Empire of the Moghul: Brothers at War (53 page)

‘Majesty,’ Bairam Khan stepped forward, his voice firm and clear, ‘I think I speak for all of us here. There can be no doubt.Your half-brother should die for the sake of you, your son, your dynasty and us all. Kamran is not your brother, he is your enemy. Put aside any brotherly feelings you have for him. They have no place in a ruler’s decisions. If you wish to remain king and to achieve the ambition we all share of regaining the throne of Hindustan for yourself and your son there is only one course to take. Execute him. Am I not right, my fellow commanders?’

Without hesitation and as with one voice they answered, ‘Yes!’

‘Does none of you advocate any other solution?’ Humayun asked.

‘No, Majesty.’

‘Thank you. I will ponder your advice.’ Humayun walked straight from the room, his brow furrowed. The decision was not as easy as his counsellors suggested. They did not share Kamran’s blood as he did. Without thinking consciously of what he was doing, Humayun headed for the women’s apartments and when he got there went straight to Gulbadan’s room. His half-sister was sitting on a low gilt chair wearing a loose purple silk robe as her attendant pulled an ivory comb through her dark hair. As soon as she saw the expression on Humayun’s face, Gulbadan dismissed the woman. ‘What is the matter?’

‘You know they have captured Kamran once more and he is imprisoned in the dungeons?’

‘Of course.’

‘I am desperately searching my conscience as to what his fate must be. I realise that by all the normal conventions he deserves death for his many misdeeds and my advisers tell me unanimously that this time he must die. Often, when I’ve anticipated the moment he’d be in my power again, anger at him for his ill-treatment of Akbar alone has made me want to kill him myself, and Hamida – as Akbar’s mother – urges this upon me. However, when I become calmer I know I must not act in anger but for what is best for our empire. I remember our father’s injunction to do nothing against my brothers and I hesitate.’

‘I understand your dilemma,’ Gulbadan said, taking Humayun’s hand. ‘You have always been a man of your word. Remember how you honoured your promise to Nizam the water-seller that he could sit on your throne for an hour or two, despite the mutterings of your courtiers? Because you always keep your word, you sometimes fail to realise that others like Sher Shah who deceived you before the battle of Chausa – or indeed our half-brothers – will not.You have given Kamran so many chances and he has exploited your mercy so often that even I believe that his persistent wickedness negates any promise you ever made to our father . . . ’ She paused. ‘If I am honest I think he should die. It would be best for the dynasty that our father fought so hard to establish. With Kamran gone you will be free to concentrate on the recapture of Hindustan.’

Humayun said nothing for a long time. At last he spoke very deliberately. ‘I know that in logic you are right. I know also our father always said I loved solitude too much . . . but I must go to consider alone for a time before taking my final decision.’

‘Why not take our father’s memoirs with you to see if they offer you any solace or guidance? After all, he wrote them, as he put it, “to give guidance for living and ruling”.’

A few minutes later, Humayun climbed the stone stairs to the top of the highest watchtower on the walls of the citadel in Kabul. In his hand were his father’s memoirs which, in their ivory binding, he had preserved so carefully throughout all his vicissitudes. He had left Jauhar at the entrance to the watchtower with strict orders that no one should be allowed to enter. As he reached the top of the stairs and emerged on to the flat roof, Humayun felt that the day’s heat was dying. It would be dark in an hour. Perhaps he should wait until the stars came out to see what guidance they might offer him, but then he dismissed the idea. He had learned from the many trials and disappointments he had endured during his life that he could not abdicate responsibility for his decisions to the stars any more than he could to his advisers, his wife or his blood relations.

Babur had told him that he had discovered early that a ruler had to rule. This gave the ruler an unparalleled freedom and opportunity to fulfil his ambitions, but it also made his role an intensely lonely one. He had not only to take the decisions but to live with the consequences both in this life and when called to judgement in the life beyond.

As the light began to fade, Humayun opened his father’s memoirs at random. His eyes first fell on a paragraph which described how, during one of his campaigns, Timur had in a rare moment of mercy followed an older tradition among the dwellers on the steppes and had a powerful member of his own family who had been caught plotting an uprising blinded rather than killed to avoid creating a blood feud. Babur had commended this as a way of disarming a rebel and noted that such punishments still continued among many of the tribes and were considered just and proper.

Immediately, Humayun knew that this must be Kamran’s fate. His threat would be extinguished with his sight. No rebellious chief could ever again consider Kamran a rival to Humayun.Yet his half-brother would have time to consider and perhaps to repent before he was called to eternal judgement. Such a punishment would be harsh, but Humayun knew that in inflicting it he would be respecting his instinct to show some mercy and also be taking some account of his father’s injunction not to be provoked into unthinking violence against his half-brothers.

Closing the ivory covers of Babur’s memoirs, Humayun descended the stairs. ‘Call my advisers to me straightaway,’ he told Jauhar. Within five minutes they were standing around him. ‘I have decided that my half-brother Kamran must be blinded, both as a punishment for his consistent misdeeds and to obviate any threat he might continue to pose to my rule here and to our recovery of our possessions in Hindustan. The punishment will be carried out tonight an hour after sunset. I ask you, Zahid Beg, to take charge. I wish the method to be the quickest known to the
hakims
and my half-brother to be given no warning so that he does not have time to fear what is to come. I do not wish to see his agony and suffering. Jauhar, you will be my witness. However, Kamran needs to know that the punishment has been inflicted on my specific orders and I alone take responsibility for it. Therefore, you will bring my half-brother to me a little before the time of evening prayer tomorrow.’

‘Majesty,’ reported Jauhar an hour and a half later, ‘it is done. The whole thing was over within five minutes or less of Zahid Beg’s six men entering the cell. Four of them each seized one of your half-brother’s limbs and held him to the ground. As he struggled and kicked, the fifth – a bear of a man – took hold of Kamran’s head in his great hands and held it still. The sixth took needles he had previously heated red hot in the flame and quickly pierced each of your brother’s eyeballs in turn several times. As Kamran screamed like a wild beast in his agony, the man rubbed lemon juice and salt into his eyeballs to ensure all vision was lost. Then he bound your half-brother’s eyes with clean, soft cotton bandages and told him that he had no more to endure. Then they left him to contemplate both his punishment and that he was to live – albeit an impaired life . . . ’

The next evening, just before prayers, Kamran was led into Humayun’s presence. His eyes were no longer bandaged and on Humayun’s orders he had been washed and clothed in garments befitting a Moghul prince of the blood. Humayun dismissed the guards and spoke softly to Kamran.

‘It is I, Humayun, your half-brother. I give you my word we are alone.’ As Kamran turned his sightless eyes towards him he continued, ‘I want you to know that I and I alone am responsible for your blinding. No blame should attach to those who committed the deed. I acted as I did because I had lost faith that any clemency I showed would cause you to repent and I needed to protect my throne and the future of Akbar and of our dynasty.’ Humayun stopped and waited, half expecting a stream of invective from Kamran or even an attempt, despite his blindness, to attack him.

But after a short silence Kamran spoke in a subdued voice. ‘You have left me with my life but at the same time taken everything I cared about from me – my plans, my ambitions. I congratulate you. You can appear the great and merciful
padishah
while knowing you have destroyed me more completely than if you’d struck off my head . . . ’

Humayun said nothing and after a moment Kamran continued. ‘I don’t blame you. I have often scorned your mercy and know I deserved punishment. As I lay awake last night, praying for the pain in these now useless eyes to ease and reflecting that my life as I have always known it was over, another thought came into my mind. It was strange, but I felt almost a sense of relief . . . the feeling that finally, after all these years, I could shake off the burden of earthly ambitions. I have one thing and one thing only to ask of you and I ask it sincerely.’

‘What is that?’

‘I do not wish to remain here, an object of contempt or of pity or even of any generosity you may wish to extend to me. Let me, like Askari, make the
haj
– the pilgrimage to Mecca. It may even afford me some spiritual consolation.’

‘Go,’ said Humayun, ‘go with my blessing.’ As he spoke he felt tears wet his cheeks. He was, he realised, crying partly from sadness at the loss of the innocent times he and his half-brother had so briefly enjoyed, partly for the years they had wasted in conflict when together they could have been recovering their father’s empire, and partly for the pain he had inflicted on Kamran the night before.

However, above all, his tears reflected a profound and transcending relief. He was now free to concentrate on achieving his ambition once more to be
Padishah
of Hindustan and even to enlarge his dominions and to build the great empire of which Babur had dreamed.

While the masseur kneaded the muscles of his upper back and rubbed sweet-smelling coconut oil into them, Humayun smiled as he remembered the first time – six weeks ago – that he had heard these words from an excited Ahmed Khan. Over the subsequent days the rumours had grown stronger, brought by travellers making the journey up through the Khyber Pass from Hindustan. Some had said that Islam Shah had died unexpectedly several months ago and that his supporters had been successful for a time in concealing the fact while they tried to agree on a successor. With each passing day and with each piece of news, renewed energy had pulsed through Humayun. He could feel a great opportunity to recover his throne opening up. Free of anxiety about threats to Kabul from his half-brothers if he left the city, he would grasp it and put an end to his long years of disappointment and exile.

Immediately, he had taken measures to prepare his army for action.At this very minute outside the walls of the citadel, his officers were drilling his musketeers to increase the speed and discipline with which they primed, loaded and fired their weapons. His recruiting agents were busy in the remotest valleys of his kingdom and beyond gathering additional recruits. The masseur now pummelling Humayun’s thighs and buttocks was also part of Humayun’s mental and physical preparation. To help plan his campaign he had begun to reread his father’s memoirs of his attack on Hindustan and to compare them with his own recollections of the invasion.

He had tried in conversation with his commanders, particularly Ahmed Khan, to understand where he had made mistakes in his own campaigns against Sher Shah and why he had succeeded elsewhere such as in Gujarat. Sitting alone in his apartments late one evening he had summed it up to himself. ‘Prepare well, think and act fast and decisively. Make your opponent respond to you and not the other way round.’

Over the years he had allowed himself to indulge once more in the wines of Ghazni and, since he had regained Kabul, just occasionally in the care-numbing relief of the opium pipe. Now, to sharpen his mind and toughen his body for the rigours of warfare, he was, after a great internal struggle and an enormous effort of will, abstaining entirely from both alcohol and opium. He had also taken up wrestling again and the masseur was readying him for his daily training contest. With a quick gesture to the man to cease his work, Humayun rolled over on to his back and stood up. He pulled on a pair of long cotton trousers, his only clothing for the fight, and made his way through some fine yellow muslin curtains into the next room. Here his opponent, a tall, heavily muscled Badakhshani, awaited him, similarly clothed and oiled.