The Four Suitors of the Dead Princess

Betaal, once again slung over Vikramaditya's shoulder, told of a beautiful princess betrothed to be married, who was bitten by a venomous snake on the very night before her wedding and died before any physician could reach her. Her grieving father had her body placed on a funeral pyre in a forest clearing, guarded, while the kingdom mourned.

Four young men, each in love with her from afar, arrived separately at the pyre that night, each having devoted himself to a different skill. The first was a scholar of omens, who had read the signs of her death in the stars days before it happened and traveled desperately to try to prevent it, arriving too late. The second was a master of mantras, who used his learning to fly through the air at incredible speed once he heard the news, arriving at the pyre within hours. The third was a physician of rare skill, who recognized instantly that the specific poison could still be drawn out even now, and successfully extracted it, restoring her to life. The fourth had done nothing but sit beside her ashes in grief, having arrived with nothing to offer but his sorrow, and upon her revival, quietly gathered the ashes of the pyre into a shrine and began a life of devotion to her memory regardless of the outcome.

"Tell me, Vikram," Betaal demanded, "which of these four deserves to marry the revived princess?" Vikramaditya answered: "The physician, for it was his direct action — extracting the poison itself — that actually restored her life. The others showed devotion, knowledge, or grief, but only his skill was the true cause of her survival; the others merely brought him to the moment where his skill could act." Having answered, the king broke his silence once more, and Betaal vanished back toward his tree, laughing at how easily the king kept forgetting his own vow.