Chapter 128: The Iron Cage and the Tantrik's Mockery
The moment Prafulla heard such absolute treason, the plan to escape from jail, and the conspiracy to become the queen of the Junagarh kingdom from the Tantrik's mouth—witnessing and hearing it with his own eyes and ears—the anger inside his mind reached the sky in a single moment! His two eyes began to burn like balls of fire in wrath. On the other side, Prabhasha also became thoroughly enraged upon hearing about such a dirty plan of using her name from her own mother's mouth. Prafulla and Prabhasha, both rushing forward at an extremely fast pace, went and stood straight in front of the iron bars of Sushila's dark cell.
Prafulla, drawing his sword halfway out of its scabbard, roared in an extremely fierce and harsh voice right in Sushila's face, saying, "What! O you wicked old woman Sushila! How do you muster such huge audacity, re, huh? Even after being imprisoned in this dark cell of the Junagarh royal palace, you are harboring thoughts of forcefully snatching the kingdom in such an absurd and dangerous manner behind our backs in that dirty mind of yours? I will cut this dirty web of conspiracy of yours into tiny pieces with my own hands today! I will not keep you in this ordinary prison even for another moment, re! You will now be imprisoned forever in the most powerful, darkest, and most wretched iron cage prison of Junagarh, from where your sight of sunlight will also be closed for all time!"
Alongside Prafulla, Prabhasha also turned her fair face red with anger and, looking toward Sushila, said in an extremely sharp tone, "Yes, Brother! You have spoken absolutely correctly. This conspiring mother Sushila should now be given a thoroughly formidable punishment, harsher than the harshest! She can never do anything else inside her mind except such absurd and wretched acts and dirty thoughts, re, Brother! If she were outside the jail today, she would not even think twice about causing massive harm to a highly placed person of the royal palace with this crooked intellect of hers! She is a thoroughly dangerous woman. Thank goodness this skirt-wearing Tantrik was present here today and informed us of everything through her miraculous powers! Although this Tantrik once wanted massive harm to our kingdom, spreading the terror of a tiger all around and instilling a huge fear and panic in the minds of the innocent village people—yet she could not cause any major harm to the kingdom in the end. And today, it is only because of this Tantrik that we could catch red-handed what a dangerous web of conspiracy was being woven against us in this witch Sushila's dirty mind! For this, she must receive a severe punishment!"
Witnessing such a sharp insult to her name from Prabhasha's mouth and the act of calling her 'Mother Sushila', Sushila, violently shaking the iron bars with both hands, contorted her face in extreme hatred and screamed, saying, "Fie, fie, fie! O you low-class girl Prabhasha! With what audacity are you calling me by name in the singular form from your own mouth, huh? Do you not feel ashamed? Am I not your own biological mother, re, huh?"
The moment the word 'Mother' was heard from Sushila's mouth, Prabhasha turned her face away in an instant with extreme hatred and sharp annoyance. Pointing a finger toward Sushila, she spoke in an extremely clear and harsh voice, saying, "Mind your tongue, Mother Sushila! With what audacity do you claim to be my mother today from your own mouth, let me hear? You were a mother only during that childhood when you gave birth to me from your womb! But does giving birth to someone truly make one a mother, go? You have never nurtured me with a genuine heart! On the contrary, throughout your entire life, you have only tried to cause massive harm to me and my Junagarh kingdom! What kind of a mother are you to me, re, huh? Go, shut that mouth of yours and sit quietly in the darkness of that dirty corner! Do not utter another single word of such absurd and useless talk before me, I tell you!" Saying this, Prabhasha, turning her face away in extreme anger and hurt, came and stood beside Prafulla.
Prafulla, without wasting another single moment, looked toward the royal guards standing in the corridor and ordered in an extremely grave and iron-hard voice, "Guards! Do not stand here idly and waste another moment! Go straight to the secret armory of the royal palace right now. From there, drag a massive, formidable cage made of the strongest, heaviest, and toughest iron of Junagarh inside this prison right away! This Sushila will be confined inside that cage, and strict guarding arrangements by guards will be made outside this cell so that not even an ant can approach her!"
The moment such a harsh royal order of the chief prince of Junagarh was heard, a group of powerful royal guards rushed out through the prison corridor at the speed of a storm. Within just a short while, four of them together dragged a massive and sturdy cage made of thoroughly heavy, tough black iron right inside that dark cell of Sushila. That cage looked so dangerous and strong that breaking it was absolutely impossible for an ordinary human! At Prafulla's command, the guards dragged Sushila and forcefully pushed her inside that iron cage, locking the massive padlock of the cage and handing over the key to Prafulla!
After confining Sushila in that manner inside a massive iron cage within the prison cell, Prafulla felt a great sense of peace inside his mind. On the other side, Prabhasha also let out a deep sigh of relief and thought to herself, "Thank goodness! Now, no matter how much this wicked mother Sushila weaves a web of conspiracy in her mind, and no matter how much she tries to play a move with her crooked intellect—she will never be able to cause even the slightest harm to any person of Junagarh by breaking out from behind this strong iron cage! All her conspiracies have now turned to dust."
On the other hand, when Sushila saw that she had become completely confined like an animal inside a massive iron cage within the jail, all her arrogance exploded in anger and insult! Biting the iron rods of her cage with both hands, she began to hurl abuses in an extremely bizarre and foul voice toward the Tantrik in the adjacent cell. Screaming loudly, she said, "O you skirt-wearing child of the devil! Will you never possess good sense and intellect in your life, re, huh? You opened that dirty mouth of yours and broke the pot of my secrets in front of everyone? I will never forgive you for this extreme betrayal of yours, re! If I can manage to break out of this cage just once, I will scratch the skin of your dirty back like a tiger with the nails of my two hands! And I will land such a powerful kick under your beautiful armpit and on your backside—that you will break the iron bars of your cell, come right outside this cage, and fall prostrate at my feet! How do you muster such huge audacity, re?"
The moment such words about kicking under the armpit and on the backside, and the absurd talk of coming outside the cage were heard from Sushila's mouth, the Tantrik burst into a loud fit of giggles inside her cell. Raising her skirt with both hands and contorting her face, she said to Sushila in a thoroughly mocking tone, "Oima! Oima go! Oh Sushila Boudi, what kind of absurd and wild things are you uttering from your own mouth go? You are saying that you will kick me and drag me out of this cage? Oh Boudi, you are perhaps completely forgetting a massive truth in the heat of your anger go! I am standing peacefully inside the open cell of this prison corridor, re, and you yourself are trapped completely confined like a full-fledged animal inside that wretched iron cage! Then how will you kick me while being trapped inside the cage go, Boudi? Has your head gone completely haywire in the heat of your anger? Or has your brain become thoroughly ruined, bapu?" Hearing such humorous words from the Tantrik, the guards inside the jail also began to smile to themselves.
While this episode of extreme abusing and quarreling was going on between Sushila and the Tantrik at one end of the corridor, right at that moment, Princess Snigdha, standing at the other end, drowned in a deep ocean of thoughts within her mind. Narrowing her two eyes and looking toward that Tantrik, she began to say to herself, "What an astonishing affair, re, father! Standing in this prison corridor, I committed so many dangerous deeds for so long, spoke of such massive conspiracies to get Rupanjan by force, and even uttered threats of killing this Prafulla and Prabhasha alive from my own mouth! But this wicked and miraculously empowered Tantrik—she discovered every single ugly word inside old woman Sushila's mind in a single flash and broke the pot by screaming like that before everyone, yet why did she not leak even a single piece of news of my massive deeds and threats near the ears of this Prafulla and Prabhasha? Why is she behaving so strangely by keeping all my truths hidden inside her belly? There must surely be some massive evil plot or some hidden purpose concealed within the mind of this wicked Tantrik! She is definitely playing a move!"
Just when Snigdha, standing there, was thinking of such a massive suspicion and plot against the Tantrik within her own mind, right at that moment, the Tantrik read every single letter of suspicion inside Snigdha's mind in a single flash through her miraculous magical powers! Shaking her beard and mustache and looking at Snigdha with a strange and mysterious eye, she burst out laughing loudly and said, "Yes, re, Snigdha girl! Whatever you are thinking inside your mind happens to be the absolute, immutable truth go! Extremely big and massive plots are hidden for you inside this magical mind of mine, re! But with what audacity and why should I tell you about that secret plot of my mind at this moment, let me hear, huh? You just beat your own forehead in your mind and die!"
The moment Snigdha heard her mind's thoughts being read exactly like that from the Tantrik's mouth and heard the sentence—'many plots are in the mind'—with her own ears, she was thoroughly shocked in a single moment! Her heart turned completely ice-cold with fear. She realized that this Tantrik was a flat-out magician from whom it was impossible to hide any secret of one's mind. Trembling with the fear of her conspiracy being leaked like Sushila's, she shut her mouth in an instant. Pressing her lips tightly together out of extreme fear, she remained completely silent, standing in a corner of the corridor; Snigdha no longer possessed the courage to utter another single word from her mouth!
On the other side, when Sushila, confined inside the cage, saw that the Tantrik was projecting herself as a massive saint by reading everyone's mind, she began to hurl foul abuses again, shaking the iron bars of her cage. Spitting from her mouth, Sushila said, "What, re, O you fake Tantrik! Have you taken yourself to be a massive magician and a holy saint by reading everyone's mind, re, huh? Are you a flat-out lunatic, or is your head thoroughly thick, re? Seeing such extreme excesses of yours, I feel—if I can manage to get out of this cage once, I will remove the bones of your two legs one by one with force and play football with your legs, re! And I will land such a massive blow on that bald head of yours—that you will straighten up in a single minute! Looking at you inside this jail, I feel like chewing you raw in a single bite and sending you straight to the gates of hell!"
The moment the Tantrik heard about playing football by removing her legs and about being bitten from Sushila's mouth, she placed a hand on her stomach and began to laugh out thoroughly loud, saying 'ho ho'! Even while laughing, swaying her colorful skirt and looking toward Sushila's cage, she said very sweetly, "Oh, far from it, far from it! Shut up let me see, oh Sushila Boudi! You have been screaming way too much since morning. Better than that, you now spread your veil in the dark corner of that iron cage and sleep a little in great peace go, Boudi! Otherwise, all the good intellect of your head has turned thoroughly bad in the heat of this intense anger, re! If you do not calm down and fall asleep now, there is no telling how many hundreds of other absurd and wild words will come out of this mouth of yours, bapu! You now keep your mouth shut and sleep quietly, will you!" Hearing such a humorous scolding from the Tantrik, Sushila began to gnash her teeth in anger right inside her cage.