Manil Suri - The City of Devi

And yet the brown and cloying aroma of ghee reminds me to hurry up. It seeps through the lining of Birbal’s stomach, mixing with the sulfur of firecrackers and the sourness of wood pulp. The maidens have begun to smear on our flammable coating, I can hear them titter and laugh. Where does all this ghee come from? The cows that give the milk—don’t they know there’s a war going on? Sarahan understands the fragrance as well, because his prayers, nominally disguised as singing, turn into frantic chants.

I realize I’m not immune from fear myself. For all this time, I’ve kept it at bay, my cockiness surrounding me like a wall. The panic floods in, now that this defense has fallen. The Jazter was not born to play the role of Bond. Or, for that matter, Joan of Arc. He’s always yelped at the tiniest burn. He can’t imagine the prospect of immolation, much less face it with aplomb.

With fear so palpable, the air inside the chamber dwindles fast. I lie in the dark, my breathing labored, my throat burnt by fumes, my mouth gritty with dust. This is how I will die—bound and gasping, pressed against the jelly mold of Sarahan’s quivering body, here in this buffalo’s stomach. The realization shocks me. I never thought my search would end so sordidly, always imagining my existence charmed.

What does one do in these last few minutes? What tips do gurus dispense to calm oneself before the death blast? I try to conjure up pleasant memories. Meals enjoyed, concerts attended, the first qawalli disco cut I mixed, a long-ago vacation with my parents in the Swiss Alps. The timeless cycle of search, battle, and victory on the epic fields of shikar. And then, of course, Karun—the montage softer, more lyrical, tinted in a rainbow of luminous colors. Perhaps the imminent heat of conflagration makes the memory of cooling barsati snow tales stand out in particular.

But none of these recollections, not even Karun, can keep me anchored strongly enough. I must liftoff to distance myself from what I face, I can no longer remain earthbound. Like the stages of a rocket, the different components of my identity begin to drop away: Jazter, Ijaz, Jaz—the shikari, the son, the holy lover. I rise higher, faster, freer, as I jettison every façade, every persona.

What will I discover about myself in these final instants? What awaits me as I break through these clouds? I’ve never ventured so high, confronted my own unvarnished being, gazed so directly into the self’s blinding sun. I know I cannot look for more than a second, but that glimpse will be enough.

And then it comes. The flash, the insight, the explanation, the awareness that sums me up. To my surprise, I find it’s tragedy that defines me—no matter how carefree a gloss I put on it, no matter how I try to bury it in fun. The tragedy of a spirit not quite formed, a character not yet done. I need more time to realize myself, to grow up fully, to assume my place in the world.

Except there is no more time left—the vision already begins to fade off. The clouds fold over me again, I find myself plummeting back into the dark. The layers I have shed cling back on, sodden and suffocating, weighing me down. Sarahan has started screaming, now that the sound of the maidens outside has died out.

All of a sudden, he stops. Noises waft down from above—metal clinks, footsteps scrape. It sounds like the tackle being attached to hooks, they must be preparing to winch us up. I close my eyes and take a deep breath, not caring that my lungs fill with gunpowder. Only one thing remains now—to wait for the buffalo to deliver us.

AT FIRST, I FEEL FAINT AT THE THOUGHT THAT THE NEWS HAS been a cruel hoax. Abandoning my fruitless search of yet another hotel floor, I’ve raced back to Guddi’s room and burst through the gaggle of guards outside. But I only see Anupam. “Where is he?” I gasp, my knees threatening to buckle, my breath squeezing through in spurts.

Anupam points towards the balcony. “Over there, Didi. He’s your husband, isn’t he?” She smiles shyly and covers her head with the edge of her sari. “I’ll be outside, in case you need anything.”

I venture deeper into the room and stop. Through the balcony doors, framed by the billowing curtains, I behold the familiar silhouette. Light swirls around Karun’s body, splashing over his shoulders, dappling his hair. I feel myself transported to all those years ago at the beach picnic, watching him emerge once more from the incandescent waves. Or the mornings that we practiced yoga, lit by the sunshine streaming in from outside. For an instant I want to just stand there and drink him in incrementally, savoring every feature as I focus on it. But then he moves closer and calls out my name, and I rush up to bury my face greedily into him.

“Karun,” I repeat like a mantra over and over again, trying to lose myself in his feel, his scent, the line between his lips. No matter how hard I hug his body or press my mouth against his, though, I can’t seem to squeeze out enough reassurance, can’t seem to make up the deficit. Perhaps all the agonizing days of separation are to blame, the hours and minutes and seconds that have played out, drip by drip. Even once I’ve sated myself, I think, I might never let go of him again.

Although his embrace is tight, even frantic, I cannot feel any joy communicated by him. In fact, his entire body seems strangely wound and unresponsive. Drawing back, I’m shocked to see how miserable he looks, how agitated. He squeezes his eyes shut when I ask what’s wrong. “Jaz. They have Jaz. And I wasn’t able to do anything about it.”

His words tumble out faster than I can keep up. Something about the hotel annex, something about Bhim, something about a colleague never heard from again. “At first I was furious when I learnt you were here and Jaz hadn’t even told me about it. But now I realize he offered himself up just so we could be safe.” My confusion must show, because Karun stops and holds me at the shoulders with both arms extended. “You do know who I’m talking about? The Jaz who found me, the one who followed you, the one you came with. They’ll kill him if we don’t find some way to save him.”

Although I’m still blurry, the expression on Karun’s face is beginning to fill me with dismay. “Do you—?” A multitude of questions throng my mind and I can’t think of which one to choose. “Do you know him—Jaz—from before, then?”

I have to repeat my question a few times before it gets through, before Karun’s train of words slows, then comes to a halt. He drops his hands to his sides and stands in silence, or perhaps contrition. “It happened a long time before I met you,” he finally says. “He and I—we were—we were together.”

Together. Is that it, then? All that needs be stated? The way it’s announced these days? Together. How should I respond? What emotion should I bring to my face? Of all the reactions that flood my mind, none seems entirely appropriate to display. It’s not as if I haven’t brooded about this possibility, as if I didn’t have any warning, any time to prepare. Perhaps my defense is I’ve never encountered a Mills & Boon heroine confronting this situation, I don’t have a template to follow from Bollywood films. Shock or disappointment or horror or hurt—I wait for the spin to stop, for the arrow to point the way. “I’m sorry,” Karun mumbles.

And then the wheel bearings lock—in a surprise photo finish, anger wins. It no longer matters whether I saw this coming or not—my fury sweeps all such irrelevancies away. The rigors of my journey, the strain of the past weeks, the insecurities of our entire marriage perhaps, fill me with a desire to exact vengeance, to punish Karun for the pain he has inflicted. Sorry is not enough. Together is not enough. Vast reservoirs of indignation rage inside me, they must be tamed.