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THE KUNDALINI

EQUATION

Stephen Barnes

A TOM DOHERTY ASSOCIATES BOOK

This is a work of fiction. All the characters and events portrayed in this

book are fictional, and any resemblance to real people or incidents is

purely coincidental.

THE KUNDALINl EQUATION

portions thereof in any form.

The lines from “Zomby Woof” by Frank Zappa that appear on page 281

First printing: May 1986 A TOR Book

Published by Tom Doherty Associates 49 West 24 Street New York,

N.Y. 10010

Cover art by Les Edwards

ISBN: 0-812-53150-7 CAN. ED.: 0-812-53151-5

Printed in the United States 098765432

Chapter One

The Legend

This whole world was enveloped by death — by Hun-ger. For what is

Death but Hunger? And Death bethought himself: would that I had a

self!

—Book One, Verse Two, The Upanishads

1500 B.C., Indus Valley, India

In silence, concealed within an angled web of temple rafters, Jiarri

notched an arrow to his bowstring and sighted along its shaft at the priest

beneath him. The old man was pinned to the bloodstained frescoed wall by

spikes through his wrists; his toes barely reached the ground.

End his pain. Jiarri lowered his arrow’s silver tip. He could do nothing

but watch.

The squat, muscular spearmen on either side of the priest snapped to

attention as a new figure entered the temple of Kalirangpur.

The newcomer was thick-chested, with the shoulders of an ape. His

scarred face mirrored the hideous carnage just beyond the temple’s

shattered, metal-bound doors. His armor and carriage round and flat

beneath one massive arm caught the smoldering torch’s glare, throwing it

back to the wall in flashes of white.

Behind the officer waddled a small, grotesquely obese figure whose feet

slapped a clumsy rhythm on the tile. His rags, matted with filth, fluttered

about him like a shroud. A scrap of cloth swathed his face diagonally from

scalp to chin, covering his left eye: one of the beggars who sought alms in

the marketplace, now licking up behind his true master. Jiarri growled,

and aligned the tip of his arrow with the back of the spy’s neck.

The officer thumbed back the priest’s eyelid, and spat directly into the

iris. The old man convulsed, the spikes tugging cruelly at his wrists. The

officer said something in a guttural tongue and threw down a silver plate

veined with tiny rivulets of gold. It rolled on edge to the priest’s feet and

clattered to the ground.

The ragged spy snatched it up. “The General wants to know where this

came from.” His voice was a barely comprehensible mishmash of barbaric

consonants. “The etching, the molding, are much finer than anything else

in Kalirangpur.” His bandaged finger lightly traced the elegantly carved

image of a sacred bull. “The General has seen such plates, but they were

old, tarnished. This is new, the metal freshly cast.”

There was no reply. Like a hawk seizing a rabbit the General’s hand

flashed out, fingers sinking deeply into the priest’s wizened throat. He

twisted the old man’s head around until their eyes locked.

“You don’t have to die,” the spy said.

The priest coughed painfully, then spoke for the first time. “All men

die.”

The spy peeled the bandage away from his face, blinking against the

light. “But why die here, today, in agony?” He called sharply, again in the

barbarian tongue, and two guards prodded a trio of children into the

temple at spearpoint. The priest’s knees sagged. He groaned as fresh blood

oozed from his wrists.

Two of the children were girls, both nearing womanhood. The youngest

was a boy, his initiate’s robe ripped and muddied. Although his legs

trembled, he stood tall and met the General’s gaze squarely.

Silently, Jiarri chanted his admiration.

The General clapped his hands, and both girls were hurled to the

ground. He twined his fingers into the hair of the eldest, and jerked her

head up, laughing as he made a vulgar hand gesture.

“Just tell us,” the spy said. “Tell us about the plates, and we will let your

miserable village rot in peace.”

The priest’s lips trembled silently, a single tear rolling from beneath his

sunken eyelids.

“Death holds few terrors for you,” the spy whispered. “But these are just

children. Children who need you to think clearly. Sanely.” His voice was

almost brotherly.

The eldest girl screamed piteously, fingernails ripping at the tiles

beneath her. One of the soldiers knocked the boy to the floor. With a

vicious laugh the spy raised the back of the stained robe.

The air hissed as a sliver of shadow flashed from above. Before the

chunky figure could complete his action he was falling, gagging on his own

blood, clawing at the feathered shaft which jutted from his throat.

Another hiss: a second arrow was through the priest’s chest before

anyone could turn. The General whipped his sword from its scabbard in a

blur of iron, shattering one of the two torches. Shadows devoured the

temple.

Jiarri cursed his own impetuousness, then let the third arrow fly in the

direction of the General. He wiggled up through the rafters to the slit in

the roof, and pushed out into the night.

The sunbaked brick walls of Kalirangpur were shattered, her woven

reed buildings sputtering with flame. Sparks and bits of ash filled the air,

spiraling like burning snow-flakes. Her people littered the streets, sad dark

bundles drifting in the embrace of the river Ganges. Drunken soldiers

reeled through the streets, backs and arms sagging with loot.

Jiarri clambered down the roof, sliding along one of the support poles

until he reached the edge. He tightened his leg muscles, closed his eyes to

blot out the light, and whispered, “Sun Eagle, your wings,” before leaping

seventeen feet to the next roof.

His feet struck the crude tile with a crunch. He skittered along the edge

until he was once again in darkness. Soldiers streamed out of the temple,

surrounding it, screaming up at the empty roof. Of course he had to be

there. The leap to the next roof was impossible.

Jiarri smiled grimly. The night was his friend, his lover, and soon he

was lost in its arms.

In the mountains north of Kalirangpur, hidden among the peaks like a

gilded bird’s nest, stood a city. Beyond its gold-veined walls were mirrored

domes and jeweled spires that grazed the clouds, temples with arched

roofs, houses of cut stone, granaries of kiln-cured brick. On the sheer

granite wall behind the city, titanic bulls and tigers contorted in mortal

dance.

On a platform atop the highest tower stood two men. The taller of them

was also the elder. His face was graven with age, and seemed somehow an

infinity of visages joined into one. All of the joy known to man was etched

in that face; all of the sorrow, and all of the hope. Every fractional tilt of

his head brought to life another combination of light and shadow and

texture, another personality, such that his appearance changed subtly

from moment to moment.

His name was Ahmara Khan. His forked beard was a pale fluttering

wisp. The robe that rippled in the chill wind was undyed, extravagant only

in the fineness of its weave.

His eyes were fixed on the southern ridge of mountains: a stubble, a

ring of dead, broken teeth. Smoke curled over them poisonously,

muddying the sky.

“Soon,” Khan said quietly. As he spoke his face seemed that of the

wisest and saddest of the gods. “Soon Pah-Dishah joins her sisters. Save

yourself. We were fools.” He drew his cloak more tightly across his

shoulders. “These mountains will hide nothing but our bones.”

The younger man touched his grandfather’s arm. It was thin and frail,

but even here, at the top of the highest wind-whipped tower, it radiated

soothing heat, as if he were burning with fever. It was, as always, strangely

calming to Jiarri. “I am a Hunter. So long as the city lives, my duty is

here.”

Khan studied his grandson: the strong, proud jaw and dark eyes, the

broad shoulders and wiry arms beneath a thin white tunic. He nodded,

resignation and pride mingling in his smile, and turned to enter the

temple. Together they wound their way down the staircase.

The air within was hazed with incense and fevered prayers, the floor

beaded with kneeling worshipers. Somberly robed figures glided across

the tiles, each ritual motion triggering an anguished cry from the faithful.

The priests blended their voices in wordless song, their bodies in sacred

dance. The tones were always precisely the same, and Jiarri supposed that

the identical rhythmic call had echoed in domed temples since the

beginning of time.

Theme interwove with theme, pitch and volume climbing until the

ceiling hummed. Their feet blurred, robes swirling like storm-tossed

leaves. The fluxing patterns of the dance, the cadence of the hymn, and the

tang of the incense made his temples pound.

Ahmara Khan appeared on the spiral stairway. The chanting stopped,

the final notes vibrating in the ceiling and floor like the last stroke of the

gong. Jiarri stayed back, watching his grandfather descend step by slow

step.

The worshipers watched him, blind to the frailty and indecision in his

step. They saw only Ahmara Khan, their one remaining hope, the high

priest who had grown ancient in service to Pah-Dishah. The holiest of

men, whose labyrinthine mind might yield one final miracle.

He was joined at the foot of the steps by his eldest priest, who bowed

low. The Elder’s eyes were deeply ringed. He trembled from weariness and

lack of sleep. Perhaps it was the perspiration that steamed from his skin

and clothes, or the pools of oil that burned atop their braziers, but the

Elder’s skin glowed, shone golden. His eyes were vast and dark, his breath

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