The Palace of Illusions (20 page)

When it was time for bed, the brothers unrolled their mats and lay down, one beside the other. Kunti placed her mat at their heads and gave me the last, rat-nibbled one to lie on. I was to sleep near the brothers' feet, at a chaste distance. I considered refusing, but I was too weary. I'd save my rebellion for another day.

I drifted in and out of sleep all night, listening to the plaintive call of owls, watching the moon drag itself across the small window. I was uncomfortable, miserable, disillusioned—and most of all, angry with Arjun. I'd expected him to be my champion. It was the least he could have done after plucking me from my home. When inside me a voice whispered, Karna would never have let you down like this, I did not hush it.

The night seemed endless. Someone snored. Someone else shouted angrily in his dream. Once I thought I saw a man looking in through the window. To my blurred, homesick eyes, his face looked like Dhri's, though that was impossible. And a good thing, too. Dhri would have been enraged to see me like this, lying on the floor
at the feet of these men—on my wedding night, no less, when my bed should have been piled with scented silks. When I should have been held close and cherished. But I was no longer my brother's to protect or indulge, I thought, tears of self-pity filling my eyes. I'd placed a garland around the neck of a man who hadn't even cared to tell me his name, and it had changed everything.

I was about to give in to despair when a thought came to me: This is what she's hoping for! The heat of that realization dried up my tears. I took a resolute breath, the way Kunti might have if she were in my place. I loosened my muscles, using the techniques the sorceress had taught. I no longer resisted the floor but let my body sink into it. One moment at a time, I told myself. What use was it to worry about the future, which might take a shape far different from what either Kunti or I wanted? And with that, sleep came to me.

“You're burning the brinjal,” Kunti said, her voice kind. “Also, you've put in too much salt. Oh, look how red your eyes are! I should have guessed that a princess like you, brought up in luxury, wouldn't have any experience with cooking.” She gave a patient sigh. “Never mind. You can scrub the pots while I repair the curry.”

But I was ready now. “Respected mother,” I said, bowing, “being so much younger, I know my culinary skills can't equal yours. But it's my duty to relieve you of your burdens whenever possible. Please let me do so. If your sons are displeased with the food, I'll gladly accept the blame.”

I turned to the pot and covered it with a battered dish and focused on what the sorceress had taught me. I willed the oil to bubble up, the brinjal to soften. I prayed to the fire to hold back its power. I closed my eyes and imagined a rich paste of poppy seed and cinnamon
coating the pieces. I didn't open them until the aroma filled my nostrils.

When at mealtime the brothers praised the brinjal for its distinctive taste and asked for more, I remained in the kitchen and let Kunti serve her sons. I kept my face carefully impassive, my eyes on the floor. But she and I both knew that I'd won the first round.

15

That first night, all my hopes fallen in ruins around me, I dreamed of the palace of lac, where my husbands were supposed to have burned to death. Of how it had come into being.

In my dream, I was a lac insect. Like my hundred sisters, I attached myself to a new twig and drank its sap. I had no eyes, so I focused my entire impassioned energy on drinking. I drank and grew and secreted resin red as mud until I was covered with it, until we were all covered. Within my shell I held still and grew, like my hundred sisters, and within me grew the eggs. The moon waxed full: once, twice, three times. The resin pooled and spread across the branches, turning them red until the tree seemed to be a dancing flame. The waiting villagers nodded.
Yes, soon.
The eggs hatched, a hundred new insects attached themselves to other trees, the villagers broke off the branches and scraped the resin clean and sent it to Varanavat where Duryodhan had ordered a palace to be built for his five cousins.

(And I? I died. No need to mourn me. My work was done.)

Palaces have always fascinated me, even a gloom-filled structure like my father's that was a fitting carapace for his vengeful obsession.
For isn't that what our homes are ultimately, our fantasies made corporeal, our secret selves exposed? The converse is also true: we grow to become that which we live within. That was one of the reasons why I longed to escape my father's walls. (But— unknown to me—by the time I left, it was too late. The creed he lived by was already stamped onto my soul.)

Often I imagined my own palace, the one I would build someday. What would it be made of? What form would it take? Krishna's palace in Dwarka was pink sandstone, the arches like the ocean waves that bordered it. It sounded lovely, but I knew mine would have to be different. It would have to be uniquely mine.

When I'd asked him what kind of palace he thought I should have, Krishna said, “Already you live within a nine-gated palace, the most wondrous structure of all. Understand it well: it will be your salvation or your downfall.”

Sometimes his riddles were tiresome. I sighed. I'd have to wait for time to uncover the answers he wouldn't give me. But this much I knew already: my palace would be like no other.

But this night, lying in a hovel, I dreamed of the palace of lac, burnished like wings. Gods and goddesses were carved into its sills to lull its inhabitants into a belief of safety. When did the Pandavas discover its flammable truth? They told no one. Such a bitter betrayal by their own cousin, their childhood playmate, must have hurt, but they secreted it deep within their bodies. They continued to laugh and sing and go boating on Varanavat lake. They invited the caretaker, the traitor Purochan, to a banquet, and did not poison his food. What gave them so much strength?

Years later, Sahadev, the youngest brother, the gentle chronicler of their lives, told me the rest of the story.

He said: “When she realized that Duryodhan had offered us this holiday at Varanavat in order to kill us, our mother went into her chambers and wept for a night and a day.

“We paced outside her room, not knowing what to do. She'd always been so strong, our foundation stone. When she came out, we rushed to comfort her. But her eyes were dry. She said to us, I've used up all the tears of my life so that they will not distract me again.”

(In this, though, she was mistaken. A woman can never use up all the tears of her life. How do I know this? Because Kunti would weep again—and I would weep with her.)

“She sent word to Vidur, the blind king's chief minister, who was sympathetic to our cause. On his advice, she made us dig a tunnel that would run from the house to the forest, that would collapse after we'd used it, leaving no telltale trace. But she wouldn't let us escape until she felt the time was right. Meanwhile, each day she gave alms to the poor and opened our doors to homeless travelers so they might have a place to sleep.

“One night the nishad woman arrived with her five sons. They were traveling to the fair with their woven baskets and feathered arrows. My mother offered them food and all the wine they wanted. She invited them to sleep in the main hall though they would have preferred the stables. When they were asleep, she asked us to set the house on fire. We saw the perfection in her plan: the nishads' charred skeletons would be taken for ours; Duryodhan would believe he had succeeded in ridding himself of us. But we were distraught, too. They were our guests. They'd eaten our food; they'd gone to sleep trusting us. To kill them would be a great sin.

“Our mother looked us in the eye. I drugged the wine, she said. They'll feel no pain. As for the sin of killing them, I swear it will not
touch you. I take it all on myself. For the safety of my children, I'll gladly forgo heaven.”

Sahadev's eyes grew moist as he spoke. He'd forgotten that Kunti wasn't his true mother. The look on his face was more tender than anything he'd ever offered me. But for once I didn't begrudge it to Kunti. Could I have made that ultimate sacrifice, taking on damnation for my children?

Sahadev, if only you'd told me this earlier! For by this time Kunti and I (yoked together uneasily by our desire for Pandava glory) had frozen into our stance of mutual distrust. But had I known the story before, I would have tried harder to be her friend.