Chapter One

She was a Jatt of the Kharral clan.  The time was the Christian year 1098 and it was no longer summer in the Punjab, the northwestern territory of India.  The rainy season had just ended, and the cane was large in the lush, green fields.  It was a time of harvest.  

The Ravi River meandered like a snake through the valley near her home.   It emanated from a confluence of five rivers of the Indus Valley, with the Himalayan Mountains decorating the horizon to the north.   The territory was soaked with rain and runoff from the melting snow on the mountains.    This provided ideal conditions for growing food.  The abundant, flat farmland was extremely fertile.  Things grew here, no matter what was planted. The Punjab was the breadbasket of the world, at least as the world was known at the time.  

The people were happy.  This was a celebratory time of year.  They would garner money and staples from the sugar they would produce.  It had been a grand harvest, and there would be plenty of food and shelter for everyone.   No one would go hungry or cold in the following winter, the deadliest season of the year.

Historically the Jatts were nomadic herders but had settled in the Punjab and now were skilled farmers.  They were a people that would be successful at whatever they put their mind to.  This trait was in their genes.  There was an unwritten rule that you didn’t get in a fight with a Jatt, because they didn’t stop fighting until they were victorious or dead.

Jatts were members of the upper castes.  They were not Brahmin, but due to their technocracy, they were placed above many in the hierarchy.  For instance, the girl’s father ran the cooperative sugar mill, which serviced the fields arrayed around her village as far as the eye could see.  The cane beautifully swayed in the wind as the warm breeze flowed down from the Himalayas.

Her name was Roopa, meaning “blessed with beauty.”  And beautiful she was, shockingly so.  Like the other women in her clan, she had wheat skin and long, dark hair to her waist.  However, her eyes were blue, which was very rare in her people.  The contrast was mesmerizing.  Many unmarried men in the village had been watching her for some time, dreaming of making her his wife.  There was much talk among the village as to who the lucky man would be.  Marriages were arranged in her clan, causing much consternation among the young maidens.  Their lives changed forever with the decisions of their parents.  The parents tended to look for a wealthy widower to provide for their daughter, whereas the young girls dreamed of a young prince.  The parents usually got their wish.

Roopa had just turned fifteen and her body was changing.  It had been changing for a while.  She was a woman now, she could feel it.  She had strange yearnings that she did not understand.  Her life was blooming in the spring of youth, her future ahead of her.  She felt immortal.

Roopa had been raised in a privileged environment.  Everyone in the valley depended on her father.  This gave him a position of prominence and respect.  Her life was easier than most due to her parent’s position in the clan, but she was still expected to work.  The last few years had been tough on the sugar industry in the Punjab, so a successful harvest was a wonderful thing for the Jatts.  However, there was always work to do, even for beautiful young girls. Besides, her father wanted her to learn the joy of creating something with her own hands.

Her family refined sugar, as they had done in this region for hundreds of years.  In this way they had become important, even indispensable. If the mill was not in operation, the population suffered.  Her father took this responsibility seriously and worked hard to keep the mill in working order and to improve its efficiency.  He constantly looked for ways to increase the output from the raw cane, even inventing processes of his own to streamline and grow the operation.   He was loved by the people that depended on him. 

“You should put on your orhna,” her mother scolded as Roopa left the house on the way to the sugar mill to do her job for the day.  There she would help package the sugar loaves as they were taken from the molds at the mill.  It was a critical job, to make the finished product attractive to their buyers on the Silk Road.

“You are a woman now!”  

“It is too hot to wear it and work,” Roopa retorted with disrespect.

“The men will notice.”

“I am still a girl,” Roopa said and stood to face her mother in the doorway to the outside world.  The intricate, religious carving accentuated the entrance to the dwelling.  Metal accoutrements adorned the exquisitely detailed wooden door.

She knew her mother was right.  She could feel the men staring at her nowadays and rather enjoyed it, but she was rebellious in the prime of her youth. Soon I will have to start wearing it when I leave the house, she thought to herself.  The orhna was a shirt but also a veil.  It was worn over her angia, or blouse, and ghagri, or heavy skirt.  Her mother said it was so that she would not have to worry about men looking at her., that is was a luxury.  Well, she didn’t want this luxury.  Her breasts were full and the men loved to stare at them.  Her hair flowed down her back soft as a sheaf of feathers.  

Her family had very strict rules regarding women.  She was a Muslim, but not all of the clans in the Punjab shared her religion.  There were Sikhs, Buddhists, and some Hindu.   

She left the house with her mother still preaching behind her, her voice trailing off in the wind.