One of my favorite stories involving Maya is the story of Maricha, Ravana's minister, who had become a hermit after an unpleasant encounter with Sita's husband Rama. Honestly, you just can't make these kinds of stories up these days...

While Rama, Lakshmana, and Sita were exiled in the forest, Ravana had decided that he was going to have to steal Sita from Rama. She was far too beautiful to be with a loser like Rama, and Ravana figured he could use her in his collection of wives. Seeking advice from his minister, Maricha, Ravana told him in no uncertain terms that Maricha was to help in his quest for Sita. However, knowing that Rama was capable of destroying not only him, but the entire kingdom, Maricha pretty much told Ravana that it wasn't going to happen - at first.

"Ravana," he started, "you do realize it is absolutely insane to even try to make Sita love you, right? I mean, short of kidnapping her, brainwashing her, and turning her into some sort of zombie, it will never happen. Plus, it is just wrong to steal someone else's wife! Do what you want, because I know that you will anyway, but for once just keep me out of it. I've turned my life around because of this Rama guy already, and I suggest you do the same. He'll annihilate you. Not to mention the fact that if you so much as touch Sita, your heads will explode."

Ravana was furious - how dare Maricha tell him no! Formulating a plan, he responded to Maricha as calmly as he could manage.

"Kidnapping, huh? What a great idea! Here's the deal, Maricha. We both know you're going to do what I want you to do, so stop playing the martyr card. You're going to turn into a sparkling, gold-encrusted deer to catch Sita's attention. When Rama goes to capture the deer for her, because we both know he will, I will capture her. It'll be ridiculously easy. So why don't you go get ready, and come get me when you're done pouting."

Sighing, Maricha knew that his days on this earth were numbered. No matter what he believed in his heart, he had allowed himself to be bullied by Ravana - and for the last time, it seemed. He made peace with the world and prepared for his final act.

Sita saw a flash of gold in the forest and gasped. Calling for Rama, she asked Laskshmana if he had seen the beautiful golden deer that she had thought was just an illusion. There was no way in Sita's mind that such a beautiful, bejeweled creature could have been real! Shaking his head, Lakshmana told her that in his opinion it wasn't real, that it was possibly something that the rakshasas cooked up. Sita rolled her eyes, telling Lakshmana that he ruined everything by being such an eternal pessimist. After all, he hadn't even seen the deer! Rama, ever the peacemaker, promised to go get the golden deer for Sita if she would stay behind with Lakshmana, who was not to leave Sita alone under any circumstances.

Moving quietly throughout the forest, Rama thought to himself that Lakshmana may be right about the deer being an illusion, but Sita's happiness meant enough to him that he would find out for sure. He spotted the gorgeous golden deer and crept up on it. Yet the deer heard him coming, and ran far away from the trio's forest hut, leading Rama deep into the dark woods. Finally, after what seemed like an eternity, Rama slayed the deer with an arrow. Out of nowhere, and not to Rama's surprise in the least, the deer transformed back into Maricha, smiled devilishly, waved, and screamed, "Help me, Lakshmana! Oh, Sita!" in Rama's voice before succumbing to death.

Upon hearing these words from far away, Sita became terrified and begged Lakshmana to go find Rama. He refused, knowing that this was just an illusion and that Rama would return shortly. Sita begged, pleaded, and cried for Lakshmana to search for her husband, as she was absolutely convinced that Rama was lying in the forest dying. Lakshmana denied her, saying that Rama would be even more displeased if he broke his promise to protect Sita. After a long time, Sita finally convinced Lakshmana to go searching for Rama.

Ravana took this opportunity to seize the beautiful Sita, carrying her off by chariot to his kingdom of Lanka - believing that this would be the last he heard of that annoying Rama person.




Author's Note: In the original story, there is a subtle hint of impatience between Sita and Lakshmana when Sita is begging him to go and search for Rama in the forest. There's an underlying relationship of "older brother and bratty kid sister" between the two of them, and I kind of wanted to expand on that a little bit without making it seem too overt. The annoyance between Maricha and Ravana, and Ravana's obvious bullying of Maricha, was very clear to me in the original stories, and I wanted to make that a bit more obvious as well by trying to get inside of Maricha's head a little bit. The original story was pretty long and drawn out, so I shortened it up a bit while keeping the most important parts intact. There is a lot about just how Ravana kidnaps Sita, but I ended up wanting to keep this as Maricha's Maya story rather than combining the illusions of both he and Ravana. Perhaps when I edit this story, I'll add in the story of how Ravana disguised himself to Sita as well and edit out some of the less important parts of this story