KRISHNA CORIOLIS#6: Fortress of Dwarka (23 page)

Rukmi had been pleased by the invitation, far more pleased than he could display outwardly. He had insisted on his sister accompanying him, the memory of that earlier promise to his old friend still in his mind. And he had set forth for Mathura with an entourage designed to show his own kingdom and lineage in its best light. He was proud to be associated with the son-in-law of the legendary God Emperor of Magadha, Jarasandha himself and after all, Arya society allowed for a king to take as many wives as he desired. His first hope was to renew his old friendship and build an alliance that would profit Vidarbha and align it with the powerful military forces of the Yadavas, Magadha and their allies. His second, secret wish was that Kamsa would find his sister Rukmini appealing and desire to have her as his wife.
 

But of course, that was the fateful tournament where Kamsa was slain on the wrestling field by Krishna. Even before Rukmi could meet with his old friend personally and shake his hand, the King of Mathura lay dead and broken in the dust of the akhaada field. When Jarasandha left in a huff, Rukmi and Kamsa’s other allies and friends had no choice but to do the same.
 

When he returned home to Vidarbha with his entourage, he was infuriated, even swearing aloud that he would take every fighting man he could find and ride back to Mathura to avenge his dear friend by slaughtering that upstart cowherd. He had no intention of actually doing so of course, and everyone around him understood that. Merely saying so was sufficient in Vidarbha. As time passed, he adopted and wait and watch attitude and that still held true, particularly in light of the strange rumors filtering through from Mathura these days.
 

As fate would have it, Rukmi’s path was indeed destined to cross that of his friend’s Slayer. And it would not be on account of the dead Kamsa that Rukmi would face and fight Krishna.
 

It would be on account of Rukmi’s sister.
 

Rukmini.
 

2

Balarama
had searched everywhere for Krishna. He was nowhere to be seen in the city. Finally, puzzled and starting to get a little concerned, he located Daruka who told him that Krishna had taken his pushpak and gone somewhere.
 

“Without you?” Balarama asked.
 

“Yes, sire, I was aboard already when Dwarkadisha asked me to step off. He took off without saying anything further.”
 

Balarama looked around. It was early morning and a beautiful autumn day was breaking. The sea glittered with a million sparkles as the first rays of sunshine caught the waters east of the island city and many people were already out on their terraces and verandahs, women drying their hair, men perambulating in the parks, children playing with each other and grandparents. Accustomed to a hardy life, the people continued to work and play as vigorously as ever, determined to earn their place as citizens of this island paradise.
 

“Did he seem to be in a hurry?” Balarama asked. “Or troubled? Disturbed?”
 

“Lord Sankarshan,” Daruka said gently, using Balarama’s other name, “If our Lord is troubled, anxious or agitated, I have never seen it on his face or in his behavior. He is always the same, always equitable. He seemed the same this morning as well, except…” The charioteer paused.
 

Balarama looked keenly at the sarathi’s round, trustworthy face. “Yes? Go on.”
 

Daruka frowned, thinking back. “There was something that made me feel he was…sad perhaps? Morose? Melancholy? It was not anything he said or did, but an air about him. Like the sound of a flute. So sweet, so beautiful, so haunting. But also—”

“But also so sad and lonely,” Balarama finished. “Yes, I do know what you mean, Daruka. Thank you.” He started to leave then turned back. “Oh, one more thing. Did you see which way the chariot flew?”
 

“To the east, I think, sire. But if you wish to follow him, it is a simple enough matter.”
 

“How?” Balarama asked.
 

“Your sky chariot, my Lord. It will take you to its brother chariot in moments.”
 

Balarama nodded. “I knew that. Of course I knew that.”
 

He was in the chariot and off moments later.
 

***

Balarama’s chariot took him in a wholly unexpected direction. He had thought it would carry him back towards Mathura perhaps, Gokuldham, or Vrindavan. But instead it flew to the east, angling to the north. The risen sun was in his eyes, blinding him and turning the world into a dazzling wall of gold but the pushpak dipped as it approached its destination within moments, and when he glanced back, he saw that Dwarka was long out of sight.
 

Shortly after, the chariot dropped to just above tree height, skimming the tops of endless rows of palmyra trees marking the coastline. It dipped sharply, wheeling about to the right, then landed on the banks of the confluence of the Gomati River and the sea. Balarama disembarked and looked up the length of the river, winding its way up between rows of palm trees and dense groves. He saw the sibling to his chariot, resting on the muddy bank just above the water line, and the tracks that led away into the palm forest.
 

He found Krishna standing in a clearing, surrounded by bars and pillars of sunlight streaming through dew-drenched palm fronds. The treetops were filled with squabbling parrots and myna and all manner of other birds, chattering and screeching to one another like a parliament of ministers. A brook gurgled past noisily, splashing sounds suggesting some manner of small animal sporting about out of sight.
 

His brother stood in the center of the clearing, drenched in sunlight, face raised to stare at nowhere in particular. He was as still as an ebony statue, face relaxed in the unguarded ease of deep contemplation and in that moment the older man he would someday be was visible. It was difficult to believe that he was still only a young man of barely sixteen years age but that was the fact. Balarama was barely seventeen. Yet he felt as if he had lived far more than those many years and knew that if he felt that way, then Krishna had lived lifetimes in comparison.
 

The souls of men grow older than their faces.
It was a thought that came to him unbidden. Yet it felt not like a quotation of someone else’s words but a memory of something he had himself thought once, a long time ago. Yet how long ago could it have been if he was only seventeen years old?

He remained standing beside Krishna awhile, not wishing to disturb his brother’s solitary contemplation. There was no crisis to deal with, no urgent decision to make, no message or summons to deliver. He would not even have come here had he known that all Krishna wanted was to stand alone in a riverside grove and think awhile. A man was entitled to his own time. It was only his concern that had brought him here to check on Govinda. Now that he had seen he was well and safe, he wanted to turn back and return to Dwarka at once. He regretted intruding upon this moment of idyllic privacy.
 

It was Krishna who spoke, acknowledging him without looking at him or addressing him directly. It was as if Krishna spoke to the forest itself, to the world at large, to all Creation. It was like the voice of the wind whispering through trees, the ocean singing in her bed of sand and shale.
 

“What do we come for?” said Krishna’s voice, to nobody and nothing in particular, yet therefore to everyone and all things at once. “What is it we seek here? What do we hope to accomplish? The cycle of life and birth will go on after we have come and gone, regardless of what we do. The world will turn and. turning, return again to where it once stood, then turn again. This is the song of eternity, we are merely instruments in the background, playing our part. We can neither change the song itself nor write its ending. All we do is play and then depart and another takes our place. The song goes on with or without us, it neither belongs to us nor is changed by our playing.”

A small breeze sprang up, rustling dried leaves on the ground, churning them into a small spinning vortex. Krishna’s finger rose a few inches to point to the vortex, controlling it, raising it above the ground. The leaves and particles and debris churned in the air, spinning faster. “The earth has her movement. She spins one way and the force of her spinning causes the oceans and wind currents to spin another way. But there is also a force, another undefinable force, that spins water and wind on earth in one direction in half the world and the opposite direction in the other half of the world. Northern hemisphere, it causes tornadoes and whirlpools and storms and even dogs and cats to spin in one direction. Southern hemisphere, it spins them the opposite way. It is as if an invisible line were drawn around the waist of the world, and all things north of it turn one way, all things south of it turn the other way. This is the coriolis effect.”
 

And now Krishna raised his eyes to gaze at Balarama. And Balarama saw that the pupils of his brother’s eyes were planets in their circuits, spinning around suns, and that the entire universe was reflected within those eyes—contained within those eyes. And all that had ever existed and would ever again exist was inside those eyes.
 

“So this thing we do, this game we play, this life we live, what else is it but a coriolis? A turning this way then that way then the other way again. Like a dog spinning to catch its own tail but never succeeding. Like a tornado churning and bellowing yet accomplishing nothing. Like a whirlpool sucking down the ocean or a river to no end at all. We have power and it is formidable, unimaginable power. The power to make and end. The power to create and destroy and everything between. Yet after all is said and done, the collective sum of all our deeds is nothing more than a coriolis effect. Turning and endless churning that accomplishes nothing. Not even Amrit Manthan but mere Manthan, and more Manthan. An aimless wandering across the map of time that marks the boundaries of our existence. A journey to nowhere. And I, even Krishna, even Swayam Bhagwan, can accomplish only a Krishna Coriolis. Epic sound and fury, signifying nothing.”
 

Krishna lowered his finger. The small vortex subsided. Silence lay over the clearing like a dense canopy. The chatter and shrieking of the parrots had ceased. The gurgling of the brook continued but no small creatures splashed about in its waters. The distant shirring of the ocean was a dreamlike rhythm. Sunlight trickled and dripped through the dewy fronds, setting wet earth on fire.
 

Balarama dared to look at Krishna again. The celestial system in his eyes were gone, replaced by the normal human eyes of Krishna, his brother in flesh and spirit, son of Vasudeva and Devaki and also Nanda and Yashoda, Slayer of Kamsa, Govinda of Gokuldham, Flute of Vrindavan, Lord of Mathura, Rage of Jarasandha, and Dwarkadisha.
 

“She is here, bhai,” Krishna said. “My Lakshmi is here upon earth, among us, in the flesh. She has taken rebirth to be with me in this life as in all others. I must go to her.”
 

3

Rukmini
woke from strange dreams of oceans and islands, flying chariots of gold and utopian cities. There were other things too in her dream that she could not name or describe, even to herself. Strange sense-memories of encounters she knew she had never had. How could she? They were all involving a person she had never actually met.
 

Of course, she had seen him. Once.
 

At the historic wrestling tournament in Mathura on the day that Kamsa son of Ugrasena had grappled with and been defeated by the young Vrishni. She had watched in amazement as the young dark-skinned cowherd had faced and fought a man twice his size and allegedly tenfold as strong, thanks to some mysterious potion he had drugged with by the sorcerous Jarasandha, or so she had heard. When Krishna broke Kamsa’s back and she saw the son of Ugrasena drop to the dust, she had been among the many tens of thousands who had gasped and clutched her chest and risen to her feet, raising her voice in amazement.
 

But her entourage had been compelled to depart almost immediately afterwards. She had never had a chance to actually meet Krishna in person. Though she dearly wanted to. So how could she be having memories of him…touching her, caressing, embracing…? She blushed, looking down at the red-tiled floor of her bed-chamber, embarrassed at the audacity of her own dreams. It was quite scandalous. Or was it? She wondered if she was perhaps simply besotted with the new Lord of Mathura. After all, it was only natural for her to be attracted to him.
 

But this was something more than mere attraction. It was like the memory of a relationship, a much deeper, darker, more serious and enduring relationship than a mere infatuation based on a single glimpse of a prince performing a heroic act. And the details were so…specific! It was like remembering, not dreaming or imagining. That was what confused her now.
 

What did these strange dreams and sense-memories of Krishna of Mathura mean? Why did she think of him so intimately as if they had been…lovers. This time she did not blush for despite the inappropriateness of such intimate fantasies, the term seemed apt. Almost perfect. As if, they had indeed been intimately entwined. But of course, that was hardly possible. She was only a virginal young woman. She had refused her brother’s offers of suitors time and again, even refused to exercise her privilege to hold a swayamvara to select her own husband. For reasons even she could not explain she had not been ready to engage in a relationship.
 

This was unusual as her mother and aunts and cousins and everyone else constantly saw fit to remind her. An Arya princess possessed of such beauty and position had no reason to stay unmarried. Indeed, the fact that she remained unattached itself begged the question. Another year and people would start wondering and asking Why? Why indeed. She didn’t have the answer. She hardly understood the question.