The Forest of Enchantments

by Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni

A shudder went through me, sorrow and longing and fury and love, as I saw the title: Ramayana. The story of the glorious king Ram. My husband.

‘For you haven’t understood a woman’s life, the heartbreak at the core of her joys, her unexpected alliances and desires, her negotiations where, in the hope of keeping one treasure safe, she must give up another.’

I set quill to leaf. In red ink I began to write—in crooked, effortful lettering because it had been so long since I’d composed anything—the Sitayan.

This was my first lesson on the nature of love: that in a moment it could fulfil the cravings of a lifetime, like a light that someone might shine into a cavern that has been dark for a million years.

Girlhood was as ephemeral as a drop of water on a lily pad. Soon I’d have to leave all that I loved—parents, sister, palace, garden, the healing house—to take my place in another family, which I must then call mine. That’s the lot of daughters, commoner or princess. Two IT HAD BEEN A GOOD day, busy but productive.

I wanted Ram. I desired him more than I’d ever desired anyone. But I wondered uneasily what price the gods would exact in exchange.

Because a trained mind is your strongest ally—and an untrained one your worst enemy.’

It’s like a huge tempest unleashed over the ocean. But always they forgive each other—for without forgiveness what love can there be? And when they come together afterwards, that union is the sweetest.’

‘Anything that makes us forget our true selves is a trap, princess—even something we love or define as beautiful. Our

in the midst of darkness, remember this conversation, what I told you today. It’ll help you see past the darkness. It’ll help you endure.’

Perhaps I should have been more worried, but I wasn’t. I was in love, and love is wild and optimistic, especially

in the beginning. Thus I did not think of this: what else might he destroy in the future?

It’s important to speak your mind to the man you’re going to marry. What kind of relationship would you have if you couldn’t do that?

even the strongest intellect may be weakened by love. This struck me as paradoxical.

Shouldn’t love make us more courageous? More determined to live according to our principles?

In my father’s house, love flowed like a calm and aged river, nourishing but predictable. In Ayodhya, I would...

Reality swirled and changed colour each day, like a sky filled with fast-moving clouds. Only this was constant: I longed for Ram, for him to hold my hands again in his archery-calloused fingers and tell me that he loved me.

We’d spend the rest of our lives together, and we wouldn’t allow any of society’s foolish dictates to separate us.

Maybe it will help you in a hard time: If you want to stand up against wrongdoing, if you want to bring about change, do it in a way that doesn’t bruise a man’s pride. You’ll have a better chance of success.’

counted out the things I needed to do on my fingers: respect Dasharath; be sympathetic to Kaushalya; be affectionate to Lakshman; observe Kaikeyi and learn from her how power could be used—all the while keeping a safe distance.

I knew it was mostly to me that she’d spoken. Endure. A word solid as a tree trunk. A good word upon which to build a life, I thought. I would learn it, and it would help me through dark times.

I was distracted by the warm pressure of his hand on mine, and his smell, a perfume I couldn’t quite place but which I knew I’d always recognize now.

Sacrifice, sacrifice, whispered the trees, carrying my promise across the valley.

This incident taught me that the more love we distribute, the more it grows, coming back to us from unexpected sources. And its corollary: when we demand love, believing it to be our right, it shrivels, leaving only resentment behind.

And if our stomachs are happy and healthy, the rest of us immediately feels a lot better.’

Because this is part of the dark fate that is unfurling, unknown to you. It will prepare you a little for the many battles you must fight.

Such is the life of a queen, filled with compromise.

Love was full of contradictions. Sometimes the person you loved weakened you and sometimes he or she made you a stronger person. But under exactly what conditions did these very different changes occur?

All of a sudden, his face appeared aged. Ah, what a chameleon thing love was, lifting us up one minute, casting us down the next.

Ram didn’t believe in displaying emotion, especially in company. He’d told me early on that self-control was the mark of a good ruler. Also that it was safer when people around you—rivals and even friends—didn’t know exactly what you thought or felt.

Did every man in the city deserve to have his opinion listened to, or his grievances addressed? If Ayodhya was anything like Mithila, there were bound to be many belligerent fools, and unfortunately they were the ones that complained the loudest, often for little reason.

‘I don’t think the goddess would mind, because she, too, knows what love is,’ I said.

Instead, it invigorated me. Such was love’s magic—the giver gained more than the receiver.

I was looking at another of love’s many faces. It made us ready to wreak havoc—even on people we cared for—in order to protect those whom we cherished more. Wasn’t it the same force that impelled Kaikeyi to turn on Ram in order to guard her own son’s interest?

Vasishta, taught us that many strands of karma must come together for an upheaval like this to occur—yours, mine, the kingdom’s, perhaps the entire earth’s. The wise man accepts it calmly. Who knows why I’m going into the forest, and whom I’ll meet there?’

Duty. Right. Those are the terms that Ram understood best, so I used them. But beneath them I was saying, I love you. I need you. Don’t abandon me.

But where love and sorrow bind people together, goodbyes are not so easily said.

So this, too, was true of love: it could make us forget our own needs. It could make us strong even when the world was collapsing around us.

Was this a woman’s predicament, always to be pulled between conflicting loves?

Forgive me, Sister, I said silently, you who are the unsung heroine of this tale, the one who has the tougher role: to wait and to worry.

Bad news, I guess, is like an infection, needing only air to carry it everywhere.

I learned a new fact about love that day: it could kill. Sometimes it could kill instantaneously.

This is what Kaikeyi failed to see: it’s not enough to merely love someone. Even if we love them with our entire being, even if we’re willing to commit the most heinous sin for their well-being. We must understand and respect the values that drive them. We must want what they want, not what we want for them.

Finally, an answer came. When you put your hand in the fire, knowingly or unknowingly, do you not get burned? Such is the ancient law of the universe. Of karma and its fruit. The idea of motive is irrelevant to it.’

They receded into mist, leaving me with another lesson: once mistrust has wounded it mortally, love can’t be fully healed again.

Such is the seduction of love: it makes you not want to think too much. It makes you unwilling to question the one you love.

That’s how love stops us when it might be healthier to speak out, to not let frustration and rage build up until it explodes.

But there was something innocent and natural in her movements, like a peacock preening itself in mating season. In her own way she was beautiful, with a wild scent about her that I could smell even from this distance, like musk or rain.

I blamed love, too, for my silence. How it makes us back down from protesting because we’re afraid of displeasing the beloved, or because we’re afraid that our disagreement is the symptom of a greater disease: incompatibility of values.

We were visitors to the forest, which already had its own rules, its own rhythm, its own savage beauty. It belonged more to the rakshasas than to us. What right did we have to cause destruction to those who had been here long before we came?