When Gods Made War

There was a time when even the gods fell ill, and in that time the god of fire grew sick. Long ago a king named Shvetaki had performed a sacrifice so vast and so unbroken that it lasted twelve full years. Day after day, season after season, the priests poured oblations of clarified butter into Agni's mouth without rest. The fire god ate and ate until his appetite curdled into sickness. The endless rich offerings clogged his flames the way too much food sickens a body. His brightness dulled. His colour faded to a sullen, smoky pallor. Hunger of a different kind gnawed at him now, a craving not for more butter but for something living and green and wild.

Agni went to Brahma, the grandsire of the worlds, and begged for a cure. Brahma considered the matter with the patience of one who has watched ages come and go. "There is a remedy," he said at last. "The Khandava forest, on the banks of the Yamuna, teems with creatures whose flesh and sap and marrow will be your medicine. Devour the whole of it - every tree, every beast, every hidden thing - and your health will return, your colour and your strength restored. That is the only physic for what ails you."

Agni listened, and something fierce woke inside his dying glow. The Khandava. A whole forest of feeding. He would burn it from edge to edge and rise renewed. Without delay, he kindled himself and rushed upon the great wood, his flames leaping high among the ancient trees, his hunger roaring ahead of him like wind.

But the Khandava was not an ordinary forest, and it was not unguarded. Among its tangled depths lived Takshaka, king of the Nagas, the great serpent who was a dear and ancient friend of Indra, the lord of the heavens. Indra had given his word that no harm would come to the wood while Takshaka dwelt there, and the king of the gods did not break his promises lightly.

So when Agni's flames first climbed into the sky above the Khandava, Indra looked down from his celestial seat and was angered. He gathered the rain clouds, those dark and heavy bearers of the monsoon, and sent them rolling over the forest. They burst open in torrents. Sheets of water fell upon the burning trees, hissing and steaming, and Agni's flames sputtered, choked, and died. The fire god, half fed and furious, drew back in defeat.

He tried again. Again the clouds gathered, again the rain came down, again the flames were drowned before they could feed. Seven times Agni hurled himself upon the Khandava, and seven times Indra's storms extinguished him. The fire god grew weaker with each failure, his sickness deepening, his hope thinning. He could not eat what he could not burn, and he could not burn what the king of the gods himself protected.

In despair Agni returned once more to Brahma. "The cure you gave me is barred to me," he said bitterly. "Indra guards the forest for the sake of his friend the serpent. Every time I rise, his rain casts me down. Tell me, grandsire, how a dying god is to grow well when heaven itself stands in his way."

Brahma did not turn the fire god away. He had foreseen, in the long unrolling of fate, that this moment would come, and that it was woven into a far larger design than a single forest fire. "Listen," he told Agni. "In the world of men there walk now two beings of more than mortal might. One is Nara, born again as Arjuna, the third of the Pandava brothers, the finest archer of his age. The other is Narayana himself, the eternal, descended into the body of Krishna of the Yadavas. These two are old companions of the cosmos, friends through countless ages, and they are presently dwelling near the banks of the Yamuna at the edge of the very forest you wish to burn."

"Go to them," Brahma continued. "Ask for their aid. If Arjuna and Krishna stand with you and hold back Indra and the hosts of heaven, then you may feed upon the Khandava in safety. No rain will reach you while those two guard your flames. This is the appointed way."

Agni heard the counsel and his dimmed light flickered with new hope. He understood now that his cure was not a thing he could seize by force alone, but a thing tangled in the purposes of gods and heroes. He bowed to Brahma and made his way down toward the river, where the two friends were resting after their wanderings, never guessing that the burning of a forest would draw them into the design of the world. He took the form of a Brahmin and went to find them, his hunger held in check, his plea ready upon his tongue.

By the banks of the Yamuna, where the Khandava forest threw its long green shadow across the water, Krishna and Arjuna sat at their ease. They had spent the day in the open country, hunting and walking and talking as close friends do, and now they rested in the cool of the trees, content in one another's company. The river slid past, bright and unhurried. Neither knew that a god was approaching.

A Brahmin came toward them out of the forest, tall and strange, his complexion the colour of molten gold, his eyes carrying a light that no ordinary priest possessed. He had matted hair and a body that seemed to shimmer faintly with heat, and when he spoke his voice had the crackle of distant flame within it.

"Heroes," he said, "I have come to beg a boon, for I am told that you two among all beings are able to grant it. I am no Brahmin, though I wear his shape. I am Agni, the eater of oblations, the carrier of sacrifice. I am sick, and there is only one cure for my sickness, and that cure is the Khandava forest. I must devour it whole. But Indra protects this wood for love of his friend Takshaka the serpent, and seven times now his rains have driven me back. Stand with me. Hold off the king of the gods and all his celestial armies while I feed, and I will be healed."

Arjuna and Krishna exchanged a glance. There was no fear in either of them at the sight of a god in disguise, only the quiet recognition of beings who had met many wonders. "We are willing," Krishna said. "But weapons fit for such a war we do not carry. Mortal arms and even our own divine ones will not be enough to face Indra and all of heaven at once. If you would have us guard your fire, you must arm us for it."

Agni was ready for this. He raised his voice and called upon Varuna, the lord of the waters and the keeper of many ancient treasures. Varuna heard the summons and answered, and from the deep places where the gods store their weapons came forth gifts beyond price.

For Arjuna there came the Gandiva, the celestial bow that had once belonged to the gods themselves. It was wrought of imperishable substance, blazing with a quiet golden fire, worth a hundred thousand ordinary bows, and it would never break, never tire, never fail in the hand of one strong enough to wield it. With the bow came two quivers whose store of arrows could never be emptied, however many shafts were loosed from them, an endless supply for an endless battle. And there came too a great chariot, plated and gleaming, drawn by horses white as the foam of the sea, bearing upon its standard the figure of Hanuman, the mighty son of the wind. The banner alone would terrify enemies, and the car itself was a moving fortress, swift and unbreakable, blazing like the noonday sun.

To Krishna, Agni gave the Sudarshana chakra, the discus of Vishnu, a wheel of fire with a hole at its centre and an edge keener than thought. When hurled it flew out, cut down whatever it was sent against, and returned of its own accord to the hand that threw it. With it came the mace Kaumodaki, heavy and terrible, the smiter of foes. Now the two friends stood fully armed, Nara and Narayana once more clad for war as in the old ages of the world.

Arjuna took up the Gandiva and felt its weight settle into his grip as though the bow had been made for him alone. Krishna spun the bright wheel upon his finger. "Now," said Krishna, turning to the fire god, "feed."

Agni blazed up into his full and terrible power. No longer the sickly, smoke-dimmed thing that Indra's rains had drowned, he became the devourer of worlds, the all consuming fire. He fell upon the Khandava from a thousand directions at once, and the forest roared into flame. Sheets of fire taller than the tallest trees climbed toward the heavens. The crackle and thunder of the burning rose into a single deafening voice. The heat could be felt for many miles, and the smoke darkened the sun.

Within the wood there was only terror. Deer fled in leaping herds and were overtaken. Elephants trumpeted and ran in circles, trapped between walls of flame. Tigers, boars, jackals, and bears burst from the thickets in a maddened crush, trampling one another in their panic. Birds rose in screaming clouds and fell back scorched. Serpents writhed up from their holes. The waters of the forest pools boiled, and the fish and turtles within them died. Every creature that called the Khandava home was caught in the great burning, and their cries were swallowed by the roar of the fire.

Around the edges of the inferno, Arjuna and Krishna took up their stations in the blazing chariot. They were the two doorkeepers of death. Any creature that tried to flee the fire and slip away into the wider world was driven back into the flames by Arjuna's arrows or Krishna's wheel, so that Agni's feast should be complete and his cure made whole. The fire god ate as he had not eaten in twelve sickly years, his colour returning, his strength flooding back, his bright form swelling with renewed life as the forest poured itself into his mouth.

High above, in his palace of clouds, Indra woke to disaster. The forest he had sworn to protect was a sea of fire, and his friend Takshaka's home was burning to ash. Wrath seized the king of the gods. He marshalled the storm clouds as he had seven times before and sent down the rain, vast and pitiless, to drown the flames.

But this time the rain did not reach the fire. As the torrents fell, Arjuna rose in his chariot and drew the Gandiva to its fullest, and from the inexhaustible quivers he loosed a storm of his own. His arrows flew up so thick and so perfectly placed that they wove a roof above the burning forest, a canopy of shafts so dense that not a single drop of Indra's rain could pass through to touch the flames. The water shattered upon the arrows and turned to steam before it could fall. Agni fed on, untroubled, sheltered beneath the archer's ceiling.

Indra could not believe what he saw. No mortal had ever turned aside his rains. In rising fury he abandoned the gentle weapons of water and called the whole host of heaven to war. He summoned the lightning and the thunderbolt. He called the Maruts, the storm gods, with their howling winds. He uprooted a mountain peak and hurled it down upon the forest, and Arjuna shattered the falling mountain to gravel with a hail of arrows before it could land. The very gods came down to fight: Yama with his rod, Kubera with his mace, Varuna, the Ashvins, the Adityas, and all the bright legions of the sky descended upon two men who stood between heaven and a feeding fire.

Against the assembled might of heaven, the two friends did not yield a single step. Arjuna stood in the chariot like a pillar of resolve, the Gandiva singing in his hands. Whatever weapon the gods sent, he answered. When the celestials loosed their divine missiles, he countered each with a missile of his own, his hands moving faster than sight. He covered the whole sky with arrows until the gods could find no opening, no gap, no unguarded moment. Krishna fought beside him, the Sudarshana chakra leaping from his hand to scythe through the ranks of the heavenly host and returning to him bright and unblunted, again and again.

The gods reeled. Yama's rod was turned aside. Kubera was driven back. The Maruts were scattered, their winds cut to pieces. One by one the bright legions of the sky, wounded and astonished, fell back from the forest they could not save. Even Indra, hurling his thunderbolt with all the force that had toppled mountains and slain the great Vritra, saw his weapon fail to break the canopy of arrows.

Then a voice spoke from the heavens, the deep and ageless voice of unseen wisdom, and it said to Indra: "O king of the gods, the serpent Takshaka, your friend, is not in the forest. He has gone away to the field of Kurukshetra and is safe. As for these two who stand against you, they are Nara and Narayana, the ancient seers, descended into the world of men for a purpose that even you cannot overturn. They cannot be defeated. The burning of the Khandava is the will of fate. Let it be."

Indra heard the voice, and the fury drained from him. He understood at last that he stood against the design of the cosmos itself. He lowered his thunderbolt. He gathered his battered host and withdrew into the high clouds, and for the first time in an age, the king of the gods left a battlefield without victory.

With heaven withdrawn, nothing remained to check the fire, and Agni fed without restraint. The Khandava burned and burned, and the great consuming went on. Yet in all that destruction, fate had marked a handful of lives to be spared, for even the most total of burnings leaves seeds for what is to come.

Takshaka himself, the serpent king whose presence had started the whole affair, was not in the forest at all, having gone away to Kurukshetra, and so he escaped the doom of his home. His son Ashvasena was within the fire, and the young Naga fought to live. When the flames closed in, Ashvasena's mother coiled herself about him and tried to carry him up out of the burning. Arjuna saw them rising and shot the mother through, but in that same instant Ashvasena slipped free and was swept away upon the wind and the smoke, escaping with his life so that the serpent line of Takshaka did not perish from the world.

And there were the four little birds. A sage named Mandapala, who had once taken the form of a bird and fathered four sons by the hen sparrow Jarita, knew that the fire was coming. Stricken with a father's fear, he prayed to Agni to spare his children. When the flames swept over the nest, the four young sarngaka birds huddled together and called out to the fire god by the holy names their father had taught them, praising him and begging mercy. Agni, who honours those who honour him, remembered the sage's prayer and parted his flames around the little nest, and the four birds lived while all the wood around them turned to ash.

There was one more survivor, and his saving would echo down the years. Deep in the heart of the Khandava there had lived Maya, the great architect of the Asuras, the most gifted builder in all the three worlds. He had raised flying cities and carved palaces of marvels for gods and demons alike, and there was no craftsman to equal him. Now the fire closed in upon his dwelling, and Maya fled before it, the flames at his very heels.

As he ran from the burning, a cry went up: "Save me! Save me!" Krishna saw the fleeing figure and, knowing him for an enemy of the gods, raised the Sudarshana chakra to cut him down, and Agni surged forward to swallow him. But Maya in his terror ran straight toward Arjuna and threw himself upon the archer's protection, crying out for refuge. Arjuna, who could not refuse one who begged for his life, called out at once, "Do not fear. I grant you safety." And because Arjuna had given his word, neither Krishna's wheel nor Agni's flames could touch the Asura. Maya was spared.

When the fire at last died down, the Khandava lay in ruins, a vast field of grey ash and smoking ground. Agni stood healed and radiant, his sickness burned away, his colour bright, his strength restored fivefold. He blessed Arjuna and Krishna and granted them further boons before he departed, well fed and whole at last. The forest that heaven had guarded for an age was gone, and the two friends had held the gods at bay to feed a hungry fire.

Maya the architect knelt before Arjuna with the gratitude of one who had been pulled living from the jaws of death. "You have saved my life when fire and discus alike were set against me," he said. "I am the builder of the Asuras, and I am in your debt. Command me. Whatever I can make, I will make for you."

Arjuna looked to Krishna, for between these two friends little needed to be spoken aloud, and Krishna gave the faintest nod. "You owe me nothing," Arjuna told the Asura. "Agni was well fed, and that is reward enough. But if you wish to do a thing that would please me, then do it not for me but for my eldest brother. Build for Yudhishthira, the king of righteousness, an assembly hall such as the world of men has never seen, a hall so wondrous that none shall ever build its like again."

Maya bowed low, and his eyes kindled at the thought of such a work, for it was the very task his genius longed for. In time he raised at Indraprastha the great Mayasabha, the hall of illusions, a palace of crystal and gold and gleaming stone. Its floors were polished until water seemed to lie where the ground was dry, and clear pools were so still they seemed to be solid floor. Doorways stood where there were walls, and walls where the eye saw open passage. It was the marvel of all the earth, and kings came from every land to wonder at it.

So ended the burning of the Khandava forest. From the hunger of a sick god had come the arming of Arjuna with the Gandiva, the binding of friendship between Nara and Narayana in their mortal forms, and the building of a hall of wonders. Yet that same hall held a hidden thread of fate, for it would be there, years later, that Duryodhana would stumble in its illusions and be laughed at, and that laughter would harden into the hatred that led at last to the great war upon the field of Kurukshetra.