• vairam — enmity
  From vīra, 'hero, warrior' — vaira originally names heroic feud. The Bhāgavata is honest that Rukmī never abandoned vaira; he merely deferred it. Gauḍīyas note the contrast with bhakti-vaira (śatru-bhāva), in which apparent enmity is itself a relationship with Bhagavān leading to liberation.
• avamānitaḥ — insulted
  ava + māna + ita, 'disregarded, treated as low.' Echoes the head-shaving humiliation of SB 10.54. Rukmī's wound is still wet a generation later — Sanskrit ego-narrative at its most precise.
• bhāgineyāya — to his sister's son
  From bhaginī, 'sister.' A specifically Sanskrit kinship term — sister's son carries particular dharmic weight, often inheriting protection-duties. The choice of word emphasises that Rukmī gave his daughter through the sister-channel, not the Kṛṣṇa-channel.
• svasuḥ — of his sister
  Genitive of svasṛ, 'one's own (woman)' — sister. The same root as svayam. Rukmiṇī remains svasṛ to him even after she eloped against his will — bhakti-bonds outlasting all his outrage.
• priyam — the pleasing
  From √prī. The Bhāgavata-key: doing priya for a devotee is the ground on which a non-devotee acts. Rukmī acts well not from understanding but from love-of-sister — a partial good that the Lord still honors.

• Where can affection for someone I love help me set aside an old grudge?
• What grievance am I clinging to that costs my family more than it gains me?

Like a stone that has not melted but is held under the weight of a sister's hand, Rukmī's old enmity remains hard inside him while his outward act bends — the will-to-please-Rukmiṇī winning what reason could not.