The messenger network was soon in place. The youngsters of the jungle were finding the job of finding out the happenings of the city and carrying the messages around very exciting. During one of these trips, Virat met with an accident. He fell down from his horse and hit a tree trunk right in his head fatally. He died on the spot. That left the king and queen without any trusted ally. But their jungle-force served them well. They did not know the identity of their citizen friends yet. But given the kind of messages they carried they had started suspecting them to not be ordinary citizens. However, they had developed too much respect for Chandrika to refuse to help them.

—

One day their messenger returned from the city and he looked excited. Chandrika found him outside the hut and asked him what the news was. She paled on hearing it. She asked him to go back as she would break the news herself to her husband.

When she walked inside, she saw the king pondering over a map drawn on the mud floor. This was his sole occupation these days was – planning their attack once the foreigners had relaxed their guards and his allies had the time to replenish their supplies. He had strategically left people behind in the capital, who would pretend to side with the enemy, but would secretly work with him. Others would attack from outside, trapping them in a city alien and uncooperative with them. He had wanted the queens and small children to leave the palace so that foreigners did not have access to anyone using whom they could blackmail him. The queens had other plans though. So, he was now trying to attack before the queens were harmed or forced to kill themselves through the ritual of ‘sati’.

“His Highness!”

He looked up at her quizzically. Why was her voice trembling?

“What happened?”

“There is some news from the palace.”

“From the palace! What is it?” he got up with a start.

“Eldest queen, Maharani Padmaja…”

“What happened to her? The enemy is not already in the palace, is it?”

“No. They are on the city boundaries. But apparently, the confidence in the palace was really shaken. They sent messages to the queens to surrender themselves beforehand and they will be treated well. The message said that if the surrender did not come right then, after the fall, the repercussions would be dire. Devi Padmaja decided to perform ‘sati’ ritual.”

“She did?” The king looked shaken.

“Yes Sir,” Chandirka herself was pained. Whatever be her thoughts on kings having multiple wives, queen Padmaja, was a gentle lady. She gracefully discharged her duties as the eldest queen and she had always been kind towards Chandrika whenever they saw each other.

“What about queens…” Bhumimitra made to ask about the other two queens.

“Sir…” she interrupted not wanting him to take their names. He wouldn’t want to, after he came to know what they did.

“What is it?”

“Please embrace yourself to hear the worst, Sir. And be kind to them and to yourself. They weren’t the strongest women you could have.”

“Don’t make me anxious Devi. Tell me what has happened.”

“They surrendered. They travelled to the outskirts of the city and surrendered themselves.”

Bhumimitra got the shock of his life. “Why! Why would they do that?” he cried out, “I wasn’t asking them for ‘sati’. I had made arrangements for their safe passage. Why would they not take that respectable route and do this…”

“Please hold yourself together, Sir. It won’t do for you to break down.”

“If only they had waited a little. We are ready to attack in two days. There are enough arrangements inside the city to hold them off until then…”

“If they had waited Sir, you would never have known how unreliable and weak they were.” Chandrika had no sympathy for them. “And hypocrites. Once the eldest queen refused to leave the palace, they did not have the courage to face their own limitations. They also repeated her decision. Obviously they didn’t have the courage to follow through on the much tougher decision of the Maharani. Hence the surrender. I mourn Maharani Padmaja Sir. For the other two – excuse my curtness – but ‘good riddance’.”

He sighed. “You are right, Devi. And yet – I can’t be so rational about it. It has hurt me.”

“Feeling hurt is human, His Highness. But not getting affected by your personal hurt and doing your duty towards your people is what kings are supposed to do. You would make your planned attack, won’t you?”

“Yes. I will.”

—

The king made his preparation at the night itself. He would leave for the city in the morning. All his allies would camp at a predetermined place few miles away from the enemy camps and attack the unsuspecting enemy. For crossing the jungle and reaching there, he would don one of the soldier’s uniform he had been carrying. His ammunitions, horses and other warfare tools were being guarded by other allies and he would find them at their camp.

Chandrika came to him with a mud-plate. She had arranged for tilak with which she would put on him in the morning. Their mood was somber.

“You will regain your kingdom and your palace, Sir. I am sure of that,” she said.

“Yes. I think so too,” he smiled sadly.

“Aren’t you happy about it?”

“Me? I am, I think. But you aren’t, right?”

“Why do you say so?”

“You would be happier being left behind in these jungles, instead of coming with me, won’t you?”

She stayed silent for a few moments. He looked at her anxiously, searching for answers to some questions. Then she spoke slowly, “Not any longer. Not without you, Swami!”

His heart leapt with joy. For the first time she had addressed him not as a king, but as her husband. But that would not satisfy him. Swami – used to address husband, but it meant a master, which the husband was supposed to be. But he wasn’t looking to be her master.

“Swami?” he questioned.

She blushed hard. “Priya!” she managed to say. The beloved! “If you choose to accept my feelings.”

“Choose to?” he smiled, his smile reaching all the way up to his softened eyes, “I had no chance to choose, Devi. I had fallen in love the moment I had turned to look at the woman who had stopped me from eating a poisonous fruit in the jungles of Chandranagar. It has taken us a lot of time, and a great deal of trouble, to reach here. Let me hold you tonight and tell you just how bittersweet this wait has been and how I intend to make up for the lost time.”

“The night is yours Sir, and so am I. Have always been.”

“My lust has always been satisfied. By my wives, by the professional women, but the women surrendering in a war… Tonight I ask you for ratidaan. Not out of a sense of duty or obligation, or for any selfish expectations, or out of any fear or terror. I ask for it out of love. That is the only reason for which I ask, and that is the only reason I will accept it for.”

“That is the only reason, I will give it for. Rest assured.”

He held out his hand and drew her in his embrace. The night of union had finally arrived for them!

—

“You are coming as well?” he asked uncertainly in the morning.

“Yes.”

“It’s not like I can order you to stay back?”

“I want to come with you.” That was a change! She sounded almost meek. She didn’t say she’d disobey him. She just expressed her wish and hoped that he would indulge her. But then, that had always been the case. She had never disobeyed him. He had always felt like indulging on his own. So, nothing had changed really, he thought to himself. Except that blush that crept up on her cheeks every so often. And the voice that was now soft, instead of petulant and bitter. He’d still indulge her. And he’d not regret it. Nothing of importance had changed.

But he felt like teasing her a little. “I’d gain the reputation of being overly smitten by my wife at this rate. Who has ever heard of taking a woman along to the hiding place in a jungle; and then to a battlefield?”

“Is that true?” she colored. She was surprised by her own reaction. If he had said something like this earlier, she’d have responded with rational reasoning. Accepting that this is possible and still making a case for her choice. But right now… she just colored. Gosh! One night and everything had changed. She was suddenly this young woman madly in love. Everything other than what he felt or said faded in the background.

Seeing her reaction, he realized that she had taken it seriously. “It’s true. But only until they see you in action!” he decided to relieve her.

And she was relieved. She found her old self back. “Yes,” she said, “And I am going there as your soldier, Sir. Not as your wife. It will be my duty to protect you. Not the other way round.”

He grinned at her. She lived in some other world, didn’t she?

“Let’s go,” he said affectionately and they left for their journey.

—

To be continued