The king reached the island and it was at that time that he saw that his wife was intoxicated and talking to a strange man.
He was depressed and angrily threw the man out of the island.
The king did not even ask the queen what had happened and concluded that his wife had been unfaithful to him.
The king wanted to give up his kingdom. Sadly King Ratnadhipathi went to his elephant to take him back to his kingdom.
It was at that time that his elephant vanished and a heavenly being appeared in its place.
The king was stunned. “Who… who are you?”
“Do you not remember?” The heavenly being smiled at the king.
The king shook his head as the being continued. “We were brothers. We were gandharvas living in heaven from the Malaya mountain region. I was Somaprabha and my brother, that was you, was Devaprabha. You loved your wife Rajavathi dearly and took her everywhere. Once the three of us went to the temple of Krishna. Rajavathi sang in the temple in her melodious voice. A sage in the temple heard Rajavathi’s song and was struck by the beauty of her voice. The sage kept staring at Rajavathi. You were unable to take it and grew angry at the sage. You angrily scolded the sage for staring at your wife. The sage told you that he was captivated by your wife’s voice and nothing else. The sage was angry with you and cursed you that you would be born as a mortal and see your wife in the company of another man.”
The king suddenly remembered his past life and was shocked. He looked at the heavenly being who nodded. “I was there with you and at that time, I was very angry with the sage for cursing you. I hit the sage with a white elephant made of mud.” The heavenly being shrugged. “So the sage cursed me to be born as a white elephant.”
The king then remembered what happened after that.
The gandharva Devaprabha had asked for forgiveness from the sage.
That was the reason that the sage had modified his curse where Devaprabha would be born as a king and Somaprabha would be born as the elephant that would carry the king. Devaprabha, Somaprabha and Rajavathi would regain their heavenly form as soon as the king saw his wife in the company of another man.
Once the king remembered all that, the king and the queen also changed into heavenly beings.
Then they left the island and went to the heavens.
Adapted from the Katha Sarith Sagara
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