The Thirteenth Day (8 page)

He turned and looked at me, ‘As far as my eldest cousin is concerned, I do believe we should take adequate precautions. But keeping him in the reserve sends out two messages—one, that we know their plans, and the second, and most crucial in my opinion, that he is afraid of being taken.’

They were talking about me like I wasn’t even in the room. I spoke up, just to remind them I was still here, and was as concerned about my safety as any of them, ‘So, are you saying I should be up front?’

‘No, no brother. While your eagerness to get killed is admirable, it won’t serve our cause just yet.’ Krishna smiled again, that wicked stretch of the lips.

Dhristadyumna spoke, ‘You’re right, Krishna. We’ll place him in the centre, surrounded by our troops. Not too far ahead to be at risk, but not too far behind either. And, I have studied Radheya myself. As you rightly pointed out, I do believe he won’t pose a direct threat today. Drona, on the other hand, deserves the full measure of our attention.’

There were nods of approval all around. Krishna smiled and looked at me. Drupada, sensing the argument slipping from his grasp, took a final shot. ‘Well, don’t say I didn’t warn you when Radheya is riding our boys like a bull in heat.’

Krishna smiled back at him. ‘With your blessings, sire, we hope it never comes to that.’

Drupada settled back on his seat defeated and gestured to his son to continue.

Dhristadyumna said, ‘I think today we will set up a strong perimeter around Yudhishthira on the field. He will be at the centre with the Panchala Corps lead by me and Shikhandi. Satyaki and the Matsya regiments will form a wall with the Yadavas. The rest of the men will be arranged around us. Bhima, Bhagadatta is your concern. Arjuna will lead the front line today with the Indraprastha Corps flanked by Nakula and Sahadeva and your Indraprastha regiments. Chekitana, your men got the worst of Grandsire yesterday, so we will hold them back in reserve.’

The council ended. Bali, the captain of our Indraprastha Corps, was waiting for us outside the tent. Arjuna debriefed him on his duties and he nodded and left. Bali was born mute but had been compensated adequately by the Lord in courage and battle awareness. His lieutenants had to learn sign language to serve under him and we had instituted special annual examinations to determine his field officers. It was a great honour for the young men of Indraprastha to belong to his batallion.

We made our way to the chariot park where our own arms lay. The park was abuzz with activity and the scent of dust disembowelled from the earth was intermingled with that of horses and humans. There were warriors from the south, dark and muscular; lithe and wiry men from the east and loud and boisterous ones from the north; all of whom found common ground on a whetstone or bowstring. Swords were being checked for sharpness. There were short blades that were accompanied with round shields, broadswords with blades as thick as a man’s bicep, whip swords with elastic metal blades and snake-shaped blades with their wavy form. There were spears with supple wooden shafts and metal heads, maces with large domes being scrutinized for cracks alongside javelins that were being checked by armourers for sharpness and balance. There were weapons of makes and shapes I had never seen or heard of.

Bows were being flexed—simple ones made of bamboo, or more complex ones made of animal bone and metal. Bowstrings were being obtained with great haste. Strings made of vegetable fibre were preferred to those of animal fibre that could lose their suppleness if they got wet.

Man’s capacity for killing his kin, and the imagination he was willing to put into it, never failed to surprise me.

At an almost reluctant pace, the armours were coming on. First, the breastplate made of iron or bronze, if the warrior could afford it, and hard wood or animal bone if he could not; then came the plates for the arms and shoulders. Thigh and shin armours were a luxury for most. Helmets would be strapped on at the battlefield. Protecting the faces, but more importantly, concealing fear in their shadows.

The first chariots began to leave for Kurukshetra, slowly, so as to not tire the horses.

Our Indraprastha Chariot Corps was the main fighting force from our own kingdom and consisted mainly of heavy chariots. Both the Kauravas and Pandavas were partial to these chariots that were borne by four horses and could carry multiple people depending on their girth. Each functioned like a mobile tower that anchored platoons of foot soldiers, shielding them, acting like a barricade from which they could launch sorties. Arjuna had decided that this was not a battle for lightly armoured chariots that could zip across the field. The battle, as he had envisioned it, would be a slow one with ground taken an inch at a time.

The chariots were almost exclusively manned by nobility with elephants. While elephants were treated as an object of reverence, prided by the general public for their ability to change the course of battles, the real celebrity belonged to the chariots. Boys all over Bharatvarsha dreamed of being chariot warriors. Playing in little box carts with visions of glory in their heads, with the weaker or younger ones relegated to serving as horsemen, or worse, foot soldiers. Men without a warrior lineage or backgrounds would spend vast sums of money trying to get admitted into the Indraprastha or Hastinapura gurukul and be a part of the Chariot Corps. A lot of them had found their way to the battlefield. Not many would leave.

As princes of the kingdom, it was assumed that we would tread the chariot’s planks in war, and for the most part, it was an accurate assumption; except in the case of Bhima who had whimsically decided early on that he would fight on his feet, much to Guruji’s and Grandsire’s disgust. Eventually, as a compromise, Bhima learned the ways of battle from the less exalted vantage of a horse-drawn car, but was never very comfortable with its speed. As one of our two best fighters, he was often required to fight in different sectors during a single day. For that purpose alone, Bhima tolerated a chariot to take him in haste across the field. But once he had reached his destination he would always get down and fight like a common foot soldier.

The chariots trundled towards the field in greater mass now, warriors manoeuvred their vehicles closer to familiar faces. Mostly, a general understanding prevailed that no one would speak at this hour. The last few moments of silence before battle, maybe forever. The metallic cluck of chariot wheels played in the background along with the steady tramp of feet and the occasional trumpet of an elephant.

The Great War of Kurukshetra had a schedule to keep. Fighting began a few hours after dawn, when there was sufficient light for us to see who we were killing; and ended late in the afternoon, when the sky began to turn purple; which it did sooner these days given that it was nearing winter. There would be no breaks during this period and troops were generally called in from the centre or reserve to replace soldiers in the front line who had been fighting for too long.

Dhristadyumna came up to me with a young man who bore his features.

‘Yudhishthira. This is my brother, Kumara. I’d, er, like him to flank your chariot today with Yudhamanyu and Uttamaujas.’

I had seen a few of his other brothers before. Uttamaujas and Yudhamanyu had been given strict instructions to stay close to me. They didn’t talk much, and were brooding and intense most of the time, but polite enough when spoken to.

But this was a new brother. I wondered again, as I had countless times before, how many young princes had old Drupada spawned. The old goat’s children practically populated half the battlefield.

I nodded and spoke to Kumara, ‘So, youngster, are you ready to save my old hide in battle?’

He blushed.

‘You won’t run away chasing glory like your elder brother now, will you?’ I said, playing the genial, experienced man of war.

Kumara went crimson, ‘No, sir.’

I left Dhristadyumna, giving him some last instructions and went to my chariot. I let my driver do a last-minute check on the wheels and the horses and began putting on my armour.

I heard Sahadeva’s voice from behind me, ‘Brother, could we talk?’

I nodded. My throat dry in anticipation of the battle.

‘Look, I know…I mean, it’s all well and good…but…’

‘Spit it out, we don’t have time.’

Sahadeva sighed, and began once more, ‘I know that our allies are committed to us, brother. No one suspects them of anything but acting in the best interests, but over the past few days, a few of us have begun to, well, question…’

‘Question what?’

Sahadeva sighed again. A melancholic figure, this brother of mine. ‘Our men are being placed ahead every day and are getting butchered. The Matsyas and Panchalas are nowhere near the heat. Some of us are beginning to question Dhristadyumna’s interests in running this army. Eventually, this could mean that we won’t be able to have a say in the council. For the long term, I think we need to withhold as many troops as possible. To ward off any future pretenders to the throne who may take advantage of our weakened state. As our eldest, you should talk to Dhristadyumna about putting his troops in front flanked by the Matsyas and Yadavas.

‘How badly off are we?’

‘Conservatively, I’d say, our Indraprastha Corps could scrape together and field one akshauhini.’

‘That’s not too bad.’

‘My sources tell me the Panchalas can account for an akshauhini and a few ankinis and the Matsyas around half an akshauhini comfortably. The Yadavas and Chekitana didn’t come in with much to begin with, so after ten days they stand at a few ankinis each. Given that we started the battle with…’

He paused and looked, expecting me to play big brother and storm off in Dhristadyumna’s direction to give him an earful.

At the beginning of the war, our coalition of forces stood at two akshauhinis from our kingdom of Indraprastha, two more from the Panchalas, an akshauhini from the Matsyas, another one from the Chedi kingdom under Chekitana and half an akshauhini from the Yadava Confederacy under Satyaki. Our remaining allies contributed a few ankinis each which added up to about half an akshauhini
.

He had a point. But the last thing I wanted to do was accuse Drupada of holding back his troops and provoke him into leaving the battlefield for good.

‘Well…it’s too late to do anything today, Saha. Why couldn’t you tell me this earlier?’

I was angry at the fact that all my brothers expected me to speak on their behalf, while they stood idly by in the shadow of my decision or indecision. That none of them would ever have to take responsibility for driving the Pandavas down to ruin except me.

Sahadeva looked down and said nothing.

I walked away without looking back.

I
n my younger days, I would wear a pair of golden earrings and gold-plated armour to create a distinct look for myself so that kings would seek me out to duel. My desire to get myself killed, and my earrings soon led to a nickname from the troops: Karna—‘the one with the earrings’.

Victory has the ability to twist facts and mould them into grotesque caricatures that people call legends.

My earrings and armour began to take on talismanic proportions, so I gave them away before people actually began to believe that the sum of the earrings and armour was greater than the warrior. No man should have to live with the burden of his own legend.

The troops still insisted on calling me Karna, though a little uncertainly now.

On the other side, it was happening to Arjuna. I had heard his bow was being called Gandiva, or ‘Conqueror of the Earth’, by the troops who had begun to believe the bow was indestructible and its wielder invincible.

A misconception I would soon clear.

I began my pre-battle routine by inspecting my arrows. Today, and for most of my killing career, my quiver was home to Kshurupras with their sharp razor-like heads, Vatsadantas with heads shaped like calf-teeth, broad-headed Anjalikas and my old reliables, Ardhachandra, crescent-shaped arrow heads. All of these were bronze-tipped.

Apart from these, I also carried a separate quiver with iron-tipped arrows (which the army had named Shakti, meaning ‘strength’). Battles were decided not by courage but metals these days, so I kept my iron arrows close at hand, using them sparingly, only on kings.

All seven-odd akshauhinis that were left of our army were spread out in front of me. I saw the chariot of Sushasana canter into view and motioned my charioteer towards it. He was a sight, the great lubber—short and muscular with thick ringlets of hair covering his face. His bronze armour had the face of a lion embossed on it. He gave me an embarrassed grin and shrugged his shoulders. Drona had put him in the reserve today and told him not to show his face for the entire day.

‘So, Sushasana, live to fight another day, eh?’ I sympathized.

Sushasana grinned back nervously. ‘Live, yes. Fight, not so much.’ He pushed his hair off his eyes. ‘But it’s a big day for you. Time to show them what stable-boy hands can do, no?’

This made me laugh, ‘The stable teaches many things, Sushasana. Cleaning shit, most of all.’