Chapter 81 81. Injured Puppy
"What happened to Ashwatthama? Why are you crying and why is there an injured puppy in your hands?"
It was Kripi who was not able to see her son cry like this asked hurriedly, She knows how much her son loves animals and seeing the injured one like that certainly would have hurt him a lot.
So she quickly approached him and while narrating him with questions, She kneeled down and wiped his tears with her not-so-soft hands filled with calluses because of the hard work.
Ashwatthama did not mind, He just looked down in guilt with his pain-filled eyes as he saw the whimpering puppy in his hand laying in his hands, The greyish fire of it now has lots of blood stains and exposed wounds.
Anyone who sees this puppy can tell that this puppy will not survive a single night. It was on its last leg and will give up on life soon even after a treatment. It would be humane to put it out of its misery and not let it suffer pain any longer in its last moments.
"Pitashri heals this puppy. It was this injured because of me. It's my duty as the culprit to take care of this puppy."
Ashwatthama choked on his tears as he pleaded with his father, He wanted to answer his mother too but what he heard when he was standing outside the door made his heart too guilty to face her.
He never knew that milk was that expensive thing, He should have thought about if not how can his loving mother never feed him the milk? And from the taste it deserves to cost a lot of money.
But because of that, he felt that he put his mother in a difficult position. He should have asked for details about it before he said that he wanted to drink it.
If it was not an urgent matter of treating this puppy, He would not dare to face her. He felt that he turned to his mother and from the words of his uncle, He also got his father into trouble.
"How can it be your fault? I know my son never hurt an innocent animal, Tell me why you think you hurt this puppy?"
Kripi was the one who asked him a question, While Drona and Kripa walked next to the puppy, Drona checked it and confirmed that there is no chance this puppy can survive even this night.
Kripa also came to the same conclusion but his heart arched when he heard the painful whimpering of that little life. This puppy should not be older than a month. Right now its eyes were closed tight and might be confused by the pain it was feeling right now.
He could not help it, He put his hand on the body of the puppy, As he do that his hand glowed in the golden-coloured light as it spread across the body of the puppy making the whimpering of it stop as it lay nicely in hands of Ashwatthama.
"MamaShri (Uncle), Di-Did you cure him?"
Ashwatthama was not in the mood of answering any questions, All he wanted was to save the puppy laying in his hand, When Kripa did whatever he did, the shaking body of the puppy stopped as it lay in his hand comfortably.
Seeing this he felt happy thinking that his uncle had healed the puppy, He knows the sage like his uncle Kripa as having enough Karmic power to cure and fix someone like this, Which he thought Kripa just did.
"Forgive me Ashwatthama, I can't cure this puppy, All I did was to make it no longer able to feel the pain from the wounds giving this little life a peaceful sleep.
Don't lose hope yet though, I can't interfere with the cycle of nature with my Karmic power but we can still try to heal it using medicine and such, Maybe if we applied the medical herbs on the wounds, Maybe it can heal this puppy."
Sadly Kripa's answer was not what Ashwatthama expected, He did not understand why when they have the power to fix everything of their will they are not willing to do it, Are they that selfish that they can't bear to spare a tiny amount of their power to save someone innocent animals life, Who got injured because of him?
"Pithashri, I know it's too late to use Ayurvedic herbs to heal, It was the first thing I thought of that's why I came here to ask for help from you, Please use your power and heal this puppy, I promise I will not ask anything after this one."
Ashwatthama's eyes filled with tears as he looked toward his father with hope. If something happens to this puppy he will never be able to forgive himself for it.
Before, when his father asked him to go outside to play, He went to his regular place, Which was near the shore of the river, Where a big tree is to provide lots of shade but no one mostly comes here as this place is close to the forest. People were afraid that they might encounter fierce animals.
They were not wrong though as he too encounters many such animals but they all become his friends, So this place for others was a forbidden area, For him was his sanctuary.
That's why he came here excitedly wanting to tell his friends that he drank the milk but because it was quite close to dusk, All his friends had gone to their place as the forest is not so forgiving at night.
So he was alone there not knowing what to do when he caught a glimpse of a little greyish fur ball under the tree roots sleeping hiding away from everyone's sight.
Ashwatthama could not understand why they are a puppy here so close to the forest. This is not a safe place for a small weak being like a puppy, so he decided to wake the puppy up.
Puppy at first woke up instantly and it looked around fearfully until it looked at Ashwatthama, Puppy's light blue locked on Ashwatthama and when Ashwatthama beckoned asking it to come to him, It come running and started rubbing its leg.
It was when he decided that this is a no place for the puppy and made a decision which he immensely defeated not that long after.
(A/N : Don't worry, the puppy will be fine.
Like always thank you for reading and have a good day 😁.)