by Dan Pearce
“Yes.”
“Cain pay Unbato for Humplant.”
“Cain no have payment. What desires Unbato?”
He pointed at my book, which I had tucked beneath one arm. “Unbato want book of Cain,” he said. He then held a seashell out to me. “Unbato also want stone of light on neck of Cain.”
I coiled back in my posture and cupped my hand over Annia’s necklace. “Book and stone of light Cain no can give,” I said. “Cain want other price.”
Unbato withdrew the shell and turned away. “No Humplant for Cain.”
Another physical surge rushed through me, and I became even more desperate for the drug. “Give Cain Humplant,” I said in a panic. “Can give Unbato book only.”
“Book and stone.”
“And stone,” I replied, angrily. “Book and stone then.”
He turned back to me and held out the shell to me once more. I reached to take it from him, but he quickly turned it over. No liquid fell from it. The shell was empty. “Cain remember now words of Unbato,” he said. “Cain see he want Humplant more than want two things most valuable to Cain.”
I stood in silence, disgusted with myself, angry with Unbato, and still desperate for the Humplant.
“Cain go. Cain say no more words to Unbato,” he said as he tossed the empty shell aside.
This time I did leave the village, and I walked all through the night in an attempt to get as far away from Unbato and his people and his stupid drugs as I could.
The mental and emotional withdrawals my last day in Unbato’s village had been difficult, to say the least. The physical withdrawals kicked-in hard the next day and lasted a full three days. I was only ever able to sleep minutes at a time. I would shake and tremble as my sweat drenched me repeatedly. The pain during those days was as intense as any pain I had felt in my life. It felt like my head was being crushed beneath a boulder, and my spine felt as if it would snap in two at any moment.
During the first parts of that withdrawal, I hated Unbato so much. By the time it came to an end, I was thankful for the man and hated myself. I was disgusted at how easily I had been fine with the idea of giving up the two things I valued most, just to get high one more time. I hated how little control I had of myself, in any aspect of my life since I had first tried Humplant. I hated how addicted to the drug I had become so immediately. More than anything, I hated the mental entanglement I had carried so long and of which the drugs had made me now so suddenly aware. There were things in my life and mind that needed to be fixed, my mind needed to be unburdened, and I knew at that point that those drugs couldn’t be the solution.
Unbato foresaw just how destructive continued use of the drugs and sex would be to me personally, and he forced me away from it before the drug could destroy me and take over my life completely. I never saw the great warrior again, but I’ll always be thankful that he saw that, and did that for me.
I wondered for some time how his people simply enjoyed Humplant and used it for their escape without becoming desperately dependent on it as I had. I had a hard time believing that Unbato only allowed the drug to be made twice each year, a fact he told me before I ever tried it. I also had no reason to doubt him, even though it made no sense to me that his people could go about life as usual in the months which spanned between their drugs and orgies while I could not seem to take my thoughts off of it at all. I still don’t have strong answers for why it was that way. I only know, after having watched many drugs come and go, that some substances affect people much more than they affect others, and I have had to learn the hard way that I simply can’t trust myself to handle them at all.
I didn’t travel far during those first few days on my own, but I really picked-up the pace once the withdrawal ended. After I was no longer crippled by my body’s cry for more, I felt a great need to get as far away from the drug and from the village as I could, and I knew I needed to do it as quickly as I could. With each step I took away from it, I seemed to crave the drug less. The heavy need I had of escaping settled in as well, but it also became normal to me once more. I knew I could live with it until I could find a way to escape from it in healthier ways. I also suddenly knew just how badly I needed to find an escape that worked and wasn’t damaging to me.
I knew I would never be happy or find that old version of myself if I didn’t find some way to untangle from the depressing and consuming weight that had bogged me down for such a long time. I was Cain. I was a good man meant to love and to be loved. I was not that current version of a sad, or depressed, or miserable man. I was a man worth knowing and a friend worth having. I knew I had lost myself for the moment, but I knew I was still there, somewhere. I was Cain. And I needed to be Cain again. It was a sad truth that sang to me from within, and it only found its tune after I conceded that I had somehow become truly lost.
CHAPTER 23
Eight months later, I met the guru Osman in the city of Du. Those who labored in the clay fields called him “teacher of higher things,” though Osman preferred to just be called “Teacher.”
The city of Du had only a few hundred inhabitants, yet I was unaware of Osman’s presence for many months. He kept a low profile and lived a humble life, desiring only to teach and give to those who came seeking wisdom or help from him. Having arrived in the city with next to nothing, and with the impediment that comes with not speaking the local language, I gave my labor in the clay fields in exchange for food and shelter. The language of Du was far more advanced than that which the people of Unbato spoke, and it took me longer to learn it in all of its new intricacies. I did learn it over the course of a few months, though, and greatly enjoyed my time among the other laborers.
There was a simplicity to their lives and existence that I hadn’t experienced in some time. They weren’t bogged-down with the constant worry and obsession that accompanies the rich. They worked each day to survive, then went home to be with their families before they slept, and that was as complicated as their lives seemed to be. The stories they told in the fields were rarely their own, as gossip and rumor had a way of spiraling down to the lowest levels of society, and while we worked, they loved recounting whatever they had recently overheard.
There were many times I stood back and just listened to them laugh together and humorously tease each other. I didn’t realize it until Osman pointed it out to me, but my time in those clay fields was a crucial first step to unwinding the tightly wrung rag that my thoughts had become. I needed to step back in order to step forward, he told me. It was true.
The stories of the laborers eventually mentioned the name of Osman, and upon further prying, a floodgate of information about the man was lifted and what I was told made me immediately leave my work and depart from the fields in search of this “teacher of all things.”
The laborers spoke of a man who knew more than any other man, and who could find the best solution for any problem that existed between any two people. They spoke of a good and kind man who sought not more than he needed. They spoke of his incredible age, which they did not know, but they knew he had been a dweller of Du since before the grandparents of their grandparents had been born. They spoke of the dye which made pictures within the skin upon his chest. I pointed to the mark on my own body and asked if the man’s mark was similar, but none of them had firsthand knowledge to give me. “He keeps it covered,” I was told.
The hut that housed Osman was no secret, and I was pointed in its direction. The excitement of again finding what must surely be a man who also had been cursed, kept my pace swift on the long walk from the clay fields back to Du. My thoughts turned heavily to Dishon as I hiked, and I wondered where he might be at that moment. I wondered if he would also somehow find his way to this land, and I realized that since his entire life was dedicated to finding Tashibag, there was a chance he was already here. It was on that walk back to Du that I realized what a true anchor he had been for me. Dishon was my truest friend, and I became suddenly so aware as I walked that I had become the most
lost only after I left him behind. It would still be centuries before I would find my friend again, but that day I could not shake the idea that I might have been so much happier if I had only stayed and met him at the great oak as we had planned.
And who was this new possibly cursed man Osman? If he had been in Du as long as the rumors surrounding him asserted, then Tashibag had to have been in this land across the ocean for some time. How had she gotten here? Did she know of ships long before I ever discovered them? Certainly, that had to be so. Thinking of Tashibag made me think of just how many false leads Dishon and I had to have followed, and it made frustratingly perfect sense why we never could find any real evidence of her for some time before meeting Mila on the road to Grath.
“You also are cursed,” were the first words Osman said to me as we met in his doorway for the first time. “You are a troubled cursed man, but a cursed man who seeks rediscovered goodness in his life. That is rare. What is your name?” I stood in silence, discombobulated by his omniscient greeting. “Or should I just call you ‘The Silent Marked Man?’” he added, after I said nothing.
“I am Cain,” I finally responded. “How did you already know I am cursed.”
He smiled a very warm smile which put me more at ease. “I see everything,” he replied. “I know everything. The energy of all that is, all that ever was, and all that ever will be speaks constant truth to me.”
“Really?”
“No,” he replied then pointed to my mark. “I simply noticed the edge of your mark is all, and you approached my home with lowered shoulders and a bowed head. You came here looking for peace, not war. It was easy to conclude the rest.”
I shrugged, indicating that I had been gullible and appreciated his humor. He invited me inside, and I followed.
Osman was a man of average stature. His head was bald, and he had no hair on his cheeks or chin. A hole had been cut into the skin of a leopard, and he wore it draped over his front and back, tied closed around the waist with some sort of dried vine.
“May I see your mark?” I asked once we were inside. He smiled his warm smile at my request, and pulled open the leopard’s skin, showing me his mark, which unnaturally seemed to glow in contrast to his black skin. It was the same mark Tashibag left on all those she cursed. Osman’s was filled with different and bright hues of oranges and purples and white.
Osman covered it again, and prepared a cup of water, which he handed to me while he gestured for me to sit upon the ground across from him. “Tell me Cain, what crime did you commit which brought Tashibag to find you?”
I saw no reason to lie or to diminish the details of my past with this man. “I killed my brother.”
Osman scrunched his nose and groaned while he laughed. “Oh, that is bad.”
“Yes. I know. What was your crime?” I asked in return.
He took a sip of water. “I dare not say. It embarrasses me.” He took another sip. “But it’s only fair since you were honest with me.” I tried not to show how overcome I was with curiosity as I waited for him to put it into words. “Cain, have you heard of blackroot?”
“No.”
“Do you know that there are plants which can alter one’s mind?”
“Yes,” I all too honestly replied. “I recently learned this, in fact.”
“Blackroot is rare and very difficult to obtain, but it is known throughout these lands.”
“What does it do?”
“It removes the memory of all that recently was,” Osman replied. “While searching the wilderness for other herbs of value, I discovered an abundance of blackroot and I used it to take from many others what was not mine.”
Not fully following, I asked for clarification.
“When a person is feeling the power of blackroot, their minds are easily persuaded. They will do or give whatever I ask of them, so long as I explain to them it is something they want to do or give.”
“What did you ask of them?”
“Everything.”
“What do you mean, everything?”
Osman looked at me with pensive eyes. “Everything,” he said. “And I paid the same price for it that you did, Cain.”
My curiosity wanted me to push for more details of his use of blackroot, but I resisted. “How long ago were you cursed?” I asked, hoping to piece together Tashibag’s timeline.
“I am older than you.”
“That is impossible.”
“Is it?”
“Yes. I was cursed by Tashibag hundreds of lifetimes ago in a land across the ocean. So it is impossible that…”
Osman cut me off. “I am older than you,” he said. “That is all you need to know.”
I tried to argue the logistics of it, but he gave me no further information. Instead he changed the subject. “More important than what we did to receive our curses is what you believe your curse to be.”
“I assume your curse is the same as mine. To live always and never get to enjoy lasting death.”
“And this is a curse to you? No. Tell me what your curse actually is.”
Of all the women I loved, my thoughts for some reason went to Annia. They usually went to Annia. “My curse is to lose any woman I love.”
“No. That is not your curse, either.”
“Yes, it is. I assure you I know my curse better than you do.”
“It is not your curse.”
I became bothered. “You’ve known me for moments only. What is my curse then, wise one?”
“If I tell you then you will never understand it fully,” he said, smiling that same smile which now just annoyed me.
“What is your curse then?” I insisted.
“You are asking the wrong question,” he said.
“And what is the right question?”
He took another sip of water. “The right question, Cain, is what was my curse?”
My heart raced. Was he implying that… “You are free of your curse?” I asked.
“Yes.”
“But how?”
He laughed sheepishly. “I don’t remember.”
“What? How long have you been free?” I demanded, my heart speeding even faster.
“Many, many lifetimes.”
He went on to explain that Tashibag had cursed him with complete forgetfulness. He could not witness or learn anything new without forgetting it completely while he slept. He remembered close to nothing from the time Tashibag placed the curse upon him to the time he found a way to break it and was sincere in his original statement that he did not know how his curse had been broken.
“I know that it was not Tashibag who broke my curse for me,” he said. “I know that because she told me when last we met.”
“When was that?”
“More than thirty years ago.”
“And you believed her?”
He laughed. “Of course. Tashibag does not ever lie.”
“Do you know where she is?” I asked.
“No.”
“You are telling me that your curse is broken, but you still cannot die?”
“Yes.”
My anxiety could let me sit no longer, and I stood and began to pace. “How could you possibly find your own freedom when you could not remember any new thing from any day before?”
Osman nodded to acknowledge the flurry of battling thoughts I certainly must have been feeling. “I have met many who carry the curse,” he said. “I am the only person I know who has yet found a way from it.”
I laughed in frustration. “Yet you have no idea how you did it!” I yelled, unintentionally.
“Sit,” he said. “What I am to tell you is something you must absorb. I have had much time to learn this, and believe it is the most important information I can pass to those also cursed who deserve to find their own answers.”
I did as he asked, and held my breath in an attempt to control my breathing as I waited for whatever it was that he had to say.
“Drink,” he said. “The mind thinks more clearly when the body
is filled with water.”
I wasn’t really thirsty, but I again did as he asked.
“What I tell you is something you must never tell another cursed soul unless you know that soul to have latched onto the good heart that exists within it.”
“I swear an oath,” I said.
The smile left his face completely. “There are many cursed who walk among us, Cain. Most have only let the darkness grow, which brought their curses upon them to begin with.”
I nodded. At that point, I had met only a few, but I knew from those encounters how true his words were.
“I have thought much about this,” he said. “I believe Tashibag knew when she cursed me that I would find freedom from it.”
