Yuram Temple
Jashnagar
Jashnagar
Ahdram dozed in and out of focus, the cold of the cavern floor no longer capable of keeping him awake. His half-closed eyelids barely detected the glow of candlelight to the sides of his vision, and he no longer uttered soft mantras into the darkness. He had meditated here for half a day already. That time was spent, as it had been since his ascension, in contemplation.
He was searching desperately through the desert of his mind for a way out of the cloud of sorrow, despair, disillusion, and above all doubt, that hung over him. For some way to cast aside those sudden storms and bask once again in the sun of assurance.
He found nothing.
The Bas'kan had become a hermit in the caves around the Yuram temple mound, rising before the monks stirred at a time when morning was still black, and fleeing to the caves for another day of struggle against himself. He preferred those caverns such as this, which were off the beaten path and so ignored by monks and tourists alike. When a monk did come across him, either here or during his occasional walks around the temple, they had learned to largely ignore him. He was no longer needed for the function of the temple, or the faith. After the first two months, when his decline turned as drastic as it had, the elder monks had made a decision to run things with out him. Likewise, he had brushed Enri off every time they met, so the Prime Minister stopped coming.
The temple, the country, and the faith proved capable of running without him. He was a redundancy, a fact created long before he was Bas'kan.
In the beginning, Ahdram had tried.
He knew too well trying was not succeeding. All the stress of his position had weighed on him immediately upon starting. Leading a temple was difficult enough, leading a country, a people, an entire religion, was a beast beyond comprehension. Yet it wasn't just that. A dark mist had blinded his mind almost immediately. It was a familiar creature, but one he had once banished long ago. He could not be sure how it had escaped to haunt him, but his thoughts trailed back to seeing Enri again at Chanaguta — and, being honest with himself, infinitely beyond.
He took a deep breath from the cool air.
He'd have never guessed he'd be taken back decades. To the cusp of his adulthood. To the darkest of all days. Within a single instant, with the uttering of one line of news, with the descent of one staircase, his life and mind would be swept back to his lowest point and held there once again, for over half a year. Ahdram figured it was inevitable —that jewel of sorrow had always sat at the center of his heart.
In that moment, he knew for certain his old ways of running would not save him now. He was stuck, and lost again, wondering through an endless desert with no one in sight to guide him out.
He opened his eyes which reeled as they adapted to the dim. They felt heavy, raw, as he examined the wall in front of him.
Like all of the caves in the temple mound, this one was adorned with painted reliefs detailing stories of the faith. They had been carved long ago, long before there was ever a Bas'kan here. Long before it was Yuram temple, during a time it was still known as Rana. When it was but a few sleepy houses at the mouth of the Param river. Every few years, the monks came and serviced them, repainting and sharpening the lines as the tropical moisture took its payment.
This one had not seen attention in an untold number of moons.
As Ahdram examined it, the legend was clear. It was marked crudely, the only real color remaining was a few broken black lines following the outline of the figures before him. He looked upon a man, Sevar, king of the Sevra, as he raised his sword into the air. To his front, a snake lunged forward in the candlelight, sinking its eroded fangs into the warrior's ankle. Ahdram knew what came next. Sevar would bring his blade down, killing the serpent.
The monk stood up, stretching after hours of sitting motionlessly. He peered on the relief as he did. Everyone knew this tale. It was central to the Kali canon, something his own Jai school considered mostly allegorical, but that his Kali brethren considered true in some form. In fact, this was a central legend, perhaps the primary one. The story of Sevar. Many other caves, and buildings at that, had more elaborate, beautiful, and masterful depictions of this story. The worn state of this particular wall was testament to the age. Though crumbling, the more he gazed, the more he liked this version. Liked the way the snake, bulky and stretched, latched onto Sevar, who stood rigid and flat, the detail of him ground down.
He recalled the rest of the story. Sevar kills the serpent, who had plagued Sevratan, the home of the Sevra. The snake, whose name was Sorrow, collected the price for his life — a bite. Sevar, with the venom coursing through him, was awoken to the tragedies of his past. Sevratan darkened around him, and he could no longer endure the blindness of his fellow Sevra, nor let the life of their land drain where he walked.
So he decided to leave, Ahdram said to himself. Sevar, he knew, prepared a boat to sail from Sevratan, knowing he could never return once he left. During his departure, his people came to wish him farewell. The relief on the right-hand wall likely showed this, but all that remained was the sanded hull of a ship. Sevar met with the others one last time, looking into the faces of the people who had colored his life — Sina, his sister whose dignity inspired flowers and plants to grow; Moru, his greatest friend, who always stood resolutely in time of crisis; Mae, his love who had grown away from him eons ago and whose laugh in memory kept the skies clear during his nights; and the many others. After seeing into their eyes one last time, Sevar cast his sails to the wind and his boat slid softly from the beach. In that moment, Ahdram recalled, the other Sevra felt sorrow, not from the serpent's venom, but from their own hearts.
That tale, which continues further, was the inspiration for the wordless Jashnagari anthem, a melody that Ahdram hummed as he stood transfixed on the walls around him. He eventually caught himself. He picked up a candle and doused the others. Moments later he turned to leave, heading back towards the cavern opening. As he did so, he looked back again at Sevar with his sword raised. The king who, when misfortune befell him, sacrificed himself so that his family and home would not suffer. The man who accepted his pain, accepted he had lost and will lose everything important to him, accepted a bitter life, so that the ones he loved, though those who had ultimately hurt him, would remain in happiness.
It's just a story, He said aloud. A story he heard a thousand times. Dousing the candle in his hand, he moved to the blinding light of the world outside the cave.
It's just a story.
***
Rastan moved quickly as he made his way through the central plazas of the temple. He kept his hands together and close to his chest, greeting quickly, but amicable, each group of fellow monks as he walked past. Normally, they had learned to ignore him, casting their stares on the Bas'kan from the side. Now though, his sudden change of demeanor intrigued them. A group of young acolytes, training with push-ups against the hard stone of a dais even stopped when he zipped by, risking the rod of their master.
Yuram temple may not have had the towering height of Kauloon, nor the shining spires of Akala, but it was large. The whole complex spread over a wide area, having been expanded over many centuries — its growth only bound by the burgeoning metropolis that sprouted around it. Even now, Rastan could see the tops of sky-scrapers peeking beyond some of the lower roofs around him.
Though sprawling, Yuram was not particularly difficult to traverse. Much of the temple inside the outer walls was neatly kept, made up of grassy courtyards streaked with stone pavement. In the past, monks spent considerable time trimming the grass by hand while meditating. Now, modern lawn-mowers eased the process. The buildings which interlocked the courts like containers weren't great stone behemoths like were found at many other temples. Instead they were wooden, sizable but vertically modest, and done surprisingly in mostly Mahkeen style — a gift to the first abbot who hailed from Lambou by Rajan Yaragupta. Subsequent additions followed the theme.
As he moved from one section to the other, Rastan couldn't help but think on his predecessors as they too traveled the complex. He had seen the man who came before him, Umyathar IV, do so in the flesh. The previous Bas'kan had always looked sickly in his yellow Pamamori robes, bald and old, but he had a joviality in his eyes that was adored by the students here. Rastan thought on his namesake, Rastan I, who had ruled four hundred years ago. He could almost see the man, robbed in black, with a feathered Jash turban and sword at his side, stride across the courts with advisers and generals scurrying behind as they discussed the crusade against Sepura. He could feel Naramel I, who had lived nearly three centuries before the first Rastan, slowly move past, he and his scribes obsessing deeply over the many texts written on the faith.
He wondered if they too had ever walked among these halls with a new found purpose. If they had struggled before their rise. If they had ever any doubts at all.
Finally, Rastan came upon the central building. It was grand and composed of many broad, tiered roofs, five in total. This was to be his court, but it mostly sat empty save for a few senior monks chatting in the center. He made his way past the porch pillars when they noticed him.
"Where Baoti?" he asked.
They seemed surprised.
"He's eating a late midday meal."
"Brothers," Rastan said with a soft smile, "I would hate to disturb him but it is urgent. Would you please fetch him for me?"
The group hesitated, as if his title as Bas'kan had no weight. He could not blame them, Baoti and the other temple elders had given them all their instruction since the previous summer. They had hardly seen a functioning Bas'kan.
Finally, they came to.
"Yes, Bas'kan-araya. I'll go get him." one said. The others followed him out.
Rastan stood in the open hall. His court was masterfully designed. The ground floor was open, allowing fresh air and light to stream in. The building above it, amazingly supported by a hundred pillars, could be accessed by a few staircases. When there was a need to, such as heavy rain, the court could be closed in at the front and stairs opened, forcing people into the first raised floor. The whole thing was part building and part wooden machine.
At the center in an open spot among the pillars, sat Rastan's throne. A small but intricately carved wooden seat, where countless of Bas'kans before him had sat. Though many moved around the temple with their own personal courts and even thrones, they all sat here in the open at least once. Rastan himself had only sat in it during his coronation. He studied it, breathing in deeply the air around him, still scented by the warm wood of the floor.
After a while, he heard steps behind him and turned to see Baoti approaching. The other monks did not return with him.
"Ahdram—" Baoti was caught off.
"Rastan, or your eminence works." The Bas'kan corrected him. Baoti had known his true name, and though the monk did not mean any offense, if Rastan was to truly return, they would all need to see him by his position and not as the hermit who had hid himself away.
"Your eminence. Why have you summoned me so urgently to you?"
"Because", Rastan placed his hand gently on his wooden seat. "I will be returning from my leave of meditation."
Baoti's eyes flashed back and forth as an eyebrow raised quizzically. He let his mouth drop for only a moment.
"Are you sure?"
"Yes."
"Very well. I will inform the others. I must say, your eminence, that you come at an odd time. Many happenings have taken place since the start of your leave. We were just discussing, for example, the economic hardship that has befallen the world in the last month."
"Inform them, Baoti."
The monk bowed. "Very well."
Rastan watched him walk away. The Bas'kan called out and stopped him.
"One more thing," he shouted. " Call Enri to me. I have an announcement to make."
