The Eighth Son

All who knew Chhaya and Rohan were envious of their relationship. They seemed very happy with one another, and they were joyful for a time. But, shortly after Chhaya learned she was pregnant with their first child, she became grave. She did not eat or sleep. Many thought it was due to a bad pregnancy. In fact, the child was stillborn. After this, Chhaya’s mood seemed to return to normal. Rohan was upset about losing the baby, but he was happy that he had his wife back. Months after this, Chhaya became pregnant again. Once more, her mood plummeted and the child was born dead.

This cycle repeated for seven children total. Chhaya recovered fully after each loss, but Rohan grew more tired and depressed. He could not understand how his wife was so unaffected. After all, she was the one who carried the children inside of her for months.

When Chhaya became pregnant for an eighth time, Rohan was determined not to lose the child. He consulted with the best medicine men and midwives about what would be best for his wife. He did everything he could for her to make sure the pregnancy was easy. He wanted to hire an experienced midwife to help with delivery, but Chhaya insisted that she must do it on her own as she had each time before. Rohan was so invested in this baby, he spoke with the child and felt the baby’s kicks through Chhaya’s stomach every day. Even the morning of Chhaya’s labor, he saw the life moving inside of her.

While she gave birth, Rohan stood watch right outside the door. Chhaya would not let him come inside to watch her deliver. She said it was a very personal moment for a mother and her child. So, he listened intently at the door and worried for his wife and child. But then he heard the shrill cry of an infant followed immediately by a gurgle. He burst through the doors to meet his child, but found his wife trying to submerge the baby in a bucket of water. Chhaya’s head jerked up at her husband’s entrance. She knew that she was caught, but continued with the horrible deed. Rohan rushed over, screaming and crying, pulling the infant from Chhaya’s hands in the water.

The baby boy coughed a moment and resumed crying loudly. Chhaya’s eyes were dead as she looked at her son. When Rohan asked her how she could do such a thing to her baby, she responded that she’d done it to the seven before as well. He took a step back from her, stunned. She looked him in the eyes, but their usual sparkle was gone. She said that shortly after they married, a prophet had stopped her while wandering a bazaar. His hand had shot out into the crowd of walking people and grabbed her ankle. She almost tripped, but when she looked at him, he was but a blind man sitting crosslegged on the ground. He foretold that she would give birth to her husband’s murderer. She paid no regard to this until she became pregnant. Then, it weighed on her mind for nine months and she was plagued with never-ending nightmares of the baby growing up and killing Rohan. Chhaya went back to the bazaar to speak with the blind prophet, but he was nowhere to be found.

When the baby was finally born, she expected to feel love and excitement, but she felt nothing. She knew that this must mean the prophecy was true and there was evil in the babe. So, she drowned the child and no one knew it had survived birth. Each time she became pregnant, she dreaded having to commit the murder. Rohan asked why she did not tell him. She said she knew he would not believe her. She could see it in his eyes at this moment that he did not believe the prophecy.

After this, Rohan sent Chhaya away. He could not live with her after her actions and deceit. He raised his only son on his own and the boy grew to be Rohan’s pride and joy. Never did he bear ill will against Rohan. The boy eventually married and gave his father many grandchildren to enjoy, since he had only had one baby of his own to celebrate and love.

Author's Note:

For this story, I combined pieces of two different stories. In the Mahabharata, there is a story about King Shantanu and Ganga where Ganga makes the king promise her he won't ever question her. He agrees and they're married, but every time she has a child, she drowns it in the river. The king says nothing for the first seven infants, but he rescues the eighth child and tells Ganga it's enough. She says the babies were celestial beings cursed to spend a life in a human body, and she was doing them a favor by helping them return to their celestial forms quickly. Ganga ends up letting King Shantanu have the eighth child, but then leaves him.

The second story is about Krishna's birth. King Kamsa was told a prophecy that his sister's eighth child would kill him, so he locked his sister up in a dungeon with her husband. He killed each of her children immediately after they were born. When the eighth child was born, it was smuggled out. The child grew up to be Krishna and came back to kill King Kamsa years later.

It was crazy to me that both of these stories involved the murder of seven infants and the miraculous saving of the eighth child. So, I pulled the good intentions and loving relationship from the first story and the idea of a prophecy from the second. But in my story, the prophecy was false. Chhaya's worry and what could have been postpartum depression caused her to believe it anyways. The water pictured in the banner represents Ganga as well as the watery deaths of the seven babies.

Bibliography:

"King Shantanu and Ganga" from Indian Myth and Legend by Donald A. Mackenzie (1913)

"Kamsa" from Krishna by Epified

Image Information:

Water, Source: Flickr

Pregnant Woman, Source: Pixabay

Father and Infant, Source: Pixabay