Tiger Claws by John Speed Read Free Book Online Page B

smells of beauty—of hot bathwater, of attar of roses and chandan oil, of patchouli and musk. Breezes from the river carry a breath of orange blossoms, and fetch the laughter of water splashing in the scented courtyard fountains.
    The harem is buzzing—maidservants, serving girls, eunuchs of the lower ranks, all walking quickly here and there; ill-mannered children dash between them, giggling. The wives complain to the eunuchs, who turn and
scold the maids, who then bark at the serving girls, who chase off on some errand near tears.
    But Basant feels only the burning stares of the eunuch guards. Since these guards are suddenly important, brought in to cope with unknown danger, they are especially watchful. And because they are eunuchs, laughed at by the regular guard, they are more watchful still.
    And the guards are everywhere, halting people, asking questions—acting in the same intrusive way that drove Shah Jahan to command their removal from the harem in the first place. The eunuch guards scrutinize even the Tartar women, Shah Jahan’s most trusted guardians. It is clear from their pink, angry faces that the women despise the eunuch guards.
    In fact it seems to Basant, as he watches the comings and goings, that everyone and everything in the harem seems upset, off balance. He has never seen the harem like this. It would be hard for him to say exactly what strikes him as wrong. Perhaps it is only his own anxiety that he projects around him—yet it seems that every eye he sees darts fretfully away, every face turns furtively aside. Anxiety perfumes the air; it pervades each breath that Basant takes. Something terrible is about to happen.
    Roshanara, walking purposefully, veiled—although here in the privacy of the zenena, veiling is unusual—moves quickly toward the wing of concubines of the first rank. Basant follows at her heels as she thrusts open a great ebony door. Whose room is this? Basant wonders. He doesn’t recognize it. He steps tentatively inside.
    Here the world moves at a different speed. Sunbeams float above them, lazily catching the incense smoke spiraling from braziers hanging from the ceiling. Two young and beautiful women are bathing, assisted by attentive serving girls and eunuchs who at this moment are pouring salvers of steaming water over their heads and backs.
    The sunlight glistens on their smooth bodies and dances in wisps of steam rising from their hair and shoulders. It sparkles on the surface of the bathwater in the twin, swan-shaped tubs, on the girls who look impossibly beautiful. Basant feels like a dervish glimpsing paradise.
    Though he has never entered these particular rooms before, Basant of course recognizes the two women who are bathing. They are Shah Jahan’s favorite nautch girls; twin sisters, barely fifteen, so similar in looks and temperament as to be indistinguishable.
    I’d forgotten they’d been moved in here, Basant thinks.
    Their nautch names are Sun and Moon. The wags in the court call them Breakfast and Lunch. From all indications they are insatiable.

    What a shame they are so stupid.
    Around them Shah Jahan has no self-control. Master Hing loves to recount how the emperor actually commanded that they both be brought to his bed at the same time. Hing, of course, was horrified, and although he expected to die for it, he refused to obey. Later—as Hing recounts at every opportunity—the emperor apologized to him for this sinful lapse and sent to Hing a robe of honor for his steadfastness, and, no doubt, to buy his silence.
    Hing subsequently had given vehement and explicit orders to assure such a scandalous act never occurred. Such a sinful act could destroy the emperor’s authority to govern.
    Basant winces at the rude and disdainful greeting Roshanara gives the twins. The twins raise their sleepy beautiful faces to her—round, wet, and innocent of any disturbing thoughts, or of any thoughts at all. Though the servants bow low to Roshanara, and stay prostrate