अर्जुनप्रिया - Arjuna's beloved.
They had dreamt of a life with each other, for each other, and in each other, but the said life made them face the reality that they had to stay apart from each other for twelve long years. Those young hearts who cou...
Oops! This image does not follow our content guidelines. To continue publishing, please remove it or upload a different image.
The Yadavas had arrived at the large doors of Indraprastha's royal palace, headed by Balarama and Krishna. The two brothers were accompanied their other brothers Sarana, Gada, Uddhava, their sons Nishatha, Pradyumna, Samba, Bhanu, and the other Yadavas like Akrura, Anadhrishti, Satyaka, Kritavarma and Satyaki. The women of the Yadavas had also come with them as their presence was more important for the occasion than the men. Revati, Krishna's eight wives, and few other ladies were the prominent ones among them. Nakula and Sahadeva had stepped out of the palace and received the Yadavas with due honor after taking the blessings of those among the guests who were elder to them in age.
They brought the party of the guests inside the palace gates as the rest of the Pandava family including the king were waiting for them at the entrance of the palace. Yudhishthira personally received Krishna and Balarama as per the royal etiquette and embraced them, followed by Vrikodara who embraced his younger cousin Krishna and took the blessings of Balarama, who had been his teacher in mace-fighting.
Krishna and Balarama touched Pritha's feet after meeting Vrikodara and then Subhadra came forward, greeting them with her palms joined. They blessed her by placing their palms above her head. Devika and Vijayaa too sought the blessings of the Vrishni brothers before the Yadava ladies came forward and exchanged pleasantries with the Pandava women.
"Where is Panchali, Mata Pritha?" Satyabhama had been noticing her best friend's absence from the beginning.
"Partha is also missing!" Krishna remarked and that brought the fact of the duo's absence into everybody's attention. Almost no one realized it as they had assumed that they would join even if it gets somewhat late but they didn't. The Pandavas exchanged perplexed glances within themselves and with their mother. Pritha glanced at Devika and Vijayaa in question who shook their heads, indicating that they didn't know where the queen was.
"Subhadra, where is he?" Vrikodara asked the sister of Krishna and Balarama who herself looked oblivious about her husband's whereabouts.
"That's fine." Balarama turned to Krishna. "Kanha, present all the gifts for the family members to Bhrata Yudhishthira and the gifts that are specifically for Subhadra, hand them over to her hands only. I'll give the presents I got for Arjuna later."
"Yes, Dau!" Krishna nodded and looked at the attendants, who understood his silent cue and went to fetch the gifts from the vehicles. He offered the expensive gifts to Yudhishthira for the Pandava family and the personal gifts that Subhadra was sent by her dear ones, he gave over all of them to her.
Once the gifts-giving session from Vrishnis to the Pandavas was done and dusted with, the guests were invited into the palace. They were taken to the common guest hall and having settled down, both the Yadava and the Pandava families began to chit chat with each other about causal matters.
_____
"You should leave!" Krishnaa uttered for the hundredth time as she dressed the wound on Sutasoma's knee which he had hurt while playing around and Arjuna ignored her words once again, focusing his sight on the boy.
"Maharani, I have come here for Soma and unless he asks me to leave, I'm not going from here!" He supported Sutasoma's arm as the latter's elbow was also wounded. "Leave me and concentrate on what you are doing. The physicians are not at the royal palace at this time so we have to make sure that his wounds are not infected."
"Your brothers-in-law would have arrived by now and don't you have the basic courtesy to receive them?"
"No matter how much you admonish me, I'm not leaving Soma in this state, Krishnaa!" Arjuna stated determinedly.
"His mother is there to take care of Soma and he doesn't need your care!" Krishnaa pursed her lips as she reached forward to his elbow.
"Mata, I want to go out to the ground and play!" Sutasoma insisted.
"Soma, your knee and elbow are hurt!" She huffed. "You cannot play again. Just take rest for the whole day until you are actually and fully healed!"
"Please, Mata, I want to play with my toy bow!" Her son whined. "Pita Arjuna will take me to the ground, Mata!"
"Soma, listen to me, your uncles from Dvaraka have come to visit us and so your Pita Arjuna needs to go outside to welcome them. So he won't help you now and it's best for you to take rest!" She said strictly as she finished dressing the wound on his elbow.
"Then I too want to meet them, Mata!" Sutasoma exclaimed. "We will go there! Please take me there!"
Krishnaa held her head in her hands in exasperation while Arjuna smiled in amusement at the child's stubbornness.
"Aren't you feeling any pain?" Arjuna caressed Sutasoma's head.
"I'm feeling the pain but I also want to do something that makes me feel happy!" He responded. "I don't want to keep feeling this pain all day!"
"Alright, Putra." She sighed at his convincing words. "But I'm also coming with you. You have to be careful!"
Arjuna lifted Sutasoma up in his arms carefully after ensuring that he did not feel any discomfort and took him out of the chamber while Krishnaa followed them close behind. Sutasoma hadn't winced even once because of the wound, he was very tough right from his childhood, just like his father. But his mother couldn't help tearing up as she merely looked at his injuries.
Arjuna had noticed that she was crying. It was very new to him as he hadn't witnessed her maternal side before. He felt as if she was not the woman he knew, she was unfamiliar to him. Her loving motherliness, the little nuances in her motherhood, the maternal love pouring out of her countenance, it filled his heart with an unknown emotion that stupefied him. As they reached the guest hall where everyone was present, every pair of eyes fell on them, and finding them walking beside each other with Sutasoma, the Pandava family was stunned.
"How divine they are together!" Pritha muttered. "Only if this was real..."
Krishnaa joined her palms together to greet the guests wordlessly as she was feeling unsettled to communicate with the Yadavas as normally as before. Everything had changed significantly. Nothing was the same as before. Arjuna too greeted all of them through his eyes as he was carrying Sutasoma. There was something extremely incongruous about Krishnaa and Arjuna compared to the others who were present there. Their arrival had shifted the aura of the place itself. Balarama and Krishna exchanged silent glances within themselves.
