This time, on the advice of Queen Janahara, Arangbar transferred his son Parwaz out of the Deccan, to Allahbad, and in his place sent Prince Jadar. The younger prince had marched on the Deccan with forty thousand additional troops to supplement the existing forces.
When Jadar and his massive army reached Burhanpur, Malik Ambar wisely proposed a truce and negotiations. He returned the fort at Ahmadnagar to the Moghul and withdrew his troops. Arangbar was jubilant and rewarded Jadar with sixteen lakhs of rupees and a prize diamond. Triumphant, Jadar had returned to Agra and begun to think of becoming the next Moghul. That had been three long years ago.
But Malik Ambar had the cunning of a jackal, and his "surrender" had been merely a ruse to remove the Moghul troops again to the north. This year he had waited for the monsoon, when conventional armies could not move rapidly, and again risen in rebellion, easily driving Ghulam Adl's army north from Ahmadnagar, reclaiming the city, and laying siege to its Moghul garrison. The despairing Arangbar again appealed to Jadar to lead troops south to relieve the permanent forces of Ghulam Adl. After demanding and receiving a substantial increase in mansab rank and personal cavalry, Jadar had agreed.
The wide wooden door of the reception hall opened and Ghulam Adl strode regally into the room, wearing a gold- braided turban with a feather and a great sword at his belt. His beard was longer than Jadar had remembered, and now it had been reddened with henna—perhaps, Jadar thought, to hide the gray. But his deep-set eyes were still haughty and self-assured, and his swagger seemed to belie reports he had barely escaped with his life from the besieged fortress at Ahmadnagar only five weeks before.
Ghulam Adl's gaze quickly swept the room, but his eyes betrayed no notice of the exceptional size of Jadar's guard. With an immense show of dignity he nodded a perfunctory bow, hands clasped at the sparkling jewel of his turban.
"Salaam, Highness. May Allah lay His hand on both our swords and temper them once more with fire." He seated himself easily, as he might with an equal, and when no servant came forward, he poured himself a glass of wine from the decanter that waited on the carpet beside his bolster. Is there anything, he wondered, I despise more than these presumptuous young princes from Agra? "I rejoice your journey was swift. You've arrived in time to witness my army savage the Abyssinian unbeliever and his rabble."
"How many troops are left?" Jadar seemed not to hear the boast.
"Waiting are fifty thousand men, Highness, and twenty thousand horse, ready to tender their lives at my command." Ghulam Adl delicately shielded his beard as he drank off the glass of wine and—when again no servant appeared— poured himself another.
Jadar remained expressionless.
"My reports give you only five thousand men left, most chelas. Chelas, from the Hindu slang for "slave," was a reference to the mercenary troops, taken in childhood and raised in the camp, that commanders maintained as a kernel of their forces. Unlike soldiers from the villages, they were loyal even in misfortune, because they literally had no place to return to. "What troops do you have from the mansabdars, who've been granted stipends from their jagir estate revenue to maintain men and horse?"