Chapter 37 Maayavi
Thianvelli, Giridah Fort
On a dark moonless night, which carried a heavy hint of storm, where the very air seemed expectant with dread and most of Thianvelli slept uneasily, came a wizard of the dark arts.
He made his slow way along a dirt road leading to the prison tower of a partially demolished fortress.
Mud squelched and splattered the tattered shawl around his shoulders. He wore a threadbare dhoti, leaving the upper part of his body bare. Gaunt bones stuck out of his emaciated torso.
In his hand, he carried a crooked staff, made of a gnarled branch from a kadamba tree. Red kumkum and yellow turmeric stained the wood permanently. Four human skulls, shrunken and mummified sat on the top of the staff, one for each cardinal direction.
The tower guards threw open the gates as his dark figure appeared at the edge of the lights cast by the torches along the walls and then stood well back. They had been given their orders not to halt his progress.
Bone-white ash decorated his sunken face, and crimson dust smeared his forehead.
Bloodshot eyes protruded from the mass of matted black hair atop his head.
The pious among them averted their eyes, nary a whisper from anyone about the blood dripping softly from the satchel he carried over his shoulder.
The wizard climbed the steps and entered the wide entrance hall. A waiting party of three were standing to greet him.
“Glad you could make it, O’ Great Wizard, Maayavi. We welcome you to Thianvelli,” said Sakaala.
The crown prince of Thianvelli, Nandiketu, and his younger brother, Ketuvahana, also were present, standing a step back, as greetings and introductions were made.
Maayavi studied the hall, with its capacious ceiling. “Is this really the place you want me to perform the ritual?” he asked his hosts.
Ketuvahana was taken aback—the wizard’s body was that of an emaciated person, but his voice sounded young and strong.
“Yes, this is the most secure location we could think of and it’s set apart from the regular dungeons. We have everything ready for use like you had directed,” said Sakaala, who worked as an aide to Ketuvahana. “Er…we hope this is enough for you to work the spell to capture Prince Aditya.”
Prince Aditya was the only son and heir of Harideva and Gauri Devi, the previous king and queen of Thianvelli. With Harideva dead, the queen and her son fled for their lives.
Recently, though, they seemed to have gained the protection of a group of rebels.
Despite several attempts by his father, King NagaBhairava, they were unsuccessful in capturing the royal runaways. Then, Sakaala had advised Ketuvahana to bring in a wizard for assistance and had even gone as far as securing the services of one.
The wizard cast his gaze toward the homam—a central square firepit, created by building an altar made of stacked bricks around it. He swept his arm outward. Furniture that dotted the room was swept as if pulled by an invisible hand, splintering against the wall, reduced to kindling.
The people in the room shrunk back.
“I need the whole floor space, not just the paltry area you provided. The entire tower will no longer be in use,” he said, as if daring people to raise objections.
“Until when?” asked Ketuvahana, not flinching when the wizard turned his dead gaze on them.
“Probably forever,” he said.
“Now hold on. We thought you didn’t require that much space. Can’t you, I don’t know, restrict the spell to this area? The other levels haven’t been cleared of prisoners,” Nandiketu protested.
The wizard approached the homam and upended the contents of his bloody bag into the kindling assembled there for his use. Chunks of flesh, wet with blood, drizzled the wood in red droplets. The smell of blood and raw flesh rose, ferrous and pungent.
A retching sound came from one of the soldiers at the back. Nandiketu, who stood a discreet distance away, a handkerchief held delicately to his nose, made a sound of distress but voiced no other objection.
Ketuvahana’s lip curled in contempt. Of course, his brother didn’t have the stomach for violence like him or their middle brother.
“You should’ve thought of that beforehand. I warned you,” said the wizard as he worked, unheeding of their objections.
He raised his staff high in the air.
“Wait! Can’t we perform this another time? We’ll get you what you want,” pleaded Sakaala, with a fearful glance towards his employers. Ketuvahana knew his reputation of being a harsh master was well earned, and it pleased him to see the people under him worry about his reaction.
The wizard lowered his staff and gazed up as if giving it some serious thought.
“Too late,” he said finally, pointing at the oculus that was embedded into the high ceiling. “The moon and stars align. The auspicious moment is upon us. There’s no backing out now.” He fixed the aide with a baleful stare. “And if you know what’s good for you, you won’t interrupt me again.”
Ketuvahana opened his mouth wanting to put the wizard in his place, but he was held back by Sakaala.
“Are you sure we can trust this man, Sakaala?” asked Ketuvahana in a low voice.
“Pardon me, Prince, but we seemed to have hit a dead end with the search,” said Sakaala in a soothing voice as if pacifying a child.
“The wizard Maayavi has a reputation for delivering, so I implore you to give him a chance. And besides, we already paid him. It’s time for him to hold up his end of the bargain. ”
“As long as he doesn’t forget his place.” Ketuvahana shrugged irritably, raising his voice in a warning to wizard.
Maayavi gave no indication of having heard his words, but he did glance at Nandiketu, who stood a discreet distance away, eyes wide above his covered mouth.
Maayavi touched his staff to the kindling and the skull on his staff opened its maw and spat out a stream of fire. The wood quickly blazed, crackling the twigs as it spread to consume the dry material, burning with a golden glow that changed to a red ochre.
From his bag, he retrieved a piece of chalk and drew a circle that touched the four points of the square homam. And then, another square enclosing the circle followed by another circle, in alternating patterns.
Every square had a “gate” open on one of its sides to allow for the flow of energy all the way to the center.
A bone with a hole drilled on one end, a shrunken human head, a rotten egg, and a lemon were placed at crucial compass points on the diagram.
Ketuvahana slanted his head, studying the pattern when Sakaala, who had a rudimentary knowledge of the dark magic, whispered in his ear that this was called a yantra, the physical form of a spell.
The sonorous sound of a chant filled the air, as Maayavi began reciting the verse form of a spell: a mantra.
He then tapped his staff on the ground and the pattern glowed white, spreading, feeding on the power it drew from the mantra, eating up the spare space and becoming more elaborate.
Now it was growing outward in the same concentric pattern of squares and circles, until it occupied all of the floor except for a narrow strip edging the walls.
People inched back to avoid stepping on it.
“I need something that once belonged to the child we’re seeking,” said the wizard. He was standing unaffected within the diagram. Ketuvahana saw he had been careful enough to leave himself a blank space to stand in. The blood-soaked satchel lay at his feet.
At a signal from him, a soldier inched along until he reached a bag propped against the wall. From within, he brought a toy horse.
The soldier gingerly made his way across the pattern, carefully sidestepping any markings. His hand brushed the wizard as he passed the toy to him, a grimace of revulsion crossing his face.
The wizard fed the toy horse to the fire silently.
At once, the lines of the elaborate design widened, resolving into tiny letters of script.
Ketuvahana realized with astonishment, that it was the mantra the wizard was chanting, but in the written form.
The spell floated along the lines of the yantra in an almost unbroken line, repeating itself.
Except where the wizard stood, there was a break.
“Now we need a sacrifice,” intoned the wizard in a hollow voice. “A live one.”
* * *
As the wizard gazed around the broken circle of petrified people, surveying them like cattle at an abattoir, Ketuvahana found his voice. “Now see here—”
“Are you volunteering yourself, Prince?” interrupted the wizard.
“What! No, of course not.”
“Then it’s in your best interest to keep quiet,” he said tonelessly.
“Why you freak… Who do you think you’re talking to?” Ketuvahana words emerged as a deep growl. He had objected only because he didn’t want to waste good, loyal men, but there was a price for everything.
There was something odd about this wizard, thought Ketuvahana, trying to put his finger on what exactly felt wrong.
Although he appeared human, there was no human emotion in those eyes.
Nothing seemed to produce a reaction. It was unnerving for Ketuvahana, who usually savored seeing a person’s fear.
“An impetuous, imprudent, bull of a man, if you must know.”
Ketuvahana felt the blood simmering in his veins as anger surfaced swiftly. He heard Sakaala’s soft groan through the thunder in his ears.
He was aware that people gossiped about his short temper and cruel streak. And if the wizard knew that, then either he was a fool poking at a tiger or powerful enough that he didn’t care who he was insulting. It was worth knowing which it was, before acting in haste.
“Fine,” he growled, reigning in his fury. “Pick someone here. Finish the blasted ritual and get out of my sight.” It wasn’t easy for him to restrain himself; he preferred to let his impulses and desires run unfettered.