The Feast of Roses (3 page)

Her step faltered. Why had she spoken at the
jharoka?
It was a small thing—this touch on Jahangir’s arm, this murmur in his ear, but played out under frighteningly huge circumstances. Mahabat’s flare of wrath at her, as though he could see through and beyond the cover of her veil, proved this. But to Mehrunnisa, standing there alone, among those powerful men of the empire,
above
those men, this blatant demonstration of her power had been irresistible. Mahabat would never forget this morning’s
jharoka.
And neither would she, Mehrunnisa thought.

She went through the wide doors of her apartments and stood with the docility of a tame fawn as the slave girls undressed her for a bath.

Hoshiyar had told her once that Mahabat had tried to stop the Emperor from marrying her. Why? What did Mahabat care about the women of the imperial harem? He had no enmity against her father or her brother . . . yet he had spoken against her. Why?

It was almost as though Mahabat was the Emperor, not Jahangir. He held no special title. Yet there had been times when he had cleverly overruled Jahangir’s intentions. One word from Mahabat, and the empire stopped in its tracks, righting itself in whatever direction he pointed. This Mehrunnisa had forgotten in her haste to speak during the
jharoka.
It did not matter, she told herself. It
could
not matter. If she were to be supreme in the
zenana
and at the court, she would make enemies. That she had always known.

Coolness flitted over her skin and she turned to the window. One of the slave girls, about Ladli’s age, ran excitedly to the balcony. Clouds blotted out the weak morning sun, enraged and black. They seemed to suck out the heat from the palaces. When Mehrunnisa stepped into her bath, it started to rain. No mere sprinkling—this was a violent, war-filled rain, thronging with the sound of a thousand drums.

As she lay there, listening to and watching the rain outside, Mehrunnisa’s heart became light. It would not be easy to break the hold Mahabat had over the Emperor. Theirs was a connection that went back many years. But, Mehrunnisa thought, so did her understanding with Jahangir. All things could be broken in the end.

•  •  •

Before the
jharoka
was over, the whole
zenana
knew of Mehrunnisa’s presence at the balcony. The eunuchs and attendants had been very busy. Even as the new Empress left the balcony, word fled throughout the palaces of this unprecedented occurrence.

The palaces of the imperial harem were many and scattered, connected by a maze of exquisitely wrought brick courtyards and lushly verdant gardens, all inside the Red Fort at Agra. Within the harem lived the three hundred women connected with the Emperor.

The hierarchy was simple. The reigning Emperor’s wives took precedence over all the other women in the
zenana.
Of them there would be one dominant one—the Padshah Begam. With that title came supremacy over the entire
zenana,
the power to watch, to weave intrigues into the women’s lives, to control their finances, their very lives.

Empress Jagat Gosini, Jahangir’s second wife, had married him twenty-five years earlier, when he had still been a prince. Then, Jagat Gosini had been a young girl with classic features and a haughty countenance. Emperor Akbar’s ruling Padshah Begam, Ruqayya, had seen the stiffness in Jagat Gosini’s spine as she bent to perform the
taslim
in front of her, the raising of an eyebrow when something disgusted her, and she had viewed this arrogance with wariness.

And so a feud had started between the two women. They never fought openly; instead, they waged a subtle campaign for supremacy, tormenting each other with sarcastic, hurtful comments delivered on the sly. As long as Emperor Akbar had been alive, Ruqayya had been absolute in the
zenana,
but once Jahangir ascended the throne, she had to give up her place to Jagat Gosini. For though Jahangir had married many wives by the time he became Emperor, Jagat Gosini, a princess in her own right, born to a mighty king, easily established herself paramount in his harem.

The evening of the momentous
jharoka,
Mehrunnisa went to visit the Dowager Empress in her palace. There were six palaces fronting the Yamuna River at Agra within the walls of the fort, and each had a unique style reflective of its occupants. Some had marble balconies and verandahs built into the battlements of the fort, and some were made of the same red sandstone that graced the fort’s walls. Mehrunnisa did not have one yet; but when the time came, she wanted it to be hers, with her voice directing the laying of each stone, and supervising the polishing of the marble floors.

Among the symbols of imperial esteem, this mansion of brick, sandstone, marble, enamel, and mirrorwork was paramount in the
zenana
’s world. The abodes, though, were merely loans during the Emperor’s lifetime; sometimes, if a woman was stupid enough to lose favor, for less than the Emperor’s lifetime. And as the crown moved to the heir, his harem would chase out the current occupants.

Yet Dowager Empress Ruqayya—a woman who was not even Jahangir’s mother, but merely his father’s favorite wife—had a palace.

When Mehrunnisa entered, Ruqayya was lounging in her usual pose on her divan, puffing at a
hukkah
and watching the antics of a Chinese lapdog someone had presented her. The water pipe gurgled as she drew on it, and smoke swirled blue around the room, laced with the sweet smell of opium.

Ruqayya saw Mehrunnisa at the doorway—it was hard to ignore her presence, for all the maids had risen to bow and there was a general bustle. But Ruqayya turned her attention to the dog, putting down the
hukkah
to clap with the delight of a child, then calling the ugly little animal to her to pet it. A few minutes passed thus, with Mehrunnisa standing at the door, waiting, and Ruqayya busy with the dog as it pranced around her, filling the now-silent room with little yips of barks.

Finally the Dowager Empress turned to one of her eunuchs. “Well, here she comes, after all this time. One would think she grew horns of pride when she married the Emperor. Some people forget I have been Empress for a long time, longer than them.”

Mehrunnisa laughed and bent in front of Ruqayya in a well-executed
taslim,
touching her right hand to her forehead and bending from the waist. “How could I forget, your Majesty? Even if I were to do so, you would not let me.”

She straightened and watched Ruqayya try to maintain the frown on her face. Then she gave up and laughed in return, her plump face creasing into well-run lines. “Ah, Mehrunnisa, it is good to see you. Does it take two months to visit an old friend? Has the Emperor enamored you this much?”

Mehrunnisa sat down next to her. “Only a little. I hear it is said in the
zenana
that I am the one who has enamored him. Not just enamored him, but used sorcery to cast a spell on him, to keep him by my side. I am a simple woman, your Majesty. Where would I have access to such guiles?”

Ruqayya laughed again, a rich, deep laugh from inside her throat. “You simple? Nothing has ever been simple about you, Mehrunnisa. Not since you were nine and refused to cry when the concubine slapped you.”

“And you saved me then by scolding her.”

“True.” Ruqayya’s beady eyes took on a shrewd look. “That was a small thing, but this, your becoming an Empress, was also due to me. Remember that always, Mehrunnisa.”

Mehrunnisa shook her head. “I will not forget, your Majesty. There are few things I forget, this is certainly not one of them.”

A servant brought a copper and silver
hukkah
and set it near Mehrunnisa. Ruqayya leaned forward on her divan, balancing her weight on one elbow. “Will you not smoke some opium?”

“No, your Majesty. I am here to talk. Did you hear of the
jharoka
this morning?”

Ruqayya nodded. “Everyone knows of it. Wait.” She snapped her fingers, and the slaves and eunuchs bowed and left the room, taking the dog with them. When they had gone she continued, “Was that wise? A woman’s place is in the harem, behind the
zenana
walls. Even I never asked Emperor Akbar for such a favor.”

“But you asked for other things, your Majesty,” Mehrunnisa said softly. “Khurram, for one.”

Prince Khurram was Empress Jagat Gosini’s son. When he was a year old, Ruqayya, who had no children of her own, demanded custody of the prince from Jagat Gosini and got it, for Emperor Akbar rarely refused her anything. So Khurram had grown up with Ruqayya, thinking her to be his mother and Jagat Gosini some subordinate princess. The transposition in power in the harem had not changed Khurram’s affections, though he was now twenty and knew Jagat Gosini to be his mother and Ruqayya his step-grandmother; he still called Ruqayya “Ma.” So Jagat Gosini would not forgive Ruqayya.

The Dowager Empress stared unblinking at Mehrunnisa, then her face cracked into a smile. “You are wicked, Mehrunnisa. But no matter, I think I taught you to be wicked. Here is another debt you owe me. And be wary of Jagat Gosini; she is still the Padshah Begam.”

“I know that, your Majesty. Today, I went to the
jharoka.
Tomorrow, who knows, perhaps even that title will be mine. Only time will tell.” Mehrunnisa picked two cashews from a silver bowl from the Dowager Empress’s side and popped them into her mouth. “But this is what you have always wished for, isn’t it?”

Mehrunnisa watched as Ruqayya leaned back and drew on the
hukkah,
spinning lazy circles of smoke in the air above her. This was what Ruqayya had recently wanted. But once, the Dowager Empress had supported Emperor Akbar’s decision to give Mehrunnisa to Ali Quli, even though Jahangir, then a prince, sought after her. One word from Ruqayya might have changed the shape of things . . . but there was a streak of cruelty in the Dowager Empress that made her sometimes turn even on those she loved.

But when Mehrunnisa had come back to the capital, widowed after Ali Quli’s death, Ruqayya had taken her into the
zenana
as a lady-in-waiting, against Jagat Gosini’s wishes. And it was Ruqayya who had engineered the meeting between Jahangir and Mehrunnisa at the Mina Bazaar. This was what the Dowager Empress wanted her to remember. She was saying, in effect,
Don’t forget who put that crown on your head, Mehrunnisa—if it wasn’t for me, you would still be a maid in the imperial
zenana.

Which was why Ruqayya called her by her old name, Mehrunnisa.

But she was here for another reason.

“Your Majesty, tell me Mirza Mahabat Khan’s story,” Mehrunnisa said.

Ruqayya sat up. “Ah, you angered him at the
jharoka.
”

Mehrunnisa nodded. “Why is he against me? I can be no threat to his position. Yet I hear he was opposed to my marriage to the Emperor. Why?”

“I am not sure,” Ruqayya said slowly, chewing on the tip of her
hukkah.
“But I have heard it comes from Jagat Gosini. She has never wanted you in the
zenana,
this you must know. I wonder if it is possible she enlisted his support in the matter. But what argument did she use to convince him? That she was apprehensive of your intelligence? Of your beauty? Would a powerful minister listen to such reasoning? Hmmm . . .”

And so the two women sat and talked late into the night. The Dowager Empress’s memory was almost perfect. She recalled for Mehrunnisa incidents from the Emperor’s childhood when Mahabat had said or done something unusual. She told her of his hold over Jahangir, of the deep affection the Emperor had for Mahabat that sometimes blinded him to his faults. Mehrunnisa listened, wanting to know everything about him.

As the night lengthened and the palace slept around them, Ruqayya suddenly said, “It is late, why are you not by the Emperor?”

“He needs his sleep, your Majesty.”

Ruqayya grinned. It was a knowing grin. She reached out to touch Mehrunnisa’s face. “You know this will not last.”

Mehrunnisa moved away. “My face, or my relationship with the Emperor?”

“Both, my dear. You have to have much more. So be wary. Watch your face for signs of aging, watch your mouth too. Emperor Jahangir does not like a woman who is too witty or too intelligent.”

Jahangir’s Empress kept her expression immobile, but inside a sharp anger flared to life at Ruqayya’s words. She could have said much to Ruqayya about the Emperor, much she did not know or willfully ignored. The Dowager Empress was prejudiced for many reasons, most of which hinged on Jahangir’s rebellion against his father when he was a prince—a rebellion that in Ruqayya’s mind, had hastened Emperor Akbar’s death. Mehrunnisa did not say anything, because she was fearful also that perhaps, just perhaps, what Ruqayya said was true. No other woman in the
zenana
had enjoyed such favor from Jahangir. . . . And so came the little pestering doubts Mehrunnisa tried to keep at bay, as they always did when she talked with Ruqayya.

The Dowager Empress was again lying back on the divan, watching Mehrunnisa with cunning eyes. “Go now,” she said. “Go back to your apartments and to bed. You need to sleep.”