The Queen's Play Read Free Page A

in the stars long ago and he who movedso close to earth was essentially powerless to shake their yoke from his flesh, so that to return home alive and be joined once more to his woman was reward enough.
    Yet many will not fulfil this resolve, certainly not that noble warrior who stands in the second row set to meet the adversary, head firm and high, muscles flexed, the left hand gripping the weapon lightly, breathing into the charnel void that awaits him. Like so many others, he will go down under the blows of the enemy, cloven by its large axe-blades that glitter in the morning sun, ready to strike.
    Anjaneya ran at the head of the brigade straight into the enemy formation. From a distance the prince-in-exile observed the scene phlegmatically, standing in his three-horse chariot, having not yet lifted his bow. Then the enemy forces closed around the first batch of his army, and, for a moment, the sea’s fluid silence covered everything.
    A clap of thunder made the prince look up. But the sound had not come from above. The sky was light and clear though he could see the gods keenly watching the scene with their heads between their legs. It was the first roar of the hovering doom. The spear skidding against the shield, the sword meeting the axe, the ribcage breaking beneath the skin, the kick in the groin, the blood on the ground, the contact of a club driving the cone of a soldier’s helmet down into his very skull to settle in the space between the eyes, which were already bidding farewell to the elements, Earth, Water, Wind, Fire were for him coalescing into a thin coolness that for another was still the ether where the visible was made invisible, where the dreamer dreamt his life again and again, where, just this moment, the dead soldier was sinking into the earth, and where dust freely swirled in the rising heat past the swinging limbs, shouts, curses, sweat, and blood.
    High above, in the sky that was beginning to be dotted by vultures, the ominous sounds from the field did not reach. And without these sounds where was the spectacle of battle? What morecould this be than a game opening between two rival forces facing each other, played on a field of alternating dark and light spaces, not fixed but shifting, little more than a motif of trembling shadows, wresting from light at one place what they returned at another, moving yet unmoving. Not so different was this then from the chequered board of smooth ebony and maple woods where, with a faint scent of pine needles on the air and the calls of the peacocks breaking into a sudden dance, with water from the fountains softly plashing in glowing pools of colour, the dark foot soldier had taken its first slight step, pushed ever so gently from behind by a pale slim hand.
    By noon the sea’s rhythm itself had permeated the battle. Each hour, the round of fatalities grew and fell with the periodic revival and ebbing away of the strength of its warriors. The initial rush of energy had departed the thick and fast of war, for the soldiers on either side, now that the first sudden terror of losing their lives had somewhat abated, had taken a more reasonable view of the situation and had settled on a longer span of combat, stretching over days, maybe months. Thus, both sides had adopted a defensive strategy, and deaths occurred more from oversight or a failure of strength than sustained initiative. Incredible as it seemed, hope had taken root even here, indeed it was thriving in every soldier’s breast, who would not have put past him the mugs of stout and tales round the campfire, a generous fare, and six hours of deep, unbroken sleep on the other side of sundown. But between sundown and the first drink there yet remained the cruel, backbreaking task of clearing the ground for the next day, moving away and cremating the dead, lighting vast funeral pyres all along the coastline, wood crackling, bones bursting from heat, blue ashes.
    When the sun sank into the waves,