History of Kanauj to the Moslem Conquest c10.s3.3

c10.s3.3

Just at this juncture, when strange feelings of renunciation and aversion from worldly power were passing through the minds of both the brothers, and the tears of their bereavement had hardly had time to dry, they were struck by another bolt from the blue. For suddenly a courier named Saṃvādaka arrived with the tragic news that the king of Malwa had killed their brother-in-law, Grahavarman, and their sister, Rājyaśrī, had been thrown into a dungeon in Kānyakubja.¹ He added: "There is moreover a report that the villain, deeming the army leaderless, purposes to invade and seize this country as well. Such are my tidings: the matter is now in the king's hands."² Hearing of this calamity that had overtaken the house of Kanauj, and the Malwa king's reported designs against Thanesvar, a "deadly frown broke forth" on the "broad brow" of Rājyavardhana, who addressed his younger brother thus: "This task is my royal house, this my kin, my court, my land...this day I go to lay the royal house of Malwa low in ruin. The repression of this beyond-measure unmannerly foe—this, and no other is my assumption of the bark-dress, my austerities, my stratagem for dispelling sorrow."³