THE MAHABHARATA: A Modern Rendering, Vol 2 (60 page)

The brahmana incinerates Yudhishtira’s common legions with the greater devastras. Fire stalks Kurukshetra and Drona is Agni incarnate. The war is Drona and he is death come naked to the world. Everywhere the sickly-sweet smell of burnt human flesh hangs in the air. The Kauravas rally around their Senapati and not the five Pandavas together can contain him. Few duels are fought, the war swirls around just Drona. Duryodhana and Nakula face each other briefly; and the Kaurava has his bow snapped in his palm and hastily retreats. Dusasana encounters Sahadeva and here also the Pandava prevails after a short, fierce encounter. In another duel, Karna and Bheema meet. In memory of how Karna humiliated him, Bheema fights beyond himself for revenge. Again, he finds Karna is an archer of superior gifts. Karna strikes Bheema unconscious in his chariot, then, spares his life once more.

Meanwhile, Krishna maneuvers Arjuna’s chariot to confront Drona and Kurukshetra seems transported to another world by the duel between that master and disciple, each fighting at the very ends of his skill. In two brilliant bands, astras sizzle across the field of moment. Only those who are masters themselves of the missiles can fathom the subtleties of that contention; the others watch, awed.

For some time, they fight, guru and sishya and neither prevails. Then, Drona, who by now hardly knows what he does, invokes a fearsome weapon. The brahmana summons the greatest brahmastra
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. Kurukshetra is rocked by a seismic tremor and a sudden night falls, when he chants the mantra for the transcendent ayudha. Only Drona’s chariot is enveloped in such light that the soldiers turn their faces from it. At its white heart, Drona draws back his bowstring and his body is a flame. In a moment, the old master looses the weapon at his favorite pupil. Pandavas and Kauravas wait, breathless; they know this is a moment that can end the war.

The brahmastra flares up into the darkened sky, lights it like five suns. Then, like doom, it falls on Arjuna’s chariot. But a gasp goes up from the armies of darkness and light. At the heart of that moment, Arjuna’s chariot also blazes like a star; his body is a pale fire as well and the Gandiva a lucific crescent in his hands. Another sun flames up from the Pandava’s bow and brahmastra and brahmastra meet in the sky. An explosion like the world ending shakes heaven and earth, a million men fall dazed on the ground. Astra blows astra apart on high; they blow the darkness away and it is daylight again on Kurukshetra. With a long roar of frustration, Drona rides away from Arjuna.

The fighting grows diffuse again, as many duels break out. At least for the time being, Arjuna has broken Drona’s dominance: the brahmana rides away to savage the Panchala army once more. Dhr-ishtadyumna and Dusasana face each other; but the Kaurava cannot stand against the angry fire-prince. Swiftly, he has his bow cloven and his sarathy leaves the field before his warrior is killed.

Another duel rages nearby, a piquant one. Chance brings Duryodhana and Satyaki face to face. They fight fiercely, but with smiles on their faces! Though Duryodhana is some years the older, these two had once been inseparable friends. Suddenly, Duryodhana feels a pang of remorse. He roars at Satyaki, “What a despicable war this is, in which you and I must fight each other. How I hate myself sometimes, Satyaki, for my arrogance, my lust for kingdom and that I am a kshatriya! Otherwise, we two would never face each other with arrows today.”

He lowers his bow briefly and so does Satyaki, a little startled. The Kaurava continues, “Do you remember the old days, my friend? How clearly they rise before my eyes, as if they were happening again. You were dearer to me than my very life and I to you! Look where time has brought us.”

Duryodhana’s confession is sharper than his arrows and Satyaki is taken aback to see the Kaurava wipe tears from his eyes. The Yadava cries, “All that is past, Duryodhana! This is not our guru’s house, when I was a boy and you a youth and you were so fond of me that you would play children’s games with me.”

Duryodhana says, “Oh, where are those innocent games? This is like another life and we are like strangers, Satyaki. How cruel time is. Look at us today. Fate is merciless, my friend and fate is my enemy. Karna always says that if fate is against you, there is nothing you can do. It is not we but fate that decides our lives, every moment of them.”

Quickly, tears fill the softhearted Satyaki’s eyes and he says, “We are kshatriyas and war is our dharma. There is no escape from that, Duryodhana. We fight and must not care if it is our brother or our friend we kill; if a sishya kills a guru or a guru his sishya. Duryodhana, if you still love me, I beg you, kill me quickly! I can’t bear to see you like this, or hear you speak thus to me.”

With a sigh, Duryodhana raises his bow and they fight again. Soon, Satyaki strikes the Kaurava down in his chariot and then rides away, with all the memories welling in his heart. He had seen his friend Duryodhana turn to arrogance and harshness, to ruthlessness; and against that Duryodhana he could fight. But now, he saw another Duryodhana, the loving friend who wept that they must fight, the one who remembered the tender past so well. This Duryodhana, Satyaki cannot bear to face in battle. The Yadava rides away as far from the Kaurava as he can. He will never speak of the moment they have shared, to anyone. Neither will he ever ride against the Kaurava again.

When Arjuna cuts down his brahmastra, he fuels his Acharya’s despair. Drona turns his wrath on the Pandava army. Astra after astra he looses at Yudhishtira’s soldiers; every missile consumes ten thousand men. The brahmana blazes like the sun just before the world ends. It seems his body is swathed in the flames of hell and no one can look at him too long, let alone face him in battle. The carnage is like the slaughter of the creatures at the end of a manvantara.

The Pandava warriors watch him, aghast. They cry to one another, “This isn’t our gentle Acharya. It is not the same man at all.”

“It isn’t Drona, but the demon that has possessed him.”

“Look at his face, it isn’t human.”

“His body is like the fire at the end of time.”

Krishna sees how Bharadvaja’s son consumes common soldiers with devastras. He says quietly to Yudhishtira, “This man cannot be vanquished in battle; and if he isn’t killed soon, you will have no army left. Look at your precious guru. Where is his dharma, that he looses devastras at our common soldiers? He must die. And since all of you together cannot kill him, we must also use a little adharma to bring him down.”

Yudhishtira waits, uncomfortably. Krishna goes on, “Drona can only be killed if he lays down his bow. The only way he will do that is if we first break his heart. Then, perhaps, Dhrishtadyumna can keep his vow.”

The Dark One pauses, “If there is anyone the cold brahmana loves more than his life, it is his son. If he hears Aswatthama is dead, he will put down his bow.”

“But the son is hardly easier to kill than the father!” cries Arjuna.

“I only said that Drona must be told Aswatthama is dead.”

Arjuna is shocked. “Oh no!”

Bheema says, “If we don’t stop the Acharya, the war is lost. Have no doubt of that.”

They gaze out at Drona, the inferno, who will make ashes of their dreams and a waste of all their trials. Nakula and Sahadeva echo Bheema’s approval. But Yudhishtira is silent. Krishna waits, everyone waits for the eldest Pandava to speak. Then Bheema cries impatiently, “I will kill an elephant called Aswatthama and tell Drona his son is dead. So there will be no lie. Yudhishtira, you must allow me to do this! Look, he kills a thousand men each moment.”

A trembling Yudhishtira nods his head, consenting. Bheema rides off and kills the king of Malava’s war-elephant, Aswatthama, with a blow of his mace. He comes storming up to Drona and roars, “Aswatthama is dead! Aswatthama is dead!”

Drona sways in his chariot. Darkness films his eyes and his very life lurches in shock. But he says to himself, ‘Bheema is lying, no one can kill my son.’

The brahmana begins to fight again, twice as savagely as before. Once more, he invokes the brahmastra and now not against Arjuna. Drona looses the missile at the Panchala and Somaka legions! A flash of fire as if a volcano has erupted among helpless soldiers: flames tall as trees engulf those armies and fifty thousand men perish in an instant. Silence falls on Kurukshetra; the war will not last until dusk, if Drona is not stopped. Duryodhana’s face is wreathed in a smile. At last, his Senapati fights as his king wants him to: now he would see how the Pandavas won this war.

But across the field, a subtle miracle is happening. Suddenly, Drona hears unearthly voices speaking to him from the air. When he looks up, astonished, he sees a host of shining beings materialized in the sky: only he saw them. Among those rishis
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, the brahmana sees his dead father Bharadvaja. A cry escapes Drona’s lips; in a moment, his eyes are full of tears.

The munis of Devaloka say, “You are not fighting with dharma, Drona; you burn men that know nothing of the astras with the brahmastra. Your time in the world has come to its end. Lay down your weapons now and prepare to die. Look, you see us with your mortal eyes. You are a brahmana, a master of the Vedas and Vedangas. This kshatriya’s violent way is not for you. Enough now, Mahatman: cast away the cloak of darkness in which you have wrapped yourself. Turn your mind again to the Brahman, your time to die is here.”

His father Bharadvaja says, “Put down your bow, my son. Your life on earth is over.”

The vision fades from the sky and Drona stands stricken in his chariot. Some way off, he sees the man born to kill him: Dhrishtadyumna hacks his way through the Kaurava army to reach his master. Away to the right and nearer, Drona sees Yudhishtira. Another war raging within him now, Drona turns to the Pandava. Seeking a final reason to die, the guru cries to his sishya, “Is it true, Yudhishtira? Is Aswatthama dead?”

Drona knows Yudhishtira will never tell a lie. He never has in all his life, even as a child. Krishna had already said to Yudhishtira, “When the time comes, Drona will ask you if Aswatthama is dead. The future of the world will depend on what you say to him. If you don’t tell this small white lie, the brahmana will fight on and in an hour or two you will have no army left. You will have the deaths of those who came to fight for you on your soul. But if you tell this small lie, I swear no blame will attach to you, no sin.”

Seeing Drona ravage his legions, Yudhishtira had reluctantly agreed. So now, when Drona cries out his fateful question, Yudhishtira hesitates only a moment before he replies, “Aswatthama is dead!” And adds under his breath, “The elephant Aswatthama.”

Yudhishtira was a man of such perfect dharma that his chariot never touched the earth but rode four fingers above it. Now, when he lied, his ratha descends to the ground and Dharma Deva’s son is like any other man in the mortal world.

Drona hears Yudhishtira and faints in his chariot. Every moment, Dhrishtadyumna battles his way nearer his Acharya. When Drona recovers, it seems his spirit is broken and the will to fight has all but left him. Dhrishtadyumna storms at him, his bow streaming; now the brahmana, who bestrode Kurukshetra a short while ago, fights back weakly, with effort. Drona’s hands have grown sluggish and hardly obey his will. Dhrishtadyumna harries him.

Yet the fight has not died in the Acharya; it only slumbers in grief. When the Panchala prince strikes him with arrows, the brahmana shakes off his stupor. Drona seizes up another bow, given him by his guru Angiras. He breaks Dhrishtadyumna’s weapon and covers him with fire. Dhrishtadyumna picks up another bow and fights back. But Drona is fear embodied, once more, his body is full of uncanny light. In a searing moment, he kills Dhrishtadyumna’s horses and his sarathy. He shatters the prince’s chariot.

Roaring himself, Dhrishtadyumna leaps down to the ground, sword in hand. He rushes at Drona. Coolly, the brahmana smashes his sword and shield and Dhrishtadyumna stands unarmed and helpless before his guru. A thin smile curving his lips, Drona raises his bow to kill the Panchala. From his quiver, he draws some arrows called vaitasmikas, meant specially for a powerful enemy who is very close. They are incendiary shafts and will steam away the armor from Dhrishtadyumna, before blowing him apart.

Of all the great archers only a few know anything about the vaitasmikas. They are more difficult to aim truly than any other arrow, because they are heavy and the bowstring must not be drawn back too far. Kripa is a master of them, as are Arjuna, Drona, Karna, Krishna, Pradyumna and Satyaki; Abhimanyu, also, was a master of the weighty shafts. Only one of those warriors is close enough to prevent Drona from killing Dhrishtadyumna.

His wrist cocked, Drona draws his bowstring back in the unusual manner used for the vaitasmikas. The Pandavas hold their breath. If Dhrishtadyumna is slain, who will kill Drona? In that interminable moment, the brahmana shoots his thick barbs, ten of them, one after the other. Dhrishtadyumna stands before him, roaring, ready to die. At the very last sliver of a moment, before the vaitasmikas tear into the Panchala’s breast, ten arrows flash out of nowhere, each one a savior and they cut down Drona’s shafts in the air! Arjuna and Krishna shout aloud in relief. They turn to see Satyaki has saved Dhrishtadyumna’s life.

Arjuna cries out Satyaki’s name. He says to Krishna, “Satyaki is more than a brother to us! The war would have been lost in another moment.”

Krishna murmurs, “It has not yet been won.”

Arrows flow endlessly from Arjuna’s Gandiva and he holds the Kaurava army off and away from Drona, just as he had on the day Bheeshma fell. On the other side, Satyaki does the same. The Kaurava warriors surround these two, but to no avail. Drona and Dhrishtadyumna still face each other.