Beneath a Marble Sky (35 page)

“His daughter?”

“I think, my lady, that it’s Isa, for I’ve seen the site from a distance, and it reminds me of him.”

My mind, dulled by years of captivity, raced ahead. “So they live!”

“I pray,” Nizam replied, raising his massive hands. “I saw the mosque a year ago, but not him. Some say he’s…some believe he’s dead.”

Suddenly my cell felt like a tomb. I couldn’t breathe. A tightness exploded within my chest and beads of sweat broke out upon my brow. “I must go. I must—”

“Escape,” Father whispered. “Escape and be reunited.”

F
ather suggested that
we bribe our jailers. Though it might have been less risky to have Nizam and a few warriors return and kill them, over the years we had grown to like these men. Around Aurangzeb, of course, they treated us harshly, but in his absence they were decent.

As I was coming to learn, Father was a man of many secrets. After recommending bribery as a course of action, he informed us about caches of weapons and gold throughout Agra. In case the Red Fort fell, as indeed it had, such resources would be invaluable to retake the throne. With rekindled passion Father told Nizam which of his strongholds held rupees and which contained other supplies we would need. Shortly thereafter, Father bribed our two evening guards, offering them enough coin to last a lifetime. They would let me out of the fort, then disappear forever with their families.

As dusk fell two days later, when all the arrangements had been made, I bade farewell to Father. I hated abandoning him and questioned the soundness of my judgment. Was I betraying my promise to my mother? Would anyone care for him once I was gone? I couldn’t answer these questions, but knew that the last time this choice presented itself I had let my love and my child go without me. I couldn’t bear to pass up this second chance. Furthermore, Father demanded that I take it. When he spoke about my escape his face glowed with animation. I knew that at least he was pleased to be plotting once again. These past few days had given him more strength and joy than he’d possessed since our imprisonment.

After hugging him and giving Akbar a piece of dried beef, I waited impatiently for the changing of the guard. When our conspirators finally arrived, I donned a nearly transparent robe and shirt, and covered myself in thick makeup and gaudy jewels. I splashed wine on my face and foul perfume on my body. It was common for courtesans to visit lords or soldiers in the fort. Now I only needed to convince the sentries at the main gates that I was a woman of the night.

Nizam came quickly. He was dressed as a lord—with an amber tunic, two necklaces of pearls, and a ruby-studded sword and scabbard. He had shaved his beard and wore only a mustache. At his arrival our guards unlocked my cell. Nizam paid them while I asked Father again if he might join me.

“I’m too weak,” he insisted, as he had so many times already.

“Please.”

“I’d endanger you. And my escape would only bring more chaos to the Empire, something it can ill afford.” He silenced my protest with a raised hand. “Allah has granted me little time, my child. It’s better to rest than run for that time. Besides, I like my view, and Akbar would miss me.”

I looked into his bloodshot eyes, searching. “Thank you, Father, thank you for your love.”

“It’s eternal.”

“As is mine.” I kissed him, squeezing his weathered hands, my vision blurring as tears swelled between my lashes. “If Allah…should take you, please, please hold Mother for me.” While he nodded I prayed that we Muslims were right, and that upon entering Paradise we would once again be in the company of friends and loved ones. Please let it be so, I thought.

“Before you leave, may I ask one thing?” he inquired. My grip on his hands tightened and he continued, “See to it that I lay out there.” He nodded toward the Taj Mahal, “at her side.”

“You shall,” I answered, hugging him. “Good-bye, Father.”

“Farewell, child. You are my reminder of all that is good in this world.”

The guards bowed as I passed. Though I desperately yearned to run forth and find Isa and Arjumand, leaving Father was torture. How can one leave such a man, when one might never see him again? Suddenly I felt weak, as if my will would betray him, but my legs would not.

“Can you carry me?” I asked Nizam humbly.

He said nothing, but I was swiftly in his arms. As Nizam ushered me through a labyrinth of hallways and stairwells within the Red Fort, I flooded Allah with my prayers. I prayed that we found my loved ones and that we secretly returned to Agra to discover Father still alive. I couldn’t conceive of him dying alone in that cold cell. Not when he had given me so much.

Prayer is for the strong and the weak, I reflected, but when my feet are next on the ground, I shall become one of the strong. I’ll continue to pray, but my path will be of my choosing, and I’ll never look back. Because until I again embrace Isa and Arjumand, I can’t be complete.

When we approached sentries stationed at the citadel’s main gate, I clenched my fists, and forced my thoughts to focus. I didn’t think of Father, or even Isa, but the task before me. As the guards stepped closer, I pretended to swim in wine, and threw my arms about Nizam. I flirted with the gawking men, arching my back so that they might glimpse my breasts. In all regards, I became a courtesan—drunkenly tracing my lips with my tongue, stroking Nizam’s face with my hands. He did his best to smile at my advances, but was a warrior, not an actor.

As one guard started to ask him something, I cleared my throat. “My younger sister,” I slurred, “isn’t far behind. Will you…won’t you escort her through the gates? She’s alone and but a child.”

The men might as well have been dogs about to go on a hunt. Their eyes widened and all save one hurriedly left their posts. I muttered good-bye to him, smiling wickedly. Beyond the thick gates, among the mayhem of Agra’s cobbled and darkening streets, our horses were tethered to an iron rail. I giggled as Nizam lifted me atop his mount. I draped my arms about his neck and he spurred the beast forward.

When far from the Red Fort, I stuffed my jewels into a pocket within Nizam’s tunic. Normally, I’d have tossed the unshapely pearls to the poor, but I realized the pearls might be useful if we had cause to bribe someone. Though I reviled the thin robe adorning me, I could do little but pull myself against Nizam as we rode toward the river.

Nizam didn’t speak but spurred his horse harder. On the way to the Yamuna, we passed the Taj Mahal. Five years had vanished since I had last seen it so close, and I felt a momentary urge to touch its precious walls. Yet there was no time for such indulgences. At any moment my absence could be discovered, though by now Father had arranged pillows under my blanket to resemble my body. With luck our ruse would remain undiscovered until long after the next change of guards.

We headed directly for a fishing boat beached beside a score of its brethren. Unlike them, it carried no nets and flopping carp, but several wooden chests. A warrior stood guard over the craft. Nizam gave him a coin and helped him push the boat into the water’s embrace as I stepped within it. About us, fishermen paused in their chores, staring. I disliked so many eyes on us, for surely rumors would ensue. But we’d be far down the river by the time Aurangzeb’s men traced our trail here.

Nizam leapt into the boat, followed by a fisherman. He must have owned the craft, for he scurried to the tiller and expertly guided us down the river. It was the dry season, and the Yamuna was low, moving lazily. Still, the shore drifted past as we headed south. I splashed water against my face, washing off the wine, perfume and makeup. As the night thickened, I wondered how our captain could safely steer us through such blackness. The lap of water against our hull and the pinpricks of light above made me think of that night so long ago, when Isa and I sat atop the barge as we returned from Delhi.

“Thank you, Nizam,” I said softly, “for freeing me.”

“Happily done, my lady.” He moved toward me from the bow, sitting with his back against the mast. “You played your part well.”

“Too well, you think?”

“I’m many things, my lady. But not a man who’d judge you.”

I took a drink of sweetened lemon juice from a goatskin bag. “A slave, once. Then a builder. Then a warrior. What’s next, my old friend?”

He shrugged his powerful shoulders. “I go with you.” The wind freshened and, as I shivered, Nizam handed me a heavier garment. “We’ll close our eyes,” he said.

I changed quickly, pleased that he had brought me a simple desert tunic made to fit a boy. I also found a turban, which I wrapped tightly about my head. “Does this part suit me better?”

“Ask me after a few days on horseback.” I offered him the juice, and he drank thirstily. “It won’t be an easy journey,” Nizam predicted. “We’ll travel fast for many days, through deserts with no ends, across rivers and mountains.”

“How long will it take?”

“Two weeks. Less if Allah smiles upon us. More, maybe never, if we come across the Deccans or Alamgir’s forces.”

“I’ll not slow you, Nizam.”

His eyes settled on mine. “You never have.”

After so many nights within my cell, the vastness of this night overwhelmed me. I saw an infinite space above, and the river seemed eternal. Is this why Akbar returned to us every night? Did he feel so very small? And are we fools to think Allah might actually care for our struggles?

Though I believed Allah heard my prayers, upon this night I felt so insignificant that I found it hard to imagine that my life would matter to Him. Surely I was like a grain of sand to a sea. I might tumble against those around me, but currents, tides and time would cast me about until I was light enough for the wind to carry away.

“Nizam?”

“Yes, my lady?”

“Might you sing, as you did so long ago?”

He had a magnificent voice, and it surged and ebbed as we drifted. His words soothed me, and in truth, I needed soothing. I was afraid of this night, afraid of where the wind might carry me. I couldn’t live without Isa and Arjumand. Already I’d lost my brothers, my mother, and soon I would lose my father. I was gaining strength with age, I knew that much, but how strong could I be when no color remained in the world?

I hummed with Nizam. Our voices blended—how good to dwell in those sounds. For a time I felt less alone, but then silence came, though it wasn’t truly silence, as I could hear my own tortured thoughts.

“Please, Allah,” I whispered. “Please let them live.”

I looked for a sign that He had heard—a dropping star, a leopard’s roar, perhaps. But no sign dawned. And I bit my nails until I bled.

Chapter 19

Journeys

A
fter
arriving in Allahabad two days later, we purchased four stallions with Father’s gold. They were fine Persian mounts, not large, but fleet of foot. What few supplies we possessed were packed behind our saddles. I hardly gave Allahabad a second glance, as I was preoccupied with thoughts of my loved ones. It seemed a dull place, with far fewer palaces and mosques than Agra.

We left Allahabad at dawn, following a beaten trail to the southwest. Nizam had changed into the clothing of a warrior and clearly looked the part. Strapped to his saddle were a musket, bow, quiver, shield, scimitar and two spears. His tunic and turban were light brown, so that he might blend into the landscape. I was clad similarly, though my only weapon was a dagger. The spare horses, also the color of sand, were tied to ours. Nizam said prudence required bringing extra mounts on such a journey. We could never hope to outfight any bandits we might stumble upon, but could outrun most.

Allahabad disappeared behind us. At the city’s periphery, we encountered colossal fields of rice. Hundreds, if not thousands of frogs lived within the fields, and as we trotted west the moans of these creatures obscured all other sounds. Much life stemmed from the paddies, for butterflies, grasshoppers and mosquitoes drifted above the verdant, ankle-high rice stalks. Amid the tidy rows, farmers had placed stuffed falcons atop bamboo poles. Such falcons, I had heard, kept troublesome crows and rats at bay. So did the slingshots I knew the half-dozen farmers in the fields brandished. The bare-chested men patrolled their crops vigilantly.

Not far from the paddies and the Yamuna that fed them, the land changed drastically. It became a flat realm, bereft of tall trees or whispering brooks. Patches of tough grass and sickly-looking bushes led to the horizon. The trail, ample enough for us to ride abreast of each other, cut like a scar into the barren earth. Dust rising from our horses’ hooves painted us brown.

We rode determinedly and the sun rose. No breeze drifted here, only the air’s kiss as our horses trotted. In Agra, with the coolness of the river and the rich gardens, the hot season was endurable. Here it seemed overpowering. Even my light tunic felt thick and became heavier as sweat trickled, then ran down my skin. The sensation was unfamiliar, sticky and tiring.

My turban shielded my face from the furious sun but felt unwieldy. I asked Nizam if I could remove it, but he made me promise not to do so. I made many such vows. For instance, I wanted to splash water against my skin, but we carried barely enough for the horses and ourselves.

So this is the life of a soldier, I thought, to march through deserts and die in strange places.

We passed few travelers that morning. We did encounter a camel-driven convoy of merchants and their wagons, as well as a group of pilgrims on their way to Mecca. We wished them well, for it is every Muslim’s duty to visit the holy shrine once in his life. The pilgrimage represents that religion is a journey, and also unites travelers by their mutual suffering. Most Muslims trek to Mecca, yet those in power—including Father, alas—often can never set time aside for the long trip.

When it became too scorching to continue, we left the trail, traveled southerly, and stopped near some boulders. No shade dwelt here, so Nizam took his two spears and stuck them in the ground. He tied a sheet of silk to the spears and the rocks. We stripped as far as decency permitted and rested on a thin carpet under the silk canopy. Nizam, however, never truly relaxed. He kept his long musket near him and constantly scanned the horizon.