The Feast of Roses (8 page)

Jahangir leaned back on his cushion and closed his eyes. He would normally be alert, watching for a sign of the lion, a flash of a golden mane in the green of the forest. But today, the two women who sat ahead of him, their backs rigid, leaning over the edge of the
howdah,
were the hunters. Since Mehrunnisa had come to him, he had been filled with happiness. If he could rub her shoulders now, take away the tension, he would do it. But there were other women in his harem who had a claim on him, as Jagat Gosini was demonstrating. He knew that Mehrunnisa wanted the royal seal, and the title of Padshah Begam, but she would have to earn it. Jahangir would not interfere in the matters of the
zenana,
even though he had the power to give Mehrunnisa anything in the world.

Mehrunnisa swayed with the rhythm of the
howdah.
She breathed in the smells of the forest, listened in the unnatural stillness for sounds of game. Her palms became clammy, and the musket slipped from her hand. She wiped her hands on her pajamas and picked up the gun again. She did not look at Empress Jagat Gosini. They had not talked since their greeting. Words were useless, for they each knew what they wanted. And only one of them would get it.

By her side, Jagat Gosini sat forward, her eyes moving through the shadowed and lit undergrowth with practiced ease. Her hands gripped her gun, right finger loosely curled around the trigger.

The breeze shifted direction imperceptibly; the women did not notice it. But the elephant twitched its long trunk, moving it up and to one side, then the next. It stopped, and the mahout said over his shoulder, “It senses the lion, your Majesties.”

The two women tensed, bringing up their muskets. But the grasses lay still, unruffled, nothing to indicate that an animal moved within them. The elephant started to quiver, and they felt the vibrations that shuddered through its large body. The lion was close, that was for sure, but where? And they waited, the soldiers quiet behind them, the elephant trembling, the Emperor watching them.

Then they heard the voice of the lion, to the right of the royal elephant, there, at the rear of a large rock. It was not a loud roar but a questing one, yet it fractured through the silence in the forest. Drugged, its senses dull, the lion had not seen them yet, or heard them, or smelled the scent of their skins. It came around the rock and froze where it stood. It saw the elephant, the humans atop it, the humans around it. All the soldiers had their muskets raised by this time, sighted steadily on the lion.

Mehrunnisa flinched. She had seen a lion once, in the royal zoo. Then it had looked so scrawny, so pallid, pacing its cage. This one was three times the size of the royal lion, gold-tufted and heavily muscled. This was a lion in the wild? She watched, mesmerized, as the lion shook its head to clear its drugged brain, then leaped through the air, going for the royal elephant.

The elephant immediately reared back, trumpeting in fear, lifting its forelegs and almost displacing the
howdah.
As the
howdah
tilted, Mehrunnisa jammed her shoulder against one of the posts and willed her hands to lift the musket to aim it at the lion.

A shot reverberated through the forest, coming fast at the edge of the lion’s roar and the elephant’s cry. The lion lay at the feet of the elephant. The shot had caught it in midleap, through its heart. Its head was askew, neck snapped in the fall. A small round hole blossomed under its ribs, trickling blood on the dusty ground.

The soldiers let out a cry. “The Empress has shot the lion!”

The drummers beat their drums loudly, and the silent forest echoed with the noise of human voices and laughter.

Mehrunnisa sat still, her hands trembling around the musket, her finger still pulling the trigger back. Jagat Gosini pulled herself upright; the elephant’s rearing had thrown her to the back, against Jahangir. Lying thus, half across her husband, her musket pulled up to her, the metal lodged under her chin, she had fired. Mehrunnisa’s gun lay cold, Jagat Gosini’s smoked in wisps and whorls. Her face, her hands, and even Jahangir’s hands, for he had held her as she had shot, were peppered with black flakes of gunpowder. The Emperor rubbed Jagat Gosini’s face free of the gunpowder, and she smiled at him, a little smile showing she was grateful for the action.

“You have done well, my dear wife. The lion could have killed us. You are indeed an excellent shot.”

He then turned to Mehrunnisa. She put her musket down, its weight suddenly heavy on her shoulder. It had all happened so fast, without warning. One moment the lion was in front of them, flushed out of its hiding place, the next it was dead. And not because she had shot it.

“See how brave Jagat Gosini is,” Jahangir said. “I am very proud of her. What other king can claim such a markswoman in his harem?”

“You are right, your Majesty. The Empress has done us all proud,” Mehrunnisa replied. Still she did not look at Jagat Gosini. As the acrid smell of freshly burned gunpowder bittered the air, she sensed a brief smile on the Empress’s face.

The hunt went on. Antelopes and
nilgau,
wild blue oxen, were flushed out of the tall grass and killed expertly by the accompanying nobles. At noon, the royal party returned to the fort, dragging behind them the carcasses from the hunt.

Mehrunnisa sat hunched in her place in the
howdah.
All morning, Jahangir had praised Jagat Gosini for her skill, her valor, and her bravery in the face of danger. It was all true. Not one of her own shots had found its mark. The nobles had laughed openly when she had missed. Even the Emperor had smiled, showing her how to hold the musket, how to pull back on the trigger, how to cushion the recoil against her shoulder. And he had pointed out Jagat Gosini’s skill. Watch her, my dear, see how she takes aim.

When they came back to the fort, dusty and tired, Jahangir left them without a word. Before he did, even as they descended from the
howdah,
needing the aid of eunuchs now, a slave girl stood near with a silver tray in her hands. Jahangir lifted the satin cloth covering the tray. On it, on a bed of velvet cloth, lay an exquisite necklace of gold and pearls. The Emperor lifted the necklace and clasped it around Empress Jagat Gosini’s bent neck, over her veil. The ends of the necklace captured her veil around her head, the pearls glowing like the moon in the afternoon sun. Then, as they all bowed, Jahangir left. He had said little during the hunt, now he walked away without even looking at Mehrunnisa. Jagat Gosini’s entourage settled around her like a flock of pigeons, exclaiming at the necklace, praising her, and they moved out together. She did not speak to Mehrunnisa either.

Mehrunnisa stood alone in the courtyard watching her husband leave, listening to Jagat Gosini’s unsaid words.
What else could you expect of woman not born to royalty? Not aware of royal etiquette or pastimes? You are common, Mehrunnisa. Nothing but common.
Mehrunnisa was wearied from the hunt. She was hot, her skin blistered from the sun. Her lips were cracked, and wetting them with her tongue had only made them more dry. She felt her hold on the Emperor slipping.

“Come, your Majesty,” Hoshiyar Khan said at her ear. He led her away, and she let him, leaning on his arm as though she was suddenly very, very old.

•  •  •

There were to be celebrations all evening in Empress Jagat Gosini’s apartments. Preparations had started even before the royal party returned from the hunt, even as the bullet left the Empress’s musket and fled in search of the lion. For among the soldiers behind the elephant were Jagat Gosini’s stewards. They waited only to see who fired the shot, and then ran back to the palaces in the fort with the news. Twenty minutes behind them were the imperial runners, sent on to the treasury in search of the pearl necklace, for it had to be waiting for the royal party when they returned.

So the whole
zenana
knew of the hunt, knew who had killed the prey, who was to be lauded upon her return and who to be ignored. The harem was aflutter with gossip. Mouths worked busily. Those envious of Mehrunnisa and predicting the demise of Jahangir’s affections for her, those in Jagat Gosini’s camp, those hateful of Dowager Empress Ruqayya—and these last went to her as she woke to tell her the news.
So unfortunate. You have put so much faith in Mehrunnisa, your Majesty, and it seemed as though that faith was to be justified. But the Emperor
—and here there was a sigh, long and theatrical—
he enjoys women who are brave, who can shoot.

And so it happened that when Mehrunnisa returned from the hunt, she found Ruqayya in her apartments, waiting for her, the ever-present
hukkah
against her mouth. Mehrunnisa was surprised at this visit; Ruqayya never went to anyone, people came to her. They talked for some time as Mehrunnisa’s bath was prepared, and then Mehrunnisa went to bed to sleep away the afternoon. In the evening, Ruqayya said, with Hoshiyar Khan by their side, they would really talk.

As Mehrunnisa slept, so did Empress Jagat Gosini. But she did so after having given orders for the night’s feast. In the royal kitchens, fifteen cooks were commandeered for the Empress. They went by foot to the outskirts of the city to the slaughterhouse. There they picked out a goat, chickens, and ducks and watched as they were slaughtered, washed, and put into sacks. In the kitchens, water-carriers poured river water out of leather bags into earthenware jars, which were sealed with white cloth until the cooks were ready to use the water. Every single ritual was supervised by the Mir Bakawal, the Master of the Kitchen.

The rice for the
pulav
was rinsed three times and let to soak for twenty minutes, until it plumped up to a pearl softness just like the Empress’s new necklace. Cardamom, cinnamon, cloves, coriander seeds, fenugreek, anise—all sorts of spices and herbs were ground, wet and dry. When the cooks were ready to put the dishes together, they washed their hands well, and wore thin white muslin masks over their noses and mouths, and white cloth caps over their hair. Not a drop of sweat could sully the Emperor’s meal. In one corner, the Mir Bakawal watched, and if a cook sneezed he was sent out, the food he was cooking thrown away, and another cook would take his place. Jahangir’s favorite foods were prepared—he had many—and that afternoon, fifty-one different dishes simmered, stewed, steamed, roasted, and boiled over the wood fires of the kitchens. The Emperor could not possibly eat every one of the dishes, perhaps he would not even taste all of them, but if he wanted something special, it would be there.

When the food was ready, it was packed into gold and silver vessels, porcelain and earthenware vessels, brought out every day from a storage stronghold. The dishes in gold and silver vessels were wrapped with red cloth, the others in white cloth. They were then sealed with the imprint of the imperial kitchens, and in his neat hand, the Mir Bakawal spent one hour detailing the contents of each dish and attaching it with a piece of paper to the top of the seal. When the Emperor and Empress Jagat Gosini were ready to eat, the Mir Bakawal would break the seals himself and stand aside, waiting to be commended for his work.

And so the afternoon passed into evening. The sun escaped into the flat lines in the west, leaving the gathering monsoon clouds edged with shimmering gold. With the clouds came the humidity, and fans swished furiously in all the palaces of the fort. Lamps were lit, some in sconces on the walls, some in little earthenware saucers filled with sesame seed oil, the flames standing steady and upright in the still air, as though pulled skyward by an invisible hand. Outside the
zenana,
lined against the walls, jostling for positions of the most visibility, the dancing girls waited with their madams. They were all young, all pretty with a sameness of beauty, eyes pronounced with kohl, faces powdered white, sequins glittering on their short
cholis
and embroidered
ghagaras.
They were accompanied by singers and musicians, both male and female, and these were the only men allowed into the harem. They took stories of the
zenana
ladies to the outside world, embellishing those tales with many sprinklings of lies, for there was no one to deny the truth of what they spoke. The Ahadis stood guard outside too, regulating the crowd, keeping down the noise until Shaista Khan came to the door to choose the troupe for his mistress.

•  •  •

Emperor Jahangir walked slowly to Empress Jagat Gosini’s apartments. The slaves following behind were silent, but some had already rushed to the Empress’s palace to announce his arrival. He passed through corridors and courtyards, nodding when a bow captured his eye, smiling to bestow favor upon a concubine who caught his attention. It was a familiar route, the one he was taking, one he had taken many times before his marriage to Mehrunnisa. One he should have taken earlier in these past two months. This the Emperor knew, that Jagat Gosini’s position should have been acknowledged by him; it was an unsaid rule of his
zenana,
of all
zenanas.
Yet, he had not been able to leave Mehrunnisa. She had never deliberately kept him, never said not to go, but she smiled and he fell in love with her again, she laughed and he took root by her side. Even now . . . he did not want to be here, but he had to.

He reached the outer door of Jagat Gosini’s palace and she stood there, a silver
thali
in her hands, on which was a gold lamp and small mountain of vermilion. He bent so she could swirl the flame from the lamp around his head three times to take away the evil eye. Then the Empress put a streak of vermilion on his forehead.