Itihāsa / Mahābhārata chronicle / Virāṭa · 24 of 50
24. Kīcaka
Virāṭa (विराट)
Kīcaka is the queen's brother and the marshal of the army, and he wants Sairandhrī. She refuses. The queen, who is fond of her and afraid of him, sends her to take wine to his rooms, which is a betrayal dressed as an errand. He seizes her. She runs, and she runs into the hall where Virāṭa and Kaṅka are sitting, and he throws her down there. Yudhiṣṭhira, still inside the year of hiding, tells her to go, quietly, that actresses' husbands do not rage. The sentence is hard to read and the poem leaves it hard. Hiding has a price, and he is willing to pay it with her dignity for a few more months.
She goes to Bhīma at night and will not accept that price. He agrees. He tells her to summon Kīcaka to the dancing hall after dark. Kīcaka comes expecting a woman. Bhīma is there. Kīcaka dies. This page says that Bhīma killed him. It does not describe the killing. In the morning the body is found, and no one can understand what man could have done it. Kīcaka's brothers seize Draupadī for the pyre, to burn her with him. Bhīma kills them too. The page says that also, and stops.
The city is afraid of a maid who seems protected by a god. Duryodhana, when the news travels, begins to suspect the year is up and the cousins are near. Draupadī has been humiliated again, in a smaller court, and again a brother has answered with a death, and again the legal king in the room chose the disguise over her. The poem does not announce this parallel. It does not have to.
नेपालीमा
कीचक रानीका भाइ र सेनापति थिए। ऊ सैरन्ध्रीलाई चाहन्थ्यो। रानीले सैरन्ध्रीलाई उसको कोठामा मद्य लिन पठाइन्। उसले सैरन्ध्रीलाई समात्यो, र उनी भागेर सभामा पुग्दा उसले उनलाई त्यहीँ पछार्यो। लुकेर बसेको वर्षमा युधिष्ठिरले उनलाई चुपचाप जान भने। रातमा द्रौपदी भीमकहाँ गइन्। भीमले कीचकलाई नृत्यशालामा बोलाउन लगाए, र आफू त्यहीँ थिए। कीचक मर्यो। यो पृष्ठले भीमले मारे भन्छ। तरिका लेख्दैन। कीचकका भाइहरूले द्रौपदीलाई उसैसँग जलाउन चितामा लैजान खोज्दा भीमले तिनीहरूलाई पनि मारे। दुर्योधनलाई वर्ष सकिन लागेको र ती नजिकै छन् भन्ने शङ्का लाग्यो। सानो दरबारमा फेरि अपमान भयो, फेरि एक भाइले मृत्युले उत्तर दिए, र फेरि राजा उनको पक्षमा नबोली चुप लागे।