Mistress of the Throne (The Mughal intrigues) Read online

  “I see the feet!” one of them yelled.

  “We don’t need the feet, we need the head!” interjected another.

  “Well, the feet are better than the buttocks we’ve been seeing all along!” The hakims continued to ramble. Head, feet, buttocks, what were they talking about?

  “I’m pulling the baby from the feet; we have no other option!”

  “You’ll shear the uterus and cause bleeding.”

  “If I don’t, she and the baby will die!”

  I froze. Die? It was one thing when my mother was saying it (I’d assumed it was her pain talking). But now the hakim was saying it? Was it true? Was my mother really dying?

  Finally I heard the shriek of the infant rend the air. Ami cried to me that this was a voice different from the voices she’d heard in her previous births. Perhaps it was due to her own dilapidated state, I reassured her, that the voice sounded different. She cried that she still felt she hadn’t given birth to a healthy baby – her weakness had prevented the child from receiving the proper nourishment.

  The hakim called out, “It’s a girl!”

  “Is it healthy?” she murmured.

  “Yes, Malikaye, she’s absolutely healthy!”

  Ami smiled as she leaned into my shoulder; she’d given birth to a healthy child after three unsuccessful pregnancies. I began to cry with joy, even as I noticed my mother’s head getting heavier. I looked over to Ami and realised that her eyes had rolled back into her head. I cried, “Ami, wake up! Hakim, look at Ami!”

  The hakim sent one of his assistants over as he continued to manage the bleeding that was issuing from her birth canal. He said, “She’s losing a lot of blood, Begum Sahiba. Lay your mother flat so that blood can rush to her head!”

  I didn’t know what to do. I ran to fetch Aba; I needed him now more than ever. But the hakim asked him not to enter, as he needed space to work.

  After three hours’ work, the hakim walked out of the apartment and told Aba about his wife’s dire condition. “Here in Burhampur, Your Majesty, I simply don’t have the instruments and tools to help the queen.”

  “Hakim, what are you saying? Make sure you think before speaking. I want the truth. Is my wife well?”’

  “Your Majesty, your daughter is healthy, and your wife is alive. But I couldn’t stop the bleeding. I’ve packed her bleeding in hopes that it will eventually stop on its own. The body has a way of healing itself. But…”

  “But what?” Aba’s voice was wary.

  “The Queen’s blood was thin to begin with,” replied the Hakim. I don’t know if she has the energy to hang on long enough for her body to heal itself. If this were Agra, I could stop it. Here I cannot.”

  Aba squinted and bit his lips. He looked up to the sky. “Why did I let her come here with me? Why did I allow her to get so weak?” He paused. “May I see my wife? Is she awake?”

  “Please, Your Majesty, go in quickly and stay as long as you like; she may not have much time left.”

  Aba and I entered the room. We each grasped one of Ami’s hands with tears in our eyes.

  “I need you to get through this, Arjumand,” whispered Aba.

  Ami opened her eyes and smiled at her torn husband, his eyes red and his face dripping with tears. She breathed feebly, “I’m very comfortable, Khurram.” They were now addressing each other by their original names, as if the time for ceremony and tradition needed to be halted. Right now they weren’t the King and Queen of India, but just Khurram and Arjumand, two people who’d loved each other as soon as they met and had never stopped loving each other since.

  “We really didn’t need another child, Arju,” Aba said, smiling.

  “Yes, we did, Khurram. You told everyone you wanted children only from me. So I needed to make up for all your other wives.”

  “No, you didn’t,” claimed Aba. “We had six already. Who needed more?”

  “We would be here, Khurram, just as we are, you there and me here, regardless of the pregnancy. This is how it was meant to end for us.”

  “Please don’t say that,” Aba pleaded. “I can’t live without you, Arju. I’m like the moon, and you are my sun. The moon has no light of its own, it’s all reflected light from the sun. Were it not for the sun, no one would ever see the moon.” Ami kept smiling at Aba’s analogy. “I draw my strength from you. I draw my light from you. Were it not for you, no one would ever see me. I am the moon, and you are my sun.”

  Ami briefly lifted a hand toward him. “Our love was the light that allowed the world to see you. Our love doesn’t have to die with me.”

  “Not like this,” insisted Aba. “Who is going to help me take care of all of these kids?”

  “Jahanara will.” Ami turned her face toward me and said, “Jahanara, from this day forward, you are both their sister and their mother.”

  I began to weep relentlessly, and I begged my mother not to leave us and to fight harder. I wanted her to stand still and transform this moment into an eternity, for her doing so would prevent the passage of time to a world where my mother was no longer alive.

  Aba wept openly now. “How am I supposed to keep our love alive without you, Arju?”

  Still smiling, yet getting weaker by the moment, Ami said, “Keep our love alive by doing whatever it is that you like that’s inspired by our love. If you wish to sing, then sing about it, if you wish to paint, paint a scene from it, and if you wish to build, build something that allows the whole world to see how we felt about each other. As long as you remember it, it will give you the light you need to shine, my love. It will be your light.”

  In her dying moments now, she uttered the religious words every Muslim must say before dying. Aba and I stared at her and watched her release her final breath.

  Instantly as she died, Aba led out a loud cry, screaming “No!” multiple times in horror, his voice only silenced by desperate, noiseless cries that followed before he could gain his breath and repeat the sequence. As though forgetting he was a king, he began tearing hairs out from his own beard.

  I beat the bed and cried out, “Ami!” I couldn’t control myself, and I eventually started to pound my own chest; I felt I didn’t want to live in a world without my mother in it. She’s not been just my mother, but my best friend and confidant. My agony turned to incoherent screams of horror and disbelief. The hakims and the harem women ran into the room, and joined us in our mourning.

  Ami exhaled her final breath shortly before dawn on Tuesday, 17th June, 1631. She was 38 years old. During her short life, Ami had become unquestionably the most popular Empress of India. She had initiated multiple reforms in the kingdom to help the poor and needy and continued to serve her husband with the utmost loyalty.

  Though born into a family where political posturing was practised more than anything else, she treated Aba’s plight as her own, and lived however he kept her. On endless journeys with swollen bellies, she’d accompanied him from one military campaign to another. No one, not even Nur Jahan, who hated everyone in the royal household, had anything negative to say about her. Her brief four years as empress gave the country a much needed figure of imperial decency and charity. The days of mourning to follow would be uncharacteristic of any royalty in that time, save for possibly the King.

  It was as if India had lost its first ever ‘Mother India’. A true embodiment of beauty, grace, tolerance, and modesty, she represented all India aspired to be. It was she who taught me to wear my title of Begum Sahiba like a medal and use it to further those causes I believed in. By the time she died, she’d already raised me to be independent and free thinking. Her son was multicultural in the spirit of the legendary Akbar, the most popular Mughal king. Her other children were too young to have learned this, but her counsel had started Aurangzeb on a course of reconciliation and service. She treated all of her husband’s wives with respect and candour, not cruelty as had been the practice of other empresses. Never before, and perhaps never again, would India fall in love with such a figure as my
mother, the legendary Mumtaz Mahal, and no Mughal king would feel for his empress what Aba had felt for his. A remarkable human being in every sense, Ami thoroughly deserved the timeless monument Aba would one day build in her honour.

  7

  HEALING BROKEN HEARTS

  18th June, 1631

  One of the Muslim nobles began reading the Koran’s ‘O Man’ chapter as Ami’s body lay beside him. Another mullah turned her head towards Mecca. As the mullah spoke the Koranic verses, her body was cleaned and washed by a female washer and wrapped in a white shroud consisting of five pieces of white cotton.

  The mullahs continued to chant in unison: “I bear witness that there is no God but God, who is One and has no co-equal. I bear witness that Mohammad is His servant and is sent from Him.” All around me women cried while the mullah chattered: “Say God is One! Say I seek protection of the Lord of Daybreak! Say, I seek the protection of the Lord of Men!”

  Kandari walked up to me and said, “Jahanara, we need to gather at the entrance of the fort to begin the procession.” I willingly left the room, not wishing to see my mother’s lifeless body anymore.

  As we congregated, all the zenana women continued to weep, some out of obligation, I thought others with genuine grief. I joined them in their mourning, still both stunned and devastated. The tatars then motioned us to stand at the side as the mullahs escorted Ami’s remains to the entrance.

  Ami’s body was then removed from the fort, head first so as to prevent her ghost from finding a way back to the fort. All this was customary.

  The chief hakim then approached me. “Begum Sahiba, we must now go to the banks of the Tapti river. The mullah has chosen that location for the burial.”

  The entire day continued to feel like a surreal experience, and I often felt like I was in an alternate reality. I felt dizzy, and my vision was foggy all day.

  Aba looked less like the king of a vast empire and more like a fakir, a street wanderer, crying and chanting religious verses. The zenana ladies continued crying the loudest, as if their own child or mother had been taken from them.

  I don’t think I ever stopped crying. From the minute Ami died to now, I think I’d been crying all along, so much that it didn’t even seem abnormal anymore. My tears flowed down my cheeks like water flows down a snowy cliff on a warm day. I began to feel my throat closing, and I began gasping for air as the procession marched on.

  “Begum Sahiba, take long deep breaths!” The zenana women tried to help me catch my breath. My cheekbones began to ache from weeping. Yet I felt the need to cry more. “My head is going to explode,” I said, gasping for air, my mouth wide open.

  The slave girls, themselves weeping, tried to restrain me. “You must remain calm, Begum Sahiba. We can’t afford to lose you, too!”

  Was I having a nightmare? This couldn’t be real. I started pounding my chest with my hands. Wake up Jahanara! This isn’t real! This can’t be real! Your mother is fine. You’re having a nightmare. We’re still in Agra; we never left! The Deccan, this jinxed Deccan, which many years ago took away my brothers from me and was the site of our exile, now had taken my mother. The maids grabbed hold of my hand.

  “This is all my fault,” I cried. “I must have committed some offence; that’s why Allah took my Ami away. Forgive me, Ami!” The zenana women literally dragged me for the duration of the procession, begging me to control myself, though I continued to fall apart.

  I somehow found myself finally at the burial site, a journey of several kos that seemed like it had taken no time at all. This was where I would say a final goodbye. The slaves began lowering Ami’s body into a shallow grave, and the mullah poured a fist of dirt on it.

  “No, stop that!” I cried out, breaking free from the maids holding me back. “You can’t lower her in that grave. She can’t breathe in there. Take off that cloak! She’s fine!” I began hallucinating and then lost all sense of self.

  The hakim stared back at me with pity in his eyes. “Hakim!” I cried, “I am the Begum Sahiba! I order you to open the cloak and stop this! I’ll have you crushed for insubordination!”

  The hakim stared fixedly at me. “She must rest, Begum Sahiba,” he said calmly.

  I continued to resist. “You all are committing sedition against the King!” I shouted. “You’re killing the queen, and you’ll burn in hell!”

  I couldn’t see straight, the tears had blurred my vision so badly, I scarcely knew where I was. Blinded by my tears, weakened by my weeping and hurting from my sorrow, I suddenly realised I was making a spectacle of myself. Kandari put my head on her shoulders and led me to the side of the grave. I continued to weep as Ami’s body lay in the grave with its head pointing north and turned towards Kaaba, the shrine in Mecca that contained the legendary black stone given by the Angel Gabriel to Abraham.

  Chanted the mullahs: “Say God is One! Say I seek protection of the Lord of Daybreak! Say, I seek the protection of the Lord of Men! Say God is One! Say I seek protection of the Lord of Daybreak! Say, I seek the protection of the Lord of Men…”

  My vision went dark after that, and I can’t recall much of what happened the rest of that day. Different women counselled and nurtured me. I don’t recall eating or sleeping. It was as if the candles in a room had been extinguished and all that remained was sheer darkness. In such darkness, one often loses track of time. Such was the case with me.

  The next several days continued in a haze of confusion and bewilderment. Though officially only 40 days of mourning were to follow, the actual melancholy of the empire would last much longer. No court events were held, no special food was made, and the immediate family members wandered around the fort like zombies themselves. It was as if everyone had lost a sense of purpose. A wet nurse took care of Ami’s newborn, named Gauhara, making sure at least someone in the royal family was getting the proper nutrition.

  I started having daily nightmares of my mother dangling off of a cliff as I stood helpless, unable to pull her back up. Slowly my mother’s arm was slipping from me, inch by inch, until the arm was released and my mother fell to the ground, screaming for help along the way. I would wake up from these dreams devastated and crying; but unlike before, my Ami was no longer with me to comfort me when I awoke. The servants tried to play her part, but theirs was not the comfort I yearned for.

  In my grief, I turned to the one person my mother had told me during our stay at Burhampur to look to if I needed anything: Sati. I awoke from my nightmare one day, distraught as always with servants rushing in to comfort me. I realised this couldn’t go on indefinitely, so I wrote a letter to Sati asking her advice:

  My dearest Sati:

  As you may have heard in Agra, Ami is no more. The light of our lives has been taken from us, and there is darkness everywhere. No one laughs or smiles anymore. The songs, festivals, poems, and shows have all ended. Ami took all of our smiles with her when she left this world. There is no hope for anyone now, it seems. We all stay in bed and wish to sleep in hope we may be visited by her in our dreams, but all that I see are nightmares. Nightmares where she is dying over and over again and I can’t help.

  I can’t help but feel this is somehow all my fault. Maybe if I had done something different, Ami would be with us right now. Aba has lost all will to live. He took off his crown jewels and decorated robes and now wears only white shrouds. He has pulled all the hair out of his beard in grief, and what he has left of a beard has turned white, to match the shroud he wears always. I went to seek his comfort a few days ago and saw him crying out in pain over the loss of his best friend. How could I seek comfort from him? We both lost our best friend, but his grief is at a whole other level than mine.

  I sometimes open Ami’s cabinet just to smell her scent, which is still in her clothes and possessions neatly tucked in drawers. But, Sati, I opened it yesterday and the smell is fading. Even her scent is fading from her belongings. I’m so sad, no words can describe how I feel. I’ve stopped eating and have lost so much weight. Yet I stil
l vomit, though I’ve eaten nothing. I feel like I’m falling and no one is here to catch me. Please help me, Sati. I need you more than ever. Please catch me, please help me find a way to live again.

  Yours always,

  Jahanara

  As I would later learn, Sati received this letter amid the grief that had overcome Agra as news trickled in of Ami’s demise. She reported to me that all the royal children were overcome with dismay and insisted on visiting the Deccan to attend our mother’s funeral, but their demands were put to rest by the news that her body had already been interred before news of her death even reached Agra. Aurangzeb took the news especially hard, and he now regressed to the state he’d assumed as Nur Jahan’s prisoner. He fell into a depression, during which his only companion was the Koran; it was his only comforting potion. I believe that like me, Aurangzeb felt like he was falling; but unlike me he was being caught by the mullahs who were counselling him about the Koran. For me, no such place of safety existed, nor would I have wanted one. As Sati wrote back to me:

  My Dear Jahanara:

  Your pain is pure, and were it not for the greatness of your mother, perhaps it would not be so deep. We all grieve with you at your loss. Losing a parent is never easy, especially one as special as the Empress. She was a lone star in the midst of a vast darkness. Yet, your mourning must eventually pass, for you must fulfill your role now as both a daughter and a sister. You are the oldest female of the royal family. Your father, the King, needs you as do your siblings. You must not let your grief prevent you from taking care of them.

  Dara and Raushanara cry all day. Shuja and Murad have stopped eating. And Aurangzeb? Aurangzeb has again sought refuge in religious doctrines and sequestered himself inside the Pearl Mosque, claiming that’s the only place he finds any peace. Jahanara, your family needs you. It is up to you to lift this family out of despair. They will listen to you in ways they will listen to no one else. You have your mother’s gentleness and grace. The future of this great family and this country is now in your hands, my dear. I am here to catch you, but YOU must catch THEM. Don’t let your mother’s legacy be simply that all she cared for died in grief over her death. There are still battles to be fought, causes to be championed and hearts to be healed. Come back to Agra and give us again a reason to live again, my child.