A dozen tents sat in the sand in front of them as Akiiki and Obasi followed the women into the makeshift village. People turned and stared as they walked through the village, and Akiiki could sense the doubt and hostility in their gaze. Eventually they came to a tent that was much larger than the rest and the women put the boat down in the sand and disappeared into the tent.
Akiiki and Obasi waited, the tension building in the air with every moment, before Akiiki turned his head and looked at Obasi whose eyes betrayed his concern.
A large man slowly stepped out of the tent and stood facing them. With arms like thick branches, and a powerful chest, his shadow engulfed Akiiki as he approached. Without acknowledging Akiiki, he stared at Obasi and spoke. His words were strange and foreign and as the two of them talked, Akiiki became suddenly aware of a growing anger in the tone of the man’s voice. The man turned and yelled in the direction of his tent and one of the women came rushing out and stood by his side.
Without taking his eyes off Obasi, he spoke to her and gestured in the direction of the village before turning his back to Obasi and withdrawing back into his tent.
The woman regarded them both for a moment and walked past them Akiiki and Obasi turned and followed her as she moved quickly through the village.
“We are not welcome here,” Obasi whispered to Akiiki as they followed the woman. “They know who I am and do not trust shaman. The chief has granted us a day’s worth of food and water but will not allow us to stay. Once we refill our pouches and have our food we need to leave immediately.”
The woman led them to one of the small tents where a man was busy cleaning fish on a small flat stone in the sand. He glanced up at them as they approached.
His hands moved effortlessly through his work, slicing and cutting fish into small pieces before reaching for another. They stood and watched him work for a moment before the woman said something to him. The man paused and glared at Obasi before returning to his work.
The woman took a step towards the man, and with a strength in her voice that carried throughout the village, spoke again. Akiiki froze at the hostility in her voice and as she continued, villagers began to crowd around them. As Akiiki looked around he saw a deep cold suspicion in the eyes of the strange men and women that made him nervous.
The man stood face to face with the woman. He was young and tough, and though he was not much bigger than her, he seemed to tower over her with his rage.
The village watched and waited in silence as the man pointed toward Obasi and spoke. The two of them argued for a moment as the man grew angrier with each word. Eventually, the woman silenced him with a glare and he turned and ducked into the tent.
He came back out holding a bundle of leaves and a large pot of water. Walking over to where Obasi and Akiiki stood in the sand, he sat the pot down in the sand at Obasi’s feet and threw the bundle of leaves in the sand.
Obasi dropped his head and quietly said something to the man as he took out one of the water pouches from his bag.
Without warning, the man attacked Obasi, tackling him in the sand and falling upon him with large powerful blows. His hands were a blur as he repeatedly struck Obasi in the head. Akiiki watched helplessly in horror as blood ran from Obasi’s face and into the sand. The woman yelled as she pulled the man off Obasi and kicked him in the ribs. A hush settled over the of the village as Akiiki rushed over to Obasi whose face was a mess of blood and sand. One of his eyes was swollen shut and his breathing was labored as he opened his one good eye.
“Fill the pouches and grab the fish,” he mumbled, blood dripping from his lips.
Akiiki laid him gently back in the sand and quickly dipped the pouch into the pot of water. Once it was full, he grabbed the bundle of fish and helped Obasi to his feet. Obasi bowed toward the woman and stumbled through the village with Akiiki by his side, as they put the village behind them.
Obasi struggled as they walked through the sand, but they didn’t stop until the village was no longer in sight. Once they were out of danger, Obasi tumbled onto his back in the sand. Akiiki searched his pack and found a piece of cloth that he used to carefully clean the dried blood from Obasi’s face. As he wiped away the blood, Obasi’s injuries became clear. A large cut above his eye bled down the side of his face, and his nose and mouth were badly swollen.
Once the bleeding had slowed, Akiiki laid Obasi’s head carefully back down and sat by his side.
As Obasi rested in the sand, his chest rising and falling in short shallow breaths, Akiiki relived the panic and helplessness he had felt watching Obasi get beaten in the sand in front him. Obasi coughed, and Akiiki wiped the blood away from his lips with the folded piece of cloth.
From his back, Obasi tried to speak, but his voice was weak and feeble, and Akiiki had to lean closer to make out his words.
“Fire……” Obasi said weakly.
“But I can’t. I’ve never done it,” Akiiki said, partly to Obasi, mostly to himself.
“Try….Believe,” Obasi whispered before falling back into unconsciousness.
Akiiki searched through the pack and found his fire board and drill. He took a handful of tinder from the bag and built a small mound of sticks in the sand. His nervous hands trembled while he set the fireboard under his foot and placed the drill in the small blackened hole. The worst of the midday heat had passed, but the sun was still strong in the air as he worked.
His focus broke into a thousand different pieces as he worked, each one a strain on his waning concentration. After a few hours of work with little progress, frustration settled over him like a storm. With each fruitless attempt, his frustration turned to anger until with tears in his eyes, he threw down the drill in the sand.
He heard a muffled sound come from Obasi, moved closer, and put his ear to Obasi’s lips.
“Be calm. You must trust yourself,” Obasi said with his eyes closed, his voice stronger than before.
Akiiki stood up, tilted his head back to the sky and closed his eyes. With a deep breath, he cleared his mind of the thousand fragile pieces of distraction and he opened his eyes to a new energy that resonated in him that gave him confidence.
The sun had begun to set, and in the evening breeze, he heard a song that sung to him of hope and warmth. He listened to the song, and let it fill his chest before he returned to his tools.
Picking up the drill from the sand, he held it in his hands as if it were an extension of his own body. Placing it back in the fire board, he did not struggle against his body or the wood as he worked. Instead he worked with the song of the wind, his energy pouring easily through his hands and into the wood. Soon, thin lines of smoke rose into the air and a small black ember formed near his foot. Carefully, he dumped the coal from the fireboard into the small nest of tinder and cupped it with both hands. He blew gently into his hands until smoke began to rush through his fingertips and a small flame leapt into the air. He slowly knelt into the sand and put the tinder underneath the mound of sticks he had prepared. He continued to nurture the small flame until it grew into a roaring fire as it feasted on the sticks.
He sat back and watched with pride as the fire took shape.
He dragged Obasi through the sand and laid him near the fire. There they spent the night, Obasi in a deep sleep and Akiiki awake tending to the fire.
***
The next morning, Akiiki unwrapped the bundle of dried fish and took a few small bites. The fish was tough and salty, and he swallowed before breaking apart a small chunk and feeding it to Obasi whose face was still badly swollen.
“Try and eat,” Akiiki said quietly, unsure if Obasi could hear him. He opened Obasi’s mouth, put a small piece of fish on his tongue, and watched as Obasi moaned and started to chew. When Obasi was finished, Akiiki gave him a few sips of water. Obasi nodded slightly and fell back asleep. Though he had not slept at all through the night, Akiiki was not tired and admired the sunrise as Obasi slept.
A calm peacefulness
filled the air as he watched the sky fill with the calming tones of the morning sun. He looked at Obasi, and fear tried to work its grip around his mind. He knew that a boy lost in a strange land, filled with dangerous men and women, had little chance of ever finding his way home. But from his doubt and fear, a new resolve and confidence grew. He tossed a few small sticks into the fire and basked in the heat from the flames as they roared within him.
Obasi stirred awake shortly after midday. He sat up and looked at Akiiki. Though his face was still badly bruised, Akiiki was relieved at the strength of his movements. Obasi pointed at the water pouch silently, and Akiiki handed it to him. He took a long sip and sighed.
“How long was I asleep?” he asked through swollen lips, his voice hoarse and tired.
“About a day,” Akiiki answered. “Are you feeling better?”
Obasi face twisted into what Akiiki decided was a smile. “I believe I feel about as good as I look.”
Then, looking around, his eyes stopped at the fire. “Is this your work?”
Akiiki nodded
“Aha! Very good!” he exclaimed loudly, before wincing in pain. “I am proud of you my King. I’m afraid I am in no condition to travel today. We will rest here one more day, and tomorrow we shall continue our journey. Where is the dried fish?”
Akiiki passed him the bundle of fish and he tore off a large chunk. “Well, we have a few day’s worth of fish, and you learned how to build a fire, I’d say our run in with the Chinyanja was not completely fruitless.”
Even through the pain in Obasi’s voice, Akiiki sensed the sarcasm in his words.
“Why did that man attack you?” Akiiki asked quietly.
“That is a story for tomorrow, for now I must rest,” Obasi said as he laid down in the sand and fell quickly asleep.
For the rest of the day Akiiki tended to the fire. When he started to run out of sticks to burn, he walked down to the ocean and collected pieces of driftwood from the shore. Returning to the fire, he stuck the wet pieces of drift wood in the sand to dry and ate a small piece of dried fish.
The heat of the day passed by calmly into night and with it, exhaustion finally worked its way through Akiiki’s body. Knowing they were within a day’s walk of the people who had beaten Obasi made him nervous, but after stoking the fire with a few large pieces of driftwood, he laid down and forced his eyes closed.
His nerves made deep sleep impossible and he woke with every crack of the fire and every breeze that carried haunting sounds from the shadows of the night.
When he finally awoke the next morning, he was surprised to find Obasi up with a pot of water boiling. The dried blood was gone from his face and most of the swelling had disappeared. He smiled at Akiiki.
“Good morning.”
Akiiki sat up and rubbed the sleep from his eyes. “Good morning.”
“If you are feeling up to it I would like to get going as soon as possible.”
Akiiki nodded and stood up. Obasi poured the boiling water into the sand and together they packed the rest of the things. Soon they were walking together through the sand. After a few minutes, Akiiki’s muscles were warm from both sun and effort.
They walked in silence, both of their thoughts swirling with the events of the past days, as well as the anticipation of what the future held. Obasi broke the silence as he turned to Akiiki.
“The Chinyanja are a notoriously superstitious people who view shaman with distain. That is why I was attacked.”
“But you didn’t do anything!” Akiiki remarked.
“No, but often we are judged not by our own actions but by the actions of others my young King. Their chief told me that about a year ago, a shaman wandered into their village. They gave him food and water as well as his own tent for the night, but when he left some of the women of the village fell ill and died. Many in his village believed that their deaths were due to a curse the shaman placed upon them. Revenge lies in men’s hearts like a snake in the grass waiting to strike. It did not matter if I was the shaman responsible or not.”
Seeing Obasi’s calm demeanor, Akiiki sighed. “They still should not have attacked you like that.”
“No, they should not have. Just as Lael and his men should not have killed your father, but when a man blames another for his woes, justly or unjustly, he starts to believe it is his right to act with revenge against others. And thus, the cycle continues, men and women exploiting their brothers and sisters out of anger and revenge. It takes a wise person to understand and break this cycle of vengeance.”
Akiiki thought about the nights he had dreamed of killing Lael and his men as they slept. He searched the lonely path of pain within him for the anger that had comforted him during those cold nights with Lael, only to find that the anger had receded, and in its place, he found a warmer companion, acceptance. Where the coldness of anger had merely numbed him to the pain of his loss, acceptance wrapped him in an embrace that seemed to thaw him from the inside out.
The conversation quieted for a moment as they walked, until Obasi said. “So, tell me, how did you manage to get a fire started? It must have been especially difficult given our situation at the time.”
Akiiki closed his tired hands. “It took me all day. At first, I was so scared I could barely hold the drill. But then…” Akiiki paused. “You told me to be calm and trust myself and I knew we would freeze during the night without a fire, so I tried to focus.”
Obasi nodded.
“Then it felt like my body was acting on its own,” Akiiki said as he struggled to remember what happened next. He had no memory of starting the fire, of the smoke and the ember, or of blowing on the nest of tinder until the flames jumped in his hands. It was like trying to remember an old dream, the more he searched for details, the more they slipped his mind’s grasp.
Obasi smiled. “Very good. It is not un-common in moments of pressure to slip into the current of nature’s stream. Pressure can slowly wear away even the largest mountain, but it is this same pressure that allows the flowing rivers to carve a path out of stone. The difference is, the mountain stands still and weathers the toll, while the river never settles and instead directs the pressure into its ever-changing flow. This is also the way of life. The path through life is never simple, the key is to be as unrelenting as the river and carve your way through life.”
“I’ll try,” Akiiki said.
“Good. Now, according to the chief back in the village, the capital city is only about a three day’s walk from their village. At our pace it may take a little longer, but we are almost there. Tonight, you will have your last healing as we prepare for you to go home.”
Akiiki was speechless. He had relegated the hope of returning home to the deepest part of his thoughts. As his hope slowly grew, like a seed through the ashes of a great fire, he was overcome with emotion.
With his newly energized spirit, the small aches and pains in his body disappeared, and he walked the rest of the day with a small bounce in his step. They stopped early so Obasi could rest as Akiiki worked to get a fire started. He struggled as his sore hands made it difficult to grip the drill, but as he continued to work he fell more and more into a rhythm until the world around him once again quieted and he listened to the wind and he expressed the poetry of earth through his hands. Only once he had gotten the fire started, did Akiiki notice Obasi watching him intently. Before the sun set on the day, the fire burned strongly in the sand.
“You are well on your way to living a life of peace,” Obasi said as Akiiki sat back in the sand and admired his work. “I see it in you now. Once you reach nirvana through the forest of nature’s truths, being king will be the lowliest of your titles. You will become a humble servant of truth, a god to only himself, a true man of the earth. The kingdom will do well to have you as their king,” Obasi said.
Akiiki shook his head. “How can I be a good king if I have never ruled?”
“There will be decisions you must make as king t
hat will affect the lives of many men, women and children across the desert sands, but try to think of your choices as if they affected you. Then you will be able to judge the correct path forward,” Obasi said. He pulled out the jars of powder from his pack and mixed them together on a plate in the sand. When he finished, he looked up at Akiiki.
“I think now is as good a time as any for your last healing. Are you ready?”
Akiiki nodded, and Obasi poured the powder into the fire. The smoke slowly thinned into a rolling plane of crashing waves that hovered over the sand. Then, a small whale broke through the waters as it leaped into the air in front of Akiiki’s face. With a puff of smoke, it crashed back into the grey water, and Akiiki’s mind drifted away.
HIS ENORMOUS BODY, no more than a speck in the vast expanse around him, glided effortlessly through the water. With the flick of his large tail, he easily maneuvered through the currents and gentle rhythms of the ocean. By his side, his calf trailed closely behind, reassuring itself to his presence by nudging him playfully.
While they swam, he sang a song that filled the water around him. Long crooning notes echoed throughout the ocean for miles, rising and falling with the ebb and flow of the ocean’s heartbeat. The song started from a place deep within him, a beautiful longing that stretched as he sang of love, pain, happiness, fear and despair. Each note hung heavy across the water, burdened with hope for a future yet to exist as well as the pain of past dreams extinguished. His song seemed to carry not only through the water but also the very fabric of time. He sang of hardship, of a life spent trapped in the middle of a constant struggle between life and death. Within the same notes, he rejoiced at the beauty of life molded by the tension between the two poles.
In moments of silence, when his song faded away, carried by the currents into the farthest corners and deepest depths of the ocean, he would listen closely to his little one’s rebuttal.
His child’s song was playful, and carefree, full of lighthearted and easy notes that against the melancholy of his song, pulled him away into a world of innocence. Where his song of truth was heavy and built of the world in which they lived, the song of innocence and youth was built upon naivety and hope, a hope that he remembered vaguely as if it had been part of an earlier life. He reveled in the memory only long enough for it to simmer in his soul, for too much time spent in the memory of a long-forgotten past made him weak with envy. They sang their song of past and future, pain and pleasure as they danced together through the water. The song filled the ocean around them with the music of love until his heart could take no more of the deep painful longing for a world that lived only in his memories, and his world faded away, drowned in hope of a love lost long ago.
The Bridge Home Page 10
