The Oath of the Vayuputras: Shiva Trilogy 3

Chapter 39

He is One of Us

The Mithra called the entire city to the town centre the following morning. Shiva and Gopal stood next to him as he addressed the crowd.

‘My fellow Vayuputras, I’m sure your minds are teeming with many questions and doubts. But this is not the time for that; this is the time for action. We trusted a man who had worked closely with us; we trusted him with our knowledge. But he betrayed us. Lord Bhrigu broke the laws of Lord Rudra. Lord Gopal, the chief of the Vasudevs and the representative of Lord Ram, has come here demanding justice. But, in this moment, it is not just about retribution for what Lord Bhrigu has done. It’s also about justice for India, justice to Lord Rudra’s principles. There is a purpose that we all serve, Parihans; it is beyond laws; it is one that was defined by Lord Rudra himself.’

Pointing at Shiva, the Mithra continued. ‘Behold this man. He may not be a Vayuputra. But he does bear the blue throat. He may not be a Parihan, but he fights like one, with honour and integrity. We may not have recognised him, but the Vasudevs consider him the Neelkanth. He may not have lived amongst us, but he respects and idolises Lord Rudra as much as we do. Above all, he is fighting for Lord Rudra’s cause.’

The Vayuputras listened with rapt attention.

‘Yes, he is not a Vayuputra, and yet he is one of us. I am supporting him in his battle against Evil. And so shall you.’

Many amongst the Vayuputras were swayed by the Mithra’s words. Those who weren’t, were nevertheless aware that it was within the Mithra’s legal rights to choose whom to support within India. So, while their reasons to do so may have differed, all the Vayuputras fell in line with the Mithra’s decision.

Shiva and Gopal received a large crate the following evening. An entire Parihan cavalry platoon had been arranged to transport this incredibly heavy trunk safely back to the sea. Never having seen the material of the Pashupatiastra, Shiva assumed from the size of the trunk that they were carrying a huge quantity; probably enough to threaten an entire city. He was therefore amazed by Gopal’s clarification that they were carrying only a handful of the Pashupatiastra material.

‘Are you serious?’

‘Yes, Lord Neelkanth,’ said Gopal. ‘Just a handful is enough to destroy entire cities. The trunk has massive insulation, made of lead and wet clay, besides the leaves of imported bilva trees. Together, these will protect us from exposure to the Pashupatiastra radiation.’

‘By the Holy Lake,’ said Shiva. ‘The more I learn about the daivi astras, the more I’m convinced that they are the weapons of the demons.’

‘They are, my friend. That’s why Lord Rudra called them evil and banned their use. That is also why we will not use the Pashupatiastra. We’ll only threaten to use it. But to make it a credible threat to the Meluhans, we will actually have to set up the weapon outside Devagiri.’

‘Do you know how to do that?’

‘No, I don’t. Most of the Vayuputras are not privy to that knowledge either; only a select few are authorised to be in the know. There is a combination of engineering construction, mantras and other preparations that we would have to follow in order to set up this weapon. We would have to do this properly so as to convey a credible threat to Lord Bhrigu, since he does know how the Pashupatiastra is prepared for use. Lord Mithra and his people will commence our training from tomorrow morning.’



Parvateshwar moved his attention away from those sitting with him and cast a look outside the window of the Karachapa governor’s residence. They were on the dwitiya or second platform of the city, and from this height, Parvateshwar had a clear view of the Western Sea, which stretched far into the horizon.

‘The sea is the only way we have,’ said Parvateshwar.

Bhrigu and Dilipa turned towards Parvateshwar. Dilipa’s Ayodhyan army had finally arrived in Meluha, many months after the Battle of Devagiri. They had sailed on to Karachapa to join Parvateshwar’s Suryavanshi forces.

‘But General, isn’t that the entire idea behind coming to Karachapa?’ asked Dilipa. ‘To attack Lothal by sea? What’s new about that idea?’

‘I’m not talking about attacking the city, Your Highness.’

While there were now four hundred thousand troops based in Karachapa under the command of Parvateshwar, he knew that it was not really enough to defeat a well-entrenched force of two hundred and fifty thousand in the well-designed citadel of Lothal. And despite all attempts at provocation, Sati had resolutely refused to step out of Lothal, thus giving Parvateshwar no opportunity to bring his numerical superiority into play in an open battlefield. The war had, for all practical purposes, ground to a stalemate.

‘Please explain, General,’ said Bhrigu, hoping the Meluhan army chief had come up with some brilliant idea to end the stalemate. ‘What is your plan?’

‘I think we should send forth a fleet towards the Narmada River, making sure that these ships are visible.’

Dilipa frowned. ‘Have your spies discovered the route that Lord Shiva took?’

The Meluhans were aware that Shiva and Gopal had sailed to the Narmada, but they had lost track of them thereafter. They assumed that the duo may have used the Narmada route to steal into Panchavati or Ujjain. To what purpose, was still a mystery to the Meluhans.

‘No,’ answered Parvateshwar.

‘Then what’s the point of making our ships sail out in that direction? The Neelkanth’s scouts and spies will surely get to know that our ships are sailing to the Narmada. We’ll lose the element of surprise.’

‘That is precisely what I want,’ said Parvateshwar. ‘We don’t want to hide.’

‘By the great Lord Brahma!’ exclaimed an impressed Bhrigu. ‘General Parvateshwar, have you discovered the Narmada route to Panchavati?’

‘No, My Lord.’

‘Then I don’t understand... Oh right...’ Bhrigu stopped mid-sentence as he finally understood what Parvateshwar had in mind.

‘I’m not aware of the Narmada route to Panchavati,’ said Parvateshwar. ‘But the Lord Neelkanth’s army doesn’t know that I don’t know. They may assume that we have discovered this precious route and that the Lord’s life is in danger. Furthermore, the Nagas are a substantial segment of the warriors in that army. Will they keep quiet in the face of an imminent danger to their capital Panchavati, the city established by their Goddess Bhoomidevi?’

‘They will be forced to sail out of Lothal,’ said Dilipa.

‘Exactly,’ said Parvateshwar. ‘Since our contingent will be approximately fifty ships, they will have to match our numbers. We will make our ships wait in ambush in a lagoon far beyond the Narmada delta.’

‘And once they’ve begun sailing up the Narmada, we’ll charge in from behind and attack them,’ said Dilipa.

‘No,’ said Parvateshwar.

‘No?’ asked a surprised Dilipa.

‘No, Your Highness. I intend to send out a crack team of commandos in advance, to the Narmada. They will wait for the Naga ships to race upriver, till they have travelled a considerable distance away from the sea. Naval movements in a river are constricted, no matter how large the river. Their fleet will be sailing close to each other. Our commandos will have devil boats with firewood and flints ready for our enemies. Our task will be to take out the first as well as last line of ships simultaneously.’

‘Brilliant. They will lose their fleet, their soldiers will be adrift. Then our own fleet can charge in from the hidden lagoon and cut their soldiers down.’

‘No, Your Highness,’ said Parvateshwar, thinking he wouldn’t have needed to explain all this to someone with the strategic brilliance of Shiva. ‘Our fleet is not going to engage in battle at all. It’s only a decoy. Our main attack will be carried out by the commandos. If the first and last line of the enemy ships are set on fire, there’s a pretty good chance that all the ships in between too will eventually catch fire.’

‘But won’t that take too long?’ asked Bhrigu. ‘Many of their soldiers would be able to abandon ship and escape onto land.’

‘True,’ said Parvateshwar. ‘But they will be stranded far from their base with no ships. I had learnt at Panchavati that there is no road between Maika-Lothal and the Narmada. It will take them at least six months to march back to Lothal through those dense impenetrable forests. I’m hoping that on seeing the size of our decoy fleet, Sati will commit at least one hundred thousand men to attack us. And with those hundred thousand enemy soldiers stuck in the jungles of the Narmada, our army would become vastly superior numerically; a ratio of almost four to one. We could then attack and probably take Lothal.’

Dilipa still hadn’t understood the entire plan. ‘But many of our own soldiers will also be in the decoy fleet, right? So we’ll have to wait for them to come back to Karachapa and then...’

‘I’m not planning on using our decoy fleet to engage in battle,’ said Parvateshwar. ‘So we’re not going to load them up with soldiers. We’ll only keep a skeletal staff, enough to set sail. We will not commit more than five thousand men. Imagine what we can achieve. Only five thousand of our men, including the commandos, will leave Karachapa but we would have removed nearly one hundred thousand of the enemy men, leaving them stranded in the jungles around the Narmada, at least six months away from Lothal. And not a single arrow would have been fired. We can then go ahead and easily march in to capture Lothal.’

‘Brilliant!’ said Bhrigu. ‘We will move towards Lothal as soon as our ships leave for the Narmada.’

‘No, My Lord,’ said Parvateshwar. ‘I’m sure Sati has scouts lurking in and around Karachapa. If they see four hundred thousand of our troops marching out of the city, they will know that our ships are thinly manned and will therefore understand our ruse. Our army will have to remain hidden within the walls of Karachapa to convince them that our attack on Panchavati is genuine.’



The customs officer at Karachapa frowned at the merchant ship manifest. ‘Cotton from Egypt? Why would any Meluhan want cotton from Egypt? They are no match for our own cotton.’

The customs procedure in Meluha was based on a system of trust. Ship manifests would be accepted at face value and the relevant duty applied. It was also accepted that, on random occasions, a customs officer could cross-check the ship load if he so desired. This was possibly one of those random occasions.

The officer turned to his assistant. ‘Go down to the ship hold and check.’

The ship captain looked nervously to his right, at the closed door of the deck cabin, and turned back to the customs officer. ‘What is the need for that, Sir? Do you think that I would lie about this? You know that the amount of cotton I have declared matches the maximum carrying capacity of this ship. There is no way you can charge me a higher custom duty. Your search will serve no purpose.’

The Meluhan customs officer looked towards the cabin that the captain had surreptitiously glanced at. The door suddenly swung open and a tall, well-built man stepped out and stretched his arms as he lazily yawned. ‘What’s the delay, Captain?’

The customs officer held his breath as he recognised the man. He instantly executed a smart Meluhan military salute. ‘Brigadier Vidyunmali, I didn’t know you were on this ship.’

‘Now you know,’ said Vidyunmali, yawning once more.

‘I’m sorry, My Lord,’ said the customs officer, as he immediately handed the manifest back to the captain and ordered his assistant to issue the receipt for the duty payment.

The paperwork was done in no time.

The customs officer started to leave, but then turned back and hesitatingly asked Vidyunmali, ‘My Lord, you are one of our greatest warriors. Why isn’t our army deploying you at the battlefront?’

Vidyunmali shook his head with a wry grin. ‘I’m not a warrior now, officer. I’m a bodyguard. And also, as it now appears, a transporter of royal fashions.’

The customs officer smiled politely, and then hurried off the ship.



‘Why the delay?’ asked the Egyptian.

Vidyunmali had just entered the hold below the lowermost deck, deep in the ship’s belly. The only porthole, high in one corner, had been shut tight and it was unnaturally dark. As his eyes adjusted, he was able to see the countenance of about three hundred assassins sitting with cat-like stillness in a huddle.

‘Nothing important, Lord Swuth,’ said Vidyunmali to the Egyptian. ‘A stupid customs officer got it in his head to check the ship’s hold. It’s been taken care of. We’re sailing past Karachapa now. We will be in the heart of Meluha soon. There’s no turning back.’

Swuth nodded silently.

‘My Lord,’ said the captain, as he entered quietly with a shielded torch.

Vidyunmali took the torch from the captain, who was followed by two men carrying large jute bags. They left the bags next to Vidyunmali.

‘Wait outside,’ said Vidyunmali.

The captain and his men obeyed. Vidyunmali turned towards the Egyptian.

Swuth was the chief of the shadowy group of Egyptian assassins that Vidyunmali was escorting back to Devagiri. The sweaty heat of the closed ship hold had made Swuth and his assassins strip down to their loincloths. Vidyunmali could see the several battle scars that lined Swuth’s body in the dim light of the flaming torch. But it was the numerous tattoos on him that drew his attention. The Meluhan brigadier was familiar with one of them: a black fireball on the bridge of his nose, with rays streaming out in all directions. It was usually the last thing that his hapless victims saw before being butchered. The fireball represented the God that Swuth and his assassins believed in: Aten, the Sun God.

‘I thought that Ra was the Sun God for the Egyptians,’ said Vidyunmali.

Swuth shook his head. ‘Most people call him Ra. But they’re wrong. Aten is the correct name. And this symbol,’ said Swuth, pointing to the fireball on his nose, ‘is his mark.’

‘And the jackal tattoo on your arm?’ asked Vidyunmali.

‘It’s not a jackal. It’s an animal that looks like a jackal. We call it Sha. This is the mark of the God I am named after.’

Vidyunmali was about to move on to the other tattoos, but Swuth raised his hand.

‘I have too many tattoos on my body and too little interest in small talk,’ said Swuth. ‘You’re paying me good money, Brigadier. So I will do your job. You don’t need to build a relationship with me to motivate me. Let’s talk about what you really want.’

Vidyunmali smiled. It was always a pleasure to work with professionals. They focused all their attention on the work at hand. The mission that Emperor Daksha had tasked him with was difficult. Any brute could kill, but to kill with so many conditions attached, required professionals. It needed artists who were dedicated to their dark art.

‘My apologies,’ said Vidyunmali. ‘I’ll get down to it right away.’

‘That would be good,’ said Swuth, sarcastically.

‘We don’t want anybody recognising you.’

Swuth narrowed his eyes, as though he’d just been insulted. ‘Nobody ever sees us killing, Brigadier Vidyunmali. More often than not, even our victims don’t see us while they’re being killed.’

Vidyunmali shook his head. ‘But I want you to be seen, only not recognised.’

Swuth frowned.

Vidyunmali walked over to one of the jute bags, opened it and pulled out a large black cloak and a mask. ‘I need all of you to wear this. And I want you to be seen as you kill.’

Swuth picked up the cloak and recognised it instantly. It was the garment that the Nagas wore whenever they travelled abroad. He stared at the mask. He was aware that these were worn during Holi celebrations.

Swuth looked at Vidyunmali, his eyes two narrow slits. ‘You want people to think the Nagas did it?’

Vidyunmali nodded.

‘These cloaks will constrain our movements,’ said Swuth. ‘And the masks will restrict our vision. We’re not trained with these accoutrements.’

‘Are you telling me that the warriors of Aten can’t do this?’

Swuth took a deep breath. ‘Please leave.’

Vidyunmali stared at Swuth, stunned by his insolence.

‘Leave,’ clarified Swuth, ‘so that we can wear these cloaks and practice.’

Vidyunmali smiled and rose.

‘Brigadier,’ said Swuth. ‘Please leave the torch here.’

‘Of course,’ said Vidyunmali, fixing the torch on its clutch before walking out of the ship hold.