RAMAYANA SERIES Part 4_KING OF DHARMA (50 page)

EIGHTEEN

From the lofty height of the Seer’s Eye, the distant horizon already held the promise of dawn. The sky in the east was marginally lighter than the inky blackness of the rest of the world. The mashaals and lanterns of Ayodhya lay far below the 1008 foot stone tower, illuminating the city in pockets. Beyond its walls, crow-black darkness claimed the land. Seen thus at this hour of ghor suvah, it was possible to understand why the Aryas of the Satya Yuga had chosen this location. Bounded by the river on one side, straddling it in fact, with the rugged mountain ranges at its back, the foothills of the Himalayas, and facing the wild jungles of the Southwoods that had long marked the great patch of central aranya wilderness dividing the Southern Arya nations from the Northern ones, the city was ideally situated for defense. Beyond that great Southern sprawl of tumultuous forest wilderness, the great and splendid tribes of the southern part of the subcontinent flourished in no lesser grandeur than Ayodhya. But that central forest had long marked a natural border in the spread of Arya civilization; a boundary not of mortal making but of nature herself. And nestled within its sprawling largesse, many minor kingdoms had grown and flourished independently. Some, like the Gangetic fisher tribe the Nisadas under Guha, were friendly to Ayodhyans and Aryas. Others were openly hostile. Seen from this height, it was like viewing an ocean of darkness untouched by the mashaals of Arya knowledge and vedic wisdom. 

“Extinguish the lights,” Rama commanded as he took up a position at the South East side of the circular promontory. The wind up here was too wanton for mashaals. The PFs accompanying the royal entourage had carried lanterns. They extinguished them now at Rama’s command. 

Bharat looked around as the light faded from the last of these, marvelling at the sheer number assembled here. There were no less than thirty people on the main promontory, with a few at the back here where he stood, by the half-platform at the head of the winding stairs that afforded climbers a space to catch their breath. He had never seen so many here together at one time before. Why was it necessary to bring the entire War Council, the Counsellors, the Advisor, their mandatory PF guard, and even the Queens Sumitra and Kausalya? Whatever Rama intended to show them, it must be quite extraordinary to require their presence. He had hoped to have a moment alone with Rama to speak in private and discuss matters in a more brotherly fashion, rather than the absurd formality of the hearing – if it could be called that – to which they had just been subjected back in the sabha hall. But that seemed unlikely now. 

Bharat wistfully recalled coming up here with his brothers in happier days of yore – with Rama as well, though what a different Rama it had been back then; he remembered this one thing they had all loved to do, even though it was expressly forbidden to them. They would each take turns standing in the center of the promontory, arms held out, head flung back then turning round and round as fast as he could manage, pinwheeling, until the pillars bounding the chamber seemed to vanish, leaving one with the illusion of a completely clear view all around. It had been remarkable – and more than a little frightening, at that age. And once, when he had lost his balance and gone rolling across the stone floor, it had been Rama who had caught him, just a yard short of the unbounded edge. He had clasped his brother’s shoulders and hugged him warmly. And Rama had hugged him back. 

Now he remembered those days with sadness and regret. What had changed? Why had it changed? Why did it have to change at all? He would give anything to have those days, that brotherly love, that sense of utter closeness and completeness, back again, if only for a day, an hour, a moment. 

As the last light of the last lantern faded out slowly, and Bharat saw the faces of those nearest to him fade into obscurity, he realized why Rama had asked for the lights to be extinguished. The answer came in the form of a collective intake of breath from those standing at the fore, looking out between the pillars that were the only thing between themselves and the darkness beyond the tower. 

Due to the prescient design of the tower, every one of those gathered here on the promontory was afforded a view of the lands that lay beyond the Sarayu Valley. Despite the thick forestation of those parts, it was possible to see what Rama had brought them here to witness. 

Visible between the gaps in the trees, and in front of the treeline, their fur contrasting sufficiently with the verdant flora to make them stand out, was an army of vanars so immense that Bharat had no words to describe it. Mammoth? Huge? Enormous? All these seemed weak choices to describe the sheer profusion that carpetted the land to the east of Ayodhya, stretching for yojanas in that direction. A moving, stirring, sea of vanars, their fur rippling like grass on an open plain. Bharat felt his own breath catch in his throat. There must be lakhs of the creatures. A crore even. Two crores? Possibly. 

A small shape hovered above the gathered vanar armies, floating in mid air. Even without the silhouette of that familiar leonine head and the bushy tipped enormously long tail curled upwards, Bharat could not have mistaken Hanuman. As he watched the vanar expanded himself in size until he grew large and tall enough for his feet to touch the ground – a hummock of earth dissolved beneath his heel, crumbling to dust – and his head stood at the same height as the Seer’s Eye itself. He put his palms together and bowed towards the tower, towards Rama, speaking in a great rumbling tone that reached the gathering on the promontory like a great wind redolent of vanar fur and sweat. “By your grace, Lord Rama, I present to you the vanar armies assembled and awaiting your command.”

Rama raised his hand which, Bharat noted, now held the gleaming raj-taru of the Suryavanshi Ikshwaku dynasty. “Thank you, my loyal friend. Once again, you have lived up to your word and done me a great service.”

Hanuman bowed deeply, shrinking as he did so. In another moment, he had resumed his normal size and flew back towards the vanar ranks, descending to ground level before them. 

Several excited voices began to speak in the gathering. Rama cut them all off by turning and raising his hand again, the royal sceptre commanding instant obedience. 

“If we shall all turn to look north and west now, we shall see what Lakshman has to show us as well.”

The gathering turned at once in the direction specified. Bharat turned with them, his eyes meeting Shatrugan’s as his brother turned too. He saw the simulacrum of his own astonishment reflected in Shatrugan’s eyes. What is Rama upto? What does he intend to do with a vanar army of that magnitude? Invade Lanka again? Surely not! There was nothing in Lanka worth taking, he knew. Which meant Rama had other territories in mind. But which ones? And why? Ayodhya had no more natural enemies left now that Ravana and his great asura and rakshasa hordes were gone. Yet he would not have called for Hanuman to assembled the vanar multitudes just for a parade!

Then he saw what lay to the north-west and all thought, all logic drained from his mind. When the gathering gasped collectively this time, he opened his mouth as well. Although no sound emerged, he felt no less stunned. 

On the northwestern plains above Ayodhya, cleared generations ago to accommodate the city-state’s great standing army and provide space for its military maneuvers and training, there now stood a force of mortal soldiers on foot, on chariot, on horseback and on elephant-back. It was the army of Ayodhya, but Bharat knew the size and extent of Ayodhyan forces. This assemblage far exceeded their normal standing numbers. Where Ayodhya’s regular standing army had perhaps four akshohini or battalions, this force was far, far greater in size. 

His practised eye scanned the neat rectangular formations arrayed out in impressive order on the practise plains and beyond. The dawn was just breaking, and as the assembly on the promontory gazed out at this astonishing spectacle, spreading tentacles of light crept across the landscape, catching and reflecting off the gleaming polished armour and weaponry of the assembled ranks. Bharat estimated that no less than six akshohini were assembled, perhaps even seven or eight if those shadows at the mouth of Ikshwaku’s Canyon were also soldiers. Eight akshohini? It was staggering. Twice the size of Ayodhya’s army! And this was in addition to the vanar hordes! 

Rama said: “Behold, the greatest army ever raised in the history of the world. A force of mortals and vanars together comprising greater numbers than all the other armies of the Arya nations combined. With this great force we shall perform the Ashwamedha yagna and go forth today to challenge all the nations of the known world.”

And he raised the rajtaru, catching the slanting first light of day and setting it aglow. 

“Ayodhya Anashya!” he cried. 

Three dozen voices answered him from the promontory: “Ayodhya Anashya!”

And from the vanar hordes behind them and the mortal army before them, a great and terrible cry resounded, filling the world with a rumbling no less than thunder:

“AYODHYA ANASHYA!”

NINETEEN

Bejoo heard the thundering roar of the armies and shuddered. Between the vanars on one side and the Ayodhyan army on the other, as well as the PF forces assembled here on the main royal avenues, the sound was deafening, like a thunder crack directly above. As the echoes faded away into the silent dawn, he glanced up at the Seer’s Eye morosely. The slanting first light highlighted the rajtaru held up by Maharaja Rama Chandra – nay, it’s Samrat Rama Chandra now, remember – and limned it in dull golden light. A cheer rose from the throats of the PFs around him and he raised his hand unhappily, pretending to join in. One never knew who was watching these days, and after witnessing what happened to those who seemed less than enthusiastic about displaying support for the Emperor, he had decided to keep his objections private and his displays public. He even shouted the ubiquitous chant “Samrat Rama Chandra ki jai!!” along with the rest, almost fumbling over the first word, which had been ‘Siyavar’ for so long rather than the recent ‘Samrat’ that he had yet to grow accustomed to saying it. It tripped awkwardly off his tongue. Emperor Rama Chandra in place of Sita’s Husband Rama Chandra. That amendment of the customary cheer pretty much summed up the change in Rama over the past ten years and described all that he considered to have gone wrong with Ayodhya in the same decade. 

From his position in the midst of a large regiment of similarly attired grama-rakshaks, Bejoo could not see what the distant figures on the lofty tower were presently viewing. But he had heard the awed descriptions of the sheer size of the vanar forces, and he had personally borne witness to the growing ranks of Ayodhyan regulars over the past year, and he could imagine the mind-numbing size of the two armies that now flanked Ayodhya. Those thundering cries had been like nothing he had ever heard before. An old senapati had once said when Bejoo was but a young novice soldier, that while men stood and walked alone, they still counted as men. But the moment they banded together, they grew into a kind of beast. The greater the number of men together, the less human and more bestial they became. Until finally, when it became the size of a national army, its individual humanity was all but lost in the hive-mind of the great majority. As the old craggy general had summed it up, An army has its own sense of morality, and that sense has very little to do with what you or I call dharma. 

Now, the greatest beast ever created stood outside the walls of Ayodhya. Roaring a challenge. 

And the fact that it was on their side rather than some external enemy’s side offered little comfort to Bejoo. 

Once awakened, the beast must be fed. It will be fed. And if it cannot find sufficient nourishment outside, it will eat its own home, family and finally, itself. For such is the nature of the beast, that slouching shambling monster that men become when they go to war. It needs no reason, for war itself is against all reason. It merely needs to be unleashed. And then the massacre begins. The old veteran’s words still rumbled in the caverns of memory. 

Bejoo shuddered again. 

A little while later, after the assembly was over and the Samrat and the others from the Seer’s Eye had descended once again into the bowels of the Palace, during the brief respite before the yagna itself was scheduled to start, Bejoo was standing by his wagon, checking that all was in readiness. The task of the grama rakshaks was to bring up the flanks and rear, providing an unbroken supply chain that led back from the frontlines all the way to Ayodhya. To this end, his grama was sparsely manned, just the minimum number required to drive the wagons and load and unload. They were all over-the-hill, old or partially incapacitated PFs deemed unfit to fight or march or ride along with the regular army. And they carried only supplies. In Bejoo’s case, that meant mostly weapons of all kinds. Two wagons were filled with only arrows, some so freshly fletched and leaded he could smell the birdshit on the feathers and the smelting on the irontips. The other wagons carried an assortment of every kind of device or tool that could accomplish the brutal business of killing and sundering human beings. He supposed it was better than having to carry food provisions, like old Nachiketa’s grama, or vaids to administer to the wounded on the field like Jagannath’s grama. He sighed as he resecured a loose binding and flicked the flap of the wagon down again, hooking it deftly to prevent it flapping up as they rode. It was hard to believe that these weapons and tools of war would be used against fellow Aryas – against fellow humans, for that matter. All their lives, old soldiers like Bejoo had prayed to their chosen amsas or avatars of the One God, in his case that had been Shaneshwara, his family’s patron deity, that someday they would annihilate the asura races from the mortal realm, restore peace and usher in a new era of contentment and prosperity. 

And look at us now, he thought as he walked around the large dusty field where dozens of other gramas were similarly awaiting the order to move out. We annihilated the asura races at last. Restored peace. We even achieved the prosperity part of the bargain. But then, instead of being content with that, we’re about to start the whole vicious cycle of violence all over again. Except that this time, since we don’t have a common non-human enemy to fight, we’re just going to make do, and slaughter one another. It made him sick to the stomach to even think of the countless men and women that had died over the decades, centuries even, so that Arya civilization could attain its present level of stability and prosperity. Was it all for this? This miserable sodding relaunch of the same old madness all over again? What the bloody hell for? 

Angry and impotent, he kicked a loose stone and winced as it narrowly missed hitting the foot of another grama-rakshak. The man glared at him as if he was insane, and Bejoo raised a hand in sheepish apology. The mood across Ayodhya was taut as a bow pulled to its maximum stretch, as it usually was before any campaign, and the last thing he needed was to get into a brawl. The other grama rakshaks regarded him with barely disguised hostility, not the least because of his earlier high office and closeness to the late King Dasaratha as well as his fame as a vajra captain, hero of many legendary exploits. They knew he was too good for this post and resented his presence among them. And they were justified in their resentment. After all, he wasn’t here because he enjoyed inhaling the dust of the road and watching the hindquarters of a team of horses twitching tails for fifty yojanas every day. He was here because he had been kicked down here to this position, courtesy of Pradhan Mantri Jabali and his cronies. Not just he, much the same fate had befallen most of those old vets who had enjoyed the trust of the late Maharaja. Dasaratha had tolerated Jabali because of his efficiency and his old ties to Kosala nobility; he had never made a secret of his personal dislike of the man and his personal habits and beliefs. After Dasaratha, and more importantly, after Pradhan Mantri Sumantra’s passing, Jabali had swept the royal house clean of all those who had been in the late king’s favour – replacing them with his own cohorts. It was typical transition politics and Bejoo understood it well. What he didn’t understand, and found increasingly difficult to tolerate, was the growing hawkishness of Jabali’s administration. And Rama’s growing espousal of that hawkishness. 

And today, all his fears had been proven true. 

He stopped and looked around listlessly. He had reached the end of his grama, and everything that could be checked had been checked twice or thrice; there was nothing left to do except wait for the order to roll out. He was bitterly unhappy about having to participate in the coming campaign. This is not what I signed up for, forty years ago. And this is not what Ayodhya is supposed to use its power and military might for. Shaneshwara curse that hawknosed fool and his cronies. I warrant they’re the ones who poisoned Rama’s ear until he finally agreed to this madness. 

He suddenly felt defiant. 

What if he simply refused to take the grama out? If he just resigned his commission and walked away?

But then again, what good would that do? It would make no difference to this massive war machine that had already been set into motion. The only one it would affect was old Bejoo himself. Military service was now compulsory in Ayodhya. Refusal or resignation – or going absent without leave – was tantamount to treason, under the new interpretation of Manu’s Laws. And the danda for such an act of defiance was execution. He would be arrested for treason and probably be executed summarily, like the handful of other protestors or dissenters who had found the Ashwamedha campaign beyond their limits of tolerance. His body would still be warm as the other gramas trundled out onto the raj-marg, and he could almost imagine the other grama-rakshaks sneering or even spitting on his cooling corpse as they passed by. He sighed and rubbed his chest. No. A futile protest was no good to anyone. He may as well go along, do his duty, serve his time. At least he was not expected to participate directly in the brutality. 

He leaned morosely against the side of his lead wagon, mulling over the unfairness of it all. So distracted was he by his own thoughts that he failed to raise his head even when he heard a wagon approach. He hardly noticed even when the wagon stopped close by and the horses snickered quietly. 

A voice spoke from the wagon. A voice he had not heard in Shaneshwara knew how many years – decades? A voice from a distant, happier past. 

“So tell me, Vajra Captain Bejoo, have you danced with any vetaals lately?”