THE CURSE OF BRAHMA (58 page)

Kansa smiled in satisfaction. He would himself undertake the chaddar upacara for all of Devki’s six children. The symbolic gesture would tell her more than anything else he could do that he still loved her and was vowing to protect her children forever.

He selected a gold-braided coverlet which was wide enough to cover the six babies. It was made of fine silk and would be fitting for the newborn princes.

Mandki glared at Kansa as he came bounding up the stairs. She stood protectively at the doorsill, her arms folded across her chest. She would not allow him to hurt her friend anymore. Kansa observed her aggressive stance and was slightly taken aback at the immense hostility emanating from her.

‘What do you want?’ Mandki demanded, her voice quivering with a mixture of fear and anger, at the man who had almost totally destroyed her friend’s life, and her own.

Kansa looked at her, awed by the loyalty she displayed towards Devki. He could have simply brushed her aside, but he was determined to make things better between Devki and himself. Antagonizing and hurting her best friend would not help do that.

Kansa smiled patiently at her. ‘I have come to put this over Devki’s children,’ he said gently, holding out the gold-braided coverlet for her to see.

Mandki saw the blanket he carried. She was well aware of the significance of the chaddar upacara. Once Kansa performed the act of putting the coverlet over the newborns, he would be bound by the law of his ancestors to protect the children throughout his life. She hesitated, unsure what to do. This man had almost killed Vasudev and imprisoned his sister and father. And her Airawat…he had hurt him so much too. She stared at Kansa, trying to comprehend his motives.
He looks so eager, and so…so sincere
, she thought, her resolve wavering.

‘Let me come in Mandki. I have come to make everything alright between Devki and me,’ Kansa said quietly.

Mandki looked closely at him. He seemed to be like his earlier self.
His eyes…they no longer blaze with that insane green light
, she noted with relief.

Her resolve faltered further. ‘Devki is sleeping,’ she said hesitatingly. ‘She…uh…she was exhausted after the childbirth and the ardhadhara gave her a strong medicine to make her sleep.’

Kansa grinned. ‘Not a day old yet, and they have already started exhausting their mother,’ he said lightly.

Mandki looked at Kansa in amazement. He seemed to be the same prince everyone had loved.

‘Should I wake Devki?’ she asked, undecided.

Kansa shook his head. ‘No. Let her sleep. She needs rest. I will come back later to meet her,’ he paused. ‘Can I at least put the coverlet on the babies?’

Mandki considered the situation. She knew the chaddar upacara would bind Kansa to protect the children in the future. More importantly, it looked like he genuinely wanted to make things better with Devki.

Mandki made up her mind. ‘Okay, you can perform the ceremony,’ she said slowly. ‘But for God’s sake don’t let the babies wake up. I have spent the last three horas just trying to put them to sleep,’ she said in mock horror.

Kansa laughed genially as he followed Mandki to the room where the babies were sleeping.

Kansa gazed upon the babies, sleeping peacefully in their cot. They looked beautiful, and he could see Devki’s features mirrored unmistakably in their faces. Kansa sighed as he remembered how Devki had been as a child.
These children will be like her
, he thought nostalgically.

‘Can you get me some water, Mandki?’ Kansa said, his throat feeling parched all of a sudden.

Mandki nodded slowly, not sure whether she should leave him alone with the babies. But he looked so peaceful as he gazed adoringly at Devki’s offspring. She turned to leave, to fetch the water, leaving him standing near the babies’ cot. Kansa gently put the coverlet over the sleeping children. Reciting the mantras he knew by heart, he commenced the chaddar upacara that would bind him to these babies forever.

Mandki stood at the door, watching him mutter the mantras. She groaned as she heard one of the babies get up from his sleep. And then the other five also began to move around and making wailing noises. Thinking they had got scared of seeing a strange face looking at them, she took a step forward to calm them. She came to a sudden halt as she heard Kansa pause in his mantras to talk gently to the children. She looked on fascinated as the babies settled down and started making happy gurgling sounds. Kansa laughed with them; and they seemed to like the sound of his deep laughter. Mandki smiled to herself and left to get the water for Kansa.

Kansa playfully tickled the feet of one of the babies, making it gurgle happily. The other children lying in the cot seemed to take offense at being ignored and tried attracting Kansa’s attention, by raising their arms in his direction. Kansa smiled and obliged the other children by tickling their feet too, one at a time. But each child craved individual attention and demanded it by trying to babble louder than the others.

Kansa began to experience the beginnings of a headache as the babbling of the children grew louder. He pressed his hands to his temples in an effort to quell the increasingly throbbing pain in his head. But the agonizing ache refused to go away. He looked at the babies and felt suddenly that they had stopped making their gurgling sounds. Ignoring the growing pain in his head, he tried to make funny faces at them to make them burble in mirth. It worked. The babies started to laugh as they saw the comical expressions he was making. They raised their arms to him again, wanting him to pick them up.

As Kansa looked at them through the haze of his pain, it seemed to him that they were no longer laughing with him. They now appeared to be laughing
at
him. Their raised arms seemed to point accusingly at him as they continued to laugh at him. The sound of their laughter threatened to split open his head. Kansa put his hands to his ears in an effort to drown out the sound, but it only seemed to increase in intensity. And then the laughter seemed to erupt from inside his head, and his entire body twisted in pain, the seizure taking hold of him. In a desperate attempt to quieten the babies, he covered their faces with the gold-braided blanket he had placed over them. He pressed down with all his might, and stayed that way till the laughter gradually faded.

As the force of his seizure left him, and the green light of Aghasamarthan faded from his eyes, he gazed in confusion at the babies in the cot. They lay still, their faces shrouded by the blanket he had brought for them. With trembling hands, he lifted the edge of the blanket and stared at the eternally quiet faces of Devki’s six children.

A howl escaped his lips as he looked at the expression on their innocent faces.

Mandki was returning with the water when she heard the howl. It shook her to the core and the goblet of water dropped from her hand, clattering to the ground. She raced towards the babies’ room and stared in dismay at the vacant room. Kansa was no longer there. With an ominous feeling she crept slowly towards the baby cot. She forced herself to look at what she was by now certain she would see. But the shock of seeing left her horrified. All six of Devki’s babies had been mercilessly strangulated.

Mandki waited for the drug to take effect before she entered Vasudev and Devki’s bed chambers. Devki had gone insane when she woke up to find all her children murdered. She had raged at Mandki for allowing Kansa to meet the babies. For the first time in their life, Devki had refused to talk to Mandki as she stormed out of the room, tearing at her hair and calling on the gods to end the life of the brother she had once loved more than anyone else.

Concerned for Devki’s sanity, Mandki had called the Ardhadhara who arrived and gave her a potent dose of a medicine that would help Devki sleep. The ardhadhara instructed Mandki to keep Devki on the drug for the next few days, till she was able to absorb the reality of her children’s death. Mandki had been following the doctor’s instructions for the past two days, and she had just given Devki her dose for the night. She looked at Devki sleeping next to Vasudev; two vibrant people whose lives had been reduced to a vegetative state by the one man they had both loved above everything else.

Mandki approached their bed, trying not to make any sound that could rouse them. In her hand, she held the sterile packet that had been given to her an hour earlier by a man she now knew she could trust completely. She had never met the man before in her life but she had heard of him from Airawat and she knew he had implicit faith in this person. She didn’t know how the stranger was able to reach her room without being apprehended by the assassin guards who were stationed all over the palace compound, but he had somehow managed to give all of them the slip. He had then handed her a sterilized packet and told her what he wanted her to do with it. When he saw her waver, he had told her his name and suggested she confirm with Airawat if she could trust him. Mandki had made a quick trip to Airawat’s cell. The guards did not stop her as they were used to her regular visits to his place of confinement. When she told Airawat the man’s name, he asked her to describe him. After hearing his description, he gave her a smile full of hope. The only thing he said was, ‘If you can’t trust this man, you can’t trust anyone!’