Duryodhana And The Secret Of Karna
The Kaurava soldiers, who had suffered the trauma of seeing three commanders downed in seventeen days, had withdrawn in a disorderly fashion.
Shalya was among the last to return to the camp, driving a chariot without its warrior.
He found a desperate Duryodhana, who could not find peace. By now this state of mind of the sovereign Kaurava continued from the first day of that war with a foregone conclusion. Everyone had told him, the most experienced and intelligent men who knew each other: Vyasa, Bhishma, Drona, and how many others! Everyone had told him to make peace with Pandu’s sons, who were stronger and would surely defeat him. Those words now sounded like a curse that had weighed on his head for so many years. But still it was impossible for him to accept the truth of an indisputable superiority, he still uttered threats against them. No one was able to console him for the death of his closest friend.
It was natural that in the Pandavas’ camp there was a very different atmosphere: the winners were congratulated, with Arjuna, with Krishna and also with Bhima, who had made his younger brother’s task easier. Krishna was radiant.
“Yudhisthira, now that Karna is dead, there is no doubt: the victory is ours. Justice has been done, only a few names are missing and soon these people too will pay for such impiety. The world, as of right, is yours: govern it with righteousness,” He said.
“O Krishna, our friend,” replied Yudhisthira. “I still can’t believe that the Suta’s son is no longer a threat. Nobody can understand how much he has poisoned my nights all these years. Now that he has fallen it seems almost impossible. Let’s go out into the field, I want to see his body, so that I feel safer.”
The Pandavas returned to the scene of the last duel and when they saw the beheaded body they celebrated.
Hours passed.
Duryodhana couldn’t sleep, he couldn’t think of anything but Karna, that dear friend who died because of him, and he was looking for a way to get some relief from the ferocious anxiety that was devouring his heart. Finally he realized that the only one he could run to was Bhishma, who was still lying on his bed of arrows, waiting for the most auspicious moment to die.
The latter had words of consolation for him, reminding him that Karna had died with honor, as a perfect Kshatriya. At that speech Duryodhana, who still did not know the mystery of his birth, became suspicious.
“You said as a Kshatriya. Then you know he was not the son of a Suta, but of a Kshatriya. Now that he is dead, clarify this mystery to me.”
Bhishma hesitated a little, then saw no reason to be silent.
“He was the first son of Kunti, from the union with Surya before her marriage to Pandu. He was a Pandava, even the eldest of them, the natural heir to the throne. And he knew it.”
Bhishma told in detail the story of Karna’s birth. But that news did not lift Duryodhana’s morale at all, on the contrary it demolished him even more.
He returned to the tent disconsolately.
This is a section of the book “Maha-bharata, Vol. 2”.
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