Chapter nineteen

The crack in his armour

Shobha was back in her cozy study. An ocher light playing over the smooth surface of her study table and Elvis Presley's deep notes cooing over the atmosphere; nothing much had changed. The lady had seen ages change, had lived in the most peculiar of times and learned to manage that impassiveness in her expression. She had finished her tour, as anyone would expect from her, and returned home. There was no one to question after the grandson she had seemingly left behind in mid tour, nor did any queries came after the girl who accompanied her for the journey. So was the elven practice; they would come and go as they please and their guardians in the human realms were not supposed to inquire after their comings and goings. Shobha sighed to herself. Only this once her inner voice choose to mutter in hushed whispers; something was wrong. It was not normal for Sanskar to vanish without a warning. He was a prince for heaven's sake, and one that was trained from infancy to keep an organized life.  

"What could have possibly gone wrong?" She wondered out loud, staring at the still blank sheet of paper pressed under her hand. Writing required inspiration, which her mind burdened with musings on possible incidents, could not conjure. "Yuvraj sa, is it your step mother at work once more?" 

*Wise men say, only fools rush in,

But I can't help falling in love with you...

Pausing to stare at the paper once more, Shobha began to write a fresh chapter.

It is one of the most trivial of beliefs. They tend to think their story is unique, that what they experience is limited to themselves and it shall never be repeated with another. They hold it dearly in their memories; share it proudly with their issues. They believe in immorality through their deeds, in form of legends. 

But in truth; no one can really declare their journey different from another they do not know of. Such is the entwined play of fates, the tricks in the flow of time. There are many, and many more, who tastes the same, bares the same, fears and flees the same. Sometimes they never meet, but sometimes they do. Then, there is a bigger purpose that requires their union. As at dawn the darkness meets the light and a new day sprouts to life, when the mirror reflections of fate cross paths, destiny turns a page. A new era begins.

*

Present time, Padmapeeta palace, Akashanagara.

**"Neither in the embrace of skies, nor in the arms of sea

Underneath the earth, nor among the hills

Would one find shelter from their burden to bear," Suvanna whispered an old elven saying, as she started to undress Lakshya's wound. 

Those bandages were bloody and the edges of the cut turning a nasty yellowish brown. For a high born lady the sight should have been repulsive to look at, but she would find it rather pleasant than watching the loathing in his gaze. Suvanna was aware of her reputation, the sense of fear mixed with reproach people held in their opinions for her. But earlier she did not care; she still did not care about the courtiers of her father's mad house of a court. Lakshya was a different case. He was not supposed to hate her; after all he did not look at Ragini that way. Her mind wondered back to the words she had muttered to herself earlier. Ragini's face would not shelter her from what she has to bear. 

"Was that advice for me or yourself?" Lakshya asked her, his tone aloof and his eyes travelling the premises instead of looking at her. "After all I'm not planning patricide,"

Suvanna winced, the words hitting harder when voiced.

"I'm not going to kill him, no," she said in a monotonous voice. 

She looked up at him, as she cleaned his cut, wanting to catch a glimpse of pain flash across his smooth features. She wanted him to experience a trace of her agony, if only to make her feel less ominous. There was none however as he returned her gaze coldly.

"You are betraying your land for nothing then?" He could have doubled in laughter at her and made it feel less mocking. "My; such a generous heart!"

Suvanna dubbed some kind of a cooling salve into the cut, her face impassive. Lakshya was still chuckling. 

"And I'm supposed to aid in this selfless adventure by risking my life, pretending to be a mindless puppet for a princess who has no idea what she wants."

"I want you to reach the final combat, collect powers in the process." She spoke in the end. "I do know what I want."

"Well yeah," Lakshya nodded, still in his cynical tone. "You want me to render your king powerless and then what...you kill me, save your daddy and become daddy's princess?"

Suvanna sighed as she finished dressing his wound. Her eyes were cold as she returned his gaze. " are you going to provoke me into reacting? Then sadly, I'm not a Vajra who wear their emotions around their necks and tempers dangling at every gust of wind. You're not going to find answers by tricking me into conversation Kuwar sa."

Lakshya looked a little startled at the use of his title he was not used to hear it often. Suvanna stood up, her skirts rustling and walked to the high window overlooking the misty palace grounds beneath her tower.

" Where do your loyalties really lie?" She mused aloud. " Are you really doing this for the sake of the deal we made? So that I would release Ragini from my hold and you'd be able to take her to your mother as you were ordered."

Lakshya turned slightly to his left, watching her forlorn figure by the window as he pondered his answer. 

"What do you mean to achieve by asking the same question again and again?" His tone was no longer icy, but a curious tint thawing the initial indifference away.  "I remember you. ..as a child...I wouldn't have guessed this turn of events then."

"People change, their circumstances change them." Suvanna's voice sounded distant as she answered.  " I went to the noir sect hoping to get enough power to achieve my father's dream. I sacrificed much, including myself...only to realise that I don't have it in me to embrace that pitch blackness into my soul.  I wasn't evil enough." She laughed a humourless empty laughter that sounded almost like wheezing for a brief moment. " I was punished for that, tortured,  poisoned, left in the swamps to bleed out and perish." She turned around leaning against the windowsill,  the silvery light from the moon glazing over her already smooth features.  "You know people don't fear the dying as much as the dead. They speak fearlessly without hesitation and it was then I knew that when my father let me go on this quest, he already knew I wouldn't be able to reach the end. He knew that I would give up and die. He counted on it."

When their gazes met again her eyes were stony a haunted look robbing them of their lively quality. 

"I was tricked to die...like a brainless beast running after a mirage in an endless desert. It was then I decided that if I cannot be the one to aquire his dream I shall be what my father would never dream of. I want him to realise that not only a son can be the salvation of a father. He would learn it the day he begs me to spare his life. I want him to realise that not only kings bends people and he will know it once he kneels for me. I never cherished an ambition for a throne, it had always been my father's heart that I thrived for. But if I can never be his daughter I shall be the queen above him." Her lips curled in a faint shadow of a smile. " I am evil enough for that."

Lakshya watched her for another minute before he realized that she had finished speaking.  He cleared his throat.  

" My loyalty lies with my brother the king."

Suvanna chuckled. 

" your brother isn't a king and most certainly he is not the king your mother would wish for."

"You have no knowledge about my mother." His tone sounded a little too defensive than he intended it to sound. 

" Perhaps, but I know of the way this game is played Kuwar sa." Suvanna bowed her head, fixing a thread in her sleeve with utmost attention. "As I said, circumstances change people. I wonder what will become of you when the choice is between your mother and your brother."

"I have no desire for the throne."

"Yet..." She amended him.  "Perhaps your mind would alter when the power of Anjani throne is in your grasp."

*

Long time previously, the Vajramandapa  (court of Vajra).

It had been a moment before the sun dipped its entire glorious self in the waves beyond their borders. The last lazy rays still reached out to the western skies, stroking the scattered clouds with elegant shades of shell pink, cobalt, red and gold.

 He was back in the place where he had no plans of ending up; the place he could not leave ever again, until his last breath; the throne of Vajra. The floor rose high above the rest of the Vajra court, the seat itself majestic enough to create an impression even in its unoccupied self. It had gold work upon the head and arm rests, never ending patterns of miniature and acute detailing, flames, blooms, waves and winds all entwining together. The throne was his brother's dream, not Ram's. It was, well, a sign of the power one held over the three nations alright, but also, of sacrifice, pain and eternal loneliness. His eyes traveled the empty court room; there was a considerable distance between the stage where the Vajra sat and the standings of the rest of the court. It was a distance that no one could cross, a gap that shall never be filled. He felt cold suddenly. 

And the doors burst open.

As usual his wife walked in. The elegance of her steps, the swish of her skirts as prominent as he always remembered. In his mind, he could replay the moment they first came across each other. Then all the time in-between this minute and that; the subtle emotions, the scalding desires,  hopes, fears, battles and smiles. She had always been there. Aruna; the only woman he truly wanted; and the only one he would ever want.

But her companionship was not freely given. There were promises he made to her. Those promises he had been forced to break off as well. From a distant a past memory beckoned him. He could hear her voice, as she considered his proposal of marriage.

"I would never be a queen, so to live with me you would have to give up any ambitions you have for the throne. Most certainly I would not share your love with anyone else, so no other woman will be your wife after me. I am a believer of non violence unlike your people, so I would surely never love a man who has killed another. With all that said, can't you really see that we are not meant to be?"

For a moment there was nothing but the giggles of river Indra and the rustle of the wind. Ram let his smile curve his lips, as she uttered those words that he knew she would. 

"Are you planning of throwing me away, or binding me to you forever with those words?"

She stopped at the center of the court, never crossing the distance the ground plan imposed upon them and bowed gracefully. Her eyes remained on the ground, never rising up to meet his gaze and she could have plunged a knife into his heart and wounded him less than what she inflicted by that behavior. 

"I had to kill him; there was no other way of stopping what he had started." An uninvited explanation broke the silence. 

"The battles are never without blood, your majesty." She replied without an emotion.

"Vajras don't break their promises, the dowager queen had given her word to Devi Annapurna's father...so I would have to...I,"

"You're a king now, and a king should marry a queen." There was a resigned tone in her reply. Ram looked at her, startled. 

"Please tell me you're not thinking of abandoning me. That you'll stay here by my side."

Aruna raised her head. It had been months since they met face to face and he had almost forgotten how vibrant her olive green eyes could turn. But they were not that unique shade anymore, but an icy hazel, specked with a wary gray.

"I told you I'll never be a queen," she begun, in a distant tone. "I did not lie then."

"We are bonded for life and death, surely that means something?"

"Your majesty, tell me this. What is left in the bond you speak of, other than memories of far gone years and pricking shreds of broken promises?"

"There are you and I, wouldn't that suffice?" 

"Are we really the same people anymore?"

Aruna turned to leave, hiding her freshly pouring tears and Ram crossed the distance between the throne and the door in a few long strides, effectively blocking her exit. He gathered her fragile frame in his arms and buried his face in the crook of her neck. Aruna stood motionless, letting him inhale the familiar fragrance of dump snowdrops and the spring breeze of her hair. 

"I'm tired," he muttered against her skin.

 "Struggling through never ending battles of both words and weapons, never pausing, never thinking, never forgiving... I'm wounded, by the cuts I made on my own people, by the deaths I delivered, by the cries I've caused. I haven't slept in months, without dreaming of the brother I've destructed. Is it necessary that you'd torture me too?"

"Ram..." Her voice shattered and broke, as she ran a hand through his hair. He only pressed her tighter in his arms, sinking into that embrace, trying to find his next breath from somewhere within her existence. 

"I did not lie either, when I said that I don't want the throne. I did not lie when I said you are the only one for me... I did not lie then. And I'm not lying now," he drew in a deep rattling breath. "You are my only queen..."

*

Present time, in the border line of Asanikshestra.

The night that descended upon the caves of Marutha was pitch black, the moon light too flimsy to tore through the darkness remained confined in the limits of the gray and indigo patched sky. Agni tried to ignore the glares thrown at his way, by the nomads gathered around their camp fires by the cave complex.  They watched as the men led by Megha pulled them through the sandy footpath, leading towards the rock planes of the cave entrance. Mentally he noticed the number of the crowd, without an effort to count them he knew that it was too much to fight through; even without an injured prince at tow. So, for the moment he had to assume the lady was right in trusting the rough men and that their leader would be sensible enough to negotiate.

He did not trust them. The trust of a Skia was not given so freely. Especially when the matter concerned about the safety of their crown prince. But he had to give up for the moment. He could fight later, but Agni realized that this was the last chance he had in reaching out for his people in the main city. The Marutha caves were blocking his power from reaching out to the Vajras. Probably the nomads had enabled some kind of an enchantment to stop them from being discovered; much like the shield line of the Nagas.  

Ignoring the high pitched singing of the drunken nomads surrounding the dying bonfire, Agni closed his eyes and reached out with his subconscious to the border lines of Vajrateerta. The crossing lines were indeed closed. He could sense a subtle power blocking his mind from penetration.  That power was not as solid as a decree of the twelve ministers.  It relieved him, for it meant the queen regent had not yet managed to turn the ministers. So it was the queen herself, Agni concluded in the end. She was using her power as a senior member of the royal household. It was only a temporary enchantment. 

Agni almost drew back his power.  And then paused. What was the point of doing something so seriously treasonous for a matter of hours. Unless, those few hours would complete some critical process. What could urge the lady into doing something so treasonous; when she had been bidding her time for decades? He almost sneered; did the woman by any chance had some hand in that abrupt attack launched upon them in the human realms? Did she close the gates in order to block the prince from the easiest way to heal himself...the power source of Vajras laying deep in the Vajrateerta forests; the herz. 

Before he could reach through however the barriers of Marutha cut off the path of his power. A new view greeted his startled eyes, as they were pushed into the very deep of the underground base of the exiled Bhavas. There was no flames cackling in these parts of the den, but the entire place lit up by a intense white light. For a moment he toyed with the idea of human florescent light, but then admonished himself. The inner walls of the large opening they were ushered into were polished to the highest possible decree of smoothness. He caught a glimpse of himself as he was whisked past the nearest bolder and the knowledge struck him. The Rock mirrors reflected the flimsy moon light into the den, capturing the highest possible number of rays that the light was intense enough to distinguish the sharply inked tattoos on the arms that continued to drag him.

In the shadows created by the reflected moonlight stood a group of people. A woman was in their midst,  with dark brown hair and sharp grayish eyes. Those eyes struck in him a resemblance of an eagal, a magnificent bird bathing in the silvery light, waiting for its prey to appear. With a jolt Agni realized it was towards her they were being dragged. 

Kalindi raised her head as the men brought forward the captured Vajras. Her stony eyes taking them in, trying to place them in her brief memories of the Agniduta fortress. She noticed Agni, the rigid square jaw and the olive eyes and instantly recalled him being the faithful guardian of the Queen Mother Nanda. She could notice the look of irritation crossing the man's features and noted that he was not overtly pleased to cross paths with her kind. Well, senani, fate was difficult sometimes.

Her eyes shifted, from him to the young woman. She met her gaze, with a strange gold one. Not a Vajra, noted Kalindi. The brownish features set in a delicate manner, the large eyes and thick curtains of hair. Not a Naga either. There was no disdain in her gaze,  no tint of malice or sarcasm.  There was a plain curiosity and a deep concern. Surely not a judgemental Anjani. 

" Who are you?" She asked in a mild tone, one that was half curious and half calculating. 

" She is the lady of Anjanis," Sanskar replied her, and Kalindi's eyes jumped from the golden pair to the sparkling emerald ones. It took her a moment to notice how pale he was, and sense the diminishing aura. 

"Megha...!"Kalindi's voice rose and octave as she addressed him. Almost Involuntarily she moved closer, stretching out an arm to touch him, an absolute concern masking her initial sharpness.

Agni could not react as fast as he wanted to, in shielding his prince. But the Bhava woman could not touch him, as Swara held her wrist. Almost as if struck by a lightening Kalindi jerked and looked at her, trying to free her arm from the hold tightened around it.  

That effort was in vain. As Swara's hold did not relent and her power reached out to the layers of the nomadic woman's mind, deciphering her loyalties. 

*

1995, Vajrateerta.

Years had unfolded themselves, turning the dirty girl chased by the vajra soldiers into a young woman, a ranked servant of the Vajra queen Aruna. But all the storms of her life were not yet dealt with. 

The cell door cracked as it opened. From her blurred vision she could not recognise the soldiers who entered. But there was no mistaking of the woman who they followed; or the white and gold skirts flowing on the dusty ground.

" Sujata?" Aruna's voice was cautious as she called out to the barely conscious girl. Theirs was not a bond of master and a servant, they were more of sisters. They were two women who felt outcasts in the glorious Vajrateerta. Neither of them were truly accepted by the Vajras. 

"My queen," she dropped at her feel, her forehead touching Aruna's feet. Aruna jumped backwards, biting her lip to stop a cry from escaping. Her features did not betray it, but the agonised look in her eyes made it clear; Aruna was disgusted at her own incapability. " Trust me it wasn't me!" The girl continued to sob. "I did not try to kill the infant prince. ..why should I? It wasn't me...It wasn't!"

Aruna closed her eyes, recalling the past evening when she had begged the Vajra to let go of the girl. Her choice of words had been similar. 

Ram had looked at her, with an unreadable look, before ordering the servants out and slamming the study door shut. 

" Aryaman asked me the same thing," he said in a calm tone. " After all what advantage it offered a mere maid if the prince was dead...and then he most conveniently remembered...It was the queen's maid. Aryaman wonders was the queen by any chance feeling insecure with the new prince's birth? Was she afraid now that her half blood son has a competition to the throne...?"

As if he had slapped her, Aruna dropped to her knees. Too shocked to sob she was that she did not notice the tears draining down her face. 

" If Mohan wasn't there I would have killed Aryaman."Ram growled turning away from her.

 "For suggesting that my queen, you of all people was capable of something so hideous. But he has already suggested it and planted the doubt in the courtiers' mind. Now if I was to argue on Sujata's  Innocence the next finger would be pointed at you."

"Then I..."

" No you will not." Ram cut in before Aruna could complete her suggestion. 

" But I know how to..."

"You're not going to meddle into this mud, neither will you take the blame and step down from your title."

"But your majesty,"

"Leave Queen, we're done discussing this. There's nothing that requires me sacrificing you. That's all I have to say. "

As the memory flew past her mind she gestured the guards to wait outside and knelt herself to grab the sobbing girl by the shoulders. 

" You're going to leave the city tonight,  before the trial tomorrow and before they sentence you to death." She muttered holding the girl close and in the native tongue of the Nagas.  Taking Sujata's cold and bloodied hand, Aruna fisted her a cold amethyst stone, dangling from a bronze chain.  " It's a vesha charm, it will help you take another face while fleeing the borders. Mohan agreed to help."

Aruna's eyes travelled over her bruised face taking in the puffed eyes and the cut in her lip. 

" Leave Sujata behind these walls, take a new name and start over."

Her eyes brimmed with unshed tears as Aruna pressed her lips to the girl's forehead.

" May the spirits look after you Kalindi, my sister."

*

Notes:

*Is an Elvis Presley song. 

**is an altered buddhist saying. The real one goes about the same in first lines but talks about fleeing one's sins instead of the burden as I've used. I did not intend to hurt anyone's feelings there nor any disrespect for the religion was intended.