As Vāli lay mortally wounded, his breath growing shallow, he gazed upon Rāma and spoke with a heavy heart. “Mighty-armed one, just as you have always been cherished by me, so too should you know that Sugrīva will never regard you with the same affection as I have, even if you remain with him.” He counseled Rāma further, “You should neither show excessive affection nor utter indifference; both are great faults. Maintain a balanced view in all things.” Having spoken these words, Vāli’s eyes rolled, his body pierced by arrows, his dreadful teeth exposed in the throes of death. And then, as life ebbed away from him, Vāli, the mighty king of the monkeys, departed from this world. A great cry arose among the vanaras as they saw their leader slain. The foremost of the monkeys, filled with grief, lamented their loss. Kiṣkindhā, once vibrant with life, now seemed empty; its gardens stood deserted, and the mountains and forests were silent, for the lord of the monkeys had ascended to heaven. With the tiger among monkeys gone, the vanaras lost their radiance; the very forests that once trembled at his speed now stood still. They mourned, “Who now will bind clusters of flowers? Who will accomplish the feats that once shook the heavens? Who will fight great battles as Vāli did with the noble Gandharva?” They recalled the endless struggle against Golabha, the mighty-armed one, a battle that raged for fifteen years without pause, neither by night nor by day. In the sixteenth year, Golabha was finally slain; Vāli, fierce and terrifying, had ended that terror. Now, those very vanaras wondered, “How has such a hero fallen?” Without their leader, the monkeys found no comfort. They wandered the forests, lost and forlorn, like cows bereft of their bull. In the midst of this sorrow, Tāra, Vāli’s beloved wife, overwhelmed by a vast ocean of grief, beheld the lifeless face of her husband. She fell to the ground, embracing his body as a tender vine clings to a great tree felled by the storm. Listen now to the next chapter in this tale, as told in the glorious Vālmīki Rāmāyaṇa, in the Kiṣkindhā Kāṇḍa. Tāra, renowned for her virtue, approached the face of her fallen husband, the monkey king, and spoke to him, her words trembling with sorrow. “O hero, you lie in distress, having disregarded my counsel, upon this earth now heaped with sorrow. Surely the earth is dearer to you than I am, for you embrace her and speak not a word to me.” She lamented, “Fate has truly brought you under Sugrīva’s power. Alas, Sugrīva alone is now mighty, O hero who delighted in daring deeds. The foremost of bears and monkeys, strong as they are, gather around you, their lamentations and Aṅgada’s grief too heavy to bear. Even after hearing my pleas, why do you not awaken? This is the very bed of the hero, and here you lie, slain in battle.” She remembered, “Here, where you once struck down your enemies, now you yourself have fallen. O pure-souled, noble-born, lover of battle, dearest to my heart, you have left me alone and helpless. The wise should never give a maiden to a warrior, for see me now, the wife of a hero, suddenly made a widow. My honor is shattered, my eternal path broken. I am plunged into an ocean of grief so vast and unfathomable that surely my heart must be made of stone, for it does not shatter.” “Having seen my husband slain, why does my heart not break into a hundred pieces? You were both my friend and my husband, dearest to me. Struck down in battle, the heroic one has met his end. A woman without her husband, even if she has children, is still called a widow. Even if she is rich in wealth and grain, people call her a widow. O hero, you lie in a pool of your own blood, your resting place now like a bed infested with worms and insects, your body covered with dust and blood. I cannot embrace you with my arms, O bull among monkeys. Today, Sugrīva has achieved his purpose in this dreadful feud.” She continued, “By a single arrow released by Rāma, Sugrīva’s fear was ended, as that arrow pierced your heart. As I gazed upon you, now departed, I tried to hold you back. Then Nīla drew the arrow from your body, and like a blazing serpent pulled from a mountain cave, its radiance shone forth. As the sun’s rays are blocked at sunset, so streams of blood flowed from your wounds, like rivers tinged with copper and red ochre flowing from a mountain. I wiped your body, covered with the dust of battle, and with tears streaming from my eyes, I drenched the valiant one, struck down by weapons.” Seeing her husband slain, Tāra turned to her son Angada, whose eyes were tawny with grief. “Behold, son, the dreadful final condition of your father,” she said. “Pay your respects to the king, your father, who is worthy of honor.” At her words, Angada rose and took hold of his father’s feet, embracing him with his strong, rounded arms. “It is I, Angada,” he said. “As you used to, honor Angada now as he pays his respects to you.” Tāra cried, “Why do you not speak, ‘May you live long, my son’? I, with my son as companion, serve you, though your consciousness has departed, struck down suddenly as a cow with her calf by a lion. Having performed the sacrificial battle, with the waters of Rāma’s weapons, and bathed in the concluding rite, how can you be without me, your wife?” She searched for the beloved golden garland, given to Vāli by the king of the gods, bestowed in battle, and wondered, “Why do I not see it on you now?” Yet, even in death, the glory of kingship did not abandon Vāli, for he lay dignified, his radiance still shining like the sun upon the mountain king. Thus, the forest echoed with the lamentations of Tāra and Angada, the grief of the vanaras, and the silence that followed the fall of the mighty Vāli.