‘I’m not planning on using our decoy fleet to engage in battle,’ said Parvateshwar. ‘So we’re not going to load them up with soldiers. We’ll only keep a skeletal staff, enough to set sail. We will not commit more than five thousand men. Imagine what we can achieve. Only five thousand of our men, including the commandos, will leave Karachapa but we would have removed nearly one hundred thousand of the enemy men, leaving them stranded in the jungles around the Narmada, at least six months away from Lothal. And not a single arrow would have been fired. We can then go ahead and easily march in to capture Lothal.’

‘Brilliant!’ said Bhrigu. ‘We will move towards Lothal as soon as our ships leave for the Narmada.’

‘No, My Lord,’ said Parvateshwar. ‘I’m sure Sati has scouts lurking in and around Karachapa. If they see four hundred thousand of our troops marching out of the city, they will know that our ships are thinly manned and will therefore understand our ruse. Our army will have to remain hidden within the walls of Karachapa to convince them that our attack on Panchavati is genuine.’

The customs officer at Karachapa frowned at the merchant ship manifest. ‘Cotton from Egypt? Why would any Meluhan want cotton from Egypt? They are no match for our own cotton.’

The customs procedure in Meluha was based on a system of trust. Ship manifests would be accepted at face value and the relevant duty applied. It was also accepted that, on random occasions, a customs officer could cross-check the ship load if he so desired. This was possibly one of those random occasions.

The officer turned to his assistant. ‘Go down to the ship hold and check.’

The ship captain looked nervously to his right, at the closed door of the deck cabin, and turned back to the customs officer. ‘What is the need for that, Sir? Do you think that I would lie about this? You know that the amount of cotton I have declared matches the maximum carrying capacity of this ship. There is no way you can charge me a higher custom duty. Your search will serve no purpose.’

The Meluhan customs officer looked towards the cabin that the captain had surreptitiously glanced at. The door suddenly swung open and a tall, well-built man stepped out and stretched his arms as he lazily yawned. ‘What’s the delay, Captain?’

The customs officer held his breath as he recognised the man. He instantly executed a smart Meluhan military salute. ‘Brigadier Vidyunmali, I didn’t know you were on this ship.’

‘Now you know,’ said Vidyunmali, yawning once more.

‘I’m sorry, My Lord,’ said the customs officer, as he immediately handed the manifest back to the captain and ordered his assistant to issue the receipt for the duty payment.

The paperwork was done in no time.