“Here we are,” said the old brahmana, jabbing one slender brown finger at the wide birch bark scroll. His fingertip rested on a small illustration in red ink depicting a minute tower rising from within a circular wall.
“Kampilya,” whispered the dark girl, bending closer to scrutinize the tiny picture. The illustration was surprisingly detailed despite its minuscule size, with individual bricks outlined in the wall and a little banner flying from the tower.
“Precisely,” said the brahmana, giving the tower an authoritative tap.
“And this is the river,” said the girl, running her finger along a set of three squiggly black lines above the red tower. The lines flowed across almost the entire length of the map, bisecting it in a curve which began near the upper left corner, ran downward a ways, then turned and crossed the scroll from left to right, finally running off the edge above the bottom right corner.
“That is Mother Ganga,” said the brahmana. “She gives life to all this land. One bath in her waters cleanses the sins of seven generations of ancestors and seven generations of descendants.”
“Tell me again about how she came to Earth.”
“Not now. I will tell you that story again another time. For now you must learn where you live. Are you listening, prince?”
The young man whom he had addressed did not respond at first. He was sitting cross-legged, like the brahmana and the princess, his large dark eyes gazing at a point in space somewhere above the old man’s head. He was slim and wiry, the veins wrapping his arms protruded like ropes, and he wore gold earrings. His skin was very dark, almost black, and his long hair was oiled and tied back in a topknot.
“Prince!”
“Mmm. Yes, I am listening. You were telling my sister that we shan’t hear Ganga’s story again right now.”
“That’s right,” said the old man. “Now look here. Directly to the north lies Ahicchatra, the city evil Drona stole from your father.”
He ran his fingertip up the map, across the Ganga, and pointed at a second red ink picture, this time depicting a wall which bounded three towers.
“I am going to kill him one day,” said the prince, matter-of-factly. He used the same tone someone might employ to say, “I think it might rain tomorrow.”
“Correct,” said the brahmana. “Now all this land”—he drew a circle with his fingertip around the two red cities and a section of the sacred river—“is Panchala, the kingdom of your ancestors. Because of Drona it is now divided into two. Your father rules South of Ganga, while that brahmana who wants to be a kshatriya rules to the North. Now pay attention. If you follow the Ganga North-West, toward her source in the Himalaya, you will arrive at Hastinapura, the ancestral seat of the Kurus.”
His finger followed the three lines of the river upward and came to rest on a picture of a war elephant. Its tusks were adorned with gold pigment and a tiny tower perched on its back.
“All the lands from here”—he drew a line a little below the elephant’s feet—“to the mountains are the domain of the Kuru clan.”
“Is it true,” said the princess, “that their king is blind?”
“Yes, Dhritarashtra is blind. But his sons are all marvelous warriors.”
“And is it true that they are always fighting with their cousins?” asked the prince.
“It was the case that the sons of Dhritarashtra disliked the sons of his dead brother, Pandu. But the sons of Pandu perished in a fire some months ago. Now there is peace in the palace of Hastinapura.”
The prince and princess said nothing. The mention of fire summoned memories of their birth, confused and terrifying memories of flames and smoke and sudden light cutting into blindness. Knowing that her brother’s thoughts ran with hers the princess reached across the map and took his hand. He smiled at her, his teeth startlingly white.
“West of Kuru lie the kingdoms of Shalva and Bhadrakara,” continued the old brahmana. “And to the South-West the vast land of Matsya, whose capital is Virata. Now let us follow the Yamuna.”
He indicated a second river, this one formed of two blue lines, which ran parallel to Ganga on her Western side.
“The Yamuna flows through Kuru and into the kingdom of the Vrishnis, a boisterous and warlike family. Their capital was at Mathura, here on the riverside, but recently they were driven from their ancestral lands. Now most of the clan resides in Dwaraka on the Western seashore.”
“Who drove them out?” asked the princess. She had wrapped a strand of her hair around one of her fingers and was tugging it, a habit she had when she was concentrating intensely.
“Jarasandha, king of Maghada. I will show you where he lives presently. Now look here: once she passes Mathura the Yamuna forms the Northern border of Ushinara and Chedi, both wealthy and fertile kingdoms, before joining Ganga here at Prayaga.”
His finger, which had been following the curve of the Yamuna from the North-West toward the East, stopped at the point where the two blue lines intersected the three black lines of the Ganga. The confluence was circled with gold ink.
“Here also the invisible river Saraswati joins with the two sacred waters. From here they are all one Ganga, flowing always toward the sea. The divine waters flow almost due East from here, except for this portion where the river curves and flows North for a short distance. There, on the Western bank, is the sacred city of Kashi.”
He indicated a set of tiny, intricately detailed buildings which rose from the edge of the wavy water lines. The artist had added a circlet of gold lines radiating outward from the buildings. They seemed to indicate a bright glow, as if the buildings themselves shone like the sun.
“Kashi is sacred, ageless and timeless. It existed before all the rest of the world and when the deluge destroys the Earth it will remain, lifted above the dark waters on the hand of the Great God.”
The royal siblings both pressed their palms together reverently.
“Have you ever been there?” asked the princess.
“I have not yet had the privilege,” said the old brahmana, “but I will make the pilgrimage before I die.”
He sat silent a moment, gazing at the bright city on the map, before clearing his throat and continuing.
“Now,” he said, waving his hand at a wide area of mostly blank birchbark above the river and Kashi, “North of Kashi, East of Panchala, is the kingdom of Koshala. The kings of Koshala rule from the ancient city of Ayodhya, which lies here on the bank of the Sarayu.”
He pointed out a small red dot next to a wavy blue line which flowed down toward the wide Ganga. Next to the dot was a curious illustration: a pair of simple sandals, their slender thongs spotted with drips of gold pigment. Here again the artist had added a corona of gold lines indicating effulgence.
“It was from Ayodhya that Rama ruled the world long ago,” said the brahmana.
“Who was Rama?” asked the princess.
For a moment the brahmana looked at her with undisguised shock on his face. Then he cleared his throat and shook his head as if to dislodge an annoying thought. It was difficult for him to remember that these young people, who were already physically in the full bloom of adolescence, able to speak articulately and reason clearly, were practically newborns when it came to knowledge of the world. But if it was strange for him to teach a pair of almost adult siblings things that any toddler would know, it was doubly strange for the prince and princess themselves. Their strong, capable bodies and sharp, inquisitive minds were ready to live fully in the world, yet they had no understanding, everything confused them; they usually kept silent so as to avoid appearing foolish. The only people they questioned openly were their brahmana tutor and their father.
“Rama was the Lord Vishnu, the maintainer of all worlds, born on Earth to rid her of evil. He was born as a prince of Ayodhya many many years ago. His life was difficult: he was exiled from his home and his wife, Sita, was stolen from him by rakshasas. He had to travel far to the South, to the island of Lanka, to take Sita back from the ten-headed demon king Ravana, who in those days had conquered the cosmos. Rama defeated Ravana and destroyed his armies, with the help of his servant Hanuman and his brother Lakshman. He returned to Ayodhya with Sita and ruled there for ten thousand years. His reign was a time of absolute peace and prosperity, when dharma held all things in the correct balance.”
“And why is there a picture of a pair of shoes?” probed the princess.
“Ah! That is because of what happened when Rama was exiled. You see, he was cast out because his father had three wives, one of whom was jealous and wanted the throne to go to her son instead of Rama, even though he was the eldest. She used an old vow of the king to manipulate him into sending Rama into exile. But her son, Bharata, was honorable and loved his elder brother fiercely. He followed Rama and begged him to return to Ayodhya at once, but Rama said that to do so would make his father a liar. So Bharata took Rama’s shoes and put them on the throne. He ruled well from a low seat beside the throne while the shoes held Rama’s place until he returned, and ever since then the people of Koshala honor Bharata’s loyalty by flying Rama’s gold sandals on their banners.”
The princess caressed the sandals with her fingertip. The tiny droplets of gold ink had a different texture from the birchbark, pleasing to touch.
“Now then,” said the brahmana. He took hold of the young lady’s wrist and guided her hand Westward and down to where the Ganga flowed off the edge of the map. Below the river the artist had drawn a triangular black banner, its edges warped as if by wind.
“This,” said the old man, “is the kingdom of Magadha. It is ruled by Jarasandha, a man of immense power and military might. Most of the lords of the North pay tribute to him and he has conquered many lands beyond the edges of his ancestral kingdom. When his armies attack, the warriors of his enemies must either surrender and become his vassals, or else they flee to distant lands. It is because of Jarasandha that the Vrishnis have left Mathura and gone to live in far Dwaraka. Luckily for you two, he has not yet set his eye on Panchala, though perhaps it is only a matter of time. He is like a man with a hole in his stomach: always hungry, never satisfied.”
“Have you ever seen him?” asked the prince.
“Yes, on one occasion. He is an enormous man, bigger than a tree, with a black beard. He is an ardent devotee of the Great God and his brow is always painted with white ash.”
The young prince smiled. The idea of such an imposing person seemed to thrill his heart.
“Where does Ganga go after that?” asked the princess. She was eyeing the edge of the map, as all curious children do when presented with such documents.
“Mother Ganga flows on through the land of Anga. Then she joins the sea in the land of Vangala.”
“So Vangala is by the sea to the East and Dwaraka to the West?”
“Yes, but Vangala is a large area of land without many cities or even villages, whereas Dwaraka is a metropolis.”
“And what about the South? What’s below this map?”
“Jungles. Deserts. And other kingdoms too, kingdoms of the old ones. The Southern people claim that they were here before the Himalaya rose from the sea, before even the Sun and Moon illuminated the heavens. To the South there are many sacred groves, shrines, and places of power, but it is dangerous to travel there. The cities are few and far between and the jungles are very dense and rife with tigers and apes and elephants and rakshasas.”
The princess smiled. She loved when their teacher described distant, mysterious lands. The idea of dark jungles dripping with green rain, loud with the sound of blood-drinking insects, with carnivorous flowers and enormous cats stalking the shadows, heated her imagination. She was hungry for all the strangeness of the world.
“And who are they?” she said, pointing to four figures the mapmaker had placed in the upper left corner of the scroll. They were positioned around a gold circle which bounded a black quadrangle such that each corner pointed to one of the figures.
“You know them,” said the old brahmana. “You saw your father and I giving them worship only yesterday.”
“Tell us again,” insisted the princess.
“Very well. They are the Lokapalas, the World-Guardians. They watch over the four directions. To the West is Varuna, the lord of waters.”
He pointed to the figure positioned beside the Western point of the compass. The illustrator had used all his powers to conjure the god’s form in minute detail: he sat astride a strange four-legged green beast which sported a curly tail and long jaws full of small, triangular teeth. The lord of the waters wore a tall ornate crown and held a noose in his hand.
Next the priest indicated the Northern guardian, a portly personage with large earrings and many heavy gold necklaces adorning his plump neck. His face bore a jolly smile and looked quite friendly, despite the two hooked tusks which protruded from the corners of his mouth. He had three legs.
“That is Kubera, the lord of wealth. He guards all the treasures of the Earth in his deep storerooms under the mountains, and he is the king of the spirits. The trees, hills, rivers, and mountains all pay their taxes to him.
“The Eastern guardian is Indra, king of the high heaven. He rides his white elephant, Airavata, and carries the thunderbolt. His body is covered with a thousand eyes.”
Indeed, the kingly figure astride the large elephant was adorned with many small blue eyes, like fishes swimming in the surface of his skin. The princess could not tell if there were quite one thousand in the picture, but there were certainly a lot of eyes.
“And what about the guardian of the South?” she said. She pointed to the figure at the bottom of the circle. The artist had filled in the entire body with black ink, except for two small blank eyes which seemed almost to glow. In one hand he held a large club, in the other a noose. He sat atop a horned beast which looked something like the black buffalos she had seen farmers driving outside the city walls.
“He is Yama, the limiter of life. He is present whenever death strikes, and he knows all the good and bad deeds of every person. When he comes to collect the soul from the dying body he knows whether that person has lived a life according to dharma or not.”
“Does anyone ever escape him?”
“No. Nobody escapes him. There are some beings who live very long lives, much longer than you can imagine, but in the end he always comes, even for the gods.”
“And will he die?”
The brahmana scratched behind one of his long, venerable ears. He looked perplexed and annoyed by his own perplexity.
“Yes,” he said at length, “Yama must die too. Time comes for all beings.”
“Then who takes his soul when he dies?”
The old man stood up quickly, his knees exclaiming two loud pops.
“That is enough for today,” he said decisively. “I am tired, and I need to prepare for evening prayers. You two can entertain each other for a while.”
Without another word he left the room. The two young people remained still and silent, listening to the receding rustle of his dhoti and slap of his bare feet on the floor. When those sounds finally faded into the marble quiet of the palace they lay down with their heads beside each other, their feet facing in opposite directions. This was what they always did when no one else was around. They lay with their backs on the floor, black cheek touching black cheek, and whispered. What the fire-born siblings talked about was doubtless very secret, very dear to their smoke-scorched hearts—so let us not listen in and spoil their privacy. Their precious moments should remain untarnished by hungry ears, a soft silver substance shared between two souls alone. Let us leave them in peace and return to the heroes of our tale.
Short, Sweet & Mysterious... <3 <3 <3