Why Durga Stood With Ravana

Rama held an arrow to his own eye, because Durga had chosen Ravana. Ten armed, her lion beside her, the mother of all worlds had turned her face away from the prince whose wife was stolen and toward the demon king who took her. Ravana had worshipped her with fire every single night for years, and a mother does not shut her door on that. Rama's soldiers stopped singing, and not one of them dared say out loud what every one of them had worked out. No mountain can lift a goddess's favour, he told Hanuman. Only worship can. So Jambavan told him the one rite that could turn her heart, and warned him in the same breath that it carried a price he could not yet name. Worship her yourself, tonight, as Ravana worships her. But it was autumn, and the Mother sleeps until spring. That is exactly why it is called Akal Bodhan, the untimely awakening. Then Brahma named the terms. A goddess asleep out of season hears only the loudest love. One hundred and eight blue lotuses, offered one by one, before dawn. One flower for each of her one hundred and eight names. And if the count was wrong, even by one, the worship would break and she would turn away for good. Blue lotuses do not grow in autumn forests. There was one lake in the world that had them, Devidaha, and Hanuman crossed the sky to it before sunset. He counted the flowers three times over, and a fourth for his own heart, and the total never changed. Keep one lamp lit, he said as he left. I will find my way back by it. The fire burned through the hours. Rama laid them down one by one, and the basket grew lighter, and the count climbed. A hundred and seven offered. Then Hanuman reached into the basket for the last one and found only water. Three counts, my lord, and I dropped none. Someone took it. Mother, said Rama, is a single missing flower enough to cost a whole war? Hanuman offered his own eyes. Lakshmana offered his. Jambavan offered his. Rama refused every one of them and sent the whole army away, until there was nothing left in that tent but a lamp, the lotuses and a question. His mother had called his eyes lotuses when he was a small boy. She wants a lotus, he said. I own two. The eyes I was born with. He passed over the longest arrow and reached for the one with the finest tip. It shook once, and then the shaking stopped completely. Mother, tell me what a devotee still owns, once everything else is gone. The point pressed his eyelid. And then a hand closed around his wrist, and its golden bangles rang like temple bells.