“You are a faithless woman,” Dasharath proclaimed, rising to his feet. “Your oaths to the gods are meaningless. They forsook you long ago. I cannot believe you so fooled me, that I took you into my confidence. Rama was right. I never should have given a woman so much power.”
“What?” Kaushalya asked, but we paid her no mind.
“You swore to me and to the gods,” I said, my voice shaking slightly. “Now say it in front of Kaushalya as your witness. Will you fulfill your boons to me, Raja Dasharath?” I lifted my chin and composed my face into as haughty an image as I could muster. If they wished me to be a jealous, faithless, prideful woman, I would give them what they wanted. That was what it would take to see this task through. I gave the golden string a final push.
Our bond, that great construction that had carried us through my father’s hall to the palace of Ayodhya, from the battlefield to the council room to the building of a revolutionary kingdom—that golden thread that had been so vital, so precious—snapped in two.
Dasharath fell to his knees, and the impact ricocheted through my body. It felt as though if I were to exit the Binding Plane, the world would remain grayed. Fragments of gold fell to the shrouded floor and vanished like the last fragments of a dream.
A piece of my soul dissolved with them.
And Dasharath, broken and tired and suddenly much older than his years, whispered, “I will.”
CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR
MY HUSBAND COLLAPSED.
You did this, Kaushalya’s expression seemed to say as she rushed to his side and tried to rouse him. Or perhaps that was simply my own mind. I thought my heart would burst from the agony of it.
Dasharath did not wake.
Undeterred, Kaushalya hooked her arms under his, trying to move him.
At last, my limbs loosened, and I helped her to lift him onto his great bed. We did not speak as we went about our task, and each time our hands brushed, one of us jerked away.
At last, she broke the silence. “Should we call a healer?”
I pressed my fingers under his chin. “Yes. But his heart holds steady.” I turned away so I would not have to see her expression.
“Kaikeyi,” she said. I did not turn around. “Kaikeyi,” she repeated, and placed a hand on my shoulder. I shrugged it off, unable to face her.
“I will say my piece. I am incredibly angry at you. I am so very angry, I could slap you, claw at your eyes.”
“I know.” I hung my head, unable to face her disappointment.
She sighed. “You know nothing, you monumental idiot. I am furious because you did not tell me of any of this. You never mentioned a thing. I want Rama to take the throne, and one day he will be a great ruler. But I agree with you. He is unready. I could not do anything about it, I can barely open my mouth in his presence, but you have always been stronger—and for that I am grateful.”
I spun around. “What?”
“I trust you more than anyone in the palace, and yet you do not seem to trust me.”
“You said you thought I was jealous,” I blurted out. I could not allow myself to think that Kaushalya spoke honestly.
I forced myself to reenter the Binding Plane, though my heart resisted it, after what had just transpired with Dasharath. I had to recite the mantra in my mind, for the first time in nearly a decade, for the Plane would not come easily.
In the faded world, I saw no evidence of deception, and only the faintest of blue bonds around her neck.
“I did not know what to think. I was hurt, and I lashed out,” she said. “That, I think, should be understandable. I am Rama’s mother. You think I do not know the way he holds forth before other men, trying to impress them? The way he obsesses over war at the cost of all else? A king needs to be grounded, secure in himself. But Bharata is none of those things either. So what was I to believe? It seemed like you cared not for the kingdom’s welfare but for your own blood son’s power.” She gave me a slight smile there. “Yet in all the time I have known you, all you have done is helped others. You saved Dasharath’s life less than a year after marrying him. Therefore, logic says you must have had a reason for making Bharata raja.”
I cradled my head in my hands. “Dasharath swore my father an oath many years ago. He said that any son of mine would be heir to the throne. My brother has heard of Rama’s impending coronation and threatened to wage war on Kosala unless Bharata was crowned. But when I tried to tell Dasharath, he… he hardly listened.”
Kaushalya considered this, eyes wide. After a moment, she reached out, gently maneuvering me so that my forehead rested against her shoulder. Only then did I realize that I had begun crying again. “Shh. You must stay strong now. Would you like me to speak for you?”