“Send them!” Rukmi said. “Do you think I fear your powers? What you have done today has shamed my sister, my father, my family. Our honor will never be repaired unless I kill you now.”
Krishna shook his head. “Rukmi, I did what I had to for reasons too complex to explain now. But if you wish, I will sit with you and attempt to make you understand why I had to do things this way. After all, we shall now be brothers-in-law. I have sworn an oath to your sister that I will not harm you and your family in any way.”
Rukmi shook his head, showing his crooked tooth in scorn. “Harm? You have destroyed our family! What else did we have but our honor. You took that from us when you took our sister. Return her at once and perhaps I may yet let you live. But know this, you will never be my brother-in-law, you Gupta Ranchodri!”
Krishna recognized the twin insults and could guess who had put those names into Rukmi’s ears. He shook his head, attempting a smile: “We may yet repair this damage. Shake my hand and let us solemnize this match with the blessings of all Vidarbha and Dwarka combined.”
Rukmi hawked and spit on the ground at Krishna’s feet. “Never! We of Vidarbha honor our sisters. We do not make peace with those kidnap them like rakshasas. How did you become such a coward, Ranchodri? I expected better of a Yadava. Was it your birth parents who made you into a coward or was it your years living among the cowherds of Gokul and Vrindavan?”
Krishna stiffened at the words but still attempted to speak calmly. “Be careful what you say next, Rukmi. I too can say things about you and your family that you will not like. About your alliance with Jarasandha and Magadha for instance.”
Rukmi walked to and fro, shouting even louder now. “That is all you can do, is it not? You will not fight me like a man. You will not give me the opportunity to avenge my family’s dishonor. You will not even grant me an honorable death! After all that I have heard about you, Krishna of the Yadu dynasty, you are a sore disappointment. Perhaps you spent too much time among the gopis of Gokul! Or perhaps you were fed so much Vrishni milk from your adoptive mother’s breast that you have no blood in your veins anymore, only milk!”
Krishna stared at him coldly, his eyes flickering with a deep blue glow. “Stop speaking of my parents and family in that way, Rukmi. It will not be tolerated. Not another word.”
Rukmi showed his tooth again. “So you can insult my family but I must not speak of your’s? That is so fair and just, is it not? Is that your dharma then? And does your dharma count for more than my own? You are nothing but a cowherd who murdered his own uncle in an unfair fight. Not just a cowherd, but also a coward, like all the cowardly cowherds of Gokul!”
“Enough!” Krishna said, still keeping his voice at a loud but conversational level. “I ask you one last time, cease this pointless bickering and return home to Kundina. The real enemy of your people is Jarasandha, not I!”
Rukmi drew an arrow and shouted: “You dare not order me, you who dishonored your own Yadu dynasty. You are nothing but a thief and a kidnapper of women. I will kill you here and now. If you dare, then fight back and kill me like a man. Or prove yourself to be the cowherd you truly are!”
18
Balarama saw brilliant yellow light scorching his vision and blinked, raising a hand to cover his eyes. Dust trickled from his raised hand onto his chest. He blinked and rose to his elbow, looking around. His head felt as if it had been struck by a gada as indestructible as his own. The yellow light was the sun, he saw now, and he was laying sprawled in the dust, some two score yards from where Jarasandha had left his chariot. But where was Jarasandha?
He got to his feet, shaking off the dust from his clothes. All he remembered was running directly at Jarasandha and Jarasandha running towards him. Then everything went white. He looked around, moving several yards in one direction, then the other. Finally he spotted something that he recognized at once. Except…there was something strange about it. Something not quite right.
It was a piece of a body.
He had seen enough corpses and partial pieces of corpses not to be disgusted. But this was unlike anything he had seen before in his life.
It was a piece of Jarasandha’s arm, the part where the arm met the torso, part of a shoulder, torn off like a joint of meat lopped off by a clean sharp blade. He could understand that happening: The full force of impact produced by Balarama running at a person could tear the body to pieces. And Jarasandha had run at him too with considerable force. Balarama had torn entire companies to shreds this way, with or without his mace.
But this was not a mere joint of meat with tendrils and blood oozing, torn muscle and flesh, ripped from the body. It was sliced off as cleanly as a chopped section of meat. Like a block of wood that could fit back into the larger log from which it had been chipped.
He looked around and saw there were other pieces laying about. Some dozens of yards away. He spotted part of a leg, another leg, a hip, a bit of torso, a belly, a neck, half a head…he blinked and stared at that one again. Half a head? Cut cleanly in half as if severed by an executioner’s blade.
How was it possible to shatter a body to pieces this way, as if it were but a block of wood or stone?
The answer, of course, was that it wasn’t possible.
And yet, the evidence lay all around Balarama.
He was still musing what to do when suddenly a golden object descended into his frame of view. He snatched up his mace, ready to fight, assuming it was one of Jarasandha’s allies or champions come to belatedly fight for their master.
But it was Krishna’s Pushpak. Daruka was steering it and he brought it low enough that he was hovering only a foot above ground, a yard from Balarama. Rukmini was standing behind the sarathi, in the chariot well and she looked as if she had been weeping.
“Bhaiya Balarama,” she said, pleading with her hands joined together, “I beg of you, please come and stop it before it is too late. Please.”
Balarama didn’t need any further urging. He leaped into the chariot, landing with a thump beside his sister-in-law-to-be. Normally his weight would have caused most ordinary chariots to shudder and the horses to rear in panic but the pushpak didn’t budge a fraction of an inch. Daruka steered the vehicle away, flying them back in the direction of Kundini.
Balarama glanced back and saw the pieces of Jarasandha’s body still lay spread across the ground. He could not believe he had just killed the God Emperor of Jarasandha with a single impact yet that appeared to be the case.
***
“Enough!” Krishna said.
His body bristled with arrows, not just the six Rukmi had shot earlier but others he had shot now. Krishna had endured the arrows and insults until now but still Rukmi would not be satisifed. His taunts had grown more insulting, more offensive until finally, it was more than Krishna could bear.
He gestured and his divine Bow appeared in his hand. With one fluid gesture, he loosed a flurry of arrows.
Rukmi’s bow was shattered, his sword shattered, his quiver destroyed--every arrow in it shattered to bits--and then Rukmi himself was struck by arrows. One in each arm, one in each leg, one in each side. He grimaced but the wounds were all in his flesh, not one struck a vital organ or caused permanent damage.
There was no shortage of weapons lying on the field around them. Rukmi took up an iron mace and swung it, coming at Krishna with rage on his face.
Krishna loosed an arrow, shattering the iron mace into smithereens. The fragments went flying away, not one touching Rukmi directly but showering the air over the ground. They clattered onto the helmets and armor and weapons of the fallen soldiers.
Rukmi picked up a spear.
Krishna shattered the spear.
Rukmi raised a lance.
Krishna shattered it.
Rukmi took up a javelin.
Krishna broke the arrow to pieces.
Rukmi found a sword and came at him, Krishna bent the sword into a twisted curl.
Rukmi flung a shield at him, Krishna melted it like molasses.
/>
Then Rukmi looked around, saw that every weapon he chose was useless, and understood what he had to do.
He unclipped his helmet and tossed it aside. It rolled across the grass and came to a halt by the fallen body of a horse and its ride, both pierced by javelins and arrows.
Rukmi unbuckled his leather-and-metal armored chestplate and let it fall heavily to the ground.
He removed every bracelet, chain and protective covering he had one.
Finally, clad in only a langot, as near naked as a man could be, he threw himself at Krishna without another word.
All that needed to be said had been said. Now, this was a fight to the death. He was attacking Krishna with the last weapon a man had left in battle: his own body.
In one smooth motion, Krishna swung around, avoiding Rukmi’s headlong rush, turned back and grasped hold of Rukmi by his hair, holding him at bay.
Rukmi continued to spout insults, directed at Krishna’s mother, father, friends, brother, community…
“Enough!” Krishna said.
He grasped a blade that lay at hand, a sword dropped by some fallen soldier. He set the edge of the blade to Rukmi’s throat, drawing blood. “Cease now.”
“Kill me then!” Rukmi taunted. “You chose to fight me as a god. Now at least kill me like a man!” Then he said something about Krishna’s mother that no man, god or asura could tolerate being said about his maatr.
Krishna paused a moment then brought the blade up and with one swift motion, sliced the hair off Rukmi’s scalp. Thick oily hair fell like sheaves of wheat to the ground.
The blade flashed in Krishna’s hand, again and yet again.
When he was done, he tossed the blade aside and rose to his feet, turning and walking away. There was almost no expression on Krishna’s face but in his eyes blue lightning flickered and in his mouth, a typhoon swirled.
***
“Krishna!”
Balarama leaped from the pushpak, landing on the ground with a resounding thump that the watching kings must have felt in their bones. He ran to where Rukmi lay and examined the prince of Vidarbha. Rukmi’s eyes flashed in his rage-mottled face. Trickles of blood ran down his scalp and sides of his face.
Krishna had not harmed Rukmi himself. He had shaved off the hair from his head and face. Shaved him clean as a son mourning for a dead parent.
Balarama swore and strode away from Rukmi, going after Krishna.
Krishna beckoned with a finger and Pushpak descended to ground level.
Balarama reached him and caught hold of his brother’s shoulder. “Why did you do that?”
Krishna turned and looked at him. Balarama lurched involuntarily. He had rarely seen Krishna so angry, so dark before.
“I could have done far worse,” Krishna said. “He gave me just cause. It was your mother and father and people he insulted as well, Sankarshan.” The voice that spoke was Krishna’s and yet not Krishna’s. Balarama remembered that voice from another time, another age, another incarnation, deep within a haunted forest, surrounded by corpses of hybrid monsters, and he remembered this Krishna, this being, this brother.
Balarama looked into Krishna’s eyes for a moment, seeing that brother across all lifetimes, past, present and future. “You should not have disfigured him in that manner, bhraatr,” he said gently, admonishingly, as only an elder brother can admonish, “For one like he, it is worse than dying on the battlefield. You may as well have killed him.”
Krishna looked back at him, hearing his words but as if from a distant and remote corner of Creation, one where the laws of mortals did not matter. “He wanted to die. I granted his wish. Yet I also upheld my oath to Rukmini. There is only so much even a god can do, Sankarshan. Now leave me be.”
And he climbed aboard the pushpak.
Balarama stood for a moment, looking around. The kings and chiefs still watched, as did their army.
In the distance, he could hear the sound of the conch shell sequence that signalled retreat and withdrawal of the Yadava forces. They were pulling back and starting the long journey back to the staging point. Krishna and he were to meet them there and arrange for the transport back to Dwarka, using the usual precautions to ensure they were not followed and their desination remained unknown.
It seemed that Jarasandha was dead and the day was won. Once again, the sons of Vasudeva had triumphed. It was time to go home. Yet he could not help feeling that something vital remained to be done. That the victory was a hollow and fleeting one. That the real threat still lay at large, looming, ominous, approaching when one least expected it.
From the chariot, he heard the sound of Rukmi’s voice, speaking softly to Krishna. He could not hear Krishna’s voice replying. He knew that although his brother had gained the bride he desired in this lifetime, he had paid a dear price for it. But then again, nothing came without a price, not even love.
Balarama boarded the chariot and watched as the ground fell away at blinding speed and the pushpak carried them home to Dwarka.
Also in the Krishna Coriolis Series
Violating the peace accord sealed by his father, King Ugrasena’s renegade son Prince Kamsa embarks on a rampage of destruction…until he meets his nemesis King Vasudeva who is supernaturally immune to any attack from Kamsa! So Kamsa allies with the evil Jarasandha, emperor of Magadha, to awaken his own demoniac powers. Returning to Mathura as a rakshasa in human form, Kamsa wrests control by force, imprisoning his new brother-in-law Vasudeva and wife because of the prophecy that foretells that their Eighth Child will be his destruction. But even in the womb, the unborn Krishna uses powerful magic to cast a spell across the entire kingdom on the night of his own birth! Now, the stage is set for the epic clash of the child-god and the terrible forces of evil with the birth of Krishna…Slayer of Kamsa!
only from
AKB eBOOKS
www.akbebooks.com
Also in the Krishna Coriolis Series
The prophesied Slayer of Kamsa has been born and smuggled out of Mathura in the dead of night. Kamsa finds that his nephew has escaped and flies into a demoniac rage. Meanwhile, Jarasandha of Magadha arrives in Mathura with his coterie of powerful supporters to ensure that Kamsa stays loyal to him. But Kamsa is not to be crushed. With the help of Putana, a powerful demoness living incognito among humans, he slowly regains his strength and acquires new powers. Packed with surprising insights into the characters of Kamsa and Putana, Dance of Govinda is a brilliant interpretation of the nature of evil in a world that teeters on the edge of violence.
only from
AKB eBOOKS
www.akbebooks.com
Also in the Krishna Coriolis Series
Infant Krishna and his half-brother Balarama are the most mischievous children in all of Gokuldham, getting up to all sorts of pranks, raiding neighbours’ dahi handis and letting the calves run free. But disciplining God Incarnate is no easy task. It slowly dawns on Mother Yashoda that the babe she is trying to protect is in fact the protector of the entire world! As Krishna survives one horrific asura attack after the other, she comes to terms with the true identity of her adopted son. Meanwhile, Kamsa despatches a team of otherworldly assassins to slay his nemesis. Harried by Kamsa’s forces, Krishna’s adoptive father, the peace-loving Nanda Maharaja, is forced to lead his people into exile. They find safe haven in idyllic Vrindavan. But even in this paradise, deadly demons lurk…
only from
AKB eBOOKS
www.akbebooks.com
Also in the Krishna Coriolis Series
As Krishna grows into youthful manhood, Kamsa grows ever more desperate to kill his nemesis. With Jarasandha’s aid, the rakshasa-king launches a relentless campaign of demonic assault against Krishna–and his fellow Vrishnis. Young gopi Radha learns to her sadness that Krishna cannot return her love when he has the fate of all humankind in his hands. Finally the day of the prophecy arrives and the stage is set for the final showdown between Krishna the boy-god and Kamsa, lord of Mathura.
&nbs
p;
KRISHNA CORIOLIS#6: Fortress of Dwarka Page 26