Another bad tiding from northern Kedatuans has reached Palembang. The Mongols have invaded Khmer in just a month after they sacked Champa. A council meeting was held, Srindravarman indignant, Maharaja restless. Srindravarman and Po Nagar emphasized to send the army to retake fallen Kedatuans as soon as possible, but Maharaja insisted to wait for Senapati Narendra.
War preparation has taken place in Palembang. Nearly one hundred sambaus have made to the estuary of Musi River. Six hundred men have infested the town; with each two hundred belong to a Senapati. Maharaja has summoned his best Senapatis: Kandra Kayet, a middle aged war veteran skillful in sea battle who helped Srivijaya to win Chaiya, Khmer and Champa twenty years ago; Anathapindika, the first woman Senapati, masterful in martial arts and war tactics in spite his young age; and Vimala, distant cousin to Maharaja Sumatrabhumi, the heir of the ancient great Syailendran sambaus.
There has been fighting in the town market, between men of Anathapindika and Vimala. Kandra Kayet and his men are reported drunk in local tavern and making a lot of fuss. However, in a sense, those reckless behaviors were reasonable since they don’t know who they are going to battle with; unlike the Maharatu.
Since childhood, Amretasari has been educated with the history of world’s kingdom. She was notorious for his extensive reading time. Although she only met a Mongol once, she knew a lot about that certain empire. Opposite to Amretasari, her hot-headed brother never bothered to busy himself with books since he spent most of his time working up skills in swordplay, archery, and riding. Since she was fifteen years old, she always invited to the council meeting by her father and trusted with a single task: to listen. Back then, it was an open secret that their father favored Amretasari over Raden Wijaya to succeed him as a ruler of Singhasari kingdom.
As she now becomes the Kumaramatya of Singhasari in Srivijaya kingdom, the slender olive-skinned beauty still plays a role as listener. She seldom speaks her mind, aware that all of the council members never trusted her. In fact, almost everyone in the Srivijaya did not trust her, even unreasonably resented her. The resentment has a reason though, but a nonsensical one.
When the last time Singhasari was still a kingdom, Amretasari was its princess. Her brother, Raden Wijaya, was its king. For hundreds of years, tension between Singhasari and Srivijaya has been maintained high. The two kingdoms have been at each other’s throats until Srivijaya proved to be the superior one. When the time Singhasari was conquered, it was not conquered utterly by force, but by marriage—or imprisonment to be exact—of Amretasari to Sumatrabhumi. Unfortunately, people of Srivijaya kept a suspicious eye toward Amretasari, just because she was born as a Singhasarian.
It got worse when her brother sprang the rebellion, the council members started to look at her with sharp and suspicious eyes, making it hard for her to contribute to the council. In fact, she never has any intention to do any harm to Srivijaya; she realized that the fallen of her father kingdom is something that commonly happens to kingdoms. Amretasari never thought of revenge, she just wants to become a good Kumaramatya that gives good counsel to her Maharaja. Although she lost her voice in the council, she still managed to speak privately with Maharaja every night, in bed.
One night, Amretasari braved herself to ask her husband about why he was keen on taking risk by brutally turned down the Mongol’s request. If I cut his throat, he won’t be able to deliver my answer to his emperor,was Sumatrabhumi’s answer. Though the bad humor made Amretasari astounded for a while, she persisted on questioning the Maharaja.
Amretasari knew well about her husband—Maharaja Sumatrabhumi of Srivijaya Kingdom. His Syailendran bloods and his education have made him almost perfect to carry on his father’s reign over Srivijaya kingdom: tough, cunning, and strong-willed. After the death of his father, the young Sumatrabhumi took his father’s seat, decreed a successful military expedition to conquer kingdoms in the north and coined the term “Kumaramatya”. All of those achievements he made at the age no later than fifteen.
Sumatrabhumi is a natural-born Maharaja, Amretasari has thought back then. But Sumatrabhumi these days is anything but that. He has grown rigid and arbitrary. Amretasari has been suspicious about the people around him—especially of Sokei-An, the priest Kumaramatya. Of late, Sokei-An often invited Sumatrabhumi to do a praying ritual in several Candi in Palembang vicinity. At first, it was just an occasional half day activity, but later on it turned out to be a cumbersome one. At one time, Sumatrabhumi, Sokei-An and several other priests spent a whole week to travel to Candi Biaro Bahal near Muaro Jambi to do the ritual.
Thus it was normal for Amretasari to worry if the priest was trying to manipulate the Maharaja. And it was also normal if Amretasari asked if Sokei-An has anything to do with the incident with Mongol messenger. However, Sumatrabhumi’s face grew dark when she mentioned the name of the priest. He then ended the conversation and went to sleep. Stupefied, Amretasari began to feel surer there was something between his husband and that particular Kumaramatya.
(Continued to Chapter IV)
(previous chapter)
