III

Krishna woke, bruised, tired and sore. Through dry eyes he stared at the sky outside. It was too early even for dawn. Yet there was a racket going on in the corridor. He turned wearily on the bed to find Satyabhama seated on a stone bench, her naked back towards him. She was combing her hair before a mirror adorned with daggers and fetishes. Satyabhama would never look at a mirror adorned with roses and cherubs. We are nothing if not our reputations.

She dressed, but not before Krishna took full measure of the long scar running down her back. In a battle long forgotten, some fortunate sword had found its way through her armour, cutting a deep gash down her spine. A stripe on a jungle cat.

Mild stirrings. Krishna smiled. ‘Come to bed, Satya. It’s too cold for you to be so bare….and so distant.’ He frowned as he heard chatter again outside the room. ‘At least draw the bed curtains. I have a feeling we are about to be disturbed.’

‘I’ve never been a champion of modesty, Krishna,’ Satyabhama replied as she pulled a cotton kurti over a corset and draped a thick ornate odhni like a cloak around her neck. ‘You think we look for shrubs to hide behind when we change on the frontlines?’

‘I don’t know why but that information isn’t particularly comforting, wife,’ Krishna said, imagining her stripping naked in front of her squad. I find I prefer nightmares of famine to this. ‘Why are you dressing so early? The day has barely begun.’

He turned on his side again, propping his head on his hand. There was a certain militaristic aspect to the furniture in Satyabhama’s chamber; the little there was could at best be described as conservative Magadhan in style. The functional basin for washing had no jasmine flowers floating in the water. The walls had no murals. And it was known that Satyabhama had no patience for the furs and silken mats that covered the floors of every other room in the Inner District. Krishna smiled at a memory that rose suddenly in his mind.

Satyabhama brows rose. ‘A joke worthy of sharing?’

Krishna got out of bed and stretched, hoping to distract Satyabhama as she had distracted him. ‘Just remembering Senator Akrur’s face when your motion to ban animal fur and wall hangings was defeated.’

The Senator had in fact, broken into a victory jig, but not for long. Satyabhama had been banished from the Senate for a year for breaking Lord Akrur’s nose. But it had been worth it. ‘Honestly, I felt it was an improvement on his features,’ Satyabhama said flatly. ‘When your soldiers, fighting in the cold, need the animal fur to stay warm, you don’t hoard it to impress whores.’

Krishna nodded. ‘What is all that chatter outside?’ he asked, frowning. Did no one sleep anymore?

‘An envoy has come from the Magadhan camp to parley.’

‘Parley! Why?’

Magadh had been at Mathura’s throat for years, with intermittent moments of sobriety. The Yamuna Wars had seen so many battles that the bards had abandoned giving them names. The enmity between the Republic and the Empire ran as deep as the river for which their War was named. But a parley? It had never happened before. No one sued for peace when they were winning.