ceans of blood will bathe the feet of the Himavant, Father!’ Prince Vidudabha ranted and raged as he brought the shocking news of this deceit to King Pasenadi. He had been determined to be the one to inform his father how the Crown of Kosala had been insulted. To the horror of the Prince, quite unexpectedly, the King responded to this declaration by saying, ‘Yes indeed, bathed in blood they shall be, but not by you, slave-son¹!’

As Vidudabha heard these words he could not at first comprehend what the King was saying, so assured had he been of his own position and of the King’s role as his Royal Father. The Prince had spent his life getting away with outrageous behaviour and no one had ever spoken back to him. He had never been scolded by his parents and he had hardly ever been on the receiving end of even a harsh word – except occasionally from Vajiri. So at this moment, as he absorbed the meaning of the King’s wrathful declaration, his world came crashing down. Inside, he was shocked, poll-axed, but he was also seething:– How dare His Majesty treat him in this way!

‘Out! Out of my sight!’ King Pasenadi barked at the Prince. His ire had been steadily building. He turned to his chief minister and shouted, ‘Bring her here! Bring her! I will restrain my Royal Disfavour until the truth of this ugly matter is clear,’ although it was apparent that this mood was already out of its stable and galloping free. The fierceness of the rap at her door, when the minster’s staff came to get her, had been the sign she had long been dreading. She knew the embassy had returned and was anxiously awaiting word on how things had gone. The sharp knocks at once told her all. ‘Here it comes,’ she exchanged a glance with Kesini and, in silence, with a wry smile, she rose to her feet. ‘Well, we managed it for a while…’, she thought, and then stood before the door, which was opened before she had even said, ‘Come in.’

Queen Vasabha was brought before the King in the throne room. Queen Mallika had picked up the tremors of the unfolding incident and had quietly drawn close to the King, to at least witness what was happening here. The return of the embassy from the Sakyans should have been a joyous and uncomplicated event but something untoward was definitely afoot. Princess Vajiri, even more quietly, joined Mallika from the side of the chamber.

‘My Royal Wife,’ Pasenadi began through gritted teeth, addressing Vasabha who knelt before him at the bidding of the chief minister. ‘An ill rumour, a report has reached my ears that tells a grim and appalling tale. It pains me that this is news that you were not of the Sakyan royal house but, rather, were a kitchen-slave who was young enough and pretty enough to pass as a princess of kshatriyan blood. Have you deceived me, your King, your Royal Husband, all these years? Have you betrayed and lied to the good people of Kosala and birthed an ill-gotten son by me, obtained by a false and invalid marriage?’ The King spoke steadily but, beneath the film of control, he was incandescent. He saw by Vasabha’s posture and her tears that, far from being wronged by these accusations, they were tragically, horribly true.

Vasabha, gently weeping, admitted, ‘Yes, Sire, this is sadly true. I have aped the role of princess and queen, a royal mother, these last seventeen Rains. I have deceived you and all the worthy folk of Savatthi, of Kosala. I dare not ask for forgiveness.’ She bowed with her head to the floor and stayed there.

Vidudabha, who was noticeably not sitting by the King, and was not in a position to be making any judgements, could not hold himself back from asking. ‘But, woman, if you were but a slave you could not have worked this treachery on your own. Surely the king of the Sakyans and his family must have been part of this. How could they not be?’

King Pasenadi recalled the embassy he had made all those years ago, and how Vasabha had been presented to him. It was blatantly clear that the Sakyan royals had to have been complicit.

‘Sit up girl!’ The King commanded. ‘Speak. Was this deception conceived by you or by the Sakyan nobles?’

‘It was not by me, Sire. I know not who first crafted the idea but I was chosen and the task was put before me.’

‘Did you have any choice?’ The point was pressed.

Vasabha considered, cast her mind back as best she could. ‘To tell the honest truth, Sire, I had no choice but I wanted to do it too.’ She knew she did not have to say the latter part of this but, in the effort to have no more secrets after years of such deception on her part, it burst forth in this way.

‘You wanted it? You wanted to cheat the King of Kosala and to live a deceitful life?’ Pasenadi was getting more heated at the very idea of it.

‘No sire, it was not about your Royal Person at all. It was, if I might say, the selfish, foolish dream of a kitchen-girl who has a chance to be a princess, a fantasy that any girl might have. It’s not an excuse for what I did but it was a way for me to escape the drudgery of the heat and smoke of the kitchen. At the time I didn’t think much beyond that. I was not an educated person.’

A few heads nodded around the throne room at this, conceding that this was a fair point to be made.

Vasabha weighed what she should say further, then, thinking ‘In for a masaka, in for a kahapana’, but perhaps not a whole kahapana as she realized it would not help things to say she’d found out that she was actually the daughter of a kinnari and a very dark-skinned novice monk. They would all assume she had completely lost her wits if she told them that. She added, ‘One small factor that my mother passed on to me, was that the King, Lord Mahanama, had often called upon my mother’s favours in her youth and he would still come by from time to time as we all grew up, since he enjoyed her company. The fact that she was a slave, and married to someone else, counted for nothing.’ She looked modestly down as she knew the same uninspiring practice pertained in Kosala, as in most kingdoms, and that kings and princes regularly consorted with any low-class girl they pleased, and law and custom protected them².

‘Prince Mahanama held that he could quite possibly be my actual father and so, when he showed me to you saying, ‘May I introduce my daughter,’ he could justify to himself that he was (possibly) not lying.’ She finished and bowed her head again.

‘Hrrmph! I don’t know whether that makes it better or worse,’ he bristled. ‘Regardless of the details of your birth, you have been falsely presented to me as a pure-blooded Sakyan, a kshatriyan princess, and you have consciously maintained that deception since our marriage. Exactly what punishment is to be exacted upon the Sakyans is to be decided but you, woman, are herewith deprived of your rank and your possessions, and will go back to the status of slave. You will be kept in the palace dungeons, attending upon my Royal Pleasure, until a decision about your fate has been made³.’

Vidudabha, still clad in his finery from the embassy’s journey, cleared his throat.

King Pasenadi turned to him, ‘Oh yes, you too. You are no longer Crown Prince, or Commander-in-Chief, and are demoted to slave as well. You don’t need to be locked up – the crime was not yours – but I can’t have a misbegotten child like you as my heir. Give your,’ here he waved a dismissive hand at his jewellery and fine attire, ‘all this stuff to the stewards and wear something that more befits your station.’

---

Queen Mallika and Princess Vajiri had been listening closely to all this and were as shocked as the rest of the court at these revelations and the sudden downfall of Vasabha and Vidudabha. They were both very fond of Vasabha and she had always been friendly, kind and respectful to them both, never wielding clout on account of having borne the King his only son.

After the former queen and the boy had been conducted out, as swiftly as she could, Mallika came closer to the King’s side. She made some comforting, soothing mumbles and led him aside to speak privately.

‘Of course, Sire, it’s the Royal Prerogative to treat Vasabha and the… and Vidudabha exactly as you choose but might it be a prudent idea to consult with the Master before making any decision?’ Vajiri dared to peek at how the King was taking this suggestion.

He had cooled a bit by now and, collecting his wits, he nodded. It would relieve him of the burden of some difficult choices and the Master so often had a perspective on things that led to benefit for all. ‘Good idea. I think we should go at once.’

With that they made their way to the Jetavana and found that the Master had expected their coming⁴. He met them at the sala and King Pasenadi related all that had occurred.

‘Venerable Sir, I have heard that your clansmen gave me a slave’s daughter to be my wife. I take this to be a grave insult so I have cut off the wealth of Vasabha and Vidudabha and have deprived them of their position, rendering them both slaves. The woman is in my dungeons since it was she who perpetrated this degrading deception. Do you have any advice for me, Blessèd One, as to how matters should proceed from here?’

‘Great King, the Sakyans have done grievous wrong, it is true, but have you considered how fickle the matters of birth and rank are⁵?

‘Not long ago, here in Kosala, a brahmin pandit called Pokkharasati sent a student of his to meet me and to appraise my teaching⁶. When the youth came to me he did not behave politely or respectfully; he referred to me as “a shaven little ascetic, a menial, a grimy off-scouring of Brahma’s foot”, then he described Sakyans as, “fierce, rough-spoken, touchy and violent”. Then, lastly, he stated that of the four castes, three – the kshatriyas, the merchants and the artisans – were entirely subservient to the brahmins, therefore kshatriyas should always pay homage to brahmins and not the other way around.

‘I then asked this youth, “What is the name of your clan?” To which he replied, “Kanhayan”.

‘I said to him, “Ambattha,” for that was his name, “the Sakyans regard King Okkaka as their ancestor. That King had a slave-girl called Disa who gave birth to a very dark child. As soon as that child was born he spoke and he was always known as Kanha⁷, meaning ‘The Dark One’. You are descended from him, that is how your clan got its name. Have you heard this story before?”

‘Now Ambattha was abashed and did not want to answer, although I asked him twice. At that time, although I had not called upon such a one to be part of the exchange, the yakkha Vajirapani⁸ hovered above the head of the youth bearing a huge iron club, thinking, “If this young man does not answer a question put to him three times by the Master, I’ll split his head into seven pieces.” I had asked Ambattha twice already so the youth, who also saw the yakkha, at last replied, “Yes, I have heard it just as you have said, this is where the Kanhayans come from.”

‘Further, Great King, in one of my own former lives, a king named Brahmadatta was once strolling in his garden; a young woman had been there, merrily singing away as she picked up sticks, making bundles of kindling wood for the fires. The King was enamoured of her and, after they had spent time together, he gave her his signet ring to acknowledge his parenthood should she bear a child⁹. She did indeed have a child, who was none other than myself, and in that life I was known as King Katthavahana, “The Kindling Carrier”.

‘Further, Great King, do you forget that your own belovèd and respected Queen Mallika was a flower girl when you first set eyes upon her? Caste and rank are a great lie. We are purified and exalted, or degraded, by our deeds, words and attitudes, not by our birth: a true warrior faces greed, hatred and delusion fearlessly¹⁰; a true brahmin is pure of heart¹¹; a true merchant is one who is fair and honest in all their dealings; a true craftsperson¹² is one who trains themselves; those “without caste”, who are the most despised and downtrodden in society, they should be honoured most of all since they are close to those who have gone forth into the homeless life of the samana, for we too renounce all caste when we take up the ochre robe¹³. The world does not like us to forget the manner of our physical birth but to be born in the “noble birth” is to reject those foolish values in our hearts. The Dharma has no caste.’

King Pasenadi was sobered and touched by the Master’s words. He turned to Mallika and Vajiri, and the courtiers who had come with them, and said, ‘I will reinstate the Prince, but the army should be under General Digha-Karaniya, not him¹⁴. As for Queen Vasabha,’ he granted her her title back, ‘I’m… I’m not sure. The deception, the affront by the Sakyans can’t go unpunished. She should stay in her quarters under guard until I’ve decided what should be done.’

---

Once all the friends were settled together in the palace garden, Ant brought the golden deva forward, as she had shyly been keeping herself to one side. ‘This is Ambaka,’ the deva made añjali to them all. Bee drew right up close and stared her in the face, ‘Yes it is!’ She clapped and looked about her. ‘Look who it is!’

Ant and Ninka as well as the others looked askance for a moment.

‘Well I never…’, Gumbiya joined in, ‘you got torched in that fire, back in Kosambi¹⁵… that little girl by the road, way before. You remember me?’

Ambaka looked as blank as the others for an instant then it came back:– In the woods, beside a stream. A little girl.

‘Amba! Samavati! We lost you! Where have you been?’ Bee was grilling her already.

‘Oh – of course – how did we miss that?’ Ant looked at Ninka. ‘I suppose we were too taken up with our own stuff.’

‘And you’ve even got the same name,’ Bee added, ‘well, nearly the same.’

‘A sprite in… wherever it was we were, gave it to me. I thought it fitted. These colours, they seem to go with me.’

The other kinnaris and their friends did their best to tell her all that had befallen after the burning of Queen Samavati and her companions in Kosambi, and more was added to what Ant and Ninka had told her about their present search and the recent finding of Tambaka. It was a lot to take in.

‘We know where she is but we can’t talk with her yet. She’s a queen but she was raised in a slave family among the Sakyans. We don’t quite know how that happened. Although perhaps the King met her and took a fancy to her and raised her up. She’s very fragrant and pretty too,’ Maggot explained.

Ambaka had the strong feeling that there was something missing. The stories of meeting by the road with the three kinnaris and the yakkha; the burning of the palace building, and her; how strangely proud she had been to be able to die like that, in such an unwavering way; now this deva life… there was a gap.

Bee was continuing the update on their plans and ideas, ‘We haven’t gone to the Jetavana yet and it might be a bit challenging to find someone there who can see us and help connect with Tambaka, and…’

‘…And there’s the possibility of Krishna being there, assuming he’s still a monk and not gone off on some other inspired jaunt,’ Maggot shook the first pollen out of that particular prickly blossom.

‘Krishna?’ Ambaka’s brow wrinkled, ‘I’m sure… yes! Yes! He was a good friend, up to the end when…’ and the cut in the dark, at her throat, came back again. The heave on her plait and then the blade, almost painless… It all flooded her senses.

‘I know Krishna. He’s a good monk but he made some bad friends, who were trying to defame the Master. I was a girl, I met him at a well, I was a candala, an out-caste.’ They could see she was piecing things together as best she could. ‘I felt glad to be able to help the Master – to give my life for such a good cause. I was proud to sacrifice myself¹⁶.’

---

The sudden loss of his rank and to have spent even just a day, half a day, in the life of a slave had been a salutary experience for Vidudabha. His elegant clothes stripped away. His jewellery gone. Pushed into the grungiest quarter of the palace, to share a room with a crowd of other youths, in the grimy clothes he was given – it was a blunt and rude shock to the system.

Up to this point in his life there had never been a time he could remember when he had not been the Crown Prince and a very special person. Such a knowledge can easily wreak havoc with a child’s sensibilities, causing the assumption that the world is arranged principally for your pleasure and convenience. The intoxication of assumed privilege is frighteningly complete in its delusory power, and Vidudabha had had an endless supply of that drug up until now.

For a spell, before word came back with the King from the Jetavana, he was thrown into a reflective state – something that was very rare for him. With his ordinary life suspended he had had the space to consider things. The staff had, thankfully, not assigned him duties as yet so he wasn’t mucking out stables or cleaning lanterns.

‘Snakes and ladders, I guess, that’s what this royal game is – up the ladders, down the snakes all according to the throw of the dice.’ He was curled up, leaning on the wall in the slave’s dormitory. It was peaceful there, and in the rapidly falling light of dusk the eerie pinkish aura that people could sometimes see about him (which had given him the nickname ‘Vidu the Fay’) was clearly visible. ‘Maybe this is where I’ll be for the next ten years or twenty, what will the dice say?’ He opened his hand, as if letting go of everything. ‘If my mother was a slave and cheated the King all these years, what real power could I have? All that indignant raging has just been stupid, youthful folly.’

At these sober reflections he also began to recall the stories he had heard in the interminable classes with the court brahmins. ‘But,’ he clenched his fist, ‘there have always been those who defied the dice, threw the board aside and made their own luck.’ His eyes flared. As with the strange glow he emanated in the half-light, his eyes had a colour and a luminosity that was unique too; they were somewhere between dark-blue and green and they could pierce any dimness with their bright ferocity.

At the doorway of the dormitory the form of a guard appeared. ‘’Is Majesty wants to see you; General Digha is with ’im.’

---

The reinstatement as Crown Prince went very quickly; it was enough for the King to summon him in, say, ‘I changed my mind,’ and add not much more than, ‘well, off you go. You can have your rooms and all your things back – most of it should still be there,’ he looked away and shooed his son off with a gesture.

General Digha-Karaniya led the Prince out and walked with him back to his chambers. There was a sly grin back on the Prince’s face, ‘Down the snakes and up the ladders again; that was quick, wasn’t it Digha?’ Vidudabha knew him well from his long hours of military schooling.

‘Truly, Your Serene Highness. Sir, if I may, I have something of import to discuss. And… er… your current experience with the caprice of your Royal Father’s moods is part of that. Do you have some time?’

Vidudabha was intrigued.

The General began, ‘You no doubt know my uncle, General Bandhula¹⁷.’

‘Of course, he has been notable in the field of battle and also in the courts.’

‘Yes, Sir. He was a man of great qualities and my aunt, his wife Madhu, was similarly blessed. Their marriage, at first, was not happy as they had failed to produce any children. In despair they went to visit the Master and, though he performed no ceremony or made any sign, soon Madhu was expecting, and they were blessed indeed. Over those following years she gave birth to sixteen pairs of twin boys who all followed in their father’s noble footsteps.

‘When the General was getting too old for the field of conflict he made himself available to perform the role of a judge. Someone who had received a biased ruling in the court came to him complaining. When he looked into it, it was plain to see that the other party was at fault and so Bandula pronounced the judgement the other way, to the great jubilation of this man, and also to others who asked him to retry their cases too.

‘The other judges, who had all been taking bribes, were bereft of their usual income and thus became resentful of General Bandhula’s interference, and his good name was now a major hindrance to them.

‘These corrupt judges managed to catch King Pasenadi’s ear and, through their wiles, they caused your Royal Father to believe that the General, with his impressive array of thirty-two fine sons, had designs upon the throne.

‘His Majesty was seduced and so he sent the General off on a falsely-based mission to a border region. After the pretended issues were settled, on the journey back to Savatthi, the General and all his sons, being ambushed and heavily outnumbered, lost their heads to a man. Not a one returned alive.

‘It was soon after this, scarcely a Moon ago, that the King was made aware that he had been deceived. He has had little peace of mind since then and he has never apologised to General Bandhula’s widow, who lost him and all of her sons on a single tragic day.

‘He has now made me Commander-in-Chief, I suspect to allay his shame and regret at having had my uncle – that fair and just man – and all his children killed, nevertheless, I feel retribution is still due and I see that you, as Crown Prince are in a unique position both to see justice done for my uncle and to secure your future and safeguard it from the foibles and whims of your… your Royal Parent.’

This was intriguing, to be sure. The Prince asked, ‘How do you propose for me to take power? Hardly ever is such a move a simple thing.’

‘In this case, Sir, I feel it will be. Leave it to me.’

---

Since the murder of Bandhula and his sons, and with Vasabha under house arrest, King Pasenadi had been sick at heart¹⁸. Life was joyless so he wished to find some solace; as was usual at such times he sought out the Master’s advice. At this time the Buddha was travelling through the countryside and was staying in a forest near a country town called Ulumpa.

The King went with a large part of his army, under General Digha-Karaniya’s command, to this same region and sought out the Master there. On arriving at the kuti where the Master was staying King Pasenadi went up to the door, coughed and knocked¹⁹, he was invited in but, before he entered, he respectfully divested himself of the five Symbols of Royalty that he, as the ruler, always carried – his sword, his royal parasol, his crown, his jewelled shoes and his royal ceremonial fan – putting these items into the hands of the General²⁰.

Once the King had been invited into the presence of the Master, inside his kuti, the General surreptitiously took these symbols and, there and then, bestowed them upon Prince Vidudabha, thus investing him as the rightful monarch.

The army had confidence in the General so, when he gave the order to march, as was their training, they formed up in their ranks and went off into the night. The General left the King one horse and a serving woman. The army returned to Savatthi.

Vidudabha was indeed making his own luck.

When the King emerged from the kuti and saw the army gone, the woman holding his horse explained what had happened. The King had been feeling as though great mountains of ageing, misfortune, bad decisions and weariness had been closing in about him²¹; this turn of events merely confirmed this mood of the inevitability of collapse and dissolution of all he held dear and had been accustomed to. He gave the serving woman leave to go her own way and he rode towards Rajagaha alone, hoping, perhaps vainly, to persuade his nephew, King Ajatasattu, to help him regain his throne from his usurping son.

He rode all night and all day but, when he reached Rajagaha, the city gates were closed. An old man on a tired horse, he had no recourse but to find shelter where he could. He spotted an abandoned shed and laying down, exhausted, exposed to the elements and heartsick beyond bearing, in that rude hovel he breathed his last and passed away.

---

King Vidudabha resumed command of the army and announced, at the first assembly of the troops in full battle gear, with wagons prepared for a foreign campaign, ‘I am your king and your leader in war. I will brook no discussion, chaffering, let alone disagreement with my orders. Is this clear?’ The broad ranks of armoured soldiers, the lords and officers on their caparisoned chargers, responded as one: ‘Sire!’

The King was barely seventeen Rains now yet he had assumed full charge of the military force. ‘Our mission, which begins this day, is to march north-east to dispense justice upon the proud and ignoble, treacherous Sakyans who have insulted the Crown of Kosala and my own Royal Person. Justice will be done and rivers of blood will flow. None will be suffered to live.’

A tense silence followed. Vidudabha barked, ‘Is this understood?’

Prince Jeta, who had been the one who sold the Jetavana park and forest to Anathapindika, wherein the Master had established such a substantial residence, had been an elder friend of Vidudabha as he grew up. This stated mission seemed far out of keeping with any noble principles so Prince Jeta’s first thought was, ‘What?! He can’t be serious.’ Jeta was not known as a staunch moralist, rather he had a reputation of being vain and a party-animal, but to him this plan was insane:– Did he really suppose he is going to slaughter the whole Sakyan clan?

‘Your Highness!’ Prince Jeta spoke up. ‘Is it the case that you expect us to slay every man, woman and child in the Sakyan kingdom?’

‘Nay,’ Vidudabha turned to look at this foppish lord, ‘only the men and the mothers need be killed, and the young children. The maidens who are of age I intend to enslave. Do you object?!’ The King fixed him with those eyes that burned with cold fire. ‘Do you?! Answer me.’

Prince Jeta – for whom the best thing he had ever done in his life was the sale and gift of the monastery land, and the resulting wonders of wisdom and goodness that had come forth from there – was strangely clear about his priorities at this at this critical moment.

‘Yes, Your Majesty, I object with all my heart.’

‘In that case,’ King Vidudabha rode his horse over to where Prince Jeta was in the ranks of cavalry, ‘dismount; that’s an order.’

The Prince dismounted and stood by the offside flank of the King’s horse. In one fluid motion the King drew his sword and separated Prince Jeta’s head from his shoulders²². He snapped his reins, his horse pirouetted on its hind hooves and the command was given: ‘Forward march!’

---

There was much uproar around the palace in Savatthi. Vidudabha had taken over as King and there had been the great departure of the army. Maggot and her friends stayed ensconced within their garden.

Ambaka’s memories steadily returned, at first fragmentary and then more complete, so she told them all what she could recall of Matanga’s life and also of her friendship with Krishna, Khujjuttara, Kesini and Vasabha. She recounted how wonderful it had been to find out that Vasabha was her half-sister, on account of Krishna having been Matanga’s father too. Maggot was made even more awkward by this knowledge.

Bee, with a determined chirpiness, tried to move things along by saying, ‘My head’s spinning! How much more complicated could this get?’

Maggot, endeavouring to be as conciliatory as possible, offered, ‘That must have been something for you, a candala girl at that time, to have a friend and half-sister a queen, appearing like that in your life.’

‘Yes, I’d got used to having no family at all by then.’

‘We can go and see Vasabha now – she’s in the palace all the time these days,’ Ant proposed. ‘Come on, let’s go and see if her half-sister and old friend can get through.’

They had picked up, through the tumult of recent days, that some crisis had just happened. The old king was gone and the new king had taken off for Sakya. Vasabha never left her rooms and was dimmed and subdued, turned inward with only Kesini to keep her company.

The group, now eight of them, made their way to where Vasabha was under house arrest in her chambers. Gumbiya shrank himself down to be as modest a size as he could manage.

Vasabha was there, with her faithful Kesini, but they were oblivious of the presence of this crowd of celestials. She was plainly in an anxious and saddened state; there was a sickly melancholy in the air and her fragrance was less rich than was the norm.

Ambaka drew close, taking in her face, her voice as she spoke with Kesini. More memories cascaded through – her fearless little sister²³ protecting her in Ujjeni, her unexpected rival and tormentor in Kosambi. She had to draw back, take a breath. She approached again, ‘Tam! Tamba! It’s me, from long ago! Amba! Remember? You rescued me from a monkey attack. You ran to get help for Amma, in the night.’ There was no response.

Various of the others tried vainly too but with no result.

‘You know,’ Ambaka looked at them, chancing a glance at Maggot, ‘we could go to see if we could find someone in the Jetavana who could help us communicate with her. I was there often with Krishna and Khujjuttara and Vasabha, and Kesini, and though none of us could ever see any spirits or subtle beings, Dusaka could – he seemed to live in that realm half the time – him and Tingri. I remember them well now. If we tried the Jetavana perhaps Dusaka, or one of the enlightened ones with powers, would be there, then he could intervene for us, or something. He could do something, I’m sure. He was always full of tricks.’

---

Maggot’s mixed feelings became even more so as they arrived in the Jetavana. It was late morning and, there on the north side of the sala in a shady spot, were the Great Elder Ananda and a very recognizable Krishna, despite being in his mid-fifties and with grey bristles coating his head, and Khujjuttara, perched on the edge of her familiar cart, leaning on a staff as well. As the group of kinnaris and their friends drew close, Dusaka approached from one side and had Kesini with him. They had just come from Vasabha at the palace.

‘No one but me’s allowed to see her but somehow,’ Kesini grinned, her wrinkled face creasing cheerfully at the memory, ‘our wise friend can walk past all the guards and they somehow assume he’s supposed to be there²⁴.’ Tingri yipped. And they don’t object to you either! Very impressive.’ Kesini was also middle-aged by now, like Krishna something like fifty-five Rains old, so she settled her frame down close by the wizened Khujjuttara, taking a pillar to lean on too.

On seeing Krishna for the first time since he was a lad of just twenty Rains, remembering the bitter words they had exchanged and the loving moments too, it was all a bit much for Maggot.

Ananda rose up and left. ‘Take care good friends. I hope you will find some way to help Queen Vasabha with her imprisonment but there’s little I can do myself.’ He gave Dusaka a brief glance and saw that the sage was nodding to him already.

‘I assumed that’s what you were all talking about,’ Dusaka said as he arrived, ‘how to help or rescue Vasabha,’ he didn’t really need to check. Since this recent crisis and the day she had been made a slave again and thrown into the dungeons, there had not been much else to discuss.

Dusaka looked around him, as he eased himself onto a grass mat, staff across his knees. He tipped a salute to the three kinnaris, Ninka, Gumbiya, Ramba and Salassa and the new arrival.

‘Ah, here you are.’ He smiled at Ambaka broadly. He then looked at Maggot, and then at Krishna, then back to Maggot again, his face conveying several messages simultaneously. She returned his smile with a wry twist, a shrug and a wiping of one eye.

He looked to Khujjuttara, Kesini and Krishna then said, ‘Do you know who’s here?’

Krishna, although more care-worn and restrained than the kinnaris and their friends remembered him in his youth, cocked an eye as this was the sort of thing Dusaka dropped into conversations at rare and special moments. Kesini’s brow crinkled, not guessing what he was talking about, while Khujjuttara at once said, ‘Don’t keep us guessin’, though I’m sure you’d loike to.’

One by one he named the celestials gathered, finishing with the kinnaris, ‘Here’s Ant, and Bee and,’ he flicked his chin at Krishna, ‘your erstwhile belovèd and mother of Queen Vasabha, Maggot,’ he dipped his head in her direction too. ‘’N lastly here’s a new arrival,’ at this he gave Khujjuttara a big grin, ‘a new one who’s well-known here. What’s your name now? Do you have one yet?’

‘I’m Ambaka.’

‘Very suitable,’ he grinned at her again. ‘Who used to attend our friend Khujjuttara and help out, last time around that was.’

As he made the introductions, or rather the indications since it was all one way; the three humans were looking about them, this direction and that, trying to get some sense of where these invisible entities might be located, to no avail.

Krishna was flooded with emotions: the fact that Maggot was close made him simultaneously nostalgic and excited to be near her again, and afraid of her wrath, should she still be unforgiving; and it seemed that Matanga, who had been his daughter too, was in some celestial form and was right there as well:– How wonderful that she was now in some divine state, after the shock and misery of her death which he had helped cause! It was overwhelming; his heart beat like a tabla drum while his head whipped side to side in the effort to see some trace of all their presences.

Maggot looked long and hard at Krishna. He had a lonely air about him. Ananda had been sitting with him, so that was an honour and a boon, but she sensed a solitariness too, which surprised her given how gregarious he had formerly been. She didn’t know of his poor reputation following his dalliances with the disreputable Group of Six and the poisonous Devadatta, but it was writ there in the lines of his face, the set of his shoulders. His catalogue of unwise choices were thoroughly scrutable and a surprising wave of compassion welled up in her heart.

She drew close. Her once-belovèd had clearly lost his way, but she also felt a calmness in him that was never there before, and beneath the signs of his cares, she saw he had been joyful too. Dusaka looked at her.

‘He’s had nine sun-turnings in the company of his and your daughter, that’s been a great blessing for him. And I told him how, and I should tell you all too,’ Dusaka looked about him, ‘Vasabha was not only Tambaka in this life but, before that, well one before before that,’ he said cryptically, ‘she was Tamba and Magandiya,’ he grinned again.

‘’N for the sake of completeness,’ Dusaka turned to the three people there, ‘along with these devas you’ve seen or heard of before, this new one tells me she’s called Ambaka. She’s a Tavatimsa deva like Ninka; she was Matanga here in Savatthi but, ’fore that she was Amba in Ujjeni and Samavati in Kosambi. So the family’s all back together. Now I suppose I will have to teach you all,’ he shot Krishna a look, ‘again, how to see clearly the beings of other realms.’

‘You don’t need to bother with me,’ Khujjuttara was not fussed, just to know Matanga had drawn close was plenty, ‘but you should help Vasabha.’

‘And me,’ Kesini complained.

‘And I need a refresher, I agree,’ Krishna grinned too, ‘I’m a bit out of practice and I’d love to see Maggot and Matanga – and all the others of course – once again.’

---

The rumour mill churned vigorously with respect to the mission of the army and Maggot was even more torn than normal. Part of her wanted to stay close to Vasabha while Dusaka made his efforts to train her in deva-vision²⁵. The other part wanted to pursue the army and see if she could somehow dissuade her grandson, Vidudabha, from creating terrible karma, His announced intention to massacre and enslave the Sakyans had sent shockwaves through many realms.

One short visit, however, to the mobile force had suggested how impossible it would be for her to get through to the young King. He was hilt-deep in his commitment to this rashness and his mind was shut to all else. At least in Vasabha, her Tam, there was an inkling of possibility of communication. She would stay in Savatthi.

Not long after the meeting of the deva friends with Dusaka, the Master himself had sent Ananda to summon Krishna to see him, at the Gandha-kuti.

‘Krishna, the King has set forth with his army on a blighted path. He is your grandson as well as the ruler of Kosala. I am going to see if he can be coaxed onto a path of reason and wisdom instead of destructive savagery. I invite you to come with me. Let us see if disaster can be averted.’

As the Master spoke these words, Vidudabha’s army was already half way to Kapilavatthu. The hills of the Himavant and their deep green forests were now visible in the distance, to the north and east of the marching troops. Soon the King would be there, to exact his revenge for the ineradicable insult that lay behind his birth.

Notes & References