Diti and the Maruts

The amrita had been shared out. The devas had won, and Indra held authority in heaven again.

But winning had not ended every grief.

Diti was the mother of the asuras, and her sons had been killed in that conflict. She went to her husband Kashyapa.

"I want a son," she said. "A son who can defeat Indra."

Kashyapa did not refuse her. He gave her a vow to keep — a very long one and a very strict one. For a thousand years Diti was to observe the rules of purity without a single lapse.

"Be careful," he said. "In a vow like this, one small carelessness changes everything."

Diti began.

Indra heard of it. He came down from heaven to where she was — not to fight her. He came to serve.

He fetched her water. He brought fruit and firewood. He swept the place where she sat and waited quietly nearby. He did this for years, and Diti accepted his service.

But Indra was also waiting. Every day he thought about the child who was coming, and every day the fear grew a little.

The last days of the vow were close. One afternoon Diti was very tired. She loosened her hair and lay down — without completing one required act of purification.

The rule was broken.

Indra saw it. He made himself small, entered the space of the unborn child, and cut it with his weapon.

There was a cry. Then many.

Alarmed, Indra said it over and over: "Do not weep. Do not weep." — ma rudah.

Instead of one child, many beings came forth, and they were weeping.

Diti woke. She understood all of it — her own tiredness, the broken rule, and the god who had been serving her for years.

She did not shout at Indra. She asked for something else.

"Let my children live," she said. "And let them not remain victims of somebody's fear. Give them a place."

Indra agreed to it. The beings became the Maruts — deities of wind and thunder and storm, who have travelled with Indra ever since.

From there Vishvamitra carried the thread onward — from Diti down through the ruling houses of that region, as far as King Sumati of Vishala.

Sumati welcomed the travellers. He asked about Ram and Lakshman and listened with wonder to what they had lately done.

After a night of his hospitality, the company went on towards Mithila.