THE MAHABHARATA: A Modern Rendering, Vol 1 by Ramesh Menon Read Free Book Online

gandharva challenged Chitrangada of the earth.
    “Mortal! You dare take the name Chitrangada, whose meaning you cannot even know. I say you are guilty of theft worse than of gold or jewels, or even kingdom.” His beautiful face turned dark. “I see you are just a boy, so I will give you a chance to save your life. Declare that you renounce the name Chitrangada, which has been mine for eons. Kneel before me and beg my pardon and I will give it to you. If you like, I will even give you a new name you can bear through your brief human years.
    This is your only chance to save yourself. If you fight me, you will die. Then what use will my name be to you? The choice is yours, boy.”
    Satyavati’s son’s eyes turned the color of plums. He said, “You must indeed have lived for eons, vain gandharva, that you have grown so tired of your life. I am Chitrangada, yuvaraja of Hastinapura and I know of no other Chitrangada. If you want to fight me for the sake of my name, I think you are a fool and deserve to die.”
    Chitrangada of Hastinapura drew his sword. The people gathered there hardly saw what happened next; it happened with such blinding swiftness that mortal eyes could not follow it. They heard a growl, as musical as the rest of his speech; they saw the gandharva’s hand streak to his side. Next instant, they saw their prince keel over clutching his neck that had been pierced by a silver dagger. The Elf whistled softly and his slender blade flew back to its jeweled sheath. The yuvaraja’s life went out through the neat wound in his throat. In a flash of light the gandharva vanished, leaving Hastinapura bereft, her destiny transformed.
    Bheeshma was heartbroken. He had loved Chitrangada as his own son. Carefully, since the boy’s infancy, he had groomed him to sit one day on the throne of the Kurus. He had taught him archery and the Vedas, politics and history, astrology and metaphysics and everything else the yuvaraja knew. They had been so close. Now all that was left, after Chitrangada’s body was cremated beside the Ganga, was an urn of ashes. Wondering for what crime of another life he was being punished with such torment in this one, Bheeshma floated those ashes down his mother’s serene currents, toward the ocean, which receives the remains of the dead.
    His dreams shattered, Bheeshma began all over again with Satyavati’s second son, Vichitraveerya. Whereas so far he had brought him up only to become his brother’s loyal minister, now he groomed that prince to be a king. Bheeshma crowned the younger boy yuvaraja and continued to rule Hastinapura himself.
    Chitrangada’s death had fallen on him like summer lightning; but in a few years, Vichitraveerya grew into a fine young kshatriya and Bheeshma crowned him king. Vichitraveerya was a modest youth who worshipped his brother and it was in Bheeshma’s able hands that the real power in the kingdom of the Kurus still rested. The people, Satyavati and Vichitraveerya himself were all content with this arrangement. It would never do that a younger brother ruled while his older and wiser brother was alive.
    Some years went by, in peace and plenty and they were kind to Hastinapura and her people. Then Bheeshma decided it was time Vichitraveerya married. News arrived in Hastina that the king of Kasi was planning a swayamvara for his three daughters, Amba, Ambika and Ambalika, all of them reputed to be beautiful and accomplished. From time immemorial, indeed ever since the two kingdoms had existed, it had been the unvarying practice for the princesses of Kasi to be given as wives to the princes of Hastinapura. Never had there been any question of a swayamvara. The slight did not escape Bheeshma: Vichitraveerya was not being offered the hand of any of the Kasi princesses because he was a fisher-girl’s son. But Bheeshma was not about to let the matter pass.

SEVEN THREE PRINCESSES OF KASI  
    The city of Kasi was festive: Manikarnika, the ornament that once fell from