Savitri Insists on Going to the Forest with Satyavan
Satyavan prepares to go into the forest alone to gather fruit for the agnihotra. But Savitri, who has not left the hermitage in a year, declares she cannot bear to be separated from him — and insists on following him, even though she knows what awaits.
Satyavan took up his axe and prepared to leave for the forest. He was going to collect fruit — food for the household, fuel for the sacred fire. It was an ordinary errand, the kind he performed every day.
Savitri said: You should not go alone. I will go with you. I am disinclined to be separated from you.
Satyavan looked at her. She had been fasting for three days and three nights — standing, not sleeping, observing a vow so severe that his father the king had tried to dissuade her. She was thin. The forest road was difficult, full of thorns and uneven ground.
"You have never gone to the forest earlier," he said. "The road is difficult. You are thin from the vow and fasting. How will you be able to walk?"
Savitri said: I am not weak from the fasting. I do not feel exhausted. I have made up my mind to go. You should not restrain me.
Satyavan saw the resolve in her face. "Since you have made up your mind to go," he said, "I will do what you desire. But first take leave of the elders, so that sin does not touch me."
She went to her mother-in-law and father-in-law — the blind king Dyumatsena and his wife, who had raised her as a daughter since the day she arrived in their hermitage. She spoke plainly: her husband was going to the forest. She could not bear to be separated from him. She had not ventured out of the hermitage for almost a year. She had great curiosity to see the forest in bloom.
Dyumatsena said: "From the day Savitri's father gave her to me as a daughter-in-law, I do not remember her having ever requested me for anything. Let the daughter-in-law's desires be satisfied. O daughter! But along the way, see that Satyavan does not get distracted from his task."
With the permission of both, she departed with her husband.
She seemed to be laughing, but her heart was miserable. The large-eyed one saw colourful and beautiful woods in every direction, resounding with the cries of peacocks. Satyavan spoke sweet words to her — pointing out the rivers full of sacred waters, the supreme trees in blossom.
The unblemished one always watched over her husband. Remembering the words of the sage Narada, she thought that he was already dead. Walking gently, she followed him. Her heart was cleft in two, and she waited for the time. Aranyaka Parva, Chapter 577