Jahanara Timeline & Summary

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• Jahanara almost drowns and is convinced Aurangzeb wanted her to die. Nice.
• Jahanara starts to take a more active role in court and is tutored by her mother in the arts of feminine wiles.
• Jahanara marries Khondamir, which is no bueno.
• Mother dies during childbirth, which is also no bueno.
• Father decides to build Mother a grand mausoleum, hires Ustad Isa, a master architect, and puts Jahanara in charge alongside him.
• Isa and Jahanara fall in love but don't do anything about it.
• Ladli gets closer to Aurangzeb in order to be spy for her good friend Jahanara.
• Jahanara concocts the stolen ring ruse, officially preventing her from being open friends with Ladli—but probably saving her life at the same time.
• Father gives Jahanara his blessing to conduct a secret affair with Isa.
• Jahanara foils Aurangzeb's plot to assassinate Dara on a business trip.
• Father tells her about a secret tunnel that will allow her and Isa to have an affair instead of just dreaming about having an affair.
• Jahanara gives birth to Arjumand, Isa's daughter, but convinces Khondamir that she is his.
• Jahanara thwarts someone else's assassination attempt on Aurangzeb and afterward wonders why she didn't let the snake just kill him.
• The Taj Mahal is completed.
• Aurangzeb betrays Jahanara's brothers, turns on Hindustan, and sends Balkhi to kill Jahanara and Arjumand. Balkhi falls into the secret trap and dies, so nah-nah-nah-boo-boo.
• Isa and Arjumand flee, but Jahanara stays behind with her ailing father.
• Jahanara and Dara lose in battle to Aurangzeb's invading forces. Dara and his family are publicly executed, and Jahanara is imprisoned with her father.
• After five years, Nizam is able to visit Jahanara and tell her that he's pretty sure Isa and Arjumand are alive. She decides it's time to escape to go find them.
• Nizam and Jahanara travel to Bijapur and successfully persuade the Sultan and his buddy Shivaji to release her family once they finish building a mosque there.
• Shivaji arranges for Isa, Jahanara, and Arjumand to spend five glorious days by the sea—but then they'll have to wait several years to see each other again, after the mosque is completed.
• Jahanara gets herself imprisoned with her father. Again.
• Khondamir assaults and rapes Jahanara in revenge for her affair with Isa.
• Aurangzeb and Khondamir visit Jahanara's prison cell to yell at her about another assassination attempt. Ladli is with them, too, and things are looking dicey. Jahanara cleverly manipulates her brother into thinking Khondamir was her accomplice all along, so Khondamir gets his head chopped off.
• Ladli flees Aurangzeb and goes south with Nizam to retrieve Isa and Arjumand for Jahanara.
• Jahanara's father dies.
• Jahanara escapes with the help of the women in the Red Fort harem.
• Nizam and Ladli, Jahanara, Isa, and Arjumand all successfully meet in Calcutta and live happily in a little village by the sea.
• Ladli dies.
• Isa dies.
• Jahanara takes her granddaughters to Hindustan and later tells them the whole story.