Seven Veils of Seth (24 page)

The day of the execution, when the vassals brought the fool, who was bound with ropes, the wind cast generous puffs of dust into the faces of the procession so the men could barely see one another. They were forced to call out to keep from becoming separated. Behind the hill, the elders assembled, although the chief had vanished from the group.

The diviner approached the fool to pronounce the statute, which he attributed to the lost Law: “An eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth. If the killer is not killed, the Law will be diminished.”

The sage whispered to the chief merchant, “The diviner begins by seeking a prophecy but ends up extolling prophecy's veil.”

The chief merchant took his time before turning toward the sage to whisper back a maxim before the frenzied wind could snatch it from his lips: “How can the diviner help but laud prophecy's veil – and not prophecy – since we know we possess nothing that does not perish?”

The sage shouted, “I almost believe that the generations continue to refer to the Law as ‘lost,' not because the Law itself has been lost – which is what we say nowadays – but to acknowledge the loss through senescence of individual axioms of the Law.”

The wind howled, casting into the wasteland new reserves of coarse dust. So the diviner signaled to the vassals to execute the fool. Just then the group heard the fool for the first time. In a voice that was husky, weak, weird, and totally unlike his normal voice, the fool said, “Undo my bonds so I can pray.”

The diviner approached him till he almost bumped him with his turban and asked with astonishment, “To whom would you pray?”

The fool replied in the same voice, “My Master!” The diviner expressed his disapproval with a telling question: “What's the use of praying to a father who has rejected you?”

The fool stammered, “My putative father in the physical world has rejected me, but my Master will never reject me.”

The diviner hesitated for a few moments. He turned toward the group of elders, but then a new wave of dust separated them. He gestured to the vassals to loosen the fool's bonds.

The vassals untied the prisoner, who stood there, gaunt, alone, abandoned, his head bowed.

The diviner shouted, “You can pray now. Your hands and feet are free.”

The prayer, however, did not issue from the fool's tongue. He also did not seem intent on stepping aside to pray privately. He stood among them like a ghost, his head bowed, his veil falling away from his face, dust coating his eyes, lips, and nose. The diviner started to repeat his words, but a hideous bellowing ripped the phrase from his mouth and almost deafened his ears. After the hideous bellowing, a demonic power swept them up and hurled them far away. It grasped them in an instant. They were first bumped against each other, colliding. Then they were scattered so far apart no one could see anyone else. They did not call out to one another, not because of the howling, but because of their surprise. The tempest separated them and the demonic wind carried them into the air after breaking up their terrestrial congregation. They were forced to travel long distances to find one another again.

This one found that one, but they never found any trace of the fool.

The following day, when the dust clouds scattered and the wind stopped once and for all, people set out to search for the missing whom the tempest had carried away. They discovered some alive and others dead but found no trace of the idiot.

Two days later, the chief merchant ran into the jenny master at the sword dunes, which the wind had shifted forward to split the oasis in half. The chief merchant said jokingly, “All the homes lost their roofs, except the stranger's.”

The strategist replied slyly, “Winds don't carry away the roofs of roofless homes.”

When Amghar looked at him askance, he added, “Tomb vaults lack roofs.”

The chief merchant, however, leapt to a different subject: “Didn't the demon wind throw you to the ground?”

“The demon wind would have to dig into the earth for a long time to reach a creature whose fortress is the tombs.”

Amghar stared at him suspiciously and remarked mischievously, “But I went to check on you and found the vault vacant.”

“The vault's a place. The jenny master does not dwell in physical space.”

“You don't live in physical space?”

“It's inconceivable that one who lives for wayfaring should live in a physical location.”

The head merchant smiled as he drew closer, his head bowed to examine the great changes the storm had made to the earth's crust. Without looking up, he said, “I'm fairly certain that the wind was your handiwork.”

The strategist asked nonchalantly, “What would make you think that?”

“You're definitely a wind demon that can polish off the remaining debris of the oasis.”

“I've never resorted to magical practices.”

He stared at him suspiciously once more and said in a tone with a concealed barb, “How can you avoid recourse to magic when your powers of metamorphosis far outstrip those of the most cunning sorcerers?”

“Now you're repeating your leader Ewar's conspiracy theory.”

“It's not a theory. He said as much in the assembly during his final attempt to save his darling fool.”

“Did he really try that?”

“He confessed everything, even though his confession served no purpose.”

The strategist retreated into silence. After a while, he said, “Did he also admit he was the wretch's father?”

Amghar glanced stealthily at him. Then he muttered: “Yes.”

“Did he claim I was the wretch's father, too?”

The chief merchant gazed at him from behind his veil and their eyes met. He signaled yes. So the strategist asked, “What else did he say in his summation for the defense?”

“He told a tale of metamorphosis.”

“Rubbish.”

“But Edahi is your lost child; isn't that so?”

“We only recover what we lose.”

“What does that mean?”

“I mean I have fulfilled my task and have definitely reconciled you to a life of wandering.”

“Is this your farewell?”

“Tomorrow I shall mount my jenny and once again become a wandering wayfarer.”

Amghar drew a deep breath and said regretfully, “I'll miss you a lot. I'll miss you more than I shall ever miss anyone in this ill-fated oasis.”

“You won't miss me, because you will soon catch up with me.”

The chief merchant groaned with pain and said, “You're right. We'll meet during our migrations, sooner or later.”

“No, sooner.”

He was silent but then added, “Have you forgotten what the wind did to the spring?”

“We complained because the water was contaminated. Now we're complaining because there's no water anymore.”

Raising his head toward the distant horizon, the strategist said: “I'll just allow my jenny to say what the jenny of all generations said when she quenched her physical thirst from a well the way the Law quenches our spiritual thirst: “‘Now let the leather bucket be slashed, let the winch be smashed, and let the well be dashed.' Did I get that right?”

Hünibach, the Swiss Alps San Remo, Italy Tripoli, Libya 2003 C.E.