Nasteya Page 5

  ‘Let us stay here, please,’ said Ayaan.

  ‘We must stop and wear the night away. Even my legs curse me now. Since it rose up until it sank, the sun has seen us walking without halt,’ I said unloading my pack.

  ‘The land that lies ahead is unknown to us… The deadliest creatures probably crawl out of their holes at night. This is the limit of my geography, and yours too I guess. Daylight will be more useful to us,’ Hira said.

  After he looked around, Nasteya said, ‘We are in no great hurry. We will rest here till dawn.’

  No sooner did we make camp then Ayaan started playing, chasing bugs and butterflies—a game that all children liked.

  The water refreshed us all. Hira worked to make a fire and soon he had a merry crackle of flame. We sat around it. White stars sprang forth in the dark sky as the night grew old. When I was lost in the world of my own thoughts, I sniffed the whiff of wheat-dough bread. I was starving—all of us were.

  ‘This is good. Where did you get this?’ I asked Hira the moment I swallowed the first nibble. ‘My mother had it preserved and packed and it was still there in our ruined hut. I took it as I thought it would help us on the way,’ was his answer.

  After eating the bread, berries and apples, I drank a mouthful of sweet and crystal-clear water from the spring. Soon, we slept. The red rim of the sun was already rising over the mountains and the colours of the waking earth returning when I woke up. Nasteya was standing on higher ground, facing the south. He was still in deep thought. I got up and walked towards him. Aware of my presence, he said, still facing the south, ‘Saarah was a kingdom that least deserved such a painful end. I wish I could change everything.’

  ‘Who can change destiny? Nor can we know what plans it has for us, whether good or bad. Whatever happens is not in our control. If change was possible we would be living that change by now,’ I said.

  ‘Change would have been possible if I were there!’ Nasteya said fiercely with his gaze fixed on the world that lay still before us.

  ‘They were fierce and outsized, Nasteya! You could have obstructed them for a while but the consequences would have been no different. Godmother knew that nothing could be done even with preparation and help. She knew it well, otherwise she would have walked herself to the king and told him to prepare for war, but today we live, and it won’t be long until we know why.’

  The moon had long been chased down by the sun. We trussed up our packs again and walked on. We set the same pace as the day before. The sun was overhead when at last we reached the lofty mountains, tipped with shining snow. A sudden breeze blew in our hair and stirred our shawls—the chill wind of the Himalayas. As we marched forward, the hills grew taller and the woods became denser. From the distance, we could see stretches of dark green woods.

  ‘This forest seems beautiful and tonight we shall find shelter amid its trees. This sound will bring dreamless slumber and we will surely awaken refreshed. I’m tired and hungry as well,’ I said.

  ‘Things are not always what they seem. I have heard legends of these forests—and the stories are not soothing but ominous,’ Hira said. ‘No bird or animal dwells here or even if they do, they flee far off at night when the shadows in the forest are awakened. Those shadows are meant to tranquilise. Those who are well aware of this leave the dark shadows of these trees but those who have no knowledge of these forests are attracted by it. When they go deep into the forest they fall asleep—and that is when the trees carry out their dirty job. They slowly pull the prey under their giant roots and eat them. We must not go forth in the absence of sunlight.’

  ‘We are at the edge of the forest and we cannot camp here,’ said Nasteya. ‘Here we are most prone to predators and other unfriendly eyes. It is still not dark and now that we are aware of the forest, we will try to pass through it as quickly as we can.’

  The bush behind us rustled. I turned and saw two points against the light, as if they were a pair of eyes. But they were gone the next moment.

  ‘It is a risk to pass through it,’ said Hira stubbornly.

  ‘Then risk we shall take,’ said Nasteya as he looked towards the forest. A shudder ran through him at the sight, a strange cold thrill. It wasn’t terror or fear. The lines on his face smoothened out and he seemed lost under the spell of the beauty of the woods. He seemed overcome by a desire to go deep into the forest. It would turn out to be a regrettable mistake. But I was too mesmerised by the charm to oppose Nasteya’s decision. Even I trotted behind him carelessly. Ayaan was already asleep on Hira’s shoulder and even Hira walked calmly behind us, resigned to our decision.

  When we were at the edge of the forest, the trees seemed to lean towards each other. The only sound was a soft humming. Slowly, we entered the forest that was dark under the shadow of banyan trees, not ordinary banyan trees but broader and taller with hundreds of fingering boughs whose shadows swung upon the land. As soon as we passed a few trees, there was a sudden crackling of wood and rustling of leaves all through the forest. Hardly taking any notice, we went on and on. We now walked under a canopy of trees. The very dim light of dusk made its way through the web of branches. Hira’s words were long forgotten. Then, Nasteya stopped by the side of one huge banyan.

  ‘I feel tired and sleepy. Let us halt here and wear away the night. I cannot bear the weight of my body,’ he said, barely managing to keep his eyes open. I too sat against the broad trunk and fell asleep at once. So did the others. We were in a deep sleep even before the sun had fully set.

  ‘Wake up!’ Ayaan said as he shook us impatiently. Slowly, sleepily, we opened our eyes. The sky was pale blue and streaked with clouds. It was dawn already and the blood red sun was coming up in a smoking haze. Low upon the edge of sight, the edges of Himalayas glinted red. We found ourselves lying in the middle of a grassy plain. The wind went like grey waves through the grass. There was a hollow bark lying near us. At one end were securely tied ropes and it looked like a boat that had been pulled out of the forest—a trail started from its rear end and went deep into the woods.

  ‘What happened?’ Nasteya said, rubbing his eyes.

  He soon realised that the place where we now rested wasn’t the one where we had gone to sleep last evening. And then we remembered everything, including the wicked spell of the woods. But how we had come out of the forest was still a mystery to us. Our clothes were stained with mud. Towards the south, the dark forest gazed upon us with a resentful silence. We had woken from a deep sleep, yet we felt tired and unwell.

  ‘How did we come here?’ Nasteya asked as he tried to recall everything he could about the previous night.

  ‘Someone dragged us out of the forest,’ piped Ayaan. ‘I was half-awakened by bumps, and I seem to remember a man who pulled this tree trunk with all of us inside it. By then, we were out of the forest. He had veiled his face. Knowing that I was awake, he left us here and fled into the forest like a captive escapes a prison,’ Ayaan narrated.

  ‘I wonder who he was—but it is due to him that we still breathe,’ said Nasteya. ‘Ayaan, did you notice anything else?’

  ‘Not really… He limped as he hurried away. He was wearing Aryan clothes, but they were stained and untidy and looked quite old.’

  ‘There is always something good against every evil. He might be a kind and noble forest dweller,’ Hira said as he tried to look deeper into the dark forest, before adding, ‘but I warned you beforehand. If not for this kind soul and our good luck, we would have been flowing through those trees as sap. I wish I could thank him, but I won’t go into these perilous shadows again.’

  With my gaze still fixed on the dark forest I said, ‘Let us now move away from it, so far that its humming won’t reach our ears.’

  We shouldered our packs and marched towards the North. The trees could now be seen into scattered groups and the slopes were more bare and rocky. As once again the dusk deepened, we came to long steep slopes with uneven ups and downs. Small streams, frozen at the edges, furrowed through the slopes ev
ery here and there. Soon the slopes became steeper, lining the deep valleys.

  The path upon which we stood went up steeply into the mountains. For another twenty days, we journeyed on the path that led us north towards the huge gateway of Eesh (the supreme lord of the universe). As we went on, a fear of encountering those White Demons started to dig deep in my heart. But nothing that I feared happened during all these days and nights of journey and toil. Soon, the slopes of the mountains became bare of trees instead wearing a blanket of thick snow. Journeying through the snow had now become quite difficult and the cold nights were even more uncomfortable. The bread we were left with would barely serve us for another two days.

  ‘I guess it’s the time to put our hunting skills to practice,’ I said.

  ‘I see it,’ said Nasteya without heeding my words.

  ‘What do you see?’ I asked.

  ‘The gateway of Eesh,’ answered Nasteya, ‘I can see the arch. It is partly shrouded by clouds. As for now, we shall rest here until tomorrow morning.’

  The huge arch seemed near but was actually a full day’s walk away. But this side of the hill was snug enough so we thought of spending the night here. Later that night, I said to Nasteya and Hira: ‘Tomorrow, by dusk, we might reach the gateway. What lies there or beyond, we don’t know,’ Nasteya said.

  ‘Then why did you opt to come here, my King?’ Hira asked.

  For a moment Nasteya said nothing, as if lost in his own thoughts. But then he said, ‘We had to go in some direction so I chose north. Furthermore, it is said that those White Demons came from the north every time they attacked.’

  ‘If the enemy actually dwells there then we are moving towards them, unequipped. Is this the decision right?’

  ‘It is not for the enemy that I chose to come north. And I am quite sure those demons don’t dwell here,’ Nasteya replied.

  I couldn’t understand what was going on in his mind but I had faith in him. Nasteya had committed certain mistakes right since Godmother’s prophecy. He was hasty in taking decisions sometimes—the first being his decision to discard Godmother’s warning and the second, his decision to pass through the humming woods, both of which were taken in a hurry. I feared it might prove harmful in the near future if he didn’t change his habit. It was his weakness. But I had promised Nasteya to follow him through any ups and downs and stay by his side in all his decisions, whether right or wrong. I knew that if Nasteya ever made a mistake, which he would since he was as human as anybody else, he would do everything in his power to make up for it. In the middle of our conversation, the sudden rustle of a bush made us turn.

  ‘Who’s there?’ I shouted.

  ‘Might be a rabbit or a squirrel, let me go and see,’ Nasteya said and went towards the thick bush—but there was nothing at all. Then we all went under the shade of a big rock and slept around the fire we had lit up. In the middle of the night, I heard the same rustling sound and opened my eyes. Slowly and cautiously, fearing a hungry wolf or even worse, I crept towards the undergrowth with my sword. But there was nothing there.

  ‘You’re tired, Vasu, so you’re hearing things. Sleep before you even start seeing them,’ I said to myself and went to sleep.

  Ayaan’s chuckling woke me up in the early hours and I saw that he was playing with a squirrel. He cuddled the squirrel in his arms and went to Nasteya and said, ‘Can I keep her?’

  Nasteya smiled. ‘Yes you can.’ Just as Ayaan smiled too, Nasteya continued, ‘But you shouldn’t.’

  With a puckered brow Ayaan asked, ‘Why?’

  ‘Her children are waiting for her to bring food. They might starve if she doesn’t go home, and there will be no one left to shield her little children from scavengers… I’m sure you wouldn’t want that, Ayaan, would you?’ Nasteya replied wisely.

  ‘You must go to your children then,’ said Ayaan, happily placing the squirrel on the foot of a pine tree.

  The squirrel hurried towards the net of pine birches and dashed away.

  Nasteya had mastered the art of convincing anyone. If I were in his place, I would have simply forbidden the child.

  We walked on and on, until the colour of the sky went from pale yellow to grey and finally black. ‘A few more miles and we will be under the arch. It’s massive. The nearer we draw towards it, the more gigantic it becomes,’ said Nasteya.

  Yes, it was huge. One end of its archway was on one mountain and the other one on the shoulder of another mountain. I had to turn my head from the left all the way to the right to observe it from one end to the other. Strong winds pushed snowflakes towards us. They settled on the arch. We saw an eagle descending slowly in wide circles before landing on the edge of the arch.

  ‘It looks like this mighty creature guards the gateway,’ I said.

  The eagle flapped its wide wings and flew away.

  SIX

  THE YETIS’ STRONGHOLD

  ‘We guard the gateway, not them!’ A cavernous and deep voice resonated behind us.

  It was a voice too deep to be that of a mortal man, louder even than the loud whistling of the fierce Himalayan wind. Within a flicker of an eyelid, we turned around. There, trouble stood in front of us, enraged. A giant beast, blanketed with thick white fur held Ayaan upturned in his right hand. His long fur streamed out in the wind, and so did Ayaan’s clothes. The creature was twice the height of Nasteya. His arms were thicker than the boughs of peepal trees, his feet big and furry, perfectly adapted to walking in the snow. There were lines of anger on his round face and about his flat nose. It was a ‘yeti’ in whose grip Ayaan struggled bravely yet feebly.

  Hira yelled and was about to leap forward when Nasteya pulled him back on seeing the yeti tightening his grip.

  ‘We mean no harm. Let the child go,’ said Nasteya.

  Troubled by this new stroke of ill fortune, we reached for our swords.

  ‘You would be fools to even think of it,’ roared the beast. ‘Before you draw your swords, this child will be crushed.’

  We halted. Ayaan struggled, though less vigorously than before.

  ‘What do you want?’ Nasteya yelled.

  ‘No creature as insignificant as you has the authority to question me, not at least here,’ answered the beast. ‘We know that Garud now uses men to spy on the arch. Tell me, on what errand has he sent you?’

  ‘It sounds to me that you have mistaken us. We are free wanderers, not spies sent on some petty errand,’ Nasteya replied.

  ‘Free men? Never in my life have I met free men wandering willfully near the Gateway of Eesh,’ said the yeti.

  Ayaan had stopped struggling, realising that he was getting nowhere. ‘It is in great need that we come this far north. You shall hear our cause before you act further,’ Nasteya said with wisely chosen words. After all, every beast is erratic in his deeds and Nasteya knew this well.

  ‘I see Garud’s mark on you. It says more than your words,’ growled the beast.

  ‘Garud’s mark?’ The beast’s words baffled Nasteya who shed his cloak at once and now stood with a bare chest. ‘It is, if you can see clearly, the scar of an eagle’s claw and it has been on me since birth,’ said Nasteya.

  ‘Well, Garud is no man!’ the beast said with a grimace, mystifying us.

  If Garud was no man then who was he?

  ‘You have lied enough and your stack of lies has run out…’ The beast suddenly stopped. His grimace deepened into a frown. His head juddered as if someone had hit him hard and his grip slackened. Ayaan fell flat on the thick snow. The giant yeti now lay motionless beside the frightened boy. All was quiet except for the cold rustle of the wind. As we raised our eyes in confusion from the two prone figures, the three of us gasped: Savaan stood on a high ledge behind the fallen giant with a stout wooden staff in his hand.

  As we stood there frozen, not knowing whether to trust our eyes, Ayaan dashed to Hira. Was I hallucinating? But then Savaan limped towards us. Taken aback, we watched him open-mouthed as he drew closer. Nasteya’s eyes wer
e wild and staring. Inquisitiveness overcame shock and I needed an explanation. When he was close enough he said, ‘I see that you’re not glad to see me.’

  For a moment not a word came out of our mouths. Then Nasteya stammered, ‘How did you...’ but he couldn’t complete his sentence as Savaan cut in: ‘We will have ample time for explanations later. Let us rid ourselves of this unconscious danger first,’ said Savaan, walking up to the yeti.

  Awestruck by his unexpected arrival, we followed him.

  ‘For now, all you must know is that I survived,’ Savaan said pulling a thick roll of rope out of his sack. The beast was heavy enough to require all of us, along with Ayaan, to drag him up to the trunk of a nearby pine tree. But what mattered to us was neither the weight of the beast nor the chill of the wind. We needed answers! Though I tried, I couldn’t resist whispering a question to Nasteya: ‘Nasteya! Was he not among the ones you buried?’

  ‘I buried only the ones I found and as far as I can remember, he wasn’t among them,’ Nasteya whispered in reply as he curled the rope around the yeti.

  The shadow of the great arch stretched long in the east as the setting sun peered over the mountains for one last time. Hira worked to make a bright blaze with dried pine branches and dead leaves. We sat around it, screening the flame with our cloaks so as to block the strong wind. The beast lay motionless and inert, his head drooping to his right, his expression alarmingly alert. Then in the warmth of the golden firelight, Savaan began his story:

  ‘The night when those White Demons attacked, I was in the palace. It was sheer chaos. So unexpected. The White Demons rode their horses right inside the palace hall. They ruthlessly killed everyone who was present there. One of them came after me. Startled and unarmed, I ran at the top of my speed but another black horse rider barred my way. My pursuer charged towards me but his horse slipped on the carpet and crashed into a pillar that supported a balcony. The pillar cracked and the balcony collapsed—on me! I was buried under the debris, unconscious. When I came to my senses, I crawled out of the debris… To my shock and surprise, I found no corpses everywhere, in and around the palace. I knew that days had passed… Then I saw a fresh trail of footsteps that went up the hill. I followed the trail until it reached a hut and vanished. Inside that hut I found a candle with a living flame. Survivors, I said to myself. Behind the hut I saw another trail that went northwards. This was a trail not of two feet, but many. I followed the footsteps until on the second night, it led me to you. My footsteps drew your attention towards the bush last night—it was no wild creature but me. And it was I who pulled all of you out of those deadly woods. When Hira warned you before entering the woods, I heard him too. At once I tucked two small pieces of cloth into my ears and kept myself from falling under the tranquilizing effect of the forest’s hum.