#yuyutsu

Vikarna: If?

She is a vaishya woman employed by the Kuru royal family. When Gandhari is expecting for the first time, Dhritarashtra begins a relationship with this woman.

She gives birth to Yuyutsu, who is the fourth one in his generation after Yudhishthira, Bheema and Duryodhana, but is not considered in the line to succession due to the manner of his birth.

At the end of the war of Kurukshetra, he changes side at the last moment, convinced finally by Yudhishthira's emotional appeal. After the war, he is the only son of Dhritarashtra left alive.

Petty younger siblings who get overlooked gossiping about everyone. Dushala will always be the sanest one.

Hellluuuuu

SEE EXACTLY WHAT I KEEP SAYING

Like no wayy all 99 of them were hardcore Pandava haters

There must have been some brothers who were like Vikarna and were good, some who were neutral about everything

Frrrr they definitely talked shit about Duryodhan and his boyfriend

Like from Mahabharat we know Karna was a big ass bully towards Vikarna, bro was legit getting bullied by that corn ass motherfucker

And Duryodhan did nothing to stop Karna from BULLYING HIS OWN FUCKING BROTHER

So we know how little Duryodhan actually cared about his own brothers (unless they were bitch ass like him)

Vikarna was probably the one that was brave enough to protest and call out the bullshits, but he wasn't brave enough to rebel against Duryodhan clearly

Maybe because Duryodhan and his gang of dick brothers bullied the nice ones or younger ones perhaps?

There were probably some brothers who weren't brave like Vikarna to publically say anything to Duryodhan or Karna but they were probably gossiping among themselves

Yututsu too

Like I'm sure he was bullied. Duryodhan didn't stop Karna from bullying Vikarna his own brother, so yeah he wouldn't have stopped anyone from bullying his half brother

He was probably the cornered one out and always got left behind or discriminated against because of his birth

(I was literally having a talk with @stxrrynxghts and @dharagalaxias about this, how Yuyutsu's childhood probably was)

Lol for real Dushala my darling deserves a better family... And a better husband... She was probably the pookiest and nicest too

She must have been so alone and sad when she got married to the most bitch ass man ever 😔

She meets her hundredth brother-in-law a month into the dazzling rush of Hastinapur, mouth and mind full to bursting of new names.

At first glance she overlooks him, at the next, she wonders how anyone might. He resembles her husband strikingly, much more than the rest of his kin. Later she will know this causes them both no little displeasure, but for now she only offers a hesitant half-smile.

”Don't bother,” says Yuyutsu by way of greeting. “I’m no one important. In fact I don’t doubt they’d rather you never had cause to know of my existence. A royal byblow makes for an embarrassing scandal to introduce to a daughter-in-law.”

Well. That is unexpected.

“It happens about once a generation among us Kurus,” he goes on, mercilessly. “A maidservant’s son brought up to speak the truth—or so they say. My uncle, at least, sees it as burden rather than blessing.”

Bhanumati’s smile grows fixed. Yuyutsu sees it, and mistakes the cause.

“Not that you need worry,” he adds. “My eldest brother seems to have escaped that particular proclivity. My next sister-in-law isn’t so lucky; nor the wife of that friend of theirs.”

A problem for another day, another woman; Bhanumati shakes her head.

”Your kindness notwithstanding,” she says, her temples beginning to pound. “I assure you those--proclivities mean little to me, except an escape from your brother's attentions."

"Hmm," says Yuyutsu: a particularly patronizing sound Bhanumati will recall whenever her husband complains to her, years in the future, of how he loathes his half-brother. It might even be the first shared sentiment to bring husband and wife together. "For now, at least."

"For never," Bhanumati retorts, startled into forgetting any semblance of grammar. Her wide-eyed expression is enough to convey her intent; Yuyutsu laughs, raises his hands in surrender, and steps away.

Her cousin is fourteen that year, two hands taller and three shades darker than Durdhara at twelve, scowlingly furious at her father’s glib decision, confounded by her mother’s placid acceptance.

“This is unfair,” she snaps at her father and mother and uncle and finally—driven to it—at Yuyutsu, who nods agreeably, infuriatingly, from his perch on the lintel of her doorway. “It should go to my brother! At the very least, to you!”

“Why, princess,” Yuyutsu drawls, “here I thought you hated me.”

Durdhara waves this off. “Of course I do, but at least you have Kuru blood to boast of. What is he? Nothing of ours, got off some wandering sage or wily mendicant by my aunt.”

“Yes, what have things come to, if they’re letting the product of niyoga on the Elephant Throne,” Yuyutsu observes. “We must condemn your great-grandmother for her sins; write to the Balhika rulers at once, I’ll carry the message myself.”

Durdhara scowls and stamps her foot. “If he’s my uncle’s son, that’s worse. How can I marry so close, if he’s as good as my brother?”

Yuyutsu sighs and slides to the floor, catches her flailing wrist in one hand and cradles her into an embrace. Two years ago he wouldn’t have dared for fear of being bitten bloody, but the arrival of the Pandavas has changed much for everyone, if nobody more than Priyadarshini Durdhara, no longer the elder sister of the presumed heir, but an younger cousin good only for some minor alliance. She is angrier now than in her sunlit childhood, but quieter with it, less sure of her hold on people’s hearts. Two years ago, faced with such a proposal, she would have rushed to Great-Uncle Bhishma, to Acharya Kripa, to the war minister and the Head of Exchequer. A year before that she would have tried to pummel Yudhisthira into submission.

Nobody has said, because nobody has had to, that this is the easiest solution. Durdhara’s younger brothers are pallid creatures of ten and younger, Yuyutsu a slave’s son destined for a ministry at best, Durdhara herself a girl. Yudhisthira is fourteen, brilliant, comely with divine light in his dark eyes; his brothers are a promising lot: the eldest just a year younger than him, the other three charming and sweet-natured. How fortunate that the Princess Gandhari dropped a daughter first, how fortuitous that Dhritarashtra’s regency will cease in a decade, how lovely for Durdhara that she will never be far from her father’s home. 

“I wonder,” Yuyutsu says after Durdhara has stopped trembling in his arms with rage and grief, “what he thinks of the matter.”

Durdhara rears back, eyes flashing again. “I just told you! He’s the one who came up with it!”

“Not our father,” Yuyutsu tells her. “Our sweet, studious cousin the crown-prince. Your intended. What do you think he thinks of this betrothal?”

Don't run in mazes that don't invite you, those things don't have any ends, only traps.

Don't fall for love, my sunshine, fall for respect.

Words of his mother ran in Yuyutsu’s head as he whispered them to see the way they tasted on his tongue. He repeated them over and over In every attempt to forget the events of morning. Yuyutsu wasn’t Allowed to be in room that included: 

The Kauravs having father-son(s) time.

 Gandhari.

He had ended up with all of them. They didn't say anything but isn't that the  problem? The silence that had made a home in the room for those 5 minutes that yuyutsu spent, almost felt like a day. He left as soon as he was done placing the casket of tobacco near the king's bed. His brother’s watchful eyes had made it hard to breathe in that room. 

Now he sat beneath this tree, eating sour grapes, cause who else will? This was supposed to be his reward for the day. ‘Cut the grass near the fish fountain and then you can have them, ok?’

Yuyutsu had his veda lessons with a local guru twice a week. Vidur used to accompany him later on their way home, Vidur would point out the mistakes from the Guru’s narration. Vidur had a different point of view but he always asked for Yuyutsu’s opinion. It was strange to have someone care about what he thought on a topic. During the day, Yuyutsu would help his mother with her daily chores, in reward she would put treats in his basket that he would eat during breaks. Later at night, when the rest of the palace slept, he traveled bare feet to the largest chamber in the palace. Sleep wasn’t Dhritrashtra’s good friend, so Yuyutsu would usually find him sitting at the edge of his bed and picking at the gems of his crown. Yuyutsu would sit near his father’s feet and his head on the king’s knee, followed by the river of words that told his father about his day, which was usually nothing interesting. Some days Dhritarathra would spill the stories of his childhood while he brushed his bastard child’s hair. ‘Pandu always wanted the toys I had because my toys had more defined details that my fingers could feel. Sometimes, Pandu would try to explain something I wouldn’t understand and this irritated Pandu so much, he wouldn't leave it. At such times Vidur would sort us. He would engrave the same details in Pandu’s toys and help me understand the things I couldn’t. He would explain the color of our new clothes, the weather, anything my useless eyes couldn’t detect.’ ‘Vidur knitted us three together.’

Yuyutsu had placed tools beside him and examined the rusty details. He was down to his last grape only when he heard a rather familiar voice. 

‘I AM NOT PLAYING WITH YOU, YOU CHEAT EVERYTIME. I’ll tell Brata Shri Yudhishthir and he will punish you.’

‘Listen, 1. Bharata Shri can’t even touch me cause Bharta Shri Bheem won’t let him.

2. I did not cheat, you are just too easy to find.

‘No you cheat-’

The twins could never play a game without ending up at pulling each other's hair. Yuyutsu could see fragments of their purple and red garments through the bushes. He tried to concentrate on the nest in tree above and tried not to listen to the twins because 

They wouldn’t want me to interfere anyway.       

As he heard the next words, Yuyutsu almost choked on his grape. ‘Bhrata Shri Yuyutsu, are you free?’

Bhrata Shri? Did he just- But Yuyutsu straightened up in a second and replied

‘Yes your majesty, anything you say’ The look Nakul gave him was enough to sink Yuyutsu’s heart to the bottom of his stomach. 

Why didn’t I leave the minute I heard they were near?

But then Nakul spoke, ‘No one calls us ‘your majesty’, only Bharat Shri Bheem, when he is taunting us. Are you taunting us?’

‘I- No I would never, your ma- Bhrata Nakul’

The twins were barely 7 but their brains were something no one wanted to mess with. 

‘Do you mind keeping an eye on Nakul while I hide? He has already cheated twice today.’

Shadev was a little shorter than Nakul even when they have almost mirroring features. No pair of kids were as beautiful as these two. Sahdev was squinting his eyes very hard under the sun and Nakul stood beside him with his hands crossed.

‘Where do I need to spectate from then?’

Two games passed and now Yuyutsu was seeking because the twins wanted to hide. The giggles of the boys filled the tree branches and fountain waters. They had lost the track of time and caste. 

If Vidur hadn’t started screaming at the younger boys to go back to their chambers and clean themselves before dinner, then Sahdev would have still been hiding under the dry bushes and Yuyutsu trying to suppress his laughter at how hard Nakul was struggling to find him.

‘We’ll get a ball tomorrow and Please finish your work early’

‘Subh Ratri Bhrata shir’

That night Yuyutsu went to his mother with something he didn’t usually go home with. A smile.

Tagging some precious people: @1nsaankahanhai-bkr @soniaoutloud @amandaanubis @supermeh-krishnafan @allegoriesinmediasres @chaanv @pratigyakrishnaki and Everyone in this fandom because uwu