PRINCE IN EXILE (93 page)

‘My lord, all I know of military strategy I learned at your side.’ Mandodhari’s tears had subsided, giving way to a muted smugness. 

Don
’
t bother with the syrupy praises
, Ravana mindspoke, though Vibhisena noted the unmasked note of approval that nevertheless slipped through.
But I do grant you this much
…
you did a shockingly good job of it
. 

‘Thank you, my lord. I am sure you will be pleased by my work once you are up and about again.’ 

I doubt that
.
Whatever I
’
ve seen already wasn
’
t exactly my idea of a rakshasa lair
,
let alone a fortress designed to keep out a mortal invasion
.
But then
,
you only used that as an excuse
. 

‘Nay, my husband. Slow of thought though the clan chiefs may be, they are not altogether without wit. Had I only initiated a cosmetic makeover of the kingdom, they would have seen through my subterfuge eventually and risen up once more. That would have been much more disastrous, their numbers being so enormously swelled by then.’ 

How so
?
The numbers of our rakshasas were severely reduced after the brahm-astra struck us at Mithila
.
And Vibhisena
’
s attempt to rescuscitate me in the volcano shut the hell portal down
,
perhaps for all time
,
cutting off the primary source of our resupply of fresh troops from the netherworlds
,
whether of our own or other asura species
.
Apart from a few thousand strays
,
there could have been no more than a few score thousand rakshasas left in Lanka
.
Even with our usual frenetic pace of multiplication
,
how many could that number have swelled to by now
?
Two hundred thousand
?
Three
?
Half a million
?
I doubt even that much could be possible
. 

Mandodhari smiled. It was the smile of a cat that had her bowl of cream at the tip of her nose. ‘Substantially more than that. Allow me to show you in good time, my lord. I think you will be pleasantly surprised by what I was able to achieve.’ 

She went on brusquely, her bossy manner regained along with her confidence, explaining the details of the fortification. Vibhisena found himself reluctantly impressed by her ability to transform so elegantly from the weeping, distraught, misunderstood wife back into this paragon of dignified mastery. 

‘As for the defensive capabilities of our newly reconstructed fortress-kingdom, I think you will find that even if the mortal invasion I conjured up to scare the chiefs into cooperation were to actually occur, we will be more than prepared for it.’ She smiled proudly, preening now. ‘In fact, I almost wish the mortals
do
invade us, if only to show you how effective my defences are.’ She added quickly, ‘All learned from close study of your own methodologies, my lord.’ 

All this kowtowing and scraping and bowing is a bore
.
Let
’
s get on with the resuscitation
,
shall we
?
If you
’
ll all take a few steps back
,
or several
,
my saviour will provide the last
‘
element
’,
as brother Vibhisena put it in his usual euphemistic manner
,
and I can be released from this tiresome Brahman spell
. 

Mandodhari looked around. They all did. Vibhisena started at the sight of the Pushpak bearing down on them at great speed, approaching from the far wall of the cavern. He knew that the walls on every side were riddled with artificial bore-caves, some expansions of natural passageways enlarged and cleared by Mandodhari, others entirely rakshasa-made. The Pushpak must have fetched someone or something from a cave on that side, the north. Which would mean the object or person had come from—the mainland? 

His question was answered a moment later as the vehicle slowed to a graceful halt, decelerating from its great velocity to a dead halt in defiance of all natural laws. A gleaming golden ramp issued silently from the base of the viman, and a creature descended from it, moving shakily and with exaggerated slowness. It took Vibhisena a moment to identify the new arrival as a rakshasi, a mongrel mix of tiger and some other unidentifiable breed. So emaciated and haggard of mien was she that it took him several more moments to associate this bedraggled semi-skeletal wreck as his own cousin sister Supanakha. 

Vibhisena, Mandodhari, my sons, allow me to present Supanakha, carrier of the element that will complete my resuscitation at long last. Sister, don’t be shy, come forward, come to me. Nobody here will harm you. Not unless they want to openly reveal their disloyalty to me and face my wrath, and that, I think, is a step they are not yet willing to take. 

Supanakha shivered. She had last met her cousin’s family thirteen years earlier, not so long a span in a life of some five hundred years. But a great deal had transpired in these intervening years, and she was at the lowest ebb of her strength and vigour. In truth, she could barely stay upright on all fours, let alone raise herself to her hind legs as she was wont to do when facing fellow rakshasas formally. As for morphing, it was unthinkable. She needed every ounce of energy left to stay conscious and on her feet. Had the Pushpak not come to fetch her, she doubted she would have been able to complete the miles-long trek down that twisting cave tunnel on her own steam. The flight itself had been frightening. She was not among those who envied the gift of flight; she was quite content to dig her claws into solid treebark and climb a few score yards by the use of her own muscles when she wanted to leave the ground. The brief flight had left her even more nauseated than before. Had her wretched belly anything left to offer, it would have emptied itself yet again. 

Her nervous gaze passed uneasily over the four rakshasas standing around the great altar. Only one really looked like a rakshasa: Cousin Vibhisena. Yet for all his ugly visage, she knew that he was more mortal in spirit than her kind. Indrajit was more honest of appearance: at least his pumped-up body and glaring eyes revealed his true nature as a violent aggressor and rapacious sexual predator. He glared at her now, looking her up and down with open derision, as if to ask what she had become. A pang of regret shot through her battered body. Once Indrajit, like every other male rakshasa in Lanka, had desired her embrace madly. She knew he still bore the scars of the when time she had fended him off in snarling defiance, which must make her one of the few rakshasis who had ever succeeded in resisting his lust. Now, with her ruined features and haggard body, she guessed that he would probably prefer to mate with an uraga. Akshay Kumar, on the other hand, looked sympathetic and compassionate, his well-shaped blue eyes inviting her to come lay her head upon his shoulder. She wasn’t fooled by his act either; he was the sort who would nurse her back to health, and then have his way with her. He was a purveyor of unimaginable excesses, his handsome close-to-beautiful features concealing a perverted, tortuous mind that could subject a mate to depraved depths of suffering in order for him to suck out the tiniest mote of pleasure. If Indrajit was a naked, rusting iron sword, then Akshay Kumar was a gleaming blade wrapped in soft, perfumed satin; yet both had once desired the exact same thing: to penetrate her flesh, one way or other. 

But the most dangerous one of them all was the last. A fellow rakshasi, and no direct blood-kin to her. Lady Mandodhari, first wife of the lord of Lanka—first and
only
wife. For unlike soft-hearted Dasaratha who treated his queens as equals in stature and granted titles like sweetmeats at a national feastday, Ravana’s clanlawful wedded wife enjoyed complete undisputed supremacy of stature. Ravana could have a thousand thousand mistresses, concubines, fetishes and whathaveyous. But only one wife. This pact was Mandodhari’s doing, her condition for granting Ravana husbandly power over herself. It was an achievement unprecedented in rakshasa history, where promiscuity was the norm rather than the exception. 

Supanakha looked into Mandodhari’s eyes, and saw her own death written there. The sensation passed at once, and she was left looking at those flawless blue eyes and chiselled aquiline features, fit to be embossed on a royal sovereign, with nothing more than haughty disdain now visible. But she knew that she had not imagined that smouldering threat: Mandodhari was not pleased at her role in this unfolding family saga. And Mandodhari expressed her displeasure not by outright aggression, as was the rakshasa way, but through a subtle manipulative deathgame. Some day, those eyes had promised her. 

Some day
. 

But there was no time to dwell on that now. Already, Ravana’s mindvoice, the equivalent of a roared bellow, was reverberating in her addled brain, and his will, immense as always, was twisting her to his own purpose. 

She stepped forward, approaching the altar. Vibhisena moved aside without protest, but both sons and wife stepped back with disgruntled reluctance, Mandodhari masking her opposition with a show of dignified retreat. The redstone tiled floor was cold to Supanakha’s paws, and the many cuts and lesions on them burned at the contact with the sorcery-rich surface. Ravana’s power was already palpable and she sensed it growing with every step she took closer to his prostrate body. Incredible as it seemed, he was drawing power from
her
. So insignificant Supanakha, currently at her most decrepit and debilitated nadir, had become the instrument of his resurrection. Who would have ever thought it? And yet, once you did think it, how ironically fitting. She had only one regret: if she had known that her very touch upon Lanka’s hostile shores would initiate the reawakening of the lord of asuras, she might have thought to negotiate a more beneficial bargain. But maybe it was not too late to do so even now … 

She stopped just short of the altar, remaining on her fours as she gathered the strength to rise up on her hindlegs. If she understood him correctly, Ravana desired her to bend over his incapacitated body and— 

Get a move on
,
mortal-lover
.
I
’
m not waiting another thirteen years for you to get your act together
. 

It was the worst thing he could have said, in the worst possible tone, at that moment. A flash of anger rose instantly, overriding her physical exhaustion. 

And you
’
ll wait years more
, she mindspoke back,
if you don
’
t change your behaviour
.
As of this instant
,
I will not tolerate any further insults or abuse
,
do you understand me
?
Enough is enough
.
Talk to me as a respected equal
.
Or you can stay this way for thirteen thousand years for all I care
. 

Nothing. If Ravana could be shocked into silence, this was as close to it as he would come. His eventual response, sullen and muted, seethed with barely restrained fury. 

I have agreed to pay your price
.
What more would you ask
?
How do I know you will fulfil your bargain once I free you
?
You have my word
. She laughed. The others shifted, startled by this most 

unexpected of actions. They could not hear the mindspeech between Ravana and her, so they did not know the context of the laughter.
Not enough
,
lord of asuras
.
Or should I say
,
former lord of asuras
?
I
’
ll need more than just your promise
. 

If it was possible to grind one’s teeth mentally in chagrin, she guessed Ravana was doing so right now.
What then
?
Would you have me draw up a scroll to put our signs too
? His tone dripped with sarcasm, but she could hear nervousness as well. Ravana was not accustomed to negotiating from a position of weakness.