As night fell upon the forest, Rama spoke to Lakshmana with a heart heavy with sorrow. “Surely, tonight our great father, the king, lies sleepless and grief-stricken, Lakshmana, while Queen Kaikeyi, having fulfilled her desires, must be satisfied. So determined is she for the kingdom that, upon Bharata’s return, she would not hesitate even to give up her life if needed. Our father, now aged and helpless, deprived of me and under Kaikeyi’s sway, what will he do, given his self-indulgent nature? Witnessing this misfortune and the king’s confused state of mind, I am convinced, Lakshmana, that desire now outweighs both wealth and righteousness. For who, even in ignorance, would abandon his own son for the sake of a woman, as our father has done to me—he who always obeyed her wishes? Bharata, Kaikeyi’s son, is indeed fortunate with his wife; he alone will enjoy the prosperous Kosala kingdom as its sovereign. He will be the sole face of the kingdom, with our father grown old and me dwelling here in the forest. Whoever abandons wealth and righteousness to follow desire alone quickly meets with misfortune, as King Dasharatha has. Gentle one, I believe Kaikeyi has come for the end of Dasharatha, for my exile, and for the kingdom for Bharata. I hope now that Kaikeyi, intoxicated by her good fortune, will not harass Kausalya and Sumitra because of me. Let not Queen Sumitra, because of me, dwell in sorrow; Lakshmana, you must return to Ayodhya at the proper time. I alone will go to Dandaka with Sita; for the mother left without support, you will be her protector, Lakshmana. Kaikeyi, acting out of malice, may yet commit wrongful deeds; she might even hand my mother over to Bharata, though he knows righteousness. Surely, in some other birth, women separated from their sons must have done something; even so, this has now come upon my mother. Poor Kausalya, who raised me for so long and with such suffering, is now deprived of me at the very time she should be rewarded—shame on me. Let no woman ever give birth to a son like me, Saumitri, who brings endless grief to his mother. I think, Lakshmana, that the pet starling is dearer to her than I am, for she listens to its words as she counts the toes of her rival’s parrot. What use am I, subduer of foes, to my mother, whom I, her son, cannot help at all as she grieves? My mother Kausalya, deprived of me, lies overwhelmed by the greatest sorrow, as if fallen into an ocean of grief. Alone, I could conquer Ayodhya and even the earth itself with my arrows in anger, Lakshmana, but truly, valor is pointless. Fearing unrighteousness and the consequences in the world beyond, O sinless one, that is why I do not anoint myself today.” Having uttered these and other sorrowful words at length in the lonely forest, Rama, his face streaked with tears, fell silent as night deepened. Seeing Rama, who had ceased his lamentation and now resembled a fire whose flames had died or a sea whose waves were stilled, Lakshmana sought to comfort him. “Surely today, O best of warriors, the city of Ayodhya is without radiance, with you gone, like the night bereft of the moon. But this is not fitting, Rama, that you grieve in this way; you cast down Sita and me as well, O best of men. Neither Sita nor I, O Raghava, could live even for a moment without you, just as fish cannot live when taken from water. Truly, I do not wish to see my father, nor Shatrughna, nor the ascetic Sumitra, nor even heaven itself, if it is without you.” Then, seeing Sita seated comfortably not far away, the two righteous brothers lay down together on a bed of leaves beneath the great banyan tree. Hearing Lakshmana’s excellent and heartfelt words, Rama embraced life in the forest with respect, devoting himself fully to righteousness and practicing supreme austerity for a long time. In that lonely forest, the two mighty scions of the Raghu line felt neither fear nor anxiety, just like lions roaming the mountain slopes. Now listen to the next part of the tale. After spending the night safely beneath that great tree, when the spotless sun had risen, Rama, Sita, and Lakshmana departed from that place. They journeyed toward the spot where the sacred Bhagirathi Ganga meets the Yamuna, entering a vast and dense forest. Along the way, the illustrious trio beheld many lands and delightful sights, marveling at places they had never seen before. As they traveled safely, passing many kinds of trees, and as the day drew to a close, Rama spoke to Saumitri, “Look, Saumitri, near Prayaga, there rises a column of smoke—I think it is the sacred fire of a sage, the sign of the divine Agni. Surely we have reached the confluence of the Ganga and Yamuna, for I hear the sound of water striking against water. Here are logs split by forest dwellers, and in the ashram of Bharadvaja, many kinds of trees can be seen.” The two archers went on happily as the day waned, and soon they reached the sage’s dwelling at the confluence of the Ganga and Yamuna. As Rama entered the ashram, he startled the deer and birds, walking for a while before approaching the venerable sage Bharadvaja.