Sita's Ascent

  VAYU NAIDU

  Sita’s Ascent

  PENGUIN BOOKS

  Contents

  About the Author

  Dedication

  Ramayana

  Sita

  Urmilla

  Rama

  Valmiki

  Lava

  Mandodari

  Soorpanakka

  Lakshmana

  Hanuman

  Ashwamedha

  A Note

  Acknowledgements

  Copyright Page

  PENGUIN BOOKS

  SITA’S ASCENT

  Dr Vayu Naidu brought her research and performance of oral traditions into the British academy, and created new works with composers and orchestras and for theatre and radio drama. This is her debut novel. The Vayu Naidu Storytelling Company is based in London.

  For Chris Banfield and Lakshmi Holmström and

  my father, Major General Aban Naidu, who revealed the

  epic in life

  Ramayana

  Rama is to be crowned King of Ayodhya. His wife is to be the queen. The coronation is interrupted. His father’s favourite wife, Queen Kaikeyi, exiles Rama to the forests for fourteen years where he must roam unrecognizable as a royal. Sita is determined to accompany him and Rama’s brother Lakshmana will not be left behind. During their time in the forests they encounter sages, rakshasas, ferrymen, tribals, hunters, spirits and the common folk.

  In the thirteenth year of exile Sita is enchanted by a golden deer and pleads with Rama to catch it so she can return to Ayodhya after the exile with the creature as a reminder of their time in the forests. When Rama leaves, only because he sees Sita distressed on losing sight of the deer, Sita hears Rama’s voice crying for help. Lakshmana is unable to convince her that it is a rakshasa’s trick. She hurls at him a fatal remark that makes Lakshmana depart hastily in search of Rama. Left unguarded, except by a protective line drawn on the earth by Lakshmana, Sita is abducted by the machinations of the emperor Ravana and held captive in his kingdom.

  The search for Sita on the princes’ return to their forest dwelling begins with their meeting Hanuman, the chief minister to the exiled King Sugriva. Hanuman, with his special powers and wisdom, is able to find Sita. When she tells him of her trials he urges her to return with him. But she does not wish to return by stealth; she feels a world order needs to be changed from might to right, from darkness to light.

  A war is waged, and Ravana is killed by Rama. When Sita appears before Rama after the great war, he informs her in public hearing that she is free from captivity. Sita is incensed that she should have to prove her ‘purity’ so she orders Lakshmana to light a fire. As she walks through the fire, that is, undergoes an agnipariksha, Agni, the god of fire, appeals to Rama about Sita’s unparalleled and uncorrupted love for her husband.

  Fourteen years have passed and Sita and Rama, with Lakshmana and Hanuman, return to Ayodhya. Rama is crowned king. Sita is expecting their child and our story begins from here.

  Sita

  When the shock subsided she could hear again. The sound of the wheels grinding recklessly on the stony track faded into the distance. Her grip on her left hand tightened. Her bangle twisted and snapped. She gasped to discover her feet rooted to the spot while her heart pounded, making her body twitch. White lips, dry mouth, white light. Like a primeval beginning, there was a sound and a string of images in her head, without meaning. Where words once flowed with lightness from the heart, there was now a forest fire. ‘When … did all this happen?’ she asked herself.

  They had been driving in the chariot for at least two hours. The paved roads gave way to rougher bypasses and then slip roads west of the capital to tracks in the forest. The breeze from the speed of the open vehicle tousled her hair. She didn’t care. She was so happy recounting: ‘That first time Urmilla and I walked through here, we heard the drums at the palace announcing our arrival. Do you remember?’

  No response from the driver. He cracked the whip and the horses charged like lightning. Parrots flew past, shrieking in their rice-field-green plumage lined with pomegranate pink. ‘Our hearts were beating fast as the dancers seemed to leap down from the trees to welcome us. As young brides, we thought this was the gateway to the world of our husbands!’ The same happiness flooded her now, so she could override his silence. Her hand cupped her pregnant belly; she was six months past. ‘When we took our vows we circled Agni seven times, and,’ she continued, half laughing to herself, ‘over the years, we’ve all travelled seven worlds of wonder, joy, fear, anger, even courage, with fire … wouldn’t you say, Lakshmana?’ Sita looked at him, and he steadily faced the path ahead of him, looking above the white rumps of the speeding horses and their red reins as the chariot drove on.

  ‘I sent a message to Valmiki,’ was Lakshmana’s reply. Teasingly she said, ‘I hope you didn’t give too much away. I want to test his memory!’ Lakshmana smiled in spite of himself. Yes, she was referring to the great storyteller who chronicled events of mythological proportions. He remembered beyond memory, and now Sita was going to playfully challenge him. Lakshmana slowed the chariot down, as this part of the forest had low-lying boughs and the pathway meandered into shrubs. The hermitage also had protected deer roaming nearby. The dwellings were camouflaged. This encouraged deer, peacocks and wild cats to come and feed there, trusting the few male and female ascetics who lived in the huts.

  Lakshmana brought the chariot to a halt a few yards from the clearing where the huts stood. Each hut sloped or stood straight depending on the length of the branches that had been cut to build it. Crowned with a thatch of dried leaves, each hut was lined with mud. The aroma of the sap from the freshly cut branches hung in the midday air. Lakshmana and Sita took a deep breath. Smell: the essence of memory. The smell of the past with associations recalling personal worlds. This smell evoked a memory of comfort. Even Lakshmana relaxed his tense muscles as he removed the harness from the horses and gave them water. ‘I am here, and this is now,’ he told himself. Swiftly, he went to Sita’s side as she held her belly and stepped out of the chariot. ‘Amma,’ she uttered with relief as her feet touched the ground. He watched as she took in her surroundings. Then she began to hand him the various earthen vessels covered with plantain leaves containing gifts for Valmiki and fellow ascetics. First were the gifts of food. She steadied herself and pulled the sari pallu over her shoulder as she walked towards the clearing with one ceremonial vessel for Valmiki. Lakshmana, cradling the other vessels in his arms, followed her.

  ‘Aaaarrh!’ came a squealing grunt of welcome from Valmiki as he emerged from his hut. He stretched his arms and interlocked his palms skyward to make a stupa over his head. He did not look much like a wise, aging sage. His creativity swirled all around him, in little atoms of cheer. His upper body was bare with matted hair covering his back and chest. His quick, shuffling stride revealed he was simultaneously embarrassed and proud of his sizeable belly. Valmiki smelt of wood smoke, bark and ghee. These were the auspicious ingredients for sacred fires, around which he often sat, chuckling merrily as he taught, or gazing silently as he composed. His laughter, which was a cross between a donkey braying and a heralding trumpet, resounded through the forest. The birds of the forest fluttered down to complete the reception for Sita, who was paying a visit nearly two years after returning to Ayodhya and the coronation.

  Valmiki approached her with his broken-toothed smile. ‘How long has it been, Sita?’

  ‘Too long, Maharaj,’ Sita said as she started to bend to touch his feet. He had earned the appellation ‘Maharaj’ as he was celebrated as the king of all known and unknown storytellers. ‘Now, now, none of that,’ said Valmiki. ‘It is awkward for you, not only because you are a queen but because you have a belly too!’ He ca
ckled. Lakshmana shook with laughter as he set the vessels down and seamlessly stretched himself on the ground to touch the old sage’s feet and seek his blessings. Sita knelt. ‘And Rama?’ Valmiki inquired.

  ‘Rama sends you his deepest love, Maharaj. He knew I wanted to monopolize this time with you!’ Sita said, her eyes shining.

  ‘It is a time of transition, Maharaj … too many demands on his time. Bharata’s administration is flawless. It is the ruling on domestic statutes that’s pressing and Rama wanted to attend to them personally,’ Lakshmana offered.

  Valmiki caught the hint of an apology and responded with the deftness of a diplomat. ‘Fourteen years is a long time to be away … not to say you all haven’t been busy; but it’s that shift from the individual to the state—every decision is slower because you have to take a whole lot of people into consideration, isn’t it?’

  Valmiki could sense Lakshmana’s unease. Lakshmana knew of his ruler’s difficult position, where taking decisions meant consultation with ministers, which at the best of times was time-consuming, and at worst, unwieldy in matters of urgency.

  Valmiki cheerfully beckoned one of the ascetics who served Sita a leaf cup of goat’s milk mixed with honey. Smell and taste: they immediately conjured up days in the forest and hospitality at hermitages. Sita couldn’t help herself and said, ‘I’ve added to this recipe, you know. A dust of cardamom with some crushed pistachio makes it a royal drink for regal hermits!’ Valmiki understood her well and burst into his high-pitched laughter. ‘Pista, ah yes. Now that is something I would have to spend a lot of time shelling. I don’t have the patience of Sabari.’

  ‘Is that why you wrote her in?’ asked Lakshmana cautiously. Valmiki’s gaze steadied beyond Lakshmana’s face. ‘She was real. How else can anyone comprehend that degree of devotion?’

  ‘Did it not contradict our entire system about maintaining purity when you made her taste every single fruit she offered Rama?’

  ‘But it’s her love, Lakshmana, which went beyond all that,’ said Sita. ‘You see, I wouldn’t think twice about what I cooked and fed my friends—only because I would be making it with love.’ How could anyone argue with that. The banter continued and gradually the other ascetics joined them, giving news about how the forest spring had widened and changed its course.

  After lunch Valmiki insisted Sita have the customary nap inside the hut. Lakshmana unloaded Sita’s luggage. Since returning to the palace the same day was impossible, it had been decided that Lakshmana would return to escort her home. Rama was particular about these arrangements. Sita had instructed her maids on cooking and cleaning the inner apartments for the few days until her return. Coming to the forest to spend time with Valmiki was almost like going to her mother’s home. Sita’s mother had died a few years ago when she got news that her daughter had been abducted by a shape-shifting king and was being held hostage in Lanka. The thought of contamination by strangers’ touch and her daughter’s life in danger made her wither into a skeleton. Her last words were: ‘What will people say?’

  Sita’s mind began to wander as she came out of a restful doze, woken by the murmur of distant bees. The afternoon sun filtered through the slatted window as the trees cast long shadows across the clearing. Sita sat up. Valmiki stood with his hands on his hips, watching Lakshmana pile wood to start the fire for cooking the evening meal. Sita was offered hot tea made with ginger, cloves and cinnamon. It got her circulation going. Lakshmana tied a knot with dried blades of grass and set the wood down. Picking two flints, he struck them decisively. He set the spark near the knot of grass and blew on it. ‘Not too big a flame, Lakshmana!’ cautioned Valmiki. Lakshmana’s face reddened with pain and rage. ‘Too much water under the bridge,’ thought Sita as she saw him wince.

  She knew what Lakshmana was thinking. It wasn’t that long ago when everyone had stood around—the victorious and the defeated. Nothing had been conquered. Sita was called to prove that she was worthy of all the lives that had been lost in the war at Lanka. Is she ‘pure’, they wanted to know. ‘After all, her captor and host Ravana was deeply and madly in love with her,’ whispered the columns of soldiers who had survived the war. Sita stood beleaguered watching the scene unfold before her eyes. She had been in captivity for thirteen months with no human contact. Her desolation vanished in an instant, a wave of relief surging over her, when she saw Rama tending to a wounded soldier. And when Rama looked up, the flame in her glowed with joy. It was him. He, who had vanquished the darkness that was eroding the world. He was the one for whom she had waited and waited.

  Rama stood before the columns of the depleted army and their malicious murmurs, and the words he uttered she first heard in slow motion. When she could made sense of them, everything dissolved into disbelief. The flame within her burst into a rage. Somewhere deep inside she knew that all of those who stood there, grieving the loss of their dear ones, wanted in exchange for the cost of flesh something invaluable—moral fibre. If the dead could not return, then those left behind wanted purity as the price of blood. Rama said to Sita, ‘Ravana is dead. You are free to go now.’ Was it Rama speaking or their spokesman? ‘Light a fire, Lakshmana!’ she commanded. ‘Let the flame burn brighter!’ she hissed. Lakshmana was stunned. Her eyes were ablaze, her voice was fire as he struck the flint and it sparked. In the here and now of this hermitage, Sita could see Lakshmana had not forgotten that moment, and she comforted him in her thoughts: ‘It will all come to pass. We live in a different time now.’

  Lakshmana neatly stacked in Sita’s dwelling the supply of vegetables, rice, grain, utensils and palm leaves for writing—gifts for everyone at the hermitage. Next to these was a modest trunk with Sita’s clothes. Sita made a mental inventory of all the things that had to be unloaded from the chariot as she had instructed their packing. Lakshmana headed towards the horses and harnessed them. They were calm and ready to be driven. Valmiki followed Sita as she bade Lakshmana goodbye: ‘Please tell Rama not to work too late. See that he drinks enough watermelon juice during the day; the circles under his eyes have grown very dark. Oh! Tell Urmilla everything is just as I expected it to be here, in fact, even better. Next time she must come too. Go carefully, Lakshmana, and I’ll see you on Dasami. I’ll be waiting.’

  ‘No, Sita,’ was what she first heard him say. This time he looked straight at her, as if to bridle the pain he was wrestling with as he said these words. ‘Rama … instructed me … I am to leave you here. You are not to return. Those were Rama’s words.’

  The shock of the sound of his voice, the look in his eyes. It was a primeval beginning. White light, dry mouth, white lips. A string of images floated in white clouds behind her eyes; they were bereft of all meaning. Her left hand rose to hold her throat. Her right hand clasped its wrist. Her bangle snapped. The figure floating away in the chariot was a man called Lakshmana. She repeated the name in her mind: Lakshmana. The more she did the more he evaporated from her memory. It, he, had no meaning. The sound filtered in and she could hear the wheels of the chariot grinding recklessly on the pathway in the distance. The clouds of dust they raised made Valmiki sneeze. Sita let out the first scream. A short one and held her belly tight.

  Words, which came so easily to Valmiki, now burned on his tongue. What do you say to a woman who has been abandoned, and that too, so many times?

  ‘When?’ she uttered. She felt cold and shivered in the afternoon heat. In the distance there was a sound like crashing. She was tumbling down in a spiral within herself the way Lakshmana’s chariot was tumbling down the gorge. He was flying through the air, kicking his legs for the last time.

  ‘When … did all this happen?’ she asked. ‘Why didn’t he tell me?’ A soft bulb of white light burst in her mind’s eye. Rama was standing as she was ready to step into the chariot. He looked at her and her heart melted. He even said he was going to miss her. How long ago was this planned? She was tumbling fast and Valmiki wanted to catch her before she fell into that dark abyss of betrayal.

&nb
sp; ‘This is good,’ he said. ‘Sita, I was born from the darkness. Listen,’ said Valmiki with urgency and music in his voice. She lifted her head; somewhere inside her there was a doll called Sita, tumbling.

  ‘Listen. When that strange man came, the one they called Narada, I thought he was another joke. I threatened him and he presented me with a challenge: “Go and see if anyone in your family will visit death in your stead and take your sins on their heads.” I was so sure everyone would. My father was having his afternoon smoke and, when I asked him, he accused me of wanting to kill him. My beloved mother said I was a snake, and my darling wife accused me of attempting the greatest murder because I was wiping the smile off her face by asking her to visit death and take my sins upon her head. Till then I had been so sure they all loved me. I risked my life every day for them, I thought. I thought they loved me for me. But I did not know that I only loved myself and, naturally, they, themselves; and whom I killed, what I brought home or how I risked my life was really of no concern to anyone. My home suddenly struck me as a wilderness. I ran for my life. I returned to untie that strange man. He could see what had transpired from the way I looked. He gave me a word. I repeated it for what seemed like years on end and, out of that darkness, worlds began to swim out of my heart and sing inside my head. I could see the future and Rama, and you.’

  ‘Did you see me like this?’ Sita asked him. Valmiki hung his head. Had he imagined her as a character for the compelling epic as he saw her now? Was she to always stand tall and take the blows her husband’s fate dealt her? Had he never seen her as a victim? That for a long time to come she would have to be the ideal by whom women swore when they took their marriage vows? He suddenly realized what a burden this must be.