The Mountain of Light Read Online Free PDF

thought—this was justice they understood and bowed to.
    Indeed, Azizuddin thought, leaning forward in his saddle, the rush of the wind in his ears, his skin cooling after the day spent in the heated embrace of the sun, it was the Akalis who formed, now, part of his bodyguard also. As the men created a tight circle around him, matching the pace of his horse, the light from the torches glanced off their quoits, which they insisted on wearing around their necks. The inner ring of the quoit was all dulled steel, easy to grasp, and if this touchedtheir necks it was no danger at all. When an enemy threatened, the Akali pulled it over his head without mussing his turban or his hair and flung it in one movement—in less than two seconds.
    Azizuddin had no personal vanity at all, so the loss of his teeth didn’t bother him. Only women ought to think of how they looked, how they smelled, whether their conversation was pleasing and pleasant. For many years, Azizuddin had served his master with a shattered jaw until he quite got used to speaking out of the side of his mouth. And then, a physician from Transylvania, Honigberger, had come to the Maharajah’s court at Lahore. He was one of the many foreigners who had honed in on Ranjit Singh, having heard of his generous pay and his openness to odd men who could not make their way elsewhere. Honigberger had cured the king’s headaches with a pink powder, something none of the other hakims at court had been able to do, and so he’d toppled them to take their position. One day he’d said, in his diffident, half-finished Persian, to Azizuddin that he could make him new teeth that would fit as well as his old. Out of a pale wood? No, ivory—it would never break and he could chew on the toughest meats in the kingdom and make a mince of them in no time. And so, Azizuddin had gotten his teeth. They had wiped years off his face, and he took the teeth out when he wanted to opt for a disguise.
    The streets of Lahore were clotted with the bluish gray smoke of cooking fires, making it hard to see, but a sure sense of direction led the horsemen through one alley and then another. Dogs barked at their passing, children squealed; at one point an urchin skipped across their path, his hair flying, just missing being clipped by Azizuddin’s horse’s hooves. The city fell away behind them as they approached the Masti Darwaza, the easternmost entry into Lahore Fort.
    Here, the reception was kinder to Fakir Azizuddin. His Akalis drew in their horses as the giant, metal-studded doorsswung open, and he raced through the gateway. Before he could look back, the doors had swung shut. Azizuddin slowed his horse to a canter, rode across the courtyard of the Diwan-i-am, the Hall of Public Audience, and to the westernmost end. Here, he jumped down from the saddle and lobbed the reins to the waiting syces. He then turned right and north and went along a corridor to the northwesternmost corner of the fort, which housed the Shah Burj and the Naulakha buildings, both of which opened out into a square, red-sandstone-paved courtyard.
    Just like the Shalimar Gardens, this fort had been built, some two hundred years ago, by the Mughal Emperor Shah Jahan. Now, the Mughal Empire had fallen to pieces, shrunken its boundaries to just the city of Delhi. And all the splendor of Lahore—the fort, the city, the gardens—belonged to Azizuddin’s king, Ranjit Singh, who was ruler of the Punjab Empire.
    Fakir Azizuddin padded on light feet through the courtyard, past the fountain, and up the steps into the Sheesh Mahal, the northernmost part of the Shah Burj. Here, lamps were lit in every niche, and true to its name, the Sheesh Mahal—the Palace of Mirrors—glittered and hurled light back into every corner from its mirrored walls. Azizuddin passed into the riverside apartments and looked down and out toward the Ravi River. The Maharajah was a lone figure on a horse in the maidan,