In plain words
They insisted that she must tell them the reason. Then Sītā said, ‘Dear children! It grieves me that my sons, who should be in a very high station, are wandering in the forest at this tender age and suffering hardships.’ Then they spoke: ‘Mother! What do we lack? We are heroic sons who surpass Śrī Rāma. When you have sons like these, why should you shed tears?’ they said. The great sage Vālmīki, who had been watching this conversation passing between mother and sons: ‘Mother! Your sons are no ordinary boys. They are adept in every branch of learning. On every matter they weigh well, ‘Is this good or not?’, and then decide; they are very intelligent, they have good judgement, and they are rich in discerning wisdom. So you need not worry about them,’ he said.
Over there, in the city of Ayodhyā, Śrī Rāmacandra resolved to perform the Aśvamedha sacrifice. They beautifully adorned a white horse bearing every auspicious mark spoken of in the Vedas: ‘Let the mighty catch this one. Or else pay tribute to Śrī Rāma’: they tied to its face a golden plate inscribed with these words, and set it loose. Śatrughna set out after the horse with an army of four divisions. As the horse roamed near the āśram of the great sage Vālmīki, Lava and Kuśa read the golden plate tied on its forehead and captured it. Śatrughna came up: ‘Dear children! You are boys. You have known no hardship of any kind. So give up the thought of fighting and go back to your āśram,’ he tried to persuade them. But Lava and Kuśa insisted that they must fight. They were afraid of nothing. In the battle Lava was struck by an arrow Śatrughna shot, and fell senseless. At once Kuśa said, ‘If our mother, Jānakī Devī, is a supremely chaste wife, may this man fall senseless by this weapon!’ and loosed a weapon. Struck by it, Śatrughna fell senseless. When Lakṣmaṇa and Bharata, who came next, also fell senseless in the battle, in the end Rāmacandra himself could not avoid coming to the battlefield.