Abhimanyu

After Bhīshma's fall, Droṇa was made supreme commander of the Kauravas, and he fought with the fury of a storm despite his years. On the thirteenth day he arrayed his forces in the Chakravyūha, the great wheel-formation, a maze of concentric circles designed to trap and hold; and he drew Arjuna far away to the south with a suicide-squad sworn to victory or death, so that with Arjuna gone, none among the Pāṇḍavas knew the secret of piercing the formation and coming safely out again, save Krishna alone.

None but one. For the young Abhimanyu, the sixteen-year-old son of Arjuna and Subhadrā, still almost a child, stepped forward to save his family's honour. He had learned the secret of entering the Chakravyūha, he said, while still in his mother's womb, overhearing his father tell it; but he had never learned the secret of coming out, for his mother had fallen asleep before the telling was done.

And on the promise of Yudhishthira and Bhīma to follow close behind and guard his back, the boy broke through the outer circle of the formation like a bolt of lightning, scattering the veteran warriors before him.

But Jayadratha, king of the Sindhus, by a boon from Shiva, stood in the breach behind him and held back Yudhishthira and Bhīma and the twins, closing the gap, so that Abhimanyu was cut off, alone, deep in the hostile heart of the formation. And there the boy fought with a fury that was godlike. Alone, surrounded by the whole Kaurava vanguard, he defeated Karṇa, disarmed Droṇa, and struck down Duryodhana's own son.

And Duryodhana, mad with grief and rage, commanded six of his greatest veterans, Droṇa, Kripa, Karṇa, Ashvatthāmā, and two others, to abandon every law of chivalry and fall upon the single isolated child together.

From behind, Karṇa cut his bowstring and killed his horses; others shattered his chariot; and the dauntless boy, stripped of chariot and weapons, stood on the bare earth and fought on with a chariot wheel held up like a discus, the very image of Vishṇu with the Sudarshana; and when that was smashed, he fought with a mace, until at last a blow to the head struck him down, and the child lay dead, six great warriors having combined against one boy to kill him.

And the Kaurava warriors danced around his body in savage celebration, blowing their conches over a victory that would stand forever as the blackest stain on their honour.

When Arjuna returned at twilight and found his brothers silent and downcast, and learned how his firstborn had been surrounded and murdered by six veterans against every law of war, he twanged the Gāṇḍīva in a paroxysm of grief and swore a terrible oath: that before the sun set on the next day, he would slay Jayadratha, who had sealed the breach and doomed his son, or else enter the fire himself.

The murder of Abhimanyu is the story's clearest picture of what happens when the banks of dharma are broken in war: that once the code of honour is abandoned, even by the noble, there is no floor to the descent, and grown men of great name will combine to butcher a lone child and dance over his corpse, and call it victory.