The story

Duryodhana went into the forest to watch his cousins suffer, and came out owing them his life.

It began with pity. A brahmana told Dhritarashtra how the Pandavas were living, sunburnt and sleeping on the ground, and the old king lamented aloud, fearing Bhima's anger and Arjuna's new weapons. Karna and Shakuni heard an opportunity. Go to the Dvaitavana lake where they are camped, Karna told Duryodhana. Let them see you in your splendour, and let Draupadi in her bark cloth see your wives in their jewels.

Nothing would please him more, Duryodhana admitted, than to see Draupadi in ochre robes in the forest. But his father would never allow it. So Karna found a cover: the ghosha-yatra, the king's routine tour of the cattle stations to count and brand the calves.

Dhritarashtra saw through it. The Pandavas were close by, he said, and his proud sons would provoke something. Send servants to count the cows. On Shakuni's promise to keep away from the Pandavas, the old king gave way, unwillingly.

The expedition left like a city on the move: eight thousand chariots, thirty thousand elephants, nine thousand horses, merchants, courtesans and hunters. He did inspect the herds. Then he made for the lake, where Yudhishthira happened to be performing a one-day royal sacrifice.

His servants found the lake taken. Chitrasena, king of the gandharvas, the celestial musicians, was there with his apsaras, and his people laughed at the order to make way. Duryodhana sent in his army. Chitrasena ordered the intruders punished, and the gandharvas fought by illusion from the air. Karna held longest, until his chariot was cut to pieces and he escaped on Vikarna's. The army broke. Duryodhana stood his ground, and Chitrasena took him alive. Duhshasana, other brothers and the royal women were taken too.

The fugitives ran to the Pandavas. Bhima was openly pleased: the gandharvas had done their work for them. This is no time for harsh words, Yudhishthira told him. Kinsmen quarrel, but when an outsider lays hands on the family the good do not stand for it, and the seizure of the Kuru women dishonoured them all. To rescue an enemy from distress was worth as much as granting a boon, gaining a kingdom, or the birth of a son. He was bound to his sacrifice and could not go himself, so the brothers must free Duryodhana — by persuasion first, then by gentle force, then by any means. Arjuna swore that if the gandharvas would not listen, the earth would drink their king's blood.

The fight was fierce until Chitrasena showed himself to Arjuna: his friend and music teacher from Indra's heaven. Indra had known why Duryodhana and Karna had come, he explained — to laugh at the exiles and at Draupadi — and had sent him to bring the culprit back in chains. Arjuna asked for Duryodhana's release on Yudhishthira's word. Let Yudhishthira hear the story first, Chitrasena said. Yudhishthira heard it, set the captives free, and thanked the gandharvas for killing none of his kin. To Duryodhana he spoke kindly: never do anything so rash again, go home safely, and do not be downcast.

That kindness was the wound. On the road home Karna, who had fled, congratulated Duryodhana on defeating the gandharvas. Duryodhana told him the truth. He had been bound in front of the women and handed to Yudhishthira, had heard Chitrasena tell Arjuna why they came, and had wished the earth would open. He owed his life to men he despised. Better to have died. He would fast to the death where he sat, and Duhshasana would be king.

Duhshasana fell at his feet, weeping, and refused. Karna argued that the Pandavas lived in Duryodhana's realm and had only done a subject's duty to their king, so there was no shame in it. Shakuni said something stranger: if the Pandavas had been so good to him, he should give them back their kingdom and win fame. Unmoved, Duryodhana spread kusha grass on the ground, put on bark, and fell silent, intent on heaven.

What talked him out of it was not a friend. The demons of the underworld saw their own cause dying with him. Their priests performed a rite, and a conjured spirit carried Duryodhana down to them in the night. They told him he was not merely human: their penance had won him from Shiva, his upper body was made of adamant, and the goddess had made his lower body of flowers. Demons would enter Bhishma, Drona and Kripa, so that they would fight the Pandavas without pity. The soul of the slain demon Naraka had entered Karna. Indra would trick Karna out of his earrings and armour, so other demons, the Samshaptakas, would kill Arjuna instead.

The spirit brought him back. It felt like a dream, but he was now sure he would win, and he told no one. At dawn Karna came to him: a dead man defeats no enemies; when the thirteenth year is past, I will kill Arjuna. Duryodhana got up and went home.

Bhishma met him with plain words: Karna had run, he was not worth a quarter of the Pandavas, make peace. Duryodhana laughed and walked out. Soon afterwards Karna vowed not to wash his feet until Arjuna was dead, and the news troubled Yudhishthira.

The cattle expedition is the epic's clearest test of mercy, and the mercy fails. Yudhishthira saves his enemy, and the rescue becomes a debt Duryodhana's pride cannot carry. From here his hope rests on a secret promise from the underworld and a vow from Karna, and Yudhishthira's kindness has hardened the hatred it should have ended.

Who appears, and what it argues

• Duryodhana — The eldest Kaurava, who never disputes that the kingdom is contested and never concedes that this makes the Pandavas' claim equal to his.
• Karna — Kunti's first son, given away at birth and raised by a charioteer, who spends his life being told his skill does not outrank his upbringing.
• Shakuni — Gandhari's brother and Duryodhana's strategist, who takes a kingdom without a weapon by being better at a game nobody was allowed to refuse.
• Yudhishthira — The eldest Pandava, called the king of dharma, who gambles away his brothers, his wife and himself without anyone forcing his hand.
• Arjuna — The archer the whole war is arranged around, who arrives at its opening unable to lift his bow because of who is standing on the other side.
• Bhima — The strongest of the brothers, whose two vows in the assembly hall turn a property dispute into something that can only end in bodies.
• Duhshasana — Duryodhana's brother, who dragged Draupadi into the assembly by her hair and paid for it on the battlefield exactly as Bhima had sworn.
• Dhritarashtra — The blind elder brother passed over for the throne and left holding it anyway, who can always see what his son is doing and never stops him.
• Bhishma — The grand-uncle whose vow of celibacy was meant to secure the succession and instead left it disputed for three generations.
• Theme: Kinship and enmity
• Theme: Counsel that goes unheeded

Elsewhere in this parva

• Arjuna and the hunter — Arjuna starves himself for four months to meet Shiva, and the god comes as a hunter who beats him senseless before giving him his weapon.
• Nala and Damayanti — A sage consoles a king who lost everything at dice with the story of another who did, and then teaches him the dice.
• Bhima and the old monkey — Bhima goes to fetch a flower for Draupadi and cannot lift the tail of an old monkey lying across the path, who is his brother Hanuman.
• The abduction of Draupadi — Jayadratha carries Draupadi off from the forest, leaves with five tufts of hair and a slave's oath, and goes to Shiva for revenge
• Savitri and Satyavan — A princess marries a man fated to die within the year, follows Death into the forest, and talks him out of her husband
• Karna's earrings — Warned in a dream by the Sun, Karna sees through Indra's disguise and still cuts off the armour that made him unkillable
• The yaksha's questions — Four brothers drink before answering and fall beside the lake, and the fifth is asked what a man must be before he may drink

Questions to explore

• Why does Yudhishthira order his brothers to rescue Duryodhana, his enemy?
• Why does Duryodhana decide to starve himself to death, and what makes him give it up?
• What do the demons of the underworld promise Duryodhana about Bhishma, Drona and Karna?