Kronicles-Spear Prophecies

Dwapar Yug…Six Thousand Five Hundred years ago
Kurukshetra Battlefield

Origin


Chapter-1
The Death of Drona
The massively built handsome warrior had been scouring for his target through the length of the vast fog enshrouded battlefield. He was hunting from sunrise when the conche bearers had blared out their shrill call to battle. Even before midmorning the warrior had found his quarry, a majestic beast, gigantic and well trained in warfare which had claimed the lives of more than a thousand warriors in its lifetime.

By afternoon he had slain the terrible beast. It did not stand a chance against him. A well placed blow with his massive spiked mace was all it took. The head was shattered into a hundred chunks of bloodied meat. The magnificent Pachyderm came crashing to the ground without a cry of protest. Its rider was last seen screaming in terrible pain, half buried under its massive weight. The warrior threw his head back and laughed raucously. Then he let out a victory cry.

“Aswathama is dead” bellowed Bheemasena the second of the five Pandava Warlords. The proclamation knelled across the bleak, devastated battlefield with the ferocity of angry thunder. No one acted, for just an instance that part of the vast battlefield was absolutely still except for the manic laughter of the Pandava warlord. Then, like an uncoiled spring, the impact of the declaration ricochetted through the belleaguered Kaurava army casting it into a tizzy of confusion.

The Kauravas were fighting a losing battle. Their powers, potent as they were, were proven useless against the more than equipotent might of the Pandava brothers. They knew what the consequences would be if Bheemasena’s declaration were to be true. They knew the war was as good as lost.

The victory cry was taken seriously by the vast majority of the Kaurava forces, soldiers and allies alike. To the Kaurava foot soldiers armed with nothing more than a sword or a spear and a two foot rectangular iron shield, the magical powers of the Pandavas was a dark deterent, an unknown force capable of stripping them down to their very bones. They abhorred the elemental forces used against them. Everyone knew that the Pandavas powers were bestowed by the Demi-Gods themselves. Fire, water, wind, space and the earth heeded the deadly dictates of the five Pandava brothers. The gory results were there for all to see.

Hundreds of tattered and torn carcasses ornamented the murky, battle scarred fields of Kurukshetra like gory jewels adorning the dark neck of death himself. The terrified screams of mortally injured soldiers, executed mercilessly night after night, were the only encouragement the Kaurava soldiers got to stay alive and in one piece.

It was a common sight during that war to see weary Kaurava soldiers gathered around huge fires on bleak foggy winter nights that brought brief and cold respite from certain death. They exchanged tales of gore and glory as they gorged their meat and guzzled their wine.

Mages and warlords sat around the crackling fire with the soldiers, wearing somber faces, hoping to ward off the biting chill that was as much from within their tortured souls as it was from the cold and brittle clasp of bone-chilling winter. They clasped their weapons tighter and threw furtive glances into the darkness which lurked just beyond the reach of their firelight. They whispered tales of the Pandavas and their preternatural powers and each story ended with the same conclusion. It was so potent in its impact that battle hardened soldiers shivered in superstitious dread.
God rode with the Pandavas!
It was in this light that the victory cry of a Pandava Prince was taken very seriously by the hopelessly demoralised Kauravas. If Bheemasena said Aswathama was dead, then he must be dead.

That fateful day Duryodhana the Kaurava heir apparent was bristling with frustration at the distressing reports from his commanders. He roamed the confines of his bivouac impatiently. Duryodhana was a huge man with rippling muscles, sharp, accusatory eyes and a straight nose. His thin lips lined by an upturned aristrocratically thin moustache, quivered in rage. He covered the length of the bivouac with long strides.

Duryodhana was a generous man when he was appreciative and loved the people of Hastinapore. He took care of them like a father. In the very same breath he hated his cousins, the Pandavas. It was true, the kingdom was theirs and it was also true that his father was merely a caretaker, but Duryodhana did not care. He wanted Hastinapore and he did not want to share it with anyone, not even its rightful rulers. His desire for power and control became a deep burning obsession and Duryodhana failed to notice a sinister force that had wrapped itself around him stoking the fires of his obsession and jealousy.

The warlord bashed his fist into the palm of his other hand and ground his teeth in impotent anger. He grabbed the jeweled goblet of wine carelessly from the outstretched arms of an aide and downed the rubic liquid in one gulp. Duryodhana was angry because he had received secret reports the previous night and they were clear. Drona, the General of his army, his teacher and guide was going soft on the Pandavas. It was common knowledge that Arjun, the most powerful among the Pandava warlords was once Drona’s favourite pupil. Duryodhana had sent for the all powerful warrior mage that night.

When Drona entered his Bivouac, Duryodhana hadn’t even bothered with the customary etiquette of greeting his teacher and offering him a seat. He rose from his chair unsteadily. The Heir apparent was reeking of wine.
“I hear you fight everyone except Arjun. Have I not taken care of you and yours? Have I not loved you as much as your son does? Have I not honoured you always? Why then in your view are Arjun and the blighted Pandavas higher than I?”
“Master, I trusted you, I made you the general of my army, yet you dishonour me!” it was a statement, not a query.

Drona was appalled by the apparent lack of courtesy and loud language of his former pupil and to be king. Try as he might, the wizened warrior was unable to recognise the courteous and big hearted Duryodhana he had once taught in this brutish, disheveled man who stood swaggering before him. To Drona, Duryodhana appeared as a man possessed by a Demon. Nevertheless the master archer spoke reassuringly to his liege.
“My son, I have not waivered from my responsibilities. Arjun is no longer the little boy I used to teach. His skills surpass my own. You know who sits with him. Is it possible to defeat Arjun when God himself rides in his chariot? I am a mere mortal. I cannot fight divinity”

The roaring fire of jealousy in Duryodhana was stoked further by apparent praises for Arjun. Duryodhana could not digest the fact that his own General was admiring the enemy.
“Krishna is no more than a cowherd yet he is hailed as God. Don’t fear him, I can slay him if I choose to. I want Arjun’s head on a platter. Can you deliver him unto me?”
“I will try my son” said the aged warrior mage. But his voice was frail and weary and his frame was bent with the burden of having to kill his own pupil, especially the one he loved like his own son.
“That is not good enough Drona. I want your word. I have reposed faith in you. I know you think the Pandavas are rightful claimants to the throne of Hastinapore. I know you think I am a mere usurper. Yet, I am the eldest. My father is elder to theirs. Their father was made king. But he gave up the throne. So what if my father is blind and vapid? I ruled in the name of my father. Am I not entitled to my kingdom?”

The long and tragic sequence of events leading to the war flashed in Drona’s mind like a vivid and horrible play-act. Deceit, fraud and murder for gain were precursors to the war that had pitted fathers and sons, brothers, uncles, masters and disciples, friends and foes alike against each other to a battle unto death. All because Duryodhana felt he was entitled to a Kingdom that rightfully belonged to the Pandavas. Drona’s wizened eyes narrowed and his aquiline nose flared.
“That may or may not be so. It was my misfortune to see the wife of the Pandavas dragged into your court. Her attire was stained with her menstrual blood. In spite of that your brother attempted to strip the chaste woman in the presence of her elders and peers in open court. Is that the act of a just king?” the mage asked and his soft voice, usually soothing and kind was like a stinging slap on Duryodhana’s face. The Kaurava warlord blinked for a moment in his drunken stupor. Then his lips curled in contempt. When he spoke Duryodhana’s voice was vehement.
“That is a family matter Drona. In any event it does not concern you. Are you fit to be my general? Can you bring me Arjun’s head? Or have we, the Kuru dynasty, reposed faith in an ingrate?” Duryodhana hissed through clenched teeth.

Even the guards outside the Bivouac were appalled by the words of the Kaurava prince. Everyone knew that Drona always stood like a rock behind the Kuru Dynasty. The warrior mage maintained his calm. His eyes shone dully, like the glint of a stone smarting under a desert sun. He stared right into Duryodhana’s eyes. Duryodhana had trouble looking into his teacher’s eyes. He averted his angry glare and focused on drinking his wine. The aged warrior mage spoke scornfully to the Kaurava Royal.
“Hear this Kaurava prince. I take an oath on my son Aswathama that I shall not return from battle tomorrow without killing at least one of the five Pandava brothers”
Without waiting for a reply Drona turned on his heels and walked out leaving Duryodhana sitting in a drunken stupor. In a small secret recess of the Kaurava Prince’s heart a pang of regret quivered forth for the way he’d treated his own teacher.
“This will ensure victory.”
The voice of the Other from the locked world of Asatya resonated in Duryodhana’s mind.
“Yes my Lord Kroni” he said softly. He wore an arrogant smile.

Duryodhana was sure victory would come his way that fateful morning. However it was his frustration that kept increasing in intensity. The insecure royal was infuriated by spell after spell of disheartening news that came his way from the warfront. The Kauravas were losing. At least ten of the prime allies had been wiped out that day and the sun had just ascended fully into the skies. To top it all Duryodhana had heard rumours of Aswathama’s death. If that was indeed true, Drona would not honour his pledge.

Duryodhana waited with baited breath for news of the General and the fulfillment of his promise. It was late in the evening when news finally came his way. The heir apparent was totally unprepared for the news he received.

At about the same time that Duryodhana was walking restlessly in his bivouac, Drona was in the thick of battle eyeing the horizons hungrily. He was searching for the Pandava Princes. Strangely, he was not able to sight even one of the five. It was as though they were masked from view. His long white beard flowing to his chest was matted with dust and grit as the master warrior mage let loose heavily encoded arrows with a fluid ease borne of countless battles.

The arrows contained complex mathematical equations. The equations multiplied the potency of elemental forces charged into the arrows a thousand fold. The arrows sizzled through the electrically charged air of the battlefield and destroyed scores of enemy formations in fiery fountains or through acidic rain. The battlefield was filled with screams of pain that filtered through thick fog and the foul smoke from burning bodies. A chilly morning had just turned into a dreary afternoon when Drona heard the arrogant victory cry of Bheemasena.

Since Dhridrastr was the reigning monarch, no matter how dubious his claims to the throne, Drona had no choice but to throw his weight behind the Kauravas. The warrior mage did not let the fact that he was fighting a losing battle deter him. Drona might not have had Krishna by his side, he did not have Arjun who was indomitable but Drona took courage from the fact that he had his own son Aswathama fighting with him. Therefore Bheemasena’s loud declaration that Aswathama had been killed descended like a wave of blight and ruination upon Drona.

In the blink of an eye Drona’s entire world crashed around him. The battlefield shimmered through the hot tears dancing delicately just inside the cover of the Mage’s eyes. The thought that his son was dead took Drona’s very breath away from him and sent cold shivers down his spine.
‘Is it because of the impulsive oath that I took last night? Have I gambled away my own son’s life on an oath that could never be fulfilled?’
These thoughts flashed across the warrior mage’s mind.

Aswathama defined Drona. Though a Brahman he had taken up arms long ago only to see the sweet smile of content in his little son’s eyes. Aswathama had grown up to become brave and noble. He was born with the Shiromani - the mysterious gem embedded into his forehead. It protected him from disease, wounds, lust, pain and death itself.

Unless the gem was forcibly removed Aswathama could not be defeated in battle let alone be killed. Drona knew that there was none in the battlefield including Arjun himself who could defeat Aswathama and yet…it was the victory cry of a Pandava prince. How could it be false? Drona knew of only one person whose words always rang true, the first of the Pandava brothers, the man who could not lie.
Yudistr!
“Find Prince Yudistr for me” Drona barked to his charioteer.

Through the gore of battle Drona rode, the sound of crunching bone and flesh and the stench of decaying human and animal carcasses flitted through his consciousness. Drona ignored them as he seized upon only the task of finding the Pandava warlord. Drona knew Yudistr would make a fine King. He was fair and just and had always been so. The irony of it didn’t escape Drona that knowing what was good for the kingdom he was fighting the one man who could rule justly. Drona thought wryly that sometimes the line between duty and doing what was right was blurred and inconsistent. The warrior mage knew he had to stick to his decision to fight the Pandavas. It was too late now to go soul searching and yet he feared if his action had impeded upon his son’s life.

Drona rode on like an unstoppable tempest. Pandava soldiers who didn’t know better than to engage the mage were prime targets for his arrows which whistled death to clear a path for his chariot. That was until he saw Yudistr’s flag and regiment. It was almost early evening. Dusk was fast approaching. The conches heralding the end of hostilities for that day would be sounded soon. Drona had a pledge to keep and a truth to ascertain.

Drona drew his chariot alongside Yudistr’s. Alarmed Pandava commanders sounded the alarm signalling danger to the Monarch. To their surprise rather than unsheathing his sword or picking up his long bow Yudistr bowed to the warrior mage. The two warriors faced themselves, yet there was no hostility in them, only mutual admiration and perhaps a wistful sadness for the way things had turned out. They had started out as master and disciple and they were now mortal enemies.
“Yudistr, is my son dead?” The agitated Drona asked without preamble

(That was the plan Krishna had deviced. He had said Drona would lose the will to fight if his son Aswathama died, so make him believe his son was dead. When Drona was helpless, capture him and thus end the war. Once the General was taken prisoner the war was as good as over. Drona would be confident that Aswathama was invincible until the Shiromani gem adorned his forehead. It was a fact that no one could ever get close enough to Aswathama to pry the gem loose. Yudistr, who had never spoken a lie in his entire life could be the only person to convince Drona of Aswathama’s death.
“No My Lord, you know I cannot lie. Even if I could, do you think I could lie to my master? To the one man who taught me all that I know? Have mercy My Lord Krishna, I cannot do this” said Yudistr.

Bheemasena found the solution. He said he would kill the Kaurava war elephant which incidentally was also called Aswathama and announce its death. If then, Drona wanted confirmation Yudistr could truthfully say that Aswathama was dead. Yudistr had agreed albiet reluctantly to declare that Aswathama the elephant was dead. Krishna had told the first of the Pandavas how to say it.)

“Aswathama (the elephant) is dead Sire” said Yudhistr.
In the din of battle the words ‘the elephant’ did not carry, they were not meant to. Yudistr had said the words sotto voce. Yudistr, true to his character had not lied, yet, the Pandava had done his teacher a grave injustice by misleading him. The visibly stunned Drona accepted Yudistr’s words without doubt.

Drona’s eyes dimmed with chagrin and his gaze fell to the ground. His rock steady hands shivered like that of a child in the dark and his bow fell from his powerless hands. The instrument of death fell to the ground as though in slow motion and as it did the leather bowstring snapped with a loud thwack, like a decrepit strand of twine. The metal armoured bamboo cracked in two as if it was a twig rather than a bow at the hands of a master for more than half an age.

Through the turmoil in his mind the effect of his perturbation on the war crossed the mighty warrior mage’s mind.
‘I cannot be captured in this state of impuissance. It is necessary for someone to succeed me or the war is as good as over. There is only one way now of achieving that.’
Drona sat on the battlefield in the lotus position and closed his mind to the chaos of pain and loss ringing and echoing relentlessly within and set forth his final incantation. The spell made his body quiver once as Drona let go of his life force. Then all was still.

Chapter-2
The Oath
The last of the ten commanders rocked back involuntarily as a crescent headed arrow plunged itself into his forehead and burst out of the back of his head. The equation coded into the arrow activated itself and the warrior’s head exploded into a million pieces. The fate of the other commanders was no different. The multiple codes within the single crescent shaped arrow made the arrow multiply itself, seek out targets scattered in ten different directions and explode once it was embedded into the targets.

The charioteers of the ten Pandava warriors swerved their vehicles around and fled the scene leaving behind a single sleek chariot on which their tall well built antagonist stood. His face was bereft of emotion as he watched the chariots fleeing into the distance.

The warrior mage just stood staring at the retreating enemy chariots. The gem on his forehead blazed orange and his bare chest, large and muscled heaved gently. The mage wore no armour because he didn’t need the protection of metal. His Gem was his sensor, armour, shield and protector. His war way-stee or what was left of it wafted in the hot wind as the elemental discharge from his latest incantation sizzled in the air around him.

The fumes and gut wrenching stench of combusted elemental forces mixed with burning flesh blanketed that part of the battlefield like a vile cerement. He had given the Pandava soldiers sufficient warning. But they chose not to heed it. It was as though they wanted to stall him, they’d doggedly pursued him, repeatedly engaged him in battle and finally it was only out of vexation that the tall warrior had ended their lives.
“Aswathama”
The mage whirled around. A wisp of warm air caressed his cheeks. Aswathama’s breathing quickened perceptibly. His vision scoured the length of the vast despondent battle field. An unfamiliar wetness in his eyes clouded his vision and he tried to wipe aside the wetness. A nameless dread made his heart heavy.
“My son”
His heart missed a beat. The warrior mage felt familiar tremors then. They were yogic impulses which emanated when a warrior mage was killed. But the tremors were infinitely stronger, they clarioned the demise of an extremely powerful warrior mage maybe the most powerful mage in that battlefield. The vibrations sent a shiver up his spine.
“Father” the word came out only as a dry whisper from a parched throat.

Deep inside Aswathama knew Drona was either dead or dying. The mage looked hither and thither helplessly, like a lost child seeking the warm comforting hand of his father. Aswathama didn’t know what to do with the hot un-solicited tears that filled the caverns of his eyes. He did not remember ever having cried. He clutched the flagstaff of his chariot in a gut wrenching grip of chagrin. At last when it all ended for his father Aswathama was not there by his side. Drona had moved on without a last word or blessing.

Aswathama drew his sword in a blur of movement and cleaved off the head of a rushing Pandava soldier with such speed and power that the decapitated head flew out of sight and the body did a macabre death dance for the briefest of moments before it collapsed to the ground. But the mage had no eyes for the corpse. He held onto his chariot and barked his orders.

The charioteer veered the sleek vehicle pulled by two powerful black horses through the bedlam of war. Orange and yellow dust combined with the acrid stench of conflagrated chemicals caused by powerful equations accompanied him through the ride. His yogic antennae zoned into the emanation point of the waves of power unleashed by the demise.

Presently he reached Drona’s final resting place. Drona lay surrounded by his forlorn and anxious personal bodyguards. Aswathama noticed something amiss from afar, something he could not quite place. As he neared the corpse the gory spectacle unfurled itself and he heard a shrill scream. The mage realized dully that it was his own scream of agony.
Someone had beheaded his father!
Even before his war vehicle came to a halt Aswathama jumped off the chariot and careened towards the beheaded torso, the head lay a few feet away rocking carelessly in the wind. Aswathama felt the earth give away as he crashed headlong to the ground a few feet away from his father’s slender body. Grief tore into Aswathama like a sword into soft naked flesh. He picked himself up unsteadily and staggered forward on rubbery legs that seemed to have no strength left to hold him up.
‘How’?
Tears rolled down his eyes and onto his grimy, battle weary cheeks. He knelt by the frail headless body and lifted the carcass into his arms. Aswathama held the body to his chest, like a mother holds a wailing infant, to fill the great emptiness in his chest. Warm blood from the body stained Aswathama’s chest and arms.

Faces of the warriors in the Pandava camp whizzed past each other in his mind as Aswathama tried to figure out who was powerful enough to have beheaded Drona himself in single battle. It was not possible, not one person in the battlefield could vanquish his father.
“How” His sharp aquiline nose flared in rage and anguish.
“How” He did not shout, instead he whispered and the guards trembled at the contained fury in that one word. His narrow eyes were pinpoints of dull seething rage, like desert sun on stone. A throbbing darkness entrenched deep within the mage threatened to lash out and embrace the mute guard until he died of sheer dismay. The guard came forward uncertainly.

“Yudistr confirmed that you died in battle. The master threw down his weapon and went into Yoga nidhra. In fact I think he died even before they did this to his body.” The soldier paused hesitantly. He was a bearer of bad news and he was scared.
“Who”? Aswathama asked with a voice choked in grief and anger. The guard hesitated further.
“Do not be afraid, tell me for I will not harm you if you will” Aswathama said through clenched teeth. His mind was threatening to go out of control, a dark malignancy had come over the mage and he had to use all his will to control it.
“Dhristadumnya son of Drupada beheaded him and the Pandavas were looking on.”
The earth itself seemed to simmer and shake as Aswathama pictured the final moments of his father’s life in his mind’s eye.
Drishtadumnya!
The audacity and cowardice of beheading an unarmed man sickened Aswathama. Where the Pandavas, Drona’s disciples in an earlier time, merely looking on when their master was being butchered? The unjustness of it shook the very thread of his being. No one had mastered Drona. They’d killed him using lies and deceit.

Yudistr had lied to Drona. Aswathama found that unbelievable but there was no other explanation. Drona must have thrown down his arms when even Yudistr confirmed that Aswathama was dead. Yudistr, a man who allegedly did not lie, that was one myth broken about the Pandavas. His father had been wrong about them all along. They were no better than their greedy cousins.

In his turmoil the dark malignancy seething within the Mage gnawed further into his mind. In that moment of utter weakness Aswathama took an oath.
“I will not let even one Pandava walk this earth, this I swear” he proclaimed through clenched teeth even as depths of grief he never knew existed scalded him.

Kroni the Other laughed… and only his own shades within the shadow realm heard him. All except one. They joined him in his laughter, though they knew not why. Just a few days more, Kroni thought. It had taken him eons to trace the device and now he had driven it to combustion level.Nothing could go wrong. If it did, well…

Kroni had a back up plan. It was almost time to give his anomalic vassal the power that she needed to free him. The use of the Brahm Astr itself was enough to loosen the locks of ASatya, but if by some freak accident his plot failed, he had to wait a mere ten thousand years. The Age of Kal was fast approaching and he was Lord and Master of Kalyug. Kroni was after all also known as Kaliyan. Freedom…the thought exhilarated him. Kroni the other laughed harder and harder still.

In a different part of the battlefield the mighty Pandava warlord Arjun fought the Kaurava forces. The slender dark man holding the reins of Arjun’s chariot heard the plaintive oath of a heart broken son and the hateful laughter of Kroni the Other. Krishna who perceived all things past, present and future gently closed his eyes and perceived a dark future.

Krishna knew Aswathama would use the ‘Brahm Astr’ the one weapon that could unleash the full potential of the dark malignancy within the device. It was too late to stop Aswathama. Krishna knew the gloom that was clouding the warrior mage’s mind imperceptibly. Krishna knew Aswathama would do something terrible. But even Krishna could not have imagined the horror of the warrior mage’s revenge.

Krishna had a fair idea of the darkness that would wake once the Brahm Astr was released for Aswathama did not know how to control the power of that weapon. If the Brahm Astr missile was not controlled it would weaken the elemental locks that bound the other side of Satya and wake the darkness too. Krishna knew there was only one recourse. He decided to absorb the tremendous energies of the celestial weapon. The power of the Brahm Astr could not be allowed to weaken the locks of Asatya.

Krishna saw things not visible to mortal eyes. He saw the dark schemes of Kroni the Other. Krishna realised that the only defence against Kroni in the darkest of the ages that was to come was the combined strength of the destined nine. Krishna turned to Arjun, observed the warrior letting loose arrow upon arrow on an unrelenting enemy. A thought struck Krishna. The more he played with it, the more he liked it. He recalled Chitrangada the warrior princess who had married Arjun. He remembered how she was torn between her love for her husband and her duty to her people. Krishna smiled mischievously and conceived the readers…

Krishna opened his eyes and they shone as brilliantly as a million suns. So be it. Aswathama had to be captured alive, it was centrifugal to his plan. His eyes twinkled brightly. Krishna knew exactly where to safeguard the device and who among the destined nine in distant Kalyug would fetch it when the time came.