Towards the second half of the twelfth year, Duryodhan had the bright idea to go make fun of his cousins due to no other reason but sheer pettiness. Bhanumati had tried to convince him to not do ridiculous foolishness like this again, but well.

What was worse was that Bhrata Karna agreed to this plan at once. Had he refused, Duryodhan might have been convinced.

The excuse had arrived when the news came that cattle sheds were being attacked and ravaged in a place near where the Pandavas were currently staying. This was of course not something the Crown Prince himself would go to check, but, well.

They thought that after saving the cows and cattle, they would display their wealth and pride to mock the Pandavas and Bhanumati honestly found it childish.

So Duryodhan had gone with some of his brothers and Karna and they had been ambushed by Gandharvas who were friends of Arjun and who rightfully detested Duryodhan.

Duryodhan had been taken captive along with his brothers.

Bhrata Karna had fought and defeated thousands of Gandharvas before being finally overwhelmed and his quiver of arrows had ended and then he had run.

Later Arjun and Bheem had gone and released Duryodhan and his brothers from the Gandharvas, by telling their celestial friends that this was not their war and they would deal with it when the time came.

It was a terribly shameful incident but Bhanumati had the notion that this was only the beginning of their misfortunes.

Pitamaha Bheeshma had created an uproar at both Duryodhan's foolishness and Karna's actions of running away.

Now Bhanumati personally didn't think anything wrong with running to save your life when you knew you were overpowered, but warriors were not sensible in matters concerning their so-called honour.

(She might have resented Bhrata Karnaa little, for leaving her husband, but given how much she loved them both despite resenting them for far greater things, this hardly registered, especially when in the end, everyone had been returned in perfect health and without any damage, except perhaps to their pride. Besides, she couldn't even blame Bhrata Karna, really. Not everyone had self-replenishing divine quivers like Arjun.)

Karna had shamefully looked away, not even attempting to defend himself, but once again surprising everyone, though by now they should have had no reason to be surprised, Duryodhan himself came to Karna's defence.

("I know you would have come back for me." He told Karna warmly.

Karna stared back at him, agape, tears in his eyes.

"Yes, I would have, of course I would have, but-- I ran , Duryodhan. I abandoned you."

"Only because you would have been taken captive as well!" Duryodhan argued. "For gods sake, your quiver of arrows had ended! What on Earth were you supposed to do?! Stand there with an empty quiver?! It would have been foolishness to let yourself get captured as well. And don't say abandoned because you would have returned to release me later. Perhaps with reinforcements. That's all that matters to me. Besides, it was the smart thing to do!"

Karna had once again been beyond touched by this friendship he had been gifted by God and as penance for his actions and to show his great regret at them, he swore off meat, till he had bathed the Pandava armies in blood.

(Vrushali had asked him to immediately stop such nonsense, especially since meat was practically a necessity for warriors, but quite like Pitamaha Bheeshma, though both of them would hate the comparison, once Bhrata Karna made a vow, that was that. )

Then someone had made a comment about how Duryodhan had needed saving by the Pandavas like a damsel. That had set him off. He had also once again decided to attempt suicide at the insult of being saved by the Pandavas.

Bhanumati had watched with her heart in her throat as once again neither she, not their children, nor his brothers or parents could reach him. Only Bhrata Karna could.

"I would have waited for you, Karna!" he screamed. "I do not need their pity! Their--their magnanimity ! I did not need to be saved by those--those--"

"There are your subjects right now." Karna had soothed him. "They were only doing their duty to you."

(Later, after the ordeal was over, Panchalraj Ashwathama had pointedly asked them if they had not thought that it was odd that the Pandavas would just allow this destruction of Cattle sheds near their accommodation to go unchecked, especially with the youngest one's fondness for cattle? Bhanumati honestly wished half the time that Ashwathama would spend more time here. Even if he couldn't talk sense to Duryodhan, he could talk sense to Karna, who could then attempt to tame her husband a bit.)

________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

As the twelfth year came to a close, Duryodhan plotted to make sure that the Pandavas could be caught out before the sunset of the final day of said year so that they would have to repeat their exile. He had finally started to become apprehensive too, though he would never show it.

And then he sent Jayadrath to kidnap Draupadi in the afternoon of the final day of the exile.

Just when they were learning to get along once again.

Bhanumati had honestly given up at this point. Her husband loved her but would not listen to her. And after he had done such a terrible thing in the Dyut Sabha, he just kept doing more and more terrible things in an attempt to avoid(rather delay) the consequences.

Of course it did not work out and the Pandavas shaved Jayadrath's head, leaving behind five locks of hair as their mark and as the greatest insult to a warrior--at least they didn't widow their sister-- and then they disappeared with their wife for the thirteenth year of their exile.

Duryodhan and Mama Shakuni started sending off spies to all ally Kingdoms to search for them but as the months went by, there were no signs of them.

________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Bhanumati's father passed away and King Shrutayudha replaced King Chitrangada as ruler of Kalinga.

She thought of how ready he had been to refuse an alliance with the mighty Hastinapur and risk devastating war, just for the sake of his daughter's happiness and felt that she would burst.

Bhrata Shrutayudha came to visit and they spent the night together, crying and comforting each other. He told her that their mother's health was not very well either.

But even as she grieved, with all the terrible things that seemed almost certain to come, there was just one sardonic, shameful thought in her head: Well, this might as well happen now too.

The death of her father marked the beginning of the deaths of all the men in her life.

(At least his was a natural one.)

________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

When there remained only a month remaining before the Pandavas' exile ended, Bhrata Karna started training both his and Hastinapur's army extensively, going over all sorts of battle formations and the rules of each faction of the troops in them, all sorts of various weaponry and battle tactics, as if already preparing for war.

According to Lakshman, word in the barracks was that the King of Anga had proved to be an even greater taskmaster than the Grand Excellency himself.

She had seen Duryodhan watching with an odd look on his face. He looked like he was both pleased to see what his friend was doing and troubled at the implications. He didn't say anything of course.

(They didn't say much of anything to each other since the end of last year. The improvement in their relationship had gone to pieces again after Duryodhan had tried to have Jayadrath kidnap Draupadi. They just co-existed in silence nowadays. There was no shouting, no arguments. Only the most basic conversations were spoken to existence and after almost twenty five years of marriage they knew each well enough to get major points across without speaking much. There was peace and serenity between them, but it was not the good sort. There was peace, but it was clear to Bhanumati that this unsettling peace between them was the precursor to the war that might rage all over Aryavarta soon.)

Everybody in the Palace from the King and Queen to the das-dasis seemed to be existing in a constant state of anticipation and wariness of what was to come as the days rolled by.

Bhanumati knew that unless there was some sort of miracle, the future wouldn't be very bright for any of them.

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A week before the thirteen years of exile were set to end, Mama Shakuni came to the conclusion that the Pandavas were hiding in Virat.

It was all but confirmed three days later when Senapati Keechak was killed anonymously, in what seemed like a wrestling match.

"Only four people could have defeated Keechak in wrestling." Duryodhan said gleefully. "Gurudev Balram, myself, Mitra Karna and.... Bheem. "

(Bhanumati had shuddered seeing the madness from thirteen years prior, return to his eyes. That madness only spelt doom.)

"We will lead an army to Virat."

(This might not have been the War that would leave Aryavarta in pieces, but the first battle cries signalling the end had already rung.)

________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

They lost. Badly. Shamefully.

It was poetic, Bhanumati thought, how the clothes of all the warriors had been stolen to make the dresses of a teenage girl's dolls.

Duryodhan was cataclysmic with rage. Pitamaha Bheeshma could barely stifle his smiles. The Pandavas had succeeded in completing their exile by adhering to the loophole that while Duryodhan was calculating the time of the exile based on the Solar Calendar, the Pandavas had started and finished their exile according to the Lunar Calendar.

Bhrata Karna was boiling in fury and shame and grief. His brother Shon had been killed by Arjun in the Virat War.

("I was unable to protect him." he had sobbed into Duryodhan's shoulder. "My little brother--he's gone now. " He had choked out. "What if I'm unable to protect you as well?"

Duryodhan had shushed him, stroking his hair. "It is not your job to protect me. That is just something you choose to make your primary objective goal. Pitamaha and Guru Drona are there for that. It is your job to stay by my side, no matter what."

"What on Earth are you talking about?! It is my job to protect you!"

"Just fight with me. The 'Protecting me' will happen automatically."

"But don't you see?" Karna beseeched. "I wasn't able to protect my own brother. I wasn't. "

"We weren't prepared for Arjun." Duryodhan attempted to console. "We didn't know it was him. We didn't fight like it was him."

But Karna was inconsolable.)

She hadn't really known Shon, except that he had succeeded in becoming a Rathi by attempting to follow in his elder brother's footsteps once he had returned from his training, by learning from him. But she had met him on a few occasions, like the name day ceremonies of Karna's children and a death so close to the family, in a war that they lost, only seemed to serve as a prologue of what was to come.

(She did her best to think of what she would do, how she would live, when it came for her.)

Bhanumati had thought she had known what Karna hating Arjun looked like. But after the Virat War, it seemed like there were coals in places of Bhrata Karna's eyes. Earlier the hatred had been powered by a need to prove himself superior, but now it was powered by sheer rage and grief and a desire to kill.

________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

(As Bhanumati looked around herself in a citadel preparing itself for war, for slaughter, even though no war had been announced yet, she felt the feeling of inevitable doom that had been creeping up on her for the past thirteen years, truly attack her now now, choking her within it's poisonous coils.)

They were on the precipice now. And they were about to topple over into the terrible depths below.

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𝒯𝒽𝑒 𝓃𝒾𝑔𝒽𝓉 𝒷𝑒𝒸𝓀𝑜𝓃𝓈 𝓌𝒽𝒾𝓁𝑒 𝓎𝑜𝓊 𝒹𝓇𝑒𝒶𝓂
𝒜 𝓁𝒾𝒻𝑒 𝓃𝑒𝓋𝑒𝓇 𝓁𝒾𝓋𝑒𝓈 𝒾𝓃 𝓅𝑒𝒶𝒸𝑒
𝒜𝓈 𝓎𝑜𝓊 𝓈𝓉𝒶𝓃𝒹 𝓊𝓅𝑜𝓃 𝓉𝒽𝑒 𝑒𝒹𝑔𝑒
𝒲𝑜𝓋𝑒𝓃 𝒷𝓎 𝒶 𝓈𝒾𝓃𝑔𝓁𝑒 𝓉𝒽𝓇𝑒𝒶𝒹
𝒜𝓃𝒹 𝒻𝒶𝓉𝑒 𝓂𝒶𝓎 𝒻𝒶𝓁𝓁 𝒹𝑜𝓌𝓃 𝓊𝓅𝑜𝓃 𝓎𝑜𝓊
𝒲𝒽𝒾𝓁𝑒 𝓉𝒽𝑒 𝒹𝑒𝓋𝒾𝓁 𝒾𝓈 𝓀𝓃𝑜𝒸𝓀𝒾𝓃𝑔
𝑅𝒾𝑔𝒽𝓉 𝒶𝓉 𝓎𝑜𝓊𝓇 𝒹𝑜𝑜𝓇

𝒮𝑜 𝒶𝓁𝓁 𝓎𝑜𝓊 𝓇𝑒𝓈𝓉𝓁𝑒𝓈𝓈
𝐸𝒶𝒸𝒽 𝓃𝒾𝑔𝒽𝓉 𝓎𝑜𝓊 𝒽𝑒𝒶𝓇 𝓉𝒽𝑒 𝒹𝓇𝓊𝓂𝓈 𝑜𝒻 𝓌𝒶𝓇

________________________________________________________________________________

 I'm frankly exhausted and am having some trouble writing. I'm also ill and I'm not sure if this chap is up to my usual standard so sorry about that. I'm trying to keep to my update schedule of posting a cap every 10-12 days, but it might eventually slip so--

(Also you might ask how come I could that say meat is a necessity for all warriors--despite the fact that it is-- because ancient Bhrahmins probably didn't have meat, but here's the thing. This non meat eating ancient Brahmins thing is something that came later when Buddhism was established around 2500 years back and eventually it spread to Hinduism as well.)