KRISHNA CORIOLIS#6: Fortress of Dwarka Read online

  Contents

  Fortress of Dwarka

  AKB eBOOKS

  Dedication

  Epigraph

  Kaand 1

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Kaand 2

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Kaand 3

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Also in the Krishna Coriolis Series

  Also in the Krishna Coriolis Series

  Also in the Krishna Coriolis Series

  Also in the Krishna Coriolis Series

  Also in the Krishna Coriolis Series

  AKB eBOOKS

  FORTRESS OF DWARKA

  Ashok K. Banker

  KRISHNA CORIOLIS

  Book 6

  AKB eBOOKS

  AKB eBOOKS

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  Dedication

  For Biki and Bithika:

  My Radha and my Rukmini.

  For Yashka and Ayush Yoda:

  My Yashoda.

  All you faithful readers

  who understand

  that these tales

  are not about being Hindu

  or even about being Indian.

  They're simply about being.

  In that spirit,

  I dedicate this gita-govinda

  to the krishnachild in all of us.

  For, under these countless

  separate skins, there beats

  a single eternal heart.

  Epigraph

  ||yadrcchaya copapannah||

  ||svarga-dvaram apavrtam||

  ||sukhinah ksatriya partha||

  ||labhante yuddham idrsam||

  Blessed are the warriors

  Who are chosen to fight justly;

  For the doors to heaven

  Shall be opened unto them.

  KAAND 1

  1

  From his high elevated seat, Jarasandha watched with arched eyebrows as Balarama wreaked havoc in the Magadhan ranks. The island that was Mathura city was surrounded by an ocean of Magadhan cavalry, foot-soldiers, chariots and elephants—arrayed for yojanas in every direction, covering the earth like nothing less than a great sea of violence waiting to be unleashed. In comparison with this great force, what were two men—young boys at that, merely fifteen years of age apiece? And yet, those two striplings were causing epic destruction to his forces.

  The brother of Krishna struck down elephants like an elephant itself might strike down standing weeds. Each time Balarama leaped and spun in the air, leaping from elephant to elephant as he wreaked destruction, dozens of elephants died. As for their mahouts, they died with such ease and frequency that it was startling to view on such a scale. Jarasandha watched with reluctant admiration.

  From his vantage point, it appeared as if the charging brigade of elephants had overwhelmed the brothers, engulfing them in a river of grey-black hastipaka rippling along. The flanks of the frontlines of the charge had bypassed the brothers, overshot them by a hundred yards or so before their mahouts could turn them around and coax them back into the fray. This meant that the river was turning into a swirling whirlpool of elephants with the two brothers at the epicenter. Balarama was leaping and dancing and spinning so rapidly, he was never in one spot for long. Krishna on the other hand, was still standing where he had been before the elephants charged. How was he still able to withstand such an onslaught? Why had he not yet been crushed to fluid pulp?

  Then the ranks parted and the dust clouds cleared for a brief moment, and Jarasandha started at what he saw.

  Krishna had transformed into his true form.

  The being that stood on that battlefield was no longer merely the young dark-skinned foster son of Yashoda and Nanda, aged fifteen and ripe in his youth and mischievous beauty.

  He was the four-armed supreme One himself. Black as a monsoon cloud. Clad in yellow silk anga-vastra and dhoti. Eyes as pink as lotus petals. Lips as red as roses. Four arms longer than any mortal’s could be. Throat as intricately formed and detailed as a conch shell with its overlapping layers. His torso and abdomen gleaming with layers of taut muscles, offset by wide hips and strong loins over powerful thighs and trunk-like legs. His limbs were adorned with precious bracelets and earrings, necklaces, sacred thread and belt, topped off by a crown on his scalp. On his chest was the sacred Kaustabha tuft within which was embedded the Kaustabha jewel, surrounded by a garland of wild forest flowers.

  Jarasandha glimpsed this for only an instant and then his vision turned dark and forbidding. That beautiful vision of Krishna turned into a great and powerful force of nature, raging and roiling like a thunderstorm at sea. He saw lightning flash within those great pink eyes, and as the delicate lips parted, they revealed a world of pain and terror that awaited Jarasandha and his asura allies. It was a mind-numbing sight.

  Then the vision was obscured by a dust cloud and the pressing ranks of the Magadhan forces as they continued to harry the brothers. Jarasandha fell back in his elevated seat, suddenly perspiring and breathless as if he had fought a battle himself.

  ***

  Magnificent as Balarama’s fighting was, and terrible as his toll of death mounted up steadily, it was nothing compared to what Krishna was about to bring down on Jarasandha’s army.

  Using all four hands, the Lord of Vaikunta released four separate weapons at once:

  The Saranga bow occupied only one hand because the bow was capable of launching missiles without needing to be pulled. The missile it launched was a thing that could hardly be called an arrow for it more closely resembled a wave of fire.

  The chakra named Sudarshana spun off the finger of another hand, racing to do its given task.

  A conch shell sat in a third hand, held to Krishna’s blood-red lips as he prepared to blow it.

  A lotus flower was in the fourth hand and at a flick of his finger, it too went flying through the air into the dust of the elephant charge.

  Then Kr
ishna blew his conch.

  Jarasandha watched in disbelief as Krishna blew his conch. From his raised platform, some ten yards high, he could not see as well as Daruka could see from the chariot hovering above, but he still had a view of Krishna amid the raging river of elephants. Balarama continued to dance and spin and smash his mace with devastating efficiency, killing hundreds of elephants and breaking the back of the attack. But Krishna had only stood still for the first several moments of the charge, apparently doing nothing and Jarasandha knew that he could not simply remain standing thus for long. The question was, how did Krishna intend to fight—he needed to see and know that in order to launch his counter-attack. He had any number of options available: over five million in fact. But he could not simply throw his armies at the enemy without knowing their capability and strategy.

  Now, his question was answered.

  The figure of Krishna appeared to blur in Jarasandha’s view. He squinted and rubbed his eyes and tilted his head this way and that, trying to see more clearly. At first he assumed it was the dust raised by the charging elephants but even when the dust cleared in brief moments, he could still not view Krishna himself clearly. Only a moment earlier he had been able to make out that handsome dark face, creased in what appeared to be a dark scowl. Jarasandha had smiled to see that scowl for it meant that Krishna was either concerned or angry; either was to be desired in an enemy. It was only when an enemy displayed utter calm that he had reason to be worried.

  The blur that was Krishna appeared to be doing something. He appeared to be moving both arms—except that he seemed to have four arms, not two. Jarasandha scowled and cursed, wishing he could see better. Then he saw the gleam of polished metal and was alert again. Krishna was about to unleash some manner of weapon. He frowned when he caught the glint of gold off the weapons in the enemy’s hands. That could only mean gold or brass. Neither were fit materials to be used in the making of weaponry; they were much too soft. Why would Krishna bother with such devices? Unless they were show-piece weapons as some kings used, merely to play the part of waging war while their soldiers did the actual fighting. Arrows that could barely pierce a breast-bone or cut flesh, javelins that were so light they bounced off a man’s skull like a reed stick.

  Surely Krishna could not be using such items?

  Then again, perhaps Jarasandha had over-estimated him after all. Maybe Krishna was a better lover and fighter, as the rumors went. And Balarama was the real fighter. Maybe his energies were spent and all he intended to do now was put up a show for the watching Mathuran army to boost their morale.

  If that was the case, then he would die on this field today.

  Jarasandha grinned and was about to issue an order to his aides when suddenly everything changed.

  Across the field, he saw the gleam of gold flash across the brigade of charging elephants. Krishna had unleashed his weapons, showpieces or not.

  And then the weapons struck. And Jarasandha stopped grinning.

  They were not showpieces.

  They were dev-astras.

  2

  The missile shaped like a wave of fire sprang from the bow Saranga at supersonic speed. So tremendous was the sound of its passing over the heads of the assembled ranks of Jarasandha’s soldiers that it was akin to a physical blow. The boom produced by its passing deafened many at once, their eardrums buffeted beyond endurance by the sonic implosion. They toppled off their horses and elephants and chariots, many falling to the ground, clapping their hands to their bleeding ears. The missile itself struck the twelfth akshohini of the army of Magadha, impacting with the force of a wave but unlike a wave, it did not simply batter and splash. It disintegrated flesh and bone and blood to gritty remains. So intense was the heat it produced—for it was the heat of tapas itself—that it incinerated living bodies, armor and apparel to crumbling ash on contact. The lives of lakhs of soldiers, horses and elephants were extinguished instantly. Mere skeletons were left behind, surrounded by a swirling typhoon of fire and ash.

  The Sudarshana chakra flew in another direction, traveling across the breach and over Mathura city. The citizens stared up as the disk, brighter than the sun at noonday, flashed overhead, spinning at unimaginable speed. It swooped down with terrifying speed, attacking the Magadhan forces on the far side of the city. It struck with devastating impact, like a blade on a grinding wheel pressed to a slab of meat. Bodies were cleaved so cleanly in half, not one drop of blood spilled from the chopped halves to the ground; the two halves simply collapsed in a dead heap. Like the first dev-astra, Sudarshana too did not distinguish between man and beast, or between flesh and armor, steel and bone. It flashed across the battlefield like a smooth flat rock tossed sideways over a placid lake, severing tens of thousands of lives in a single passing.

  The third weapon was the lotus flower. What harm could a mere lotus flower do? Yet this was no ordinary lotus flower. It was the very lotus held by Vishnu himself, plucked by his lady Sri’s own hands from the oceanic pool in which Anantha lay coiled eternally. Over millennia Anantha’s venom had infused the lotus in that pond with such a high level of toxicity, the mere fragrance could kill any living creature. Because Vishnu like all devas was not affected by mortally threatening poisons or weapons, he could inhale its sweet fragrance with impunity. Indeed, only he or devas like himself could even scent its fragrance. But to the soldiers of the Magadhan army and the beasts that bore them and fought for them, the fragrance was as toxic as the most concentrated venom ever drawn. The lotus flower passed across a section of the great army, spreading its fragrance across the assembled lines. And as it passed by, tens of thousands dropped like flies whose wings had burned off.

  The fourth and final weapon was the conch shell. Ordinarily it did serve the purpose of alerting the assembled armies on the battlefield that the day’s warring had commenced—or ended. But when blown by its master in a certain way, it could produce a very different sound and result. Krishna blew into the conch shell in that certain way now, as the first three weapons spread their waves of devastation across the field. The sound produced by his blowing was nothing like the loud resonating trumpeting that it usually made.

  This was a subsonic scream so low-pitched, it vibrated at the same frequency as the molecules in the body of a living being…and then stopped. When it stopped, which was when Krishna stopped blowing it, of course, all those molecules simply stopped as well. He blew it outwards, aiming the sound in the opposite direction to the breach and Mathura city on his right hand, to ensure that no friendly soldiers or citizens could come to harm.

  The effect was even more devastating than the slaughter of the first three astras. The cessation of the conch shell sound stopped the hearts, brains, blood flow and every cell in every living body. The result was that the bodies at whom it was directed, regardless of their clothes, armor or other accessories, crumpled inwards like thin wooden boards. Bone structures, flesh, organs…everything was pushed inwards upon itself, forced into destruction by the cessation of the natural motion of their molecules. The tissue itself collapsed

  When each weapon had completed its task in one cardinal direction, it returned instantly to its owner. Even as he blew the conch shell with one hand, the weapons had already returned to the other three hands of Vishnu.

  And when all four had completed their tasks, he deployed them again. And again. And again.

  3

  In the end, the only warriors left standing were Jarasandha and the last remnants of his Mohini Fauj. Seeing the utter devastation wrought by Krishna and Balarama he had descended quickly from his raised viewing platform, boarded his chariot and started to flee the battlefield. Now, he was a mile or so and gaining speed. And Balarama was giving chase.

  Even the fastest horses in the world were no match for the celestial chariot. Balarama’s vaahan swooped low over Jarasandha’s contingent, startling his horses into bucking and drawing the nervous shrieks of the Hijras. The horse team, already confused and maddened by the sight and sce
nt of so much death and struggling to avoid the many obstacles posed by carcasses and torn remnants of armor and weaponry, caught its feet on something and tumbled. The chariot rose bodily in the air and broke free of the reins and horses. As the horses themselves tumbled, breaking legs and screaming pitifully, the chariot somersaulted and struck the ground, bouncing once, then again, before coming to a halt in upright position once more, a shattered wreck with a shaken yet largely unharmed Jarasandha huddled in the well.