Yama's Lieutenant and The Stone Witch Read online

  The sky was overcast and there wasn’t the faintest promise of sunshine. If the ominous clouds were any indication, there would be acid rain before sundown. Those sudden, corrosive showers devoured life; it would never do to be caught in the open when it hit.

  Everything was dull and dismal in this world leached of colour, light and hope. The silence was profound and complete, broken only by the occasional howling of the wind—an intermittent keening indicative of the despair that drenched everything.

  Debris and dust lay scattered everywhere, blanketing the concrete remains in a wash of refuse. Doors and windows had been torn out, glass panes smashed in, leaving so much exposed. An open wound ripe for infection. Ash and soot were all that remained of the fires that had consumed the wood and plaster that went into the making the space habitable. A few cars remained standing or overturned but they had long been stripped of everything of value, not that anything had much value these days, barring the things you could eat and those you could shoot up (or at) someone.

  There was no sign of life on the surface. Usually you would run into dogs or street kids grown wild, unruly and learned to hunt in packs. But here there was nothing. He moved on, casting a wary eye heavenwards. Sometimes all you could do was follow the blood trail.

  His feet propelled him past the dead remains of the ghost town. A sign above a burnt-out store caught his eye, even though it was bent and blackened. It said: ‘Mommy and Baby’. He remembered when the company had been the leading manufacturer of all things new mommies and their babies could possibly want. He no longer cried but there was a lump in his throat so big it was hard to swallow. But he did it and kept on walking.

  He walked to the edge of the town, a couple of miles out, following the scent of fresh destruction like the trained bloodhound he had become. It had once been a public park where lovers romanced, mothers brought their children to feed the ducks in the pond and older folks came for their evening constitutionals. He remembered snacking on salty peanuts sold by a vendor just outside the park. Now bodies lay where they had been burnt en masse.

  Still, he kept walking, past the park to the highest point of the town, towards the crematorium. The townspeople had never made it that far. When he made his way past the barbed-wire fence, he saw signs of the last struggle. It had been a mighty one, judging by the scorched earth, upended tombstones and still-smoking fallen tree trunks.

  In the thick of destruction, he could make out the outline of a man who lay spreadeagled on the rough ground littered with glass. On moving closer, he felt for the poor bastard who had fought back in vain. Had he also been a magic wielder?

  His wrists and ankles had been tightly secured with ropes and barbed wire. Nail guns had been used for good measure, and the poor schmuck’s body was so punctured it was leaking crimson blood everywhere.

  His naked body bore the stark evidence of torture and mutilation. Flesh hung in shredded ribbons across his shoulders, chest and torso. The quadriceps muscle of one thigh was so mangled it looked like it had been ravaged by a wild animal. On one side there was a deep gash that appeared to be haemorrhaging copiously.

  The eyes had been put out and the head doused in oil and set on fire. Not even the mother who birthed and raised him would have been able to identify him. Given the extent of the injuries sustained, he ought to have been long dead but there was life in him still.

  In a fit of urgency, Agni ignored better sense and ran to him. Perhaps he could be saved. All he had to do was get him to Mino or Taravarsha. But his legs had turned to lead and his arms hung uselessly at his sides, even as he willed his limbs to make haste. They struggled to oblige and it felt like trying to wade through treacle.

  But Agni wouldn’t give up and forced himself to make the effort to close the gap between himself and the dying man. But he could not. His own wrists and ankles had been secured tightly with ropes and barbed wire. Nail guns had been used for good measure, and his body was so punctured he was leaking crimson blood every which way. But still he struggled. It was all in vain because he just could not move or avoid smelling the burnt flesh, which was his own.

  Then she was leaning over him. He knew it, though his eyes were gone. She was so close he could feel her breath and it made him flinch. ‘I loved you once, Agni Prakash! And you repaid my love with betrayal. Now see what it has got you.’

  She leaned over to kiss him with lips as cold as stone. Yama’s lieutenant struggled with every fibre of his being. What had become of the weapons he had been given? They were only as strong as the one who wielded them and he was almost dead, his strength having given out. But still he fought to wrap his fingers around that slender throat. His dismal effort made her laugh.

  Agni had fallen out of bed and was thrashing about on the floor when he finally came to. His wrist hurt like a bitch and a bastard both, but thankfully he had not broken it. Gingerly, he swallowed the blood in his mouth that was there probably from when he had bitten his tongue. There would be no more sleep for the time being at least.

  He ran down the stairs, driven by the fumes of his feverish dream, wincing with every step, and threw open the front door. He saw the figure waiting for him, silhouetted in the moonlight, past the little wooden bridge where the trees thickened and their trunks bulked out till they towered over their surroundings, like massive, stern-faced sentries standing guard over the woods. But even they were not as formidable as the man who had come for Yama’s lieutenant.

  Of course, there would be no rest for the weary. All his visions were bad but this was something else. The stranger showing up even before his breathing had returned to normal was proof that something big was afoot and, like it or not, he would soon be in the thick of things. He assured himself it was only a vision that need not necessarily become a part of his future and stepped forth into the darkness to confront the stranger before ironclad logic could assail him with its bitter truths.

  6

  Mountain of Death

  Nivarita Parva, the forbidden mountain, rose out of the turquoise depths of the sea, a colossal natural monument, studded with magnificent gorges and steep cliffs. Beneath the peak, the mountain split into glorious pinnacles of rock that made it seem insurmountable, especially given the treacherous climb that no mortal could hope to negotiate safely.

  The summit disappeared into the clouds as they enveloped it in a passionate, billowy embrace with stray tendrils of frothy lace descending languidly down the naked rock before dissipating into nothingness, leaving the lower slopes bereft of its touch. There was a nip in the air, a presentiment of impending doom no doubt, but who could say for certain?

  Mara, the agrima, or chief, of his order, stood on a narrow ledge beneath the summit, taking in the beauty of the place that had been their home for more ages than could be accounted for in all the history books. It was a quiet place where they could go about their business in peace, or slip into a state of meditative contemplation when they wished to rest from their labours.

  In some places, the rock was so smooth and polished by the elements that there was no handhold or even the tiniest outcropping of stone to allow one to find purchase. The sea lapped playfully at the base of Nivarita, sending up a gentle breeze.

  The wind cooed at Mara and tugged at his hair and iron-grey robes. The link chain he wore looped loosely around his waist clinked softly. It was a show of solidarity from the elements, he knew, and was meant to be appreciated. Especially on the eve of battle. They had always worked in tandem with the elementary forces. It was necessary for what they had been chosen to do.

  Truth seekers all, they had been trained to see the clandestine acts revealed in the flames, secrets whispered by the wind, tidings borne on the tides of the waterbodies, all things both bright and beautiful and dark and dastardly witnessed by the rays of the sun, moonbeams and overarching canvas of the sky that encompassed everything in existence, and finally the bitter truths concealed in the heart, which could not escape the gaze of Yama or those who acted in his name, to uphold the dictates of Dharma.

  Gathering the information, processing, filtering and finally acting on it—this was what the Order of the Kimkaras did or had done to the best of their collective ability. It should have been enough to keep the three worlds from falling apart. But it never was.

  The seekers were tasked with curtailing excesses, deterring those who sought to do evil to others or themselves, punishing repeat offenders and rewarding the few who chose to do the right thing. But the job was a demanding one and too often had they caved in to its pressures, focusing so much on preventing evil that they had forgotten to preserve all that was still good. Mara saw that now, but truths learned in retrospect would not help them. Their lapses had proved costly and they were being made to pay. For his mistakes, if he were being brutally honest, and he was.

  Thirty-two of his brothers had battled the creatures that fought them below. Mara could not see them but knew that they were fighting to the death. And he knew that they were falling, their numbers decreasing by the second. If he had been the sentimental sort, he would have been proud. They had put aside most of their petty differences and stood united in the face of death. Or so he hoped.

  He could have chosen to fight by their side. It would have given them fresh heart. But being a leader meant making hard choices, and he was not one to balk, even if some among the brothers had pronounced him craven and cursed him with their last breath.

  Others had tried to fight them here but all had been thrown back, defeated and dead, though the kimkaras had no fortress or walls of stone to cower behind. In the days of yore, men and rakshasas had tried the mettle of the Order of the Kimkaras but the thirty-three came under the protection of the lokapalas—Yama, Varuna, Kubera and Indra—and they were invincible. For the longest tim
e, they had weathered the passing of the ages with their numbers intact. But then again, nothing was meant to last forever.

  The accursed souls who had come for them on this particular day were led by Nayima, the sorceress, the one who took their worst dreams and made them come true. Some among the kimkaras called her the Stone Witch, or a word that rhymed with it. It was an epithet given to her by those who feared and hated the sorceress in equal measure. But Mara had known her when she was still a child. It had all been so long ago that it was almost entirely irrelevant in the current scheme of things.

  Mara wondered if Nayima’s generals—Yatana and Hathya, the tormentor and the murderer, giants who quaffed blood and feasted on flesh—would honour them with their presence. They were fitting companions for one who specialized in butchery. It was strange that there was no sign of them. But Nayima had brought along her pets, which she had also bred, the tarakshas and mirugadasas, the demon wolves and mutated monsters, respectively, because she had made it the mission of her sordid existence to see how far she could go along hitherto-uncharted territories of evil. Even the vilest veterans of the furthest bowels of Yama’s hells dared not venture where she did.

  Nayima could have been anything she put her mind to. As a child, she had had a big and beautiful heart, and all the potential in the world, but in the end she had turned out to be a wicked witch. And not just a regular one . . . There was no use in dwelling on these things, Mara knew. Just as he knew that none of them would survive the hour. After all, you could be sure of some things in an uncertain world.

  Mara smiled then, and it was a grim thing to look upon, for it bespoke a dreadful purpose that would brook no opposition. Time was the real enemy and he was determined to buy some, not for them who were already lost but for those whom it would better serve.

  Nayima’s monsters had burrowed their way into the heart of Nivarita, he knew. And he could feel them gnawing at her roots, chewing away at her core with iron and fire. By now they would have found the wide tunnels that stretched out for miles and miles with the hand-carved ceilings, artistic galleries and pillared splendour raised by the blood and devotion of the kimkaras, leading into the caves that were their home and hearth. The agrima’s brothers were fighting them tooth and nail, putting their heart and soul into defending their stronghold. And dying.

  The agrima’s heart would have broken into pieces at the carnage but he would not allow it to shatter. He could not afford to. His brothers had spent centuries erecting the enchantments to deter creatures of their ilk. No doubt that would slow them down. But it would not be sufficient to make a palpable difference. Not this time.

  War had a distinctive sound—a deep resonance of snapping and tearing, shrieking and cursing, cutting and slashing by sharp weapons, sudden booms as things were blasted into oblivion, exploding spells cast by the magic of the kimkaras and, all around, the sounds of dying. It had its own peculiar smells too—metallic blood, liquid faeces and burning flesh.

  Mara was not one to give into self-doubt and recriminations and yet he could not help but pause. None of the brothers had seen what he had—the doom that was overtaking them and the faintest ray of hope. His mouth twisted again at the bitterness of his thoughts.

  He saw Nayima then. She soared upwards in a graceful spiral like a magnificent bird of prey. Some would have proclaimed her the comeliest of them all. But all Mara saw were the hollow eyes, the features bereft of goodness, grace or warmth and the rock-hard, chiselled form that was taut and cruel—every one of these features was a dead giveaway of the mouldering remains that constituted her core, marking her as the foulest of beings.

  Clad in a sari of exquisite gold, she wore the navaratnas, ‘nine gems’, in her hair and they shone against their darkness. At her throat, from a link chain of gold, hung a precious stone the size of a pigeon’s egg, crimson like dried blood. It gleamed with hidden fires on the combined strength of the sarvaratnas, the celestial gems charged with the power of the immortals, some of which she had managed to get her avaricious paws on. He wondered if she was still on the hunt for the pancharatnas, the ‘heavenly five’. It was said that the combined power of these fabled gemstones could be withstood only by the combined efforts of the Divine Father and Divine Mother. But Nayima, in her hubris, sought to gain mastery over them all.

  For a long moment, he pondered over the bloody history of the precious stone that had ended up in the hands of the sorceress and was now being used to destroy their order. The crimson gemstone gleamed as it caught the rays of the setting sun, stealing the warmth and light, leaving the world just a shade darker than it had been. A deep silence had descended.

  The sorceress hung suspended a good ways from him. But she was looking at him. He could see the frozen pupils, the smoothness of those cheeks and her vacant expression. Gently she removed the crimson stone, holding it cupped in the palm of her hand as it drew in the last rays of the setting sun and caught on fire. If she felt the burn, there was little indication of it.

  Nayima threw the stone then, like a flowery dart meant to capture the attention of a lover, but it flew hard and fast and the deadly missile made for him with unfaltering intent, speeding towards him like a thrown javelin, aimed straight and true. Then the darkness that had descended on them moments ago was suddenly dispelled in a blinding haze of heat and light. The boom that marked their total annihilation reverberated across the three worlds.

  White-hot pain exploded inside him. Mercifully, the pain centres shut down at once but he could smell his charred skin and hear his body disintegrate into a pile of ash. Reduced to a shadow, robbed entirely of the physical form that had for so long housed his will, dreams and purpose, he stole away into the distance, biting back the wail of anguish that threatened to burst forth from a phantom lung that had moments ago collapsed amidst the smoking rubble.

  The blast had lifted Nivarita as light engulfed it, the unstoppable incandescence from that deadly missile tearing apart the formidable stronghold of the kimkaras as though it were a child’s toy. In a heartbeat, the mountain became a spiralling inferno reaching up to the sky, as if in supplication, and then simply vanished as if it had never existed.

  Darkness claimed them again, seconds after the intense conflagration had burnt so hot and bright under a cauliflower-shaped pyrocumulus cloud. All that remained were the scorching heat and the feather-light kisses of smouldering ash. Aftershocks rippled across the sky and sea both, and a grey vortex descended, destroying what was and what would be without thought. Hot winds blew across the remains, knocking over boulders and toppling burning trees with a sinister flourish.

  Nothing remained but death. The crimson stone had done its job well, having released the terrible energies that had been concentrated at its core. Everything was burnt to a crisp. There were no corpses. They had all melted away—his brothers, the tarakshas and the mirugadasas. Nayima did not believe in sparing those who fought on her side when total victory demanded they be sacrificed. For her everyone was dispensable and everything was disposable.

  Mara floated high above the widespread destruction, as insubstantial as the smoke that drifted over the devastated land. He could see the golden form of the sorceress, bright as a flame. If she was satisfied with all that had been accomplished, she did not show it. She did not linger either but soared away without a single backwards glance.

  As for him, all he had was the time he had stolen for another, and none of it could be used to mourn the end of the mighty Order of the Kimkaras. Hopefully, despite everything, something could still be done. But he had to hurry, and believe, even if he no longer did.

  7

  From Varu’s Book: Floating

  Yama’s consort wandered through the dark, swirling mists, absolutely free and wild. Thoroughly encapsulated within the protective, silvery barrier of the Rodhana, she was rather like a fairy-tale princess, trapped in a tower waiting for her Prince Charming. Except she wasn’t a princess, nor did she wish to be rescued. The Rodhana had been fashioned by her and it was the fulfilment of a long-cherished dream. Fortunately it did not entail waiting for anybody or anything. It was merely a state of being.