The Aryavarta Chronicles Book 03: Kurukshetra Read online

  ‘Hmm. I’d suggest you think further on that. Indr-prastha has one weakness, Syoddhan. It is impregnable, it can withstand siege, it can outlast any enemy. But what it cannot do is support a huge army – which I suppose is another defence in itself.’

  ‘Surely that is an advantage.’

  ‘From a military perspective, yes. From a political perspective, however… As it stands, your men and mine form the city’s army, and they are as much as we can manage to have here. If Govinda attacks in Dharma Yudhisthir’s name, he will do so with the might of Matsya and, we should assume, Panchala behind him.’

  Syoddhan said, ‘How does that matter? We can withstand them, can we not?’

  ‘The city can,’ Asvattama said. ‘But your rule will not. With two of Aryavarta’s most powerful nations against you, some for you… What happens when Sudakshin’s men start getting hungry? Or when some other ally’s soldiers begin dying of disease and lack of sanitation? These kings who march to your side do so in the expectation of immediate war, not endless strife. They do it for duty, but also for the spoils from war. How long will they continue to side with you if you can’t maintain their men? And once their coffers are empty, as are yours, then what? We – your friends – won’t abandon you, Syoddhan, but we cannot be sure how the rest of the kingdoms will react to such a situation. Now do you see? Politically speaking, only a ruler who enjoys great trust and loyalty from his vassals – one who truly rules over united Aryavarta – can hold Indrprastha. It’s brilliant!’

  ‘But…’ Syoddhan began, but stopped short as the import of Asvattama’s words sank in.

  Asvattama continued, ‘It is like a piece of hot iron. Not everyone who picks it up would be able to hold it. And by refusing to make peace, you have set off this rather impressive trap, and Govinda knows it.’

  ‘Are you saying this is my fault?’ Syoddhan bristled.

  Asvattama shrugged and met Syoddhan’s angry eyes with patience. Finally, Syoddhan turned away. His voice was quiet when he said, ‘Much is my fault, yet none of it is, though I could not admit that to anyone but you. By Rudra, Asvattama, you have no idea how liberating it is to just be here for a day to two, away from Hastina. Every day I’m there I feel as though I’m being torn apart, pulled in different directions. Often, I don’t know what to do, and so…’

  ‘You do nothing. You say nothing.’

  Syoddhan’s eyes were earnest. ‘Is that wrong? All my life, I have been told that destiny is nothing but Divine Order in action, a higher will manifested on earth for us to follow. So it follows that to surrender to destiny is to surrender to a higher power, to follow Divine Order. All that I have done has been such, I have made no effort to twist events to my whim, but let destiny take its course – with me, with my family…with the Empire. And yet…and yet I cannot help but feel that in ages to come people will not remember me as the man who let destiny prevail, but as one who failed.’

  ‘This bothers you?’

  ‘It bothers me that it can be so; that doing what is good, what is right, can still lead to perdition and ruin. Would future generations not speak of Syoddhan Kauravya as the hero who stood to preserve the noble way of life as everything came crumbling down around him? Yet I know it is not whether I do right or wrong that will decide how I am spoken of, but the simple fact of whether I have won or lost… Does it not bother you, Asvattama?’

  The tall warrior shook his head. ‘No.’

  ‘No?’ Syoddhan was astonished.

  ‘No,’ Asvattama confirmed. ‘Just as it does not bother me that in ages to come it is not I who will be remembered as your loyal friend, the man who stood by you through perdition and ruin. But that does not, will not, stop me doing so, Syoddhan. As for what will be said of me – you’re right, that ultimately depends on whether we win or lose.’

  A melancholy silence followed. Finally, Syoddhan said, ‘Look at us, speaking of winning and losing as though war were upon us. Posturing, that’s all it will come to. Posturing and waving arms about, and then good sense will prevail. My cousin may be a self-righteous idiot, but he is not a bloodthirsty man. He will not allow war to come upon this realm… You know, I never really understood how anyone could win a war, when it leads to such great loss on both sides anyway.’

  ‘For such existential questions,’ Asvattama said, ‘it is a philosopher, possibly one of the Firstborn acharyas, that you need to speak to. All I can tell you is this: If it comes to war, you don’t want to make your stand here, at Indr-prastha. You need to meet the enemy at a more strategic location, one where your allies can stand by you, not just in principle, but in fact. You need to stand in command over the single, mighty force that will be the army of united Aryavarta.’

  Syoddhan asked, ‘What do you have in mind?’

  ‘Govinda will call for them to assemble at one place – probably Matsya. He is interested in a display of strength, just as we are. But to show his might, he will pull together his allies’ forces, removing them from their current strategic positions around us.’

  ‘Then why wait?’ Syoddhan said. ‘We can stop them before they begin to consolidate their forces. We can direct Sudakshin to attack Dhrupad before he marches to Matsya.’

  ‘Are you sure Dhrupad marches to Matsya?’ Asvattama’s smile was both sad and cruel.

  ‘No,’ Syoddhan said. ‘You’re right. Southern Panchala is still in play, no matter what ties of blood and matrimony they may have to Dharma. The Grandsire’s influence over Dhrupad is strong.’

  ‘To throw Sudakshin at Dhrupad may make him side with Dharma, irrespective. We must be patient if your victory is to be absolute. Do nothing but send emissaries and gather troops. And if Govinda, in turn, musters troops to Dharma’s aid, then let him. He will think you have fallen into the trap of trying to create a garrison here at Indr-Prastha. But you will not…Your Highness…’

  Syoddhan did not miss the added honorific, Asvattama’s customary way of tempering his commands to make them appear like advice. But that the other man so instructed him did not bother Syoddhan at all. He responded in the same vein, preserving his illusion of supremacy, more as a matter of studied habit than as intent to assert his authority. ‘And where do you suggest we make our stand?’

  Asvattama said, ‘Kuru’s Fields. Kurukshetra.’

  ‘But…the terrain? If we come in from the south, from Indrprastha, does that not expose our line of approach? And what about Jayadrath’s forces: They must march in from the west. Shalya will most certainly march to Dharma’s aid, along the same path… What is the point of secrecy then? The whole purpose of preempting the attack by meeting the enemy at Kurukshetra would be defeated.’

  ‘It would, unless we had help. Syoddhan, I may not be your best friend, but will you nevertheless trust that I act in your best interests?’

  ‘Yes.’ It was all Syoddhan could bring himself to say.

  ‘Then ready your armies.’

  21

  SEATED IN THE MIDDLE OF THE CROWDED DINING HALL AT Kampilya, his father’s vassals in their festive finery and best spirits surrounding him, Dhrstyadymn, Crown Prince of Panchala, felt alone. He would have, in an instant, traded each last one of the assembled nobles and every single delicacy to eat and drink that was there before him for a quiet moment with one man: his brother, Shikandin. Over the years, Dhrstyadymn had got over his guilt at having taken from his brother the right to rule Southern Panchala, but it nevertheless bothered him that some things had not changed – for instance, no one in the entire palace had spoken of or asked about Shikandin since the day they had last seen him.

  Shikandin had set out directly from Matsya on what Dhrstyadymn knew was a task to muster forces. In fact, the Crown Prince had expected he would soon have to do the same on his father’s orders. But then, to his disbelief, Dhrupad had chosen to wait.

  ‘She’s your daughter. The rest of the realm goes to war for her, but you won’t?’ Dhrstyadymn had asked, furious.

  His father had been terse. ‘And this
is my kingdom. I have more to think about and answer for than petty personal grievances.’ Gritting his teeth, the king had added, ‘My eldest son may well be dead for all the good he has done me. My daughter – she too has brought me no joy. You are all I have left, Dhrstyadymn. I trust you won’t disappoint me.’

  After that conversation, Dhrupad had gone out of his way to create the impression that all was well in Southern Panchala – entertaining his nobles, inviting vassal lords to visit. Each occasion was marked by an excess of revelry and drink, the aftermath of which were suffered mostly by the attendants and concubines of the royal palace. Dhrstyadymn turned as one such concubine trailed her slender fingers down his arm. ‘More wine, my prince?’

  He smiled and shook his head. She waited in invitation but when it was clear that Dhrstyadymn was not in the mood to be entertained in any manner of her specialization, she moved away. To his surprise, though, she headed straight for Yudhamanyu: Shikandin’s son, if one could still use the filial appellation for a man who held nothing but utter hatred for his father.

  It was partly fate and partly Dhrupad’s fault that things had always been this way. Shikandin’s marriage to Dasarnika, the princess of a neighbouring nation, had been a political arrangement. Shikhandin’s mistake, as he had admitted in retrospect, had been that he had not refused. He had been too drunk on power and his status as a prince to realize that deep inside he was already in love with a simple forest-dweller. He had tried to be a good husband, as a matter of duty if not desire, but his love for Guhyaka had been too intrinsic a part of the bigger journey that he had already begun. His lust for power quickly died out, his ambitions faltered and very soon he was a different man, not the mighty prince with a great reign before him whom Dasarnika had married. Consequently, the marriage of political convenience soon turned into a relationship of distrust and hatred. Dasarnika and her father had demanded the marriage be annulled, claiming that Shikandin was not a man and had not been able to consummate the marriage.

  The dishonour of such a claim had been too much for Dhrupad to take, and the incident had driven the final wedge into the king’s already tenuous relationship with his son. An enraged Shikandin had eventually succeeded in impregnating his wife, though in a terrible, violent way for which he had never been able to forgive himself. Dasarnika had refused to see him again and returned home to her father. And though she had died at childbirth, her legacy of hatred had continued in the form of Yudhamanyu, her son.

  Dhrstyadymn’s first memory of Yudhamanyu was not a pleasant one. It had been some days after he and Panchali had been adopted as Dhrupad’s children, and Dhrstyadymn remembered being in the royal treasury trying to get his head around the kingdom’s taxation and revenues, when he had heard the sound of crying. Searching, he had found Yudhamanyu, then hardly five years old, sitting in a dark corner of the treasury. The boy was curled up on the dusty floor, weeping uncontrollably, holding a small but well-adorned hair-pin bearing the Dasarna kingdom’s emblem close to him. Dhrstyadymn had sat down next to the boy, taken him on his knees and let him cry for a while, gently rocking him back and forth. At length, he had said, ‘Come, let’s go find your father.’

  ‘I do not have a father,’ Yudhamanyu had said, in a surprisingly adult tone, shocking Dhrstyadymn to the core. ‘Shikandin is not my father. He is a traitor and a cheat who hurt my mother. He was a woman who went into the forests and met an ugly, one-legged Yaksha, with horns on its head. The Yaksha used his magic to turn Shikandin into a man, and he came back and hurt my mother even more.’

  Dhrstyadymn had held the boy close, but had been unable to say anything. Distraught, he had sought out his brother at the earliest opportunity.

  Shikandin had brushed off his concerned enquiry. ‘Do you believe in karma, Dhrstyadymn, the inevitable circle of life?’ he had asked, with a grim smile. ‘Then you will see that this is mine. My son despises me the way I have despised my father all my life. But that cannot change. I made my choices; I did what I had to. If, for that, I have to go through my life being hated by my own son, so be it.’

  After all these years, Dhrstyadymn now knew the whole story. He saw what it was that drove Shikandin to the forests, how noble his brother was. But he still floundered for the words to tell Yudhamanyu the truth.

  Dhrstyadymn felt a touch yet again and was about to shrug it off, irritated, when he heard the voice of Satrajit, the Commander of the Panchala armies. ‘Father wants to see you at once. We have a visitor.’

  ‘Who…?’

  ‘Come, see for yourself. You won’t believe it. And before you get your hopes up, there is no way this can be anything good…’

  His heart sinking, Dhrstyadymn rose to his feet and followed his brother out of the hall. Yudhamanyu joined them.

  ‘You too?’ Dhrsytyadymn asked, and the younger man nodded in response. The gesture only served to remind both Dhrstyadymn and Satrajit of Shikandin, for despite Yudhamanyu’s best efforts to look as little like his father as he could, including directing the royal barber to cut his hair ‘just like Uncle Drsytydymn’s’, he was undoubtedly Shikandin’s son in more ways that one. And that, Dhrstyadymn often reminded himself, gave him hope. Someday Yudhamanyu might just understand and forgive his father, Dhrstyadymn thought, just as the door to Dhrupad’s private chambers opened and he finally saw who their visitor was.

  With a silent sigh, he let go of all hope and focused his attention on their visitor: the Grandsire of Kuru, Bhisma Devavrata.

  22

  KING DHRUPAD WAS A MAN OF CONSIDERABLE PRIDE AND FELT rightly entitled to be so. The Panchala dynasty was as old and honoured as the Kurus, and at one point, generations ago, they had shared a great ancestor. Both the common and the splintered family lines had produced great emperors and many great kings. By virtue of its location, the region around Panchala’s capital, Kampilya, was fertile and verdant, and thus capable of supporting a great army – one strong enough to consistently quell all dissidence that arose in the less prosperous mountainous regions in the north of the kingdom as well as the dense forests on its eastern borders. In short, Dhrupad was the mighty king of an old and powerful nation, and he never let anyone forget it, least of all himself.

  Except, that is, in the presence of Bhisma Devavrata, Grandsire of the Kurus. Dhrstyadymn did not fail to notice how Dhrupad was muted, subservient in Bhisma’s presence. The reasons were steeped in recent history, he knew, though it had taken Dhrstyadymn a long time and some terrible incidents to understand the situation in all its complexity. Despite all its strengths, once, just once, the great army of Panchala had failed to keep rebellion in check – when the same Firewrights who had contributed to Panchala’s rise turned against their rulers. And that was when Bhisma Devavrata had come to Panchala’s aid, routing the Firewrights, restoring Dhrupad’s father Prishata to power. In return, Panchala had set up her armies to join in the Great Scourge, killing, ravaging, raping their way through one village of Firewrights after another. But even that had not been enough to set the kings of Panchala free of their debt to Bhisma Devavrata, and the Grandsire’s influence had remained a shadow over their heads.

  Dhrstyadymn clenched his fist as it struck him that Panchali’s wedding to Dharma Yudhisthir, all those years ago, was equally a result of Bhisma’s interventions as it was of Dwaipayana Vyasa’s. As for all that had happened since… He forced himself to let go of his anger as both Bhisma and Dhrupad turned to look at him.

  ‘Ah! There they are,’ Bhisma said, exuberant. ‘Dhrstyadymn, Panchala’s future… I say, Dhrupad, your son’s skill with astra-weapons is unbelievable. I saw him train when he was at Acharya Dron’s hermitage. One warrior like him, in every generation, and all will be well. And this…’ Bhisma turned to Yudhamanyu, ‘I suppose, is your grandson?’

  The words held a distinct hesitation, which was not lost on those present. Yudhamanyu grit his teeth with anticipated shame, as Dhrupad hastily declared, ‘He is Dhrstyadymn’s son, for all purposes. His uncle, the Crown Prince
, has brought him up in his own likeness. He too has trained with astra-weapons. In fact, with heirs like these, I wish we had a couple of Firewrights left, who could make astra-weapons for their use. The Kuru-Panchalas could then rule the world!’

  The statement was made partly in jest, but Dhrupad’s tone lacked the requisite levity, and so left an uncomfortable strain in its wake. He cleared his throat for lack of anything to say, but Dhrstyadymn took it as a reminder to formally bow to Bhisma Devavrata. Yudhamanyu did the same.

  Dhrstyadymn then said, ‘You sent for us, Father?’

  ‘I did,’ Dhrupad said. ‘The Grandsire has some disturbing counsel for us. I wished you both to listen to him directly, and speak your mind on the matter. After all, you are, as he said, the future of the kingdom, of the entire realm.’

  ‘Nonsense,’ the Grandsire intervened. ‘Nothing disturbing at all. Merely political strategy and that too devised by the master of such situations: Dwaipayana himself. I see you have not declared your support for Dharma Yudhisthir as yet…’

  The statement left Dhrupad visibly uncertain as to what was expected of him in terms of a response and consequent action. ‘I… we…’ he began.

  Again, Bhisma cut in. ‘You must declare that you stand with him. Take your armies and march to Matsya or wherever it is that he gathers his forces. You have a little over one akshauhini division, do you not? That is a sizeable army, indeed. Yes, you must do this, at once.’

  ‘Why?’ The question was clearly on everyone’s mind, but it was the impetuous Yudhamanyu who blurted it out.

  ‘Do you want war, young man? Do you really want war?’ Bhisma gave Yudhamanyu a condescending glance. ‘I don’t,’ the Grandsire went on, before the youth could reply. ‘In general, I prefer peace to war, and in this instance in particular I prefer peace quite strongly. It is my kin, my children who stand at odds with each other, and I will do all I can to keep Kuru blood from being spilled in a civil war.’