Humayun looked around at his counsellors, like him dressed in the mourning that custom demanded they wear for forty days. Maham had been dead for only fourteen of those days but if the alarming reports reaching him were accurate, little time was left for observing the courtesies to the dead.
‘You’re certain, Ahmed Khan. .?’
‘Yes, Majesty’, responded his travel-stained chief scout.‘Sher Shah is advancing fast with an army at least three hundred thousand strong. I saw the vanguard with my own eyes just five days’ ride east from here.’
‘This matches other reports that have been coming in, Majesty,’ said Kasim. ‘Despite the start of the rains, Sher Shah is making good progress.’
At least Sher Shah hadn’t caught up with his retreating army, Humayun thought. The main force had reached Agra safely nearly a week ago though many had deserted along the road. ‘So he means to attack us here in Agra. . How many troops do we have left?’ Humayun turned to Zahid Beg, the tall, thin officer he had made his commander-of-horse in place of Baba Yasaval.
‘Around eighty thousand including the returning forces from Kanauj, Majesty, but the number diminishes every day. . ’
Raising his head, Humayun looked down the length of his audience chamber to the courtyard beyond. The rain had ceased temporarily and in the shafts of sunlight the red sandstone glowed.This fortress had been the Moghuls’ greatest stronghold ever since they had swept down to conquer Hindustan. Last night before retiring into the pleasures of the haram he had stood on the battlements with his astrologer, Sharaf, and together they had gazed into the night sky. But Sharaf had been unable to find any messages written there — or in his charts and tables.Was the silence of the stars God’s way of showing him that he and he alone must find a way of saving his dynasty. .?
‘Ahmed Khan’s news confirms what I had already feared. We have no choice but to retreat from Agra,’ Humayun said at last. There was an audible gasp.
‘Abandon Agra, Majesty?’ Kasim looked shocked.
‘Yes. That is the only way.’
‘But where will we go?’
‘Northwest, to Lahore. That will buy us time and I will be able to summon more troops from Kabul — the clans there will welcome a chance for some plunder. . ’
A long silence followed, then Baisanghar spoke. ‘Many years ago when I was still young and with Babur in Samarkand, we faced an enemy — Shaibani Khan and his numberless Uzbeks whom we knew we could not defeat. The only alternative to retreat was the death of thousands of our people. Babur, with the courage and foresight that made him so great, understood that. Though it grieved his warrior soul to yield Timur’s city to the barbarian Uzbeks, he knew he must. . Just as we must leave Agra. . ’
Humayun looked down. Baisanghar’s words were the truth. But what he hadn’t said was that, as part of the bargain, Shaibani Khan had demanded Khanzada as a wife and Babur had been forced to yield her up. For ten years she had endured life in the haram of a man with a visceral hatred of Timur’s descendants who had enjoyed trying to break her spirit. He had failed.Whatever happened, he, Humayun, would make sure that no such fate overtook her again.
‘We are retreating, not running away. Though we will ride out tomorrow morning at dawn, everything must be done in an orderly fashion. . Kasim, assemble the officers of the imperial household and ensure that they and their servants carry out my commands swiftly and without question. The contents of the royal treasuries in Agra must be transferred into strongboxes. Anything else of great value must also be packed to go with us — I will leave Sher Shah nothing that will help him. Zahid Beg, prepare our troops. Tell them that we are riding to Lahore to join our forces coming from Kabul. And make sure all our muskets and all the ammunition are securely loaded on to bullock carts and the cannon made ready for travel. Say nothing, do nothing to suggest defeat or flight or that we are in any way afraid of Sher Shah.’
Humayun paused and looked around. ‘And you, Ahmed Khan, choose your fastest and best young riders to carry letters to my half-brothers with orders to leave sufficient troops to hold their provinces but to join me with the rest at Lahore. I myself will write the letters and mark them with the imperial seal so my brothers are in no doubt it is the emperor who commands them. Now hurry, there is little time. . ’
Humayun neither slept nor visited the haram that night — there was too much to attend to. In any case the hours of darkness were punctuated by the frequent arrival of scouts bringing fresh and ever more disquieting news of the progress of Sher Shah’s advance troops. If they maintained their present pace, their vanguard could reach Agra in as little as three or four days’ time, Humayun calculated.
Even before the sky was lightening to the east, the first detachments of Humayun’s army, pennants streaming in the warm breeze, were moving out, their task to secure the route ahead. Once word spread that he was leaving Agra, the populace might become restive and dacoits might take the chance for some mischief. The task of Humayun’s vanguard — in their burnished steel breastplates and mounted on fresh horses from the imperial stables — was to impress them with a show of power. And he was still powerful, Humayun told himself. He still had nearly eighty thousand men under arms — far more than he and his father had had at Panipat.
Looking down from his apartments into the courtyard below, he saw the royal women and their attendants preparing to climb into the carts and litters that had been prepared for them. They would travel in the heart of the column, with guards positioned around them in a protective cordon, and to the front and rear would be further lines of specially assigned cavalry. But Humayun had ordered that Khanzada and his half-sister Gulbadan should ride close to him on one of the imperial elephants. Salima, still his favourite concubine, would follow behind on another.
Behind the women would come the baggage wagons with all the equipment for the imperial camp — the tents and mobile bathhouses, the cooking pots and other utensils necessary for the four-hundred-mile journey northwest. And, of course, the imperial treasure in the huge iron-bound travelling chests whose intricate locks required four separate silver keys — each in the keeping of a different official — and a fifth golden key that was hanging from a chain around Humayun’s neck. Humayun was glad that before first marching out to face Sher Shah he had had the foresight to order his treasure in Delhi to be sent to Agra for safe keeping. With his own money and gems and what he had captured from Bahadur Shah, he should have more than enough funds to recruit and equip a new army to match Sher Shah’s.
At the very end of the line would come further ranks of cavalry and foot soldiers, including some of his best archers, so skilled they could fire forty arrows a minute. And strung out all around the column and out of sight for much of the time would be Ahmed Khan’s scouts, ever watchful for trouble.
Two hours later, mounted on the long-legged, muscular bay stallion that had carried him so swiftly back to his capital after the disaster at Kanauj, Humayun himself rode slowly down the ramp of the Agra fort. Beneath his jewelled helmet, his eyes looked straight ahead. This was no time for backward glances or nostalgic thoughts. This was only a temporary setback and soon — very soon, if God so willed — he would return to claim what was his. Yet there was still one thing he must do before departing. Riding down to the riverbank, he dismounted and boarded the small boat waiting to carry him across the Jumna to Maham’s grave. Arrived at the simple white marble slab, he knelt and kissed it. ‘Sher Shah is a man of our own faith,’ he whispered. ‘He will not violate your grave and one day I will return to you. Forgive me, Mother, that I cannot observe the forty days of mourning, but the fate of our dynasty is in the balance and I must strain every nerve and sinew to defend it. . ’