#devayani

[dharagalaxias]

Devayani my baby 💔💔💔💔 I'm forever gonna be a Sharmishtha hater for this

[blackknight-100]

@sambhavami's Devayani and Madhavi posts have brought back my obsession with them. I've reblogged and rambled in the tags endlessly, however between these and the Sharmistha post, I keep making myself miserable by thinking about Shukra. Poor man, he tried his best, you can tell, but his best is never enough. Not for his side to win decisively against the Devas, not for his wife/lover to remain with him, not even to save his daughter.

Like. The whole story starts because he sees a beautiful woman and gets together with her, and they have a daughter, and for a while they are so, so happy. And then he's realises, oh, I'm running from my duty to my people, and wants to return, but Jayanti his wife will not come, not when she of the Devas (the enemy, the enemy), not when she loves her father, not when her father is the king of gods, able to come down on them like a ton of bricks.

So she leaves. But no matter, he has his daughter, and it's not a consolation, it's a whole trophy. If this separation was a battle he has already won (it wasn't supposed to be a battle between them). He calls her Devayani, so she knows she might follow the path of her mother's people, so she has something of her mother even if he cannot give her Jayanti herself. Which is fine. She's sweet, she's beautiful, she's growing up fast and he loves her. It's not as well as can be but it's not all bad.

And then Brihaspati's son shows up. He's not even bad, is the thing. Shukra can be unhappy with his closeness to his daughter if he had any tangible evils but he doesn't. The Danavas kill him anyway, and his daughter comes begging and he sees at once what the gods want, knows that they will get it. It takes three tries. Shukra would be angry at his daughter's infatuation, but Kacha turns her down, and no greater punishment may be rendered by Shukra's hand.

Her grief turns to simmering rage and bitter pride. She quarrels with her friends, and speaks ill words to a companion who tongue has as many knives as her own. She is hurt, she is rescued, and now she weeps at the city gates, asking "Are you a sycophant? Are we beggars? Leave me here, if that is so."

"No," he says, "we are not. I will see you are compensated."

The compensation is a girl enslaved.

Shukra keeps failing.

His daughter finds another man to chase, and for a while Shukra is happy, because this king loves her, and there are grandchildren to dote on, and he has warned Yayati away from Sharmistha while asking him to care for her in the same breath.

And yet love makes traitors of all men, and Devayani returns to him in tears. He should not have been surprised. He too was once a traitor. That guilt is his rage, and his rage is blind, and he curses.

"Father," Yayati says, "how can your daughter be happy when I am old? What woman wants her lord unmanned?"

Shukra cannot take back the curse, but he can offer a caveat. Yayati leaves. He hears of the outcome from others, the change in inheritance. He looks out to the path outside his home. Devayani does not come again.

She is happy, he tells himself. She knows to come to me if she is not.

The thought is not as convincing as he would like it to be.

Devayani does not return.

Hope dies last, but hope dies as well, and Shukra leaves. From the corner of his eye he sees a girl by the side of the road, her face turned away. The curve of her chin reminds him of a distant dream, but when he looks closer, she is gone.

.

.

(There is a girl in the forest, bedecked in jewels.

Jayanti! He almost calls. Devayani!

But no, it is not them. A maiden remarkably of their appearance, but not them. Not his daughter, not his wife.

"Who are you?" he asks anyway.

"Madhavi, daughter of Yayati," she says, and tells her tale, and Shukra thinks he will never know the end of this bone-deep grief, of Devayani's sorrow.

Jayanti, he thinks despairingly, even now, even after so many years. Jayanti, what do I do?

Jayanti is not here. Madhavi is, though, so he asks her, "What do you want?"

"To live," she says. "To be like them." She points at the herd of deer running past. "To be free."

Shukra wants to shake her, to demand she tell him who gave her that stupid boon, so he can find them and curse them; he wants her to tell him to go slay the kings and her sons, to pull Yayati down from Jayanti's Swarga by his ankles and rip him apart, but he has asked her what she wants, and she has answered.

"I will show you, if you will it," he offers.

"I would be honoured."

Madhavi bows, and when she rises, she is princess no more. In her place is an ascetic to be, free as the deer, Mrigacharini.)

(Later, she gives her virtues to her fallen father, smiling, sending him to where her mother so dearly wished to go.

"He is my father," Madhavi says. "They are my sons. It is our duty."

There was once a woman who loved, whose sons did not honor their father as he willed. There was once a woman he loved, and she had a little girl, who grew up to have another little girl, and they were all the same.

There was once a man who loved greedily, viciously, clawing on to all he named his own. There was once a man whose hands reached out and took and took and took. And there was another who would take nothing.

There were so many men and women and he has lost count of them all.

Shukra turns away, unable to contain his bitterness. His little girl is gone, but Devayani remains anyway.)

[sambhavami]

Women in Mahabharata - Devayani

Abandoned by her mother Jayanti, she is swindled easily by Kacha, Vrihaspati's son. Kacha sees a vulnerable adolescent, who he woos with stories of svarga, a place where her absent, idolized mother resides, and uses her as a human shield against the danavas, all while buttering up her father to gain access to a very coveted magic trick that is the key to win the war ongoing from the previous generation.

When Kacha breaks her young heart, this destruction of her first love fundamentally shifts something in Devayani's brain, and she slides into an ultra-fundamentalist school of thought, using her identity on her father's side as a brahmin to bully Sharmishtha, the danava king's daughter.

After Sharmishtha, tired of her behaviour, tries to kill her, Devayani is rescued by Viraja's son Yayati.

Devayani uses her father's unconditional, compensatory devotion to herself to force Sharmishtha into submitting to be her slave, and then forcing Yayati later to marry her despite both his and her father's unwillingness and a documented caste-incompatibility.

She develops a chip on her shoulder, where even after several years she is unable to allow Sharmishtha any happiness, disproportionately punishing her by effectively keeping her prisoner in a garden mansion.

She later shortsightedly forces her father to curse Yayati after the latter has an affair with Sharmishtha, effectively pushing her own children, Yadu, Turvasu and Madhavi, out of the order of succession.

Her story seems to embody the saying: "Hurt people hurt people."

[ginazmemeoir]

Mmkay so this is just a fic idea that was swirling in my head, based off the tale of Kacha and Devayani. hope you like it :D

tagging some : @gopikanyari @momo-all-the-way @carmen-riddle @taareginn @reddish-green-personality

@holding-infinity-and-a-book @aadyeah @weird-u @the-fault-in-our-inquilab @dragonfairy1231 @allegoriesinmediasres @mango-pickle

The afternoon sun poured through the trees. A breeze flowed through the forest, picking up pace and then lazing back, like a cat trying to chase bees. Kacha, Sharmishtha, Prabha and I had gathered near a brook. It was our favourite spot in Vrishaparva. There were no prying eyes, and devas did not interfere in asura territory so we were safe from them as well. Everything seemed a bit too bright and colourful whenever Kacha was around. He chalked it up to the fact that his mother was a yaksha, so he had a connection with the forests. I sighed as I admired him – his flowing shoulder length locks, his wide nose and high cheekbones, his smile, the way he talked with the cows, his biceps as he whirled around his lathi. “Quit ogling him and just go up to him already or you’re gonna end up alone in a pit” said Sharmishtha, elbowing me. “I don’t even know what you see in him. I hear the other asuras call him a ‘deva bastard’ and a ‘twink’.” “That’s because they’re jealous of him. No asura could match the way he looks, or the way he behaves” I reply, cutting off Prabha’s useless critiques.

The wind picks up pace once again, and Sharmishtha gets up chasing her dupatta. A blue lotus flutters and drops near my feet, and I pick it up. It shimmers as if dusted with moonshine, and its scent made the fullest of roses in bloom in spring smell like stale bread. Prabha put it along with the other flowers in my gajra, and said “Even Lakshmi wouldn’t look half as beautiful as you when she sees you like this” she laughs merrily. I push at her playfully, and that is when Kacha arrives there. He was mostly silent, listening, observing, so it made me feel as if the lotus was a drug when he said, “Devayani, can I have that lotus?”

I hastily pluck it from my hair and give it to him. Sharmishtha returned by then, leaves in her hair, and her torn dupatta in her hand. “It was stuck in a branch and I had to climb 6 feet to retrieve it.” Kacha was oblivious to her rant, and he kept looking at the flower, as if studying a complex problem. “Do you like it Devayani?” he asks. I stare at him, slack jawed, dumbfounded to reply for a minute. “Yes she does. Now Kacha why don’t you get her those flowers?” “After all aren’t you the one who brings flowers for her priceless gajras?” say Prabha and Sharmishtha in order, teasing Kacha. A blush creeps up his cheeks, as he replies, “Lady Devyani is my guru’s daughter, it is my duty to serve her.” What I wouldn’t give to hear those words, but spoken with love instead of reverence. “They grow near the river’s source, in a lake nearby. That is the only place you can find these blue lotuses.” Sharmishtha says. Determination fills Kacha’s eyes. Sometimes I do wonder if he lies about his half yaksha parentage, for there is certainly something… different about his eyes. “I will return by dusk with your cattle Lady Devyani.” He assures me, and leaves for the lotuses, getting his lathi for the trek up ahead. I don’t believe his promise at all. Twice he’s promised me before, and twice before have the other jealous asuras murdered him, and twice before has father resurrected him through the mrita-sanjeevani on my plea. I look behind him, hopeful for the love budding in his heart, and dreading for his safety.

Dusk creeps its way into the ashram. I stand at the gate, looking anxiously for any sign of Kacha, when the asuras, led by Atibala, arrive at the gates. They were clearly coming after making merry, and I could smell the scent of honey wine on them. “Guru Shukracharya, please come accept our obeisance” says an asura, slurring his words and giggling half way through. Father arrives, in his flowing white dhoti and beard, annoyed at the disturbance in his prayers to Shambhu. “Who is it at this late – oh Atibala! Come, it is always great to see an old student!” says father, as he invited Atibala and his companions. Maybe he wouldn’t greet them the same way if he knew they were the ones who had murdered his favourite disciple in cold blood twice. Or maybe he did know, but chose to ignore it. Atibala brings a pitcher and a goblet towards father and offers him wine. Father took the goblet and greedily inhaled the scent, swirling the vessel. An enthusiastic wine connoisseur, father downed the goblet in one gulp, remarking afterwards that it tasted different. Atibala attributed it to fanciful terms like the right serving temperature, touched father’s feet and left. Father soon after retired to his chambers, leaving me alone.

The sky is now dotted by stars, illuminated by the first rays of moonlight, and I start panicking. There is still no sign of Kacha. I rush towards father’s chambers and wake him up. “Father, Kacha hasn’t returned yet. Please do something!” I cry. Father immediately gets up, all hints of the sluggishness from the wine gone. He instructs me to light a lamp, and to wait outside. After what feels like eternity, but would have been a blink of an eye for him, he calls me in. His expression is gaunt, and his hands are trembling. “What happened father?” I ask, warily. “Kacha is no more.” he says, as if tired. “What?” I reply, shocked. “I SAID HE IS DEAD. HE WAS CUT DOWN BY ATIBALA AND HIS PARTY, AND THEN THE SON OF A BITCH BURNT HIM.” “Father, you are the only person in this universe who can revive the dead. Twice you have revived him at my behest, I vow father this is the last time I ask of you, please bring Kacha back.” I plead again, trying to calm father’s rage. He goes into a meditative trance again, but returns back quickly, this time even more shocked than last time. “Kacha is in me.” I am too stunned to even comprehend what he means. “Atibala mixed his ashes in my wine.” Father says, disgusted and horrified at himself, his students, and fate’s cruel turn.

Dread floods me. I cannot choose the man I love, about whose love I’m not even sure, over my father. Father, as if sensing my thoughts, says in a resigned tone, “Devyani, I can only resurrect Kacha on one condition. I will have to teach him the mrita-sanjeevani, which Kacha will then use to resurrect me back once he comes out of my body.” Father sounds like a defeated man. Obviously, such a heinous act by ones students was bound to leave a teacher like this. I kneel beside father’s bed, holding his hand, calming and healing him through my powers, as he starts chanting the mantra. Slowly, a faint light starts emitting from him. Kacha then emerges, making a sickening sound as he tore through father’s abdomen. Immediately he kneels down beside father, laying his hand on his chest, and utters the mantra. Father’s stomach seals up, and his breath returns to him as he opens his eyes. He still has that odd look of resignation on his face, and looks at me with – pity?

Today has been a lesson to me, a lesson that matters of the heart while shouldn’t be rushed, should certainly not be stayed, lest the heart’s wish never take wings. I can’t even bear the thought of losing Kacha again, not without telling him how I felt about him. “Kacha,” I start, as I move towards him “, I am in love with you. I love you like the dawn loves the sun, like the river loves the sea, like the clouds love-“ “Stop Devyani.” Kacha says, interrupting me midway. I fear what’s going to happen. Is he offended? Or does he not love me? “Devyani, I must return back.” Kacha says. “Where?” I ask him. Kacha had showed up on our door once, and each time I asked about his origin or parentage, he shied away. “Back to Amravati.” he replies. The deva capital? I look at father, who has instead chosen to look at the floor. I look back at Kacha.

I now realize the heartbreak that poets so fondly mention, as if stating the weather. How idiotic they are. Heartbreak wasn’t beautiful. It wasn’t even painful. It was draining. Everything I thought I knew was a lie. The man I had fallen for saw me as nothing more than a tool. All those times I caught him looking at me, or when he caught I, was a performance. His demeanour? What about his silent laugh? Was the way he blushed earlier today also a performance, part of an elaborate use to manipulate me? A thousand questions flood me, but only one sentence makes it out of my mouth – “You lied to me. You-you used me?” Tears blur my vision as I take a step back. “You are just a deva spy, and you used me.” Kacha stays silent, his shoulders hunched and head bent. “And you knew – you knew and you kept this a secret from me!” I whirl at father. He looks at me with tear stained eyes. “Devayani I-“ “Don’t you dare even take my name out of your filthy impure tongue!” I shout as I turn back to Kacha. He flinches at my tone, and I see the glistening tears on his face as well.

“You knew how I felt about you. You knew I loved you, and you knew I would get father to resurrect you each time you died. Had you told me your truth, I would’ve kept my distance, I would’ve stayed out of your way, I would’ve respected you for fighting for your faction, and yet. Yet you chose to manipulate me and my love, you conniving betraying lying cheating deva bastard!” Kacha looks taken aback at my words. I can feel my features contorting from my rage and pain. I can feel the hurt I’m causing, the way my tongue bleeds Kacha’s heart like he bled mine. I muster all my powers, and then I utter words that would cause Kacha the most suffering – “Kacha. You have seen my love so far, but now you will see the power of my hatred and my wrath. Kacha, I curse you to never be able to use the mrit-sanjeevani. I curse you to forget the knowledge to use the same mantra for which you have died and returned to the world thrice. Let the devas know that their spy failed.”

Kacha’s expression turns to stone. He bows to my father and touches his feet, and my father, the chivalrous, honourable man he is, blessed the man who almost killed him and broke his only child’s heart with a curt “May you emerge victorious in all future missions.”. Kacha then flies out of my house, and a blue lotus, with petals that shone like moonshine and fragrance that made the fullest of roses blooming in spring smell like stale bread, falls at my feet.

[arjuna-vallabha]

Murugan with wifes, Devayani and Valli.

[avani008]

An Alphabet of Legendary Ladies - D for Devayani, for @queenofmahishmati!

“You will never know love,” she snarls at Kacha, and he only looks at her sadly, his shining earrings swinging about that elegant neck—no, Devayani, no more.

“Then neither will you, little sister,” he replies, and how dare he, how dare he call her sister when all he did was come out of Father’s body at her request, when she burned for him…

Enough. Enough with men, she decides, after Kacha is gone; and holds to it. What are men, any way to her friend Sharmistha’s company, to Sharmistha’s sharp humor, and sparkling eyes, and sense of justice?

Curses are persistent things, though, and work their way into the most precious things. It is only when Devayani looks up at Sharmistha’s retreating form from the bottom of the well when she realizes how very foolish she has been, loving her as she did.

[sambhavami]

Women in Mahabharata - Jayanti

She is the daughter of Shachi and the mother of Devayani.

Her father, Sakra, sends her to distract Shukra from his penance, but she herself falls in love with him, and the two of them run and hide from both the Devas and Asuras up until the birth of their daughter.

After Devayani's birth, Shukra attempts to return to the Asuras upon finding out that Vrihaspati has been masquerading as him for all this time. However, Jayanti refuses his offer to seek shelter with the Asuras, unable to betray her own side completely.

She therefore returns to her father, leaving Shukra, who is still madly in love and yet similarly devoted to his own side, to raise their daughter alone.

She appears as a fleeting enigma in the wide canvas of the epic and yet her abandonment leaves a fatal scar upon the direction of the narrative, as her decision shapes young Devayani, whose course of actions eventually snowballs into the devastating war of Kurukshetra.

[sambhavami]

Women in Mahabharata - Ghurnika

She is a young nanny employed by Shukra to take care of young Devayani in the absence of Jayanti, and she often takes messages back and forth for Devayani.