Chapter 24

Hiding in Plain Sight

Atop two broken walls, two soldiers in black leather armour could be seen easily.

“Bring them down,” said Rakt Guru, motioning to his men. Two archers appeared. “Silently,” he said.

They looked at each other and nodded. They moved forward and sat behind two large stones. In their hands were bows, which held two weird-looking arrows with long hooked ends. The men aimed at their targets, who were standing against the walls, and released the arrows at once. Along with the arrows flew two strong ropes tied at their rear ends. The arrows entered the men’s heart. Before they knew what had hit them, two strong men pulled the ropes. Within an instant, the men were dead and pulled away from their comrades.

With the lookout gone, the entire Raktsena gathered behind the wall, beyond which was their target. Shwet Guru motioned to them. Rakt Guru, Ravindran and Devdhar went towards the left of the wall. Forty men followed them as silently as possible and disappeared behind a broken house.

Shwet Guru, Pradyuman, Vidyut, Pranas and Namant, with a few soldiers, followed Grahaan, who disappeared on the right.

***

Chandra looked at both groups with disdain. He, along with Parth, Jayant and Aditi, had been left behind on Shwet Guru’s orders. Rakt Guru had told his superior to let them come. But Shwet Guru was explicit in his orders. It was possible that they were going to their deaths and he was not ready to bring young recruits and children with him.

“I don’t like this.” Chandra turned to the others. “They are out their fighting and we are hiding.”

“We are following orders, Chandra.” Aditi was sitting there with her eyes fixed on the tip of an arrow that was shining in her hand.

Chandra looked at her. She had called his name for the first time.

“No, they are following orders,” Parth corrected her. “They are the recruits, not us.”

“So, if you two go in,” said Jayant, “We will have to follow you to protect you.”

“Exactly,” said Parth and winked at him.

“I like this smart brother of yours, Chandra,” Jayant said as he returned Parth’s wink.

“But what will we do? We are only four.” Aditi looked up at Chandra. The three boys were surprised and happy at her approval.

“Grahaan never told them where the palace is, did he?” said Parth, looking at Chandra. “This city is in ruins. There is hardly any structure intact in this ghost town. So, where do you think the palace is?”

The others looked at him not understanding where he was going with it.

“What I mean to say is, he said it was a palace, right? If there is no intact structure, where is that palace?”

Jayant tried his best to answer. “Do you want to say that he is not in the city. His palace is somewhere else?”

“No,” said Chandra, who had understood his brother’s point. “He means to say that the palace is hidden.”

Jayant looked shocked.

“By magic?” Aditi enquired. “How can something like that be hidden from plain sight?”

“There is no magic,” Parth said, rising from the stone he was sitting on. He picked up a broken twig and made a circle with it on the ground. He then marked many points in concentric circles. The other three gathered around the drawing.

“According to the map, this is how Rambh has divided his men and positioned them all around the city. These men, according to Grahaan, don’t know what they are protecting. In the centre,” he said and marked a point in the centre of the circle, “is the old warden’s house.”

“How do you know that it is the warden’s house?” Jayant asked, looking uncertain.

“Because this is what he does,” Chandra said and smiled, looking at his cousin. “He knows everything. If we get out of this place, I will show you his library.”

“So, he is living in the warden’s house,” Aditi said, looking at the boys. “That is not very wise. It can’t be well guarded or defended.”

“Yes, it is indefensible. In fact, the whole city was never built for defence. It was just a trade centre. There was never any threat to this place for the whole east was friendly, and there was nothing in the west except the great Sindhu and the wastelands beyond it. That is why the commander of Anandmath was able to easily destroy the city. Do you know that this desolation won him a nickname?” Parth said, looking excited.

Chandra raised an eyebrow. He knew his brother had the tendency to get carried away while telling a story.

“All right, the story part will come later. What I am telling here is, the men are definitely guarding the warden’s house. And I suspect they don’t know what it is,” said Parth.

“What do you think it is then?” Chandra asked him, sounding uncertain.

“I think it is an entrance.” Parth looked at all of them one by one. “It is the entrance to Kaalkesh’s palace.”

“Where is the palace?” Jayant and Aditi asked together. Chandra answered them.

“It is underground.”

***

Vidyut knew the plan was working. They were all dressed in black armour and led by Grahaan. The first group of ten men didn’t even know what had hit them. Grahaan walked calmly among them with the others walking slowly, a few paces behind. He walked past them and started giving directions about something and then Vidyut returned the favour. His strikes were ruthless and swift. The small ten-men group did not stand a chance against the likes of Shwet Guru and Pradyuman. Namant and Devdhar were good too. Pranas killed one of his former army mates without any distress.

Within moments, the first group standing guard was no more. And then, they moved silently ahead. Vidyut turned his head just in time to see forty men dressed in red descending upon the scene.

***

Rambh had placed his men smartly, though he had no idea why his Lord was being so overtly paranoid. They were completely protected. They were invisible from even their own people, the palace lay hidden under the city. Mrityusena knew their Lord was with them and that was enough for them.

But the question was why was the Lord so worried about an attack. It was true that the Lord always had good intuition. Rambh remembered how the Lord had predicted, years ago, that Sindhudurg would fall. And they had prepared for it. He had also predicted that the Elders’ army would try to interfere in Sindhudurg’s affairs. The Lord had made sure that their intentions were not fulfilled. He had also said that Suryagarh would not live up to their promises. That is why they had taken revenge and looted the temple, which they had been assigned to protect.

But something was amiss today. Rambh had planned the perfect defence but, for some reason, he was not liking it.

“Call the raiders. I want to give them a final order before I go in,” he ordered the two guards, who were standing by his side, as he walked into the courtyard of the only building that was still standing in Sindhudurg.

Three men arrived in no time, riding their horses, each with two men behind them. They bowed, still atop the horses. Rambh looked around. Someone was missing.

“Where is Grahaan?” he asked the others.

They all looked at each other.

“We haven’t seen him since morning,” said one of the men.

“After you told him to check the hills,” said another.

“And the men who went there before him?” Rambh asked, a sickly thought rising in his mind.

“No, My Lord, I don’t think we have seen them either,” a man standing by the horse said casually.

The man did not see when the sword came into Rambh’s hand. In an instant, it sliced his throat in one backhand swing. The man fell on the ground, clutching his throat, drowning in his own blood. Silence fell all around. Even the horses seemed afraid of the Mrityusena commander.

“Your Raider Supreme is missing since morning and you fools are talking to me like nothing is wrong. If Grahaan is missing, something is wrong,” said Rambh and sheathed the sword. He looked sharply at his raiders. “Send two men to the hills and find out what happened there. Look around and see if the groups have seen anything suspicious.”

Rambh turned back and started walking towards the large building, which once was the home of the warden and his family. At the gate, he looked back at the raiders, who were still waiting for their commander to leave. “If anyone goes missing this time, I will cut off your heads personally,” he threatened them.

***

The three prisoners were kept in the torture chamber, in the second portion of the palace. This portion housed the guard chambers along with the dungeons to keep prisoners. It had a few other chambers for special people like the warrior elite. Beyond the chambers, a darkened corridor led directly from Kaalkesh’s living quarters to a hall, which was always closed. No one was allowed there. There was talk among the guards that two monsters guarded the great hall. The monsters came out when the guards were sleeping, one at a time. The men only heard sounds, but no one dared to open their eyes.

The warrior elite left her room, fully dressed for the day ahead. She was wearing her black leather armour and black robe. Her hair was tied behind her head into a bun, so as not to interfere when she got in a fight. And today, a fight was inevitable.

She walked away from the corridor’s gate, which was closed now. She knew that Rambh had not yet come. He could be here any moment. The Lord did not like to wait. She knew all too well. But before Rambh arrived, she had things to do.

There were guards at the door, but they did not stop the warrior elite, as she opened the iron door of the torture chamber. She closed it shut after entering the chamber. She had made up her mind about her Lord’s proposal.

***

“What do we do now?” Jayant asked.

They had seen Grahaan’s plan work like a charm. The army had progressed further, and Chandra and his friends were left behind.

“We have to sneak in. We are only four and there is too much rubble between the two groups. We have to take our chances,” said Jayant.

Aditi and the boys were standing at a place from where they could easily see the new lookout, who had quietly replaced the one they had killed. The lookout near the wall was looking out for the other members of Mrityusena.

“All right, here is the plan,” Chandra said, as they sat behind a broken wall. “We will run for the next cover in groups of two. First, Aditi and I will go and you two keep a watch. Once we reach there, we will signal to you and keep a watch on both sides.”

The others nodded without a word. Then Jayant and Parth turned around. Chandra waited for the men on top of walls to look to the other side. The moment they turned, he nodded. With Aditi crouching low by his side, he started to run as fast as he could.

It was the first time that he was doing something like this. Surrounded by enemies, against his commander’s orders, he and his friends were trying to fight an unknown enemy—an enemy whose stories he had heard but not understood. Something was not right about this mysterious demon.

They reached the cover and hid themselves. The men on walls, both friend and foe, looked unaware of the daring act unfolding between them. He then nodded to Aditi who brought out her bow and arrow. She aimed and waited for Chandra’s signal. As the two men started to turn, Chandra said, “Now!” Aditi shot the arrow. And they waited.

Chandra’s mind raced again to the mystery that was Kaalkesh. Why did a man who had avenged his father become a plunderer? After all, his father had been a good man, a man behind whom an entire city had rallied for its freedom. How did such a man’s son become a demon in the minds of the people he was once poised to rule?

Chandra’s thought process was broken by the appearance of his brother and his best friend. They both were smiling. The first line was crossed. There were now between the first and second circle of the Mrityusena men, who had formed concentric circles around the warden’s house. There were four such circles. Each circle, according to Grahaan, consisted of ten groups patrolling their assigned areas; each group had around ten men, including the slaves.

According to Grahaan, there was only one flaw in Rambh’s arrangement. Their number was stretched thin. Raktsena was using this fault to slowly move forward, kill and replace them with their own.

Chandra was using the same flaw, but a little differently. He and his friends were using their small size and inferior numbers to their advantage. One by one, they crossed the next two circles. But the fourth circle was difficult. The distance between the two groups was too less. Chandra raised his head from his current cover and saw that there was hardly any place to cross.

And then he saw two familiar looking men, dressed in black, walking calmly towards the group on their left. Chandra had no idea what they were doing. If Vidyut and Grahaan tried to kill this group, the others would see them easily. Chandra looked around.

“You are sure this is the last circle?” he asked, looking at Parth.

“Yes, this is what that bald man said. But what are they doing here?” said Parth.

“If they try to kill them now, the other groups will see them,” said Chandra.

“We have to do something,” said Jayant.

Chandra looked back and saw that the number of Raktsena soldiers who were hiding behind Shwet Guru and the others was very less. Most of them had replaced their enemies in the outer protection rings. He started telling the others about the plan he had in mind.

***

Vidyut walked calmly by Grahaan’s side as if he was strolling in his garden. His hand rested on the hilt of the sword as he stood and looked around. Grahaan was the one who was doing all the talking.

“My Raider Supreme! We have Commander Rambh’s orders. No one can pass this inner ring,” one of the Mrityusena men said calmly.

“Do you know who you are talking to, soldier?” Grahaan said forcefully. “I am the Raider Supreme. I have been called by Commander Rambh. He needs assistance.”

One of the soldiers laughed. “You heard it, lads. Raider Supreme is to provide assistance.”

The others laughed with him. Grahaan’s eyes were getting red with anger.

Vidyut knew what was happening. The others were making fun of an old man who once had been their commander but was now disgraced. Vidyut knew that if Grahaan lost control now, all would be lost. He looked towards his right. Two men from the adjacent group were in his line of sight.

Grahaan forced himself to smile. “Laugh all you want, children. Lord Kaalkesh knows how important I am. And you will do better to let me pass.”

Before anyone could answer, a voice called from behind.

“Raider Supreme? Is that you?” a boyish voice asked.

Grahaan turned. “Commander Rambh requests your presence,” said the boyish voice. His hair was all messed up and his face was soiled.

“What happened to you?” Vidyut asked, looking at him.

“I fell in a ditch. I was looking for him. Sir, please. The commander is in a bad mood,” he said.

“We can’t let him go. We have our orders too,” a soldier objected.

“You can take him in. I will stand guard with my men and the slaves,” the newcomer said. “Or else, I will inform the commander, once this is over, why I couldn’t bring the Raider Supreme to him.” He turned away, as if he was going away but Vidyut stopped him.

“No need to be so touchy. We are friends here,” said Vidyut and turned to the soldier. “I will tell you, my friend, you take our raider with you and take two to three men, so that you can keep watch.”

The soldier thought for a moment. The prospect of disobeying the commander was a scary one.

“All right. Raider Supreme, please come with us.” He nodded to his men. With Grahaan in the lead, five men walked away, leaving Vidyut and the newcomer with a few slaves.

As the soldiers walked away, more men appeared from behind the wall where they had been hiding. They walked calmly among the slaves. And in a few silent moves, the slaves were down, unconscious but alive.

When the dust settled and the Mrityusena soldiers looked calm on all sides, Vidyut looked at the newcomer.

“I thought Shwet Guru asked you to stay behind. What are you doing here?” Vidyut asked calmly.

Chandra replied with a smile, as he rubbed the dirt off his face, “I guess I am saving your life again?”

Before Vidyut could say anything, Jayant came there and whispered, “Brothers, I guess something is wrong. Weren’t Shwet Guru and others supposed to be behind you?”

They all looked in both directions. The men who were supposed to be keeping guard were moving in the same direction. They were moving towards the outer circle, where the Raktsena had just replaced their enemies. It seemed their plan was just turning on its head. They were in trouble.