other gestures and reactions of the others, she had understood that these reports were now commonplace. She shuddered at the realization: innocent lives snuffed out, butchered by her own son, and even Mathura’s wisest heads accepted it as commonplace. She did not know which was worse: the fact that he had committed and was still committing such terrible acts, or the fact that they were tacitly accepted and tolerated by those governing the kingdom.

She turned to Ugrasena now, her mind raging.

‘We must curb him,’ she said. ‘This cannot be allowed to go on.’

He sighed, rubbing his hand across his face, looking terribly weary and old, a pale shadow of the man she had wedded, loved, and shared her life with for over two decades.

She now understood why he had taken ill these past several weeks, why he had not come to her bed at nights, why an endless procession of royal vaids seemed to always be coming from or going into his chambers, why the annual festival had been cancelled, why no entertainers or artists had been invited to the palace of late ...

Her father had once told her that no matter how comfortable and luxurious it may appear, a royal throne was the hardest seat to sit on. And to remain seated on it meant foregoing all comfort forever.‘All these things,’ he had said, gesturing expansively at the rich brocades, luxurious adornments and gem- studded furniture, ‘exist to pay homage to the seat itself, to the role of king or queen. For the man or woman who sits on that hard spot, there is no luxury, no comfort, no rest.’

She saw now the truth of those words. Truly, Ugrasena, at the peak of his reign, at the helm of the greatest Yadava nation that had ever existed, had no comfort.

‘Yes,’ he agreed at last. ‘This ought not to be permitted to continue.’

She waited, knowing that he was not merely echoing her words but qualifying them.

‘Ought not,’ he repeated, still rubbing his forehead. ‘Yet,whatcanwedotostophim?’

She felt her throat catch as if she had swallowed a dry, prickly thing and it had stuck in her gullet.‘We can speak to him.’

He laughed softly. There was no humour in the laughter; it was merely an acknowledgement of the inherent humour in her suggestion. ‘Yes, of course we can. And he will talk back. And then go out and continue doing what he is doing now. And then what shall we do?’

She moistened her lips.‘We will have him confined to the palace. To his chambers. Prohibit him from leaving Mathura. Strip him of his privileges.’

He shifted in his seat and looked at her. There was no anger or irritation on his face, merely sadness, perhaps even sympathy. ‘And how will we do that? Kamsa is the commander of all our armed forces. It is he who is in charge of even the city’s security, the royal guard. You must recall that I had vested him with those powers when I crowned him heir and king-in-waiting.’

Yes, of course he had. And he had done so precisely because they had felt at that time that once he was given power and responsibility, and began handling all the administrative and other burdens of state, he would cease his adolescent antics and be compelled to settle into a more serious state of mind. Instead, he had simply used the power and leapfrogged to a whole new level of adolescent rebellion.

‘There must be somebody you can depute with the task.’ She glanced around, looking at the empty seats, trying to remember the various courtiers.‘What about—?’ She named a senior minister, formerly a general in the King’s Akshohini, the most prestigious regiment of all. ‘Or ...’ She named several others.

Ugrasena shook his head. ‘He has grown too strong. He commands the loyalty of the troops now. They would mutiny to support him if we act overtly.’

She was shocked. ‘But surely they know of his brutalities?’

Ugrasena looked away.‘He gives them freedom to enjoy the spoils of war as they please. He plays cleverly upon the natural rivalries between the Andhaka and the Sura clans. He uses past enmities, petty feuds, tribe conflicts, anything that serves his purpose. Recruitment is at its highest mark ever. Every eligible young boy old enough to hold a weapon is lining up to join Kamsa’s army. That is what they call it now, by the way,
Kamsa’s
army. Not Mathura’s. Or Ugrasena’s. Or even just the army. Kamsa’s Army.’

She looked around for water, wishing they had not sent away the serving staff. There was wine everywhere, as always, but no water to be seen. Water was too precious to be kept lying around. It was always brought fresh, untainted, and closely checked on command. And only royals and the wealthiest courtiers could afford to have potable water served at will. The vast majority of their people still had to draw it from wells or drink it from rivers or ponds when they desired to slake their thirst. Water, after all, was the main bone of contention and the reason for most of the troubles of the past decades. Like all causes of war and violence, it was merely the most visible evidence of a deeper social dissatisfaction. If she understood Ugrasena right, it appeared that Kamsa had cleverly tapped into that deep groundwater source of discontent, using it for his own devious purposes.