Rama’s voice was soft, apologetic. “I want nothing more than Sita’s garland around my neck and to claim her as my own,” Rama said. “But I cannot agree without my father’s permission.”

  Sita’s spirit rose; his hesitation was not directed toward her.

  “We will send a message to your father at once,” Janaka declared. “Today you will be promised to one another. The fires will be lit and the sacred vow made only with your father’s blessings. Do you agree?”

  “Yes.” Rama smiled, looking intently at Sita.

  “Sita,” her father said, turning to her. “Place your garland on Rama if you consent to this betrothal.” He was speaking the formal words, but there was no formality in his voice.

  Sita lifted the flower garland to place it around Rama. As she stood on her toes, he bent his head so she could reach. With the flowers around his neck, Rama became shy. Sita wanted to touch his skin and garland him with her arms.

  Flower petals showered on them from every direction, and the cheering grew louder.

  The bow was broken and their princess would marry!

  After the momentous day, the moon illuminated the gardens at midnight. Sita sat by the lotus pond with Urmila dipping her toes in the water. Neither Sita nor her sister could sleep. The darkness of night was bright as a blessing. The silence was filled with Urmila’s whispers; the success of the contest and Sita’s dazzling prince only increased Urmila’s loquaciousness. As Sita listened to her sister’s happy chatter, she felt the waters in the lotus pond swirl up around her feet. The quiet wind and the sky above them were filled with Rama’s name.

  Another name appeared: Lakshmana. Rama’s brother who seemed close like a twin.

  “Did you see the way Lakshmana ran down from his seat?” Urmila said enthusiastically.

  “He couldn’t wait to congratulate his brother. It was so sweet. Did you notice that he stood right by Rama the whole time, even when you garlanded Rama?”

  Sita had not noticed any of those things. Her attention had been wholeheartedly on Rama, to the exclusion of common sense. A lucid part of her consciousness had of course noted Lakshmana’s presence, but the one time Sita had glanced his way . . .

  “I felt like a shield around Lakshmana deflected my very glance,” Sita said. “I could not truly see him.”

  “Do you think he is jealous of you?”

  “No!” The thought had not crossed Sita’s mind.

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  “I have heard that sometimes even a father gets jealous,” Urmila said, “if a mother dotes too much on her newborn. It could be the same with a brother. Lakshmana’s eyes follow Rama everywhere he goes.”

  “And someone’s eyes seem to follow Lakshmana wherever he goes.” Sita raised her eyebrows at Urmila.

  “No, no,” Urmila shook her head vigorously, but Sita saw a blush appear on her cheeks.

  Suddenly eager to turn the attention away from herself, Urmila said, “When you think of being with Rama forever, what do you really feel?”

  Sita thought her joy was written in every word and gesture she made. She put her hands on her cheeks to contain the expansion of bliss she felt.

  “The bow chose Rama for me, but I feel like I wandered the whole universe to find him.”

  “I told father to set the same bride-price for me! Then I would be as happy as you are. But now the bow is broken. There is no hope for me.”

  Urmila dropped her hands into her lap and sighed.

  Sita thought of Rama’s brother again. Everyone’s life would change. Sita would go alone to Ayodhya. She reached for Urmila’s hand. “I will miss you more than anything.”

  “We knew this day would come,” Sita said in a soft voice. “We have to be brave.”

  Urmila leaned on her sister’s shoulder. “You always accept everything so easily. You are grace personified.”

  Sita had to smile. That was their mother’s phrase. In this case, Sita didn’t have to struggle to find acceptance. She felt beyond lucky. This night would have been very different if someone else had broken Shiva’s bow. Like the king of Kashi—a menacing brute. At the first contest when she was thirteen, Kashi had been the most repulsive of them all. During his second attempt, she had fervently prayed that he would once again fail. Kashi frightened her; he had been willing to snatch her away against her will. In his presence, she felt like a deer scrutinized by a tiger. Or worse, that he was a blood-drinker and she his prey.

  “Why are you scared, Sister?” Urmila asked.

  “Oh,” Sita said, rippling the surface of the water with her hand. “I was just imagining how much I would grieve if someone else had lifted the bow.”

  Rama’s gentle and powerful face loomed in her consciousness. Sita could ask for nothing more. She was so happy she could not imagine going to sleep.

  A few moments later, however, Queen Sunayana came into the gardens. “Sita, your father seeks you.”

  The sisters rose from the lotus pond. Urmila looked at their mother, the question in her eyes. Was she too summoned to their father, the king?

  Sunayana shook her head. “Father wants to speak with Sita in private.”

  A shadow crossed Urmila’s face. She persisted in thinking that Sita was Father’s favorite.

  Sita viewed it differently. There was something more, or simply something else, in Father’s attention. Sita didn’t quite understand it herself. If she had to describe it, she would name it fear. She saw it in her father’s eyes, how it spread through his body like veins of blood.

  Sita parted from her mother and sister in the courtyard. Padmini and Urmila’s maid 345

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  stepped out of the shadows where they had quietly waited, and for a moment Sita felt ashamed. Just because she couldn’t sleep, the maidservants were forced to stay awake. But there was no reproach in Padmini’s eyes. As Sita walked into her father’s chambers, Padmini once again took her place in a corner to wait.

  All the candles and flames were lit in the room, sparkling like stars breathing in the darkness. Sita loved the sight of fire, and she was content to stand and wait for her father.

  Father smiled when he saw her. He had taken off his crown and most of the jewels he wore. Flickering shadows from the flames danced across his face. His eyes sparkled with joy. Perhaps he only meant to share his delight in the success of the contest. He dismissed the two servants who stood at his beck and call. Like Padmini, they melted into the shadows, becoming unobtrusive in the large chamber. Janaka took Sita’s elbow gently and guided her to the balcony so they truly could speak in private.

  Sita’s heartbeat quickened. It wasn’t often that secrets were so secret that the trusted servants were kept at bay.

  “Janaki, my daughter,” he said, using the nickname, which simply meant daughter of Janaka. “I have never spoken to you openly regarding this. But being the perceptive girl you are, I’m sure you have noticed me keeping a watchful eye on you.”

  Sita nodded, looking at her father with a somber feeling. She knew it well. Her father’s caution was her own.

  She had second-guessed her own thoughts and reactions ever since she understood that they were separate from her. She was not her sadness, her anger, her love, her confusion. She was the witness, very much like someone standing inside while a storm raged without. She could control and subdue her thoughts and feelings. She could walk away from those storms. That’s what she had done all these years for the sake of her father. To please him.

  To be the one he expected. And because she did not want to be singular, a lone mind excluded from the resonance that bound all humans together.

  “I don’t fully understand your nature, Janaki. The thirty gods know I have tried. I even wrote a letter to King 347

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  Dasharatha once, asking for Vasishta’s advice.” Janaka laughed lightly. His teeth were white in the moonlight.

  Rama’s father knew about her, Sita thought. But what exactly was there to know?

  “You were hardly three years old,” Janaka said, “when I finally sent that missive to the emperor. My hands shook as I wrote. The tale I told was strange, even to me. There is something different about you, Sita. You know that, do you not?”

  Sita nodded. But there was a big lump in her throat.

  “No, no, no,” her father said, noticing at once. “It is not a bad thing. Of that I’m certain.

  Janaki, listen to me.” He put a gentle hand on her shoulder and lightly touched her chin, telling her to look up at him. “Listen to me, my girl. You are not an ordinary human like the rest of us. Your birth showed us that, and then when you easily lifted the bow, it was confirmed.”

  “Are you afraid of me?” Sita asked frankly. Her chin was trembling, but she knew she should not allow the upsurge of tears to spill out. That always increased her father’s apprehension. No man could stand to see a woman cry. Urmila’s wisdom words.

  “I was afraid at first, my dear. That’s why I sought Vasishta’s help. Even now, when I must speak openly with you about it, I feel a tremor within. But it’s not you that I’m afraid of!”

  He let those words sink in. “From the very beginning, when I saw what you could do, I feared other humans. If I know anything as king, it’s that people cannot accept anyone who differs from them. You saw how the kings reacted when you lifted the bow. They did not want to believe it. They called it sorcery, black magic. They wanted to possess you and subdue you.”

  Sita remembered well the uproar she had caused that time. Lifting the bow had seemed so easy. She hadn’t truly understood that she was proving herself stronger than every man in the arena. Now, she would have never done it. In fact, she couldn’t. She had tried to lift the bow once again after that, but it had become impossibly heavy.

  “But Father, what is it that I can do?” Sita asked. “Why am I different than Urmila? Why don’t you watch her the way you watch me?”

  Janaka took a deep breath. He looked up at the moon, and then toward the ground.

  This was the portion of the conversation he had evidently feared, despite what he said. Sita watched him carefully.

  “Actually, Sita, I want to ask you the same thing.”

  He looked at her then, as if she was capable of unimaginable things. There was awe and wonder in his eyes. Sita preferred his fearful concern to this worship!

  “But I’m just a girl with strange dreams,” Sita said. “That’s all!”

  “Don’t you remember when you were a small child? In those years before you could speak. Do you remember anything from that time?”

  She shook her head. Shrugged. Blinked. Shook her head some more.

  “Before you could walk and talk, every display of emotion on your part would have a response or counterpart out here.” He motioned to the sky, the wind, the fire, the earth.

  Sita’s mouth fell open. She blinked hard. She thought this was merely her deepest held fantasy.

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  “Yes, my child. When you cried, it rained. When you were angry, the fires crackled. When you screamed, the Earth trembled. No one could imagine that these occurrences were tied to a little child. But I observed it, many a time, and therefore took it upon myself to keep you appeased.”

  He looked carefully at Sita.

  She remembered those days well. They were her sweetest childhood memories of wild joy, rolling on the ground, being underwater, singing to the wind. She rode on deer, gabbled with parrots, and felt one with the Earth.

  “Then it stopped,” Father said. “After you mastered language, you became reserved, even guarded. Mithila has never seen such a serious and mature child. Since then, I have never observed any elemental occurrences around you. What changed?”

  Sita felt terribly exposed. She hugged herself as the memory returned. The large ones, the humans, had gathered around her, emanating big tangles in their energy. The one who was Father rushed to appease her, enveloping her in his protection. His energy vibrated with waves of anxiety. So she took farewell from the Earth and the sky and withdrew into herself, and for a time, she was paralyzed, denying her connection to the elements she was made of.

  It was a terrible pain, like having her limbs amputated.

  Father drew her to his side. His hands were warm, her skin cold. “Hush, hush,” he said, as though she was crying. Warmth returned to her limbs.

  “I remember when Ananda came to live with us,” she said.

  “Shatananda. Our dear friend.”

  He had come with his matted hair, clay markings, and a boyish face with alert eyes. Sita had loved to pick bits of the dried clay off his forehead and eat them. It made Ananda laugh.

  He saw the fire at her core, but he was not afraid. He taught her to become the witness, to be free even with constraints. All this was done without words, and whatever Ananda told her father in words transformed the situation. Father’s eyes grew less watchful, and his energy flowed naturally again, like a river to the sea.

  “Did you know that Rama’s father sent Ananda to us?”

  Sita shook her head. She had not known that. It made her like Rama’s father.

  “Ayodhya is a very good place,” Janaka said. “Flawless in reputation. In addition to his military prowess, King Dasharatha is widely known for his thoughtfulness. By all evidence, his son Rama has inherited that trait from his father. Over time, Rama will come to know you better than I do. But Sita, if a man is not prepared to see what’s in front of his eyes, nothing can persuade him of the truth. I pray that Rama’s love will be strong. I pray that the gods reveal your purpose here among us.”

  “You make it sound like I’m not one of you.”

  “I don’t know if you are, child,” he said.

  But when he saw the expression on Sita’s face, he amended. “You are the beloved of my heart. And now the beloved of Rama’s heart. I treasure no one the way I treasure you. And I can see the same adoration in Rama’s eyes. He will take care of you. He will do everything 349

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  for you. But even he is but a man. Don’t be afraid, my child. Just be careful. That’s all.

  Now go.”

  The stars blinked above them. The fires shone within the room.

  Sita had to be careful. She always had been. She hoped Ananda would come to Ayodhya with her. She wished Urmila would come too. She longed for anchors to keep her secure in this strange world. A sudden possibility dawned on Sita.

  “Urmila is more than a sister to me, Father. She is my best friend and a natural leader.

  She is vivacious and does not shy away from being at the center of attention.”

  Her father nodded. He knew this too.

  Sita hesitated, choosing her words. She had never before made a political suggestion.

  “Urmila mentioned Lakshmana to me several times,” she said. “If Sister marries Lakshmana, she and I could always be together.”

  With that, Sita turned and ran out. She couldn’t bear to think of the farewells that stood between them all. What would her life become without her father’s watchfulness? What would she do without Urmila’s wise words?

  As Sita walked to her chamber, the faithful Padmini held Sita’s arm. She had sensed the anxiety of her mistress. It had been a tremendous day for them all, and especially for Sita. Padmini brought Sita a calming herbal tea, and moments later, Sita sank deep into her dreams.

  This night, an entirely new dream came to her.

  The entire Earth was trembling. No one was safe. The fires at the core burned too hot, pushing toward the surface, demanding more space to breathe. The Earth split apart and was no longer one. The ocean claimed the planet. Hungry waves swallowed the rich soil of the Earth, turning it into sea bottom. When the fires sighed in peace and the waves forgot to be hungry, the Earth had split into thousands of pieces, scattered across the ocean. All the while, Sita had been the silent witness. She might have been able to stop it once, but by the time it happened, it was too late.

  When Urmila’s eager hands shook Sita awake, she had forgotten the dream, but had a vague sense that she had been scattered into a million little pieces. Sita smiled at her sister and put the vision away. She could no longer be a dreamer. Her father had entrusted her fate into her own hands. She had to embrace her fate with a cautious but open heart.

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  chapter 40

  A Father’s Blessings

  hile Rama waited for word from his father, he savored every moment with WSita. He woke early in the morning, leaving Lakshmana and Vishvamitra, to find Sita at the lotus pond. She always waited for him there. Nothing seemed more certain to him than this. Sita’s attendants kept a thoughtful distance, and the new couple would sit together for hours and sometimes stroll about in the lush grooves.

  Rama was careful not to cross any lines of propriety, for he did not yet feel his claim on her was final. He did not reach for Sita’s hand; he did not touch her cheek; he did not play with her hair or the curls around her face. But sometimes he had to clasp his hands together to stop them from seeking her nearness.

  Lakshmana came to the lotus pond once but left rather quickly. Sita’s sister came too and stayed longer but eventually noticed that neither Sita nor Rama paid full attention to her presence. When King Janaka visited, he waved at them from a distance with a contented smile. There was one unexpected visitor, a sage unknown to Rama. Sita’s face lit up as the holy one arrived. His face was smooth and boyish, but his matted hair was long, and he was effulgent like Vasishta.

  “Ananda,” Sita said, “please come.”

  “Revered prince, you do not know me,” Ananda said to Rama, “but I was present at your birth. I have longed to do this, and now I have a concrete reason.”

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  He fell at Rama’s feet, touching his forehead to Rama’s toes. This was unusual, for with holy ones, it was the other way around. And yet not long ago, a woman of stone and rested her forehead on his feet in this exact manner.

  “Ahalya is my mother,” Ananda said, rising to his knees, tears streaming down his cheeks. “For over a thousand years, she was trapped in that stone, and your mercy released her. I thank you. I have not felt my mother’s presence for a thousand years, and now I do.