Chapter 89 — Shatrughna's Return

In the twelfth year after Madhura's founding, Shatrughna made ready to travel east to Ayodhya. He did not bring the full display of a king on progress. He dismissed his ministers, the commanders of his forces, and his priest, and went with only a small retinue. Then he entered a shining chariot drawn by horses and turned toward the city of Rama.

For seven or eight nights the road lay between him and Ayodhya. Behind him was the city he had made secure after Lavana's death: its markets, fields, houses, and people. Before him was the elder brother whose command had placed that work in his hands.

When Shatrughna reached Ayodhya, he entered the splendid city without delay and went to the place where Rama sat. He bowed before him with joined hands.

“What you commanded has been done,” he said. “The wicked Lavana has been killed, and the city has been settled.”

That report completed the charge that had begun with the frightened ascetics at Rama's court. But Shatrughna had not come only to deliver an account of roads secured and a city founded.

“Twelve years have passed without you,” he said to Rama. “I cannot endure living apart from you any longer. Be gracious to me.”

The words carried no refusal of the work he had done. The city was established, and Shatrughna had come from it as its ruler. Yet the distance from Rama had become a burden he could no longer hold in silence.

Rama embraced him.

“Do not sink into sorrow, hero,” he said. “This is not the way of a king. Kings must not lose heart when they are away from home. Their people must be protected according to the duty of a kshatriya, a ruler and warrior charged with that protection.”

The counsel was not cold. Rama told Shatrughna that he was dear to him even beyond life. But affection did not remove the work that had been placed before him. A kingdom did not remain governed because its ruler longed to be elsewhere. Madhura, reclaimed from Lavana's devastation, now depended on the continuance of Shatrughna's care.

“Come to Ayodhya at the proper times,” Rama told him. “And return to your own city. The care of the kingdom must be done.”

He asked Shatrughna to remain with him for five nights. Shatrughna accepted the command. For those days he stayed in Ayodhya with Rama, and then prepared to return to Madhura with the attendants, forces, and vehicles that belonged to his rule.

When he left, Bharata and Lakshmana accompanied him some distance beyond the city. The brothers went together along the road for a time: Rama's two younger brothers who had each borne a different portion of the life of the kingdom. Bharata had kept Ayodhya for Rama in the years of exile. Lakshmana had shared Rama's forest and war. Shatrughna had gone west to end Lavana's terror and settle a city afterward.

At last they parted. Bharata and Lakshmana turned back toward Rama and Ayodhya. Shatrughna went on toward the Yamuna, toward the city that waited for him. Their separation did not undo their closeness. It gave that closeness a shape: each returned to the duty that could not be carried by another in his place.