AJAYA - RISE OF KALI (Book 2)

by Anand Neelakantan

  “Sir, have your oft-stated objections to me melted away because you no longer think I am of low caste but a Kshatriya? You have never treated me fairly.”

  “Do not carry harsh thoughts about a dying man. I only wished to keep you away from this madness, Karna.”

  “How can I stay away when Suyodhana is in danger? I will fight until my friend is King.”

  “The throne belongs to you, my son.”

  Karna withdrew his hand from Bhishma and stood up. “What wrong have I ever done to you?”

  “Karna, I did my duty to my country. When the Confederate demanded your head, a war for your sake was a risk not worth taking. It was not in the interests of the kingdom.”

  “Would you have given them Suyodhana or Yudhishtra’s head had they asked for it? Would you have allowed any of the Kuru Princes to suffer the humiliation I have suffered all my life?”

  “I have no answers to your questions. Perhaps things would have been different had I known you were Kunti’s son.”

  “Even for the great Bhishma, it is all about caste?”

  “Karna, you are my grand-nephew, like Suyodhana or Yudhishtra.”

  “Yet I was treated like a dog. You could have changed that.”

  “Will you not allow an old man to die in peace, Karna? You want me to bare my heart to you? Then hear what I have to say. I was afraid of you, and jealous.”

  “The great Bhishma afraid and jealous of a charioteer’s son? Sir, you mock me yet again.”

  “I knew that if I allowed you to fight, there would no Pandavas left. You have no equal, Karna. I merely chose to save my clan and country. Do not fight in this war. Persuade Suyodhana to stop. We have already paid a terrible price. Only you can do this. Accept Krishna’s offer...”

  “And betray Suyodhana? Betray the man who did not think twice about making a Suta King of Anga? Betray friendship for a worthless throne? Sir, I would rather die.”

  “You make this old man proud, son. You are indeed the best of the Kurus. I have no regrets but sometimes I wonder if I did the right thing by abdicating the throne. I lived for this country, yet here I lie on my deathbed, a bed of arrows shot by one of my grand-nephews hiding behind a eunuch. Here I await the Lord of Death to claim me once the sun has crossed the sky into Sankranti, while my countrymen butcher each other around me.”

  Karna’s hard resolve broke at Bhishma’s words. He bent down beside the prone figure and gently took Bhishma’s hand between both his own. “Forgive my harsh words, Pitamaha. Bless this Suta.”

  “Blessed you are, Karna, by the Gods and by the love of the people. Remain so forever – unflinching in adversity, selfless in giving and brave hearted in battle.”

  “You did not bless me with victory, Pitamaha.”

  “No victory will be greater than yours, my son. Your name will be remembered till the sun burns in the sky.” Bhishma raised a hand to touch Karna’s head in benediction.

  Choking back his tears, Karna touched the patriach’s feet. How deeply he had craved acknowledgement from this man! Abruptly, Karna stood up. He had his answers but they only made him feel sad. He had to win this war at any cost but he vowed in his heart to seek out Arjuna and make him beg for his life, for the cowardly way in which he had brought down this great man. Karna walked to the river and stepped into its freezing waters. The sun was an orange ball in the east. He began to recite the Suryagayatri.

  “My son... “

  Karna cringed, his eyes still shut in prayer. He recognized the voice. A shiver ran through his body when she touched his arm. Karna completed his mantras and dipped his head into the rippling water. He prayed she would leave him in peace. He yearned to stay in the water and die there. When he came up, she was weeping. He wanted to hate this woman but he felt only weariness. As he stepped out of the river, she stood in his way.

  “Devi Kunti, allow this Suta to pass. Let not my polluted shadow fall on you.”

  “My son, will you not forgive your mother?”

  There was nothing to say. Karna stared into the distance, his arms folded across his powerful chest. He wished he were somewhere else, far away from the woman before him. Finally he said, “Who am I to forgive the Rajamata of Hastinapura, the mother of the noble Pandavas? I am but a water weed taken from the Ganga by a Suta.”

  “You are nevertheless my son, Karna,” Kunti raised her head, her eyes blazing with a hint of their old fire.

  “Where were you when my father pawned his only possessions to give me an education? Where were you when the world laughed at my ambitions? Where were you when I was being insulted about my caste at every turn?”

  “Son, you must find it in your heart to forgive me. Stop this war!”

  “The war will end with the death of your five sons.” Karna’s skin flushed. The Ganga glowed in the golden rays of the sun.

  Kunti tried to fall at his feet but Karna pulled her up. Anger throbbed in his deep voice. “Devi, you forget your exalted station.”

  “Spare my sons. They are all I have. We have suffered enough. Do not kill them.” Kunti stood before him with folded hands.

  “This is a war, Devi. If they are fearful, you can stop the conflict by asking them to accept Suyodhana’s rightful claim to the throne.”

  “My sons are not afraid, Karna; it is a mother’s heart that speaks.”

  “I will kill them all, have no doubt about that.”

  “They are your brothers, Karna. Be generous and spare them.”

  “You have too many expectations from the son you never wanted.”

  “Forgive them, Karna, even if you cannot forgive your mother.”

  “Forgive Arjuna for all that he has done? Tell your noble son I am not a great man like Bhishma. He is in for a nasty surprise if he tries such tricks with me.”

  Kunti dried her tears with her pallu and looked up at Karna calmly. “I know how to stop this war and still win. I will announce to the world that you are my son. Your evil friend will have to step aside for you. Then, my son – and not Gandhari’s – will sit on the throne.”

  “So this is all a part of your political game? You came to me because you wanted to win a petty point over Maharani Gandhari?”

  “Call it what you will. No one can prevent me, not even you, my son. I will do it.”

  Karna was taken aback. His first thought was for his friend. Suyodhana must never know. “If you do so, I will kill myself with my own sword. Suyodhana will be the rightful heir again. Rest assured that I will ensure you do not win.”

  “Karna, spare a thought for your mother. Spare my five sons.”

  “Five sons? Five including the twins of your co-wife Madri, but not six, including the son you threw out like trash?”

  “Do not misunderstand me, Karna. Allow me to explain. I do not wish you to die. You are my firstborn, my flesh and blood. I carried you for nine months and bore you in pain...“

  “What about Draupadi?” Karna asked, his eyes cold and unforgiving, his lips curved in a derisive smile.

  “She will be your wife, too. Being the eldest, you will have first right.”

  “You would do anything for power? Even this?” Karna’s eyes mocked as he let out a bitter laugh.

  Kunti looked away from the condemnation written on her son’s face. “I did not mean...“

  “I will spare the lives of four of your five sons – all except Arjuna. That is my promise to you.”

  “Oh no...son, do not harm your own brother. It is a great sin.”

  “You will have five sons after the war, Devi, not six. Either it will be Arjuna or me, though I am ashamed to call myself your son. Please leave before I regret my decision.”

  Kunti reached out her hand in blessing but Karna evaded her touch. He turned back to say, “I must thank you for throwing me away, else I would never have known what a real mother’s love is. Accept the gratitude of this Radheya, Devi Kunti.” Karna bowed and walked away with steady steps.

  ‘I thought he would agree to the kingship i
f I asked, if I admitted I was his mother. Oh, what have I done?’ Kunti cried silently.

  Krishna stepped out from behind a tree and walked towards his aunt smiling. “Every man has his destiny and Karna has chosen his.” He put a comforting arm around her shoulders.

  “You are wrong, Krishna. I am not being manipulative. It was not a game to me. He is my son,” Kunti declared coldly, shaking off Krishna’s arm.

  “And a great son, too! A son you can be proud of.” Krishna’s smile broadened. “Nevertheless, it was a valuable promise to extract from him, Aunt.”

  *****

  62 GANGADATTA

  BHISHMA COULD HEAR THE WAILING OF WOMEN. He could smell the blood from the battlefield. If only they would stop this carnage. The work of a lifetime was being destroyed before his eyes. “Oh death, why you have forsaken me?” the grand old man of Bharata moaned in pain. He wished Karna had stayed for a little longer. He wished his nephews would come and stay with him until he took his last breath. What had he achieved after a life lived for others – a bed of arrows shot byArjuna or the abuse Suyodhana had bestowed upon him? No one needed him now. All his efforts had been in vain.

  Shakuni’s anger he could understand. He was a Mlecha. But how he had loved him as a boy! Bhishma knew he had wronged Shakuni – shattered his kingdom, killed his father, and made his sister marry blind Dhritarashtra. He should have killed the little boy when he had found him cowering under his sister’s bed. It had been a grave mistake, but he knew he would have taken the same decision again. What he could not understand was Krishna’s ruthlessness and single-minded determination to win the war. True, he had come with an offer of truce, but why was he meddling in the affairs of the Kurus?

  Krishna’s obsession with dharma as he defined it, was the reason for all this carnage. How much more blood would flow for an idea nobody understood and each person defined in his own fashion? Both sides passionately believed they had dharma on their side. The tragedy was that no one was going to win, not even Krishna. They would all be losers in this war. Women and children would be the worst affected. His countrymen, already affected by the drought, would surely lose the most. They had always lost, irrespective of who ruled them. This war had no winners.

  Bhishma wanted to cry aloud to the Gods in heaven, ‘Have you no mercy that you afflict this poor earth and its people with so much misery?’ Then, in a moment of shocking clarity, he saw that the war would have winners, waiting in the wings like vultures, for the warriors on both sides to die. They would inherit this holy land, make a hell out of it and call it eternal dharma. His life had been futile.

  Bhishma was glad he would not live to see it. He wished death would come. He was unwanted, even by the beasts feasting on the dead in the temple of dharma. He was condemned to wait and witness the rise of Kaliyuga. ‘Ma Ganga, forgive your son, Gangadutta, for I have failed you,’ the great warrior of the Kurus cried alone.

  Far away, in the camps on either side, preparations went forward for the next day’s battle. They had already forgotten Bhishma. He was the past.

  *****

  63 END OF A POEM

  DRONA ELABORATED ON HIS BATTLE PLAN for the next day. After Bhishma’s fall, despite his friend’s pleas, Karna had declined the post of Commander-in-Chief and Suyodhana had been compelled to appoint Drona as Commander of the Kaurava forces.

  “Father, Mother has given me her blessing.”

  Suyodhana turned to see his young son standing behind him. Kumara looked glorious in his battle attire. Suyodhana embraced his son. Was he doing the right thing by taking this untested boy into fighting such a ruthless war?

  “And here, Kumara’s forces will meet Abhimanyu’s battalion head on. If Arjuna’s son tries to launch an attack on Kripa’s akhshouni...”

  Drona’s voice hammered in Suyodhana’s brain. He wanted to protest but his pride silenced him. He knew Lakshmana Kumara was not Abhimanyu’s equal in battle, but how could he say so without hurting the boy’s pride and his own? Suyodhana’s mind was a knot of worries as the Guru outlined his war strategy to his generals. If something went wrong, how would he face Bhanu? How would he face himself? But surely, nothing would go wrong?

  ***

  “This is a stupid war.” Shakuni sat in his tent, his hands restless. His eyes gleamed in the golden light of a burning torch. His son sat close by, listening. A moth buzzed around the torch and dived into the flame. An acrid smell filled the air.

  “This war is the most gruesome fighting I have seen, Father,” Uluka remarked, shaking his head.

  “This is a sham war. It is neither gruesome enough, nor bloody enough. Nothing is happening. These Indians stick to some ancient rules which make battles a joke.” Shakuni rattled his dice together and threw them on the floor. “What we need is raw emotion, wounds that will never heal. These Indians must carry the scars for centuries.”

  “What do you suggest, Father?” Uluka asked.

  “Important people must die, not just foot soldiers,” Shakuni said softly, looking at his sons. “Sleep well, for tomorrow we change everything.” He took the torch and thrust it head first into the sand. The flame broke into a thousand sparks and died with a hiss, drowning them in darkness. Shakuni lay awake long after his sons had fallen asleep.

  ***

  “Prince Kumara, it is your father...you must help him! Hurry, Abhimanyu has trapped him,” Shakuni shouted from his chariot.

  Kumara looked around, trying to locate his father’s chariot and banner. Where was the white flag with the coiled serpents? Through the cloud of smoke and dust he finally he saw it at a distance. Abhimanyu’s forces had encircled his father’s chariot. Guru Drona had warned him of such a move. How foolish he had been to stop for the wounded men around him! His father would die because of him.

  “Take me there,” Kumara screamed to his charioteer, pointing to the fluttering white flag. He braced himself as the chariot rumbled on at great speed. Arrows rained around him and a couple pierced his armour. “Faster, faster...” he yelled. The bow he held was heavy and his armour was suffocating him. Kumara had no clear idea of what he had to do, only that he had to save his father somehow.

  When he reached the spot, his father was nowhere to be seen. Instead, Uluka, Shakuni’s son, was fighting Abhimanyu from his chariot. Uluka’s had a similar flag, with one coiled serpent, but it also had the small emblem of Gandhara in its left corner.

  “Hey, you coward! Why are you running away?” Abhimanyu yelled at the fast vanishing Uluka.

  Kumara realized he had made a grave error and placed himself in harm’s way.

  “Prince, see who we have here,” a soldier said, jumping into Kumara’s chariot.

  Abhimanyu turned and his eyes grew wide with surprise. “What are you doing here, Kumara?” he asked as he threw down his bow and unsheathed his sword.

  Another soldier jumped into Kumara’s chariot. With a force he had never imagined he possessed, Kumara kicked the first soldier. The second one charged at him but Kumara cut him down with his sword. Clutching his lacerated stomach, the man collapsed onto the chariot floor. Kumara looked at the river of blood in a daze. He threw down his sword, saying in horror, “I have killed a man!”

  Kumara’s charioteer tried to leap down and escape but Abhimanyu cut off his head with a slash of his sword. Then he advanced towards his childhood friend and grabbed Kumara by the hair.

  “Abhimanyu, are you going to kill me?” Kumara asked softly,

  “This is war, my friend. I am sorry, Kumara. The world will miss a poet.” With one clean sweep of his sword, Abhimanyu severed Kumara’s head. It dropped to the ground and rolled away. Arjuna’s son thrust his sword into the head and raised it for the world to see. “Behold! I have killed Duryodhana’s son and heir!”

  All around him, conches sounded and drums boomed to mark his feat. His father and uncles arrived to congratulate him. He had made them proud. Abhimanyu stood in the middle of the battlefield with Kumara’s head raised on the tip of his s
word. He felt a twinge of pity for the friend he had killed, but the exhilarating victory and pride in his father’s eyes soon swept away such feelings.

  He was about to walk away when he saw something strange. What was wrong with Iravan’s severed head? He blinked. The head had somehow changed into Kumara’s, then some Rakshasa’s, before changing back to Iravan. The head kept changing its features. Abhimanyu’s throat went dry. He stared in utter horror and disbelief. He was looking at his own severed head on the spike.

  ***

  “I want him dead,” Bhanumati said fiercely, her eyes and lips red and swollen from crying.

  Suyodhana did not raise his head. He yearned for the release of tears but they refused to come.

  “You killed him! You told me you would protect him; that no harm would befall him. I want to see your Subhadra weep like me. Go! Get me Abhimanyu’s head! Give me your word as a man that you will kill him.”

  “Bhanu, it is a war... your son died like a warrior.”

  “I don’t want words, I want Abhimanyu’s head. Kill him mercilessly, just as he killed my son.”

  “Devi Bhanumati, it was I, as Commander, who failed to protect your son.” Drona came forward with head bowed.

  “Guru, do not protect my husband. It was not your fault but his. He failed to protect his only son. But we are nothing to him. How does it matter that our son is dead? My Kumara never wanted to fight anyone, never wanted to be a warrior. He was a gentle soul. But he went to make his father proud. Now he is dead. My son did not want the throne. For whose sake does my husband fight but his own?

  “Abhimanyu will not see tomorrow’s sunset, Devi. This is Drona’s word. They have broken yet another rule of war – not to attack a disarmed man. We will not rest until we have vanquished the amoral Pandavas.”

  “What good will that do my son, Guru? My Kumara is never going to come back.”

  “His sacrifice will not have been in vain. Place your trust in me.”

  “Guru, you are too kind, but why does my husband remain silent?”