ABOUT THE AUTHOR

AUTHOR’S NOTE

DRAMATIS PERSONAE

PROLOGUE

ADHYAYA I: WINTER OF DISCORD

ADHYAYA II: ALL THAT GLITTERS

ADHYAYA III: BEST SERVED COLD

THE SWAYAMVAR: PART I

THE SWAYAMVAR: PART II

ADHYAYA IV: A FIGHTING CHANCE

BATTLE OF MATHURA: PART I

BATTLE OF MATHURA: PART II

EPILOGUE

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

AUTHOR’S NOTE

When I took the wonderful characters of the epic Mahabharata and tossed them into a parallel dimension that was pervasively bleak and nihilistic, it was with the intention of making you, my reader, sit up and gasp on your couch.

The bare bones of Sons of Darkness saw the light after I read A Game of Thrones. My vision was clear. Epic Grimdark Fantasy was an unexplored bastion of Indian literature, and I wanted Sons of Darkness to be the first to conquer it. So, I started building a new world on the legacy of scores of hand-drawn maps, character sketches, raw notes, castle plans, detailed fight scenes, caste tattoos, heraldic designs… you name it. And five gruelling years later, here we are, at the threshold of an exciting adventure.

But before you fasten your seat-belts, do give my bipolar invitation below a read. I was asked to draft this Author’s Note because the world of Sons of Darkness is completely different from what you may know about the Mahabharata through books and TV shows. You will encounter strange new characters that were not part of the original epic poem. Old, loved characters take unfamiliar journeys and meet untimely ends. Am I thereby abusing my literary privilege? Who can tell? None of us were there when it happened. Then again, if you prefer the unsullied version, just read Vyas’ beautiful, original piece.

If you are, however, prepared to dive head-first into a chasm of chivalry and cynicism, all I ask is that you leave your helms and shields behind. Forget what you think you know about Krishna. Forget Karna’s backstory. Forget Vyas’ Bharatvarsh. Instead, enter the dark world of Aryavrat. For Sons of Darkness has little to do with the mytho-trope of simply re-writing Mahabharatan reality from a different character’s perspective and more to do with re-imagining a brave new world that is as disillusioned and ultraviolent as our own reality.

When you enter the world of Sons of Darkness, you enter a vast immersive universe, a Narnia of India, if you will. It is every bit as messy and intricate as our own world. There are no good or bad characters in this book, just real people faced with impossible choices. More importantly, Sons of Darkness does not whittle down the sorcery offered by our lore under the guise of science or realism. Instead, it creates an enchanting magic system, premised on our Vedas in a way I promise you have never seen before. But the uniqueness of Sons of Darkness, in my humble opinion, is that it does not project ancient India yet again as a village-world stuck in the Age of the Wheel, obsessed with wooden arrows and mud dwellings. Not at all.