THE Potter's Village

The story is done, documented as mortally possible from the subliminals that this track had brought to one's mind.

For the benefit of the rest of humanity, here it is.

Thank you,

Love and peace.

In the potter's village: Chapter - 12 (of 12)

A week after the trial concluded, Rahman was publicly beheaded in the presence of the priests, 2 ministers of the sheikh's court, and the general public. It was a low key affair, concluded by 8 in the morning. Karim had never felt as aggrieved as he did now, but was surprised to find a different element adjoining that sorrow.

As the crowd dispersed, he walked away aimlessly, and soon found himself near the sight of the weekly food market, some miles from the village. Some yards in front of him stood a tiny hut, in which he thought he saw a light moving. With steps that followed no thought or direction, and a mind as blank as a slate, he entered the little temple. Two days later, he would walk away, and never be seen again.

---

In the potter's village: Chapter - 11 (of 12)

The third day of the trial was almost a formality, lasting just 10 minutes, as Masood summarized the proceedings, and delivered his judgement. Having known the outcome from the moment the trial began, Karim had spent the last 3 days in a state of stoical waiting.

The previous evening he had visited Rahman in prison.

The two looked at each other, and knew exactly what they both knew.

Karim: How can you just sit there, knowing what is to happen tomorrow?

Rahman: I can, because I must. It is the path I have chosen, and that has chosen me.

Karim (hesitating): Do you know where you shall go?

Rahman: It is unto my father that I proceed, how else is one to see one's life fulfilling itself?

Karim: But what if there is nothing.. no light.. no truth.. nothing divine at the other side?

Rahman (smiling): What is light? What is truth? What is divine? Are they not figments of one's belief in the end? Then how does the case of the contrary arise?

Karim: No.. yes.. no, what I mean is, what if you find yourself floating in a sea of darkness looking for the image you see in the hut, but find nothing at all?!

Rahman: The answer would then be clear, wouldn't it, that the divine indeed lies in the path one takes, and not where one ends. One lives and is one with the Creator during his life, for that is all one has. There is no 'ending', for there is no end. The end and the beginning always meet.

Hearing this, Karim stood up, walked slowly backwards, dropped down to his knees and offered namaaz to the prisoner in front of him. Then he ran away.

In the potter's village: Chapter - 10 (of 12)

The trial was adjourned to the following day, after all the participant members found it best to close for the day. With Rahman having rested his case with his elaborate opening statement, proceedings moved rather linearly the next day. Both prosecutors called on witnesses against the potter, making strong arguments in front of the judge. As the clock struck the noon hour, there was little left to do than the judge to deliberate and announce verdict. The same he deferred to the next morning, allowing himself time to think and evaluate.

As he stepped out of his seat the judge, Masood, could feel the earth moving underneath his steps. He had anticipated something on these lines the moment he was briefed on the case, but what had transpired in the last 2 days was beyond what he had imagined. It was exactly what had been foretold all those years back; the day that he had hoped would never come; the only one thing he had feared all his life thus far. It was the day when he would need to make a choice. It was the point of no return between his ideological past and present; in fact, the point where the two met, beyond which neither could reconcile the other any further.

During his travels, in fact towards the last few weeks, which he had spent in India, he had grown to question the seemingly theoretical nature of the academia that he had espoused all those years. This question had led him to a wise man that people referred to simply as 'JK', who had, after listening to his story, told him the following:

"Masood, you are indeed correct when you label your current exposure to academia as too theoretical, and even bookish in nature. And that must be so, for learning finds its purpose only in action, and its time will come. Till then, your days shall be comfortable in that things shall be a smooth flow in your head. The time for action would be the true test, in disturbed waters."

Years later, when he was under the tutelage of the radical imam Maqbool Hasan, the cleric had smilingly told him that no matter how much he studied and learnt about the scriptures, it was all a sham till the day of deliverance came; till the day he would be forced to choose between the one thing he would translate from learning to practice, and the rest of the universe on the other side.

At that very instant, sitting next to the imam, he had recalled JK's words, and was struck by the similarity in the views expressed by both. The fact that the two polar opposite ideological tracks, that he had so intensely followed, could actually intersect at this one point convinced him of the veracity of this prediction; that one day he would be standing on a path, where it would be impossible to carry on in both directions; when he would have to choose his way, his boat, his life. He had realized it in that instant, that till then, he could afford to be ambivalent internally, but only till then.

In the trial that had taken place, Masood was split right down the middle, for there were indeed two voices within him. The Masood of yore, exposed to the most diverse mix of ideas and philosophies known to man knew exactly what Rahman was doing, and saw no wrong in it. There was no case even to be considered; Rahman was a free man. However, the other side, of which he was a more active subscriber now, and had been for the last many years, told him otherwise. In his eyes, Rahman had blasphemed beyond what words could describe, spoken against the rule of the king, and belittled the very socio-religious fabric that had given him a position to stand in. And thus, he deserved no less than to pay with his life. Rahman had to pay for his sins.

As these thoughts played around in a little wind in his creased head, he saw the clock had crossed the 3rd hour of the night. Just then, a young man not unlike his self of many years back walked into his room. He stood in front of him and smiled. In that instant, Masood realized it was indeed he himself, returning to Khemnuur after the voyages that had been. In a fit of terror and a reasonably distant cousin of rage, he picked up the closest object at hand, and threw it wildly at the impostor. His image was shattered, and with that his dream.

Masood welcomed the next morning with the most bitter of feelings in his stomach, and a coldness of being that stifled the tears before they reached their rightful place beyond his eyes. The case was closed.

In the potter's village: Chapter 9 (of 12)

Rahman: I am Rahman, a potter by profession, and a free human being created by the Creator who created us all. I arrived at your village, which has accepted me graciously ever since, over 3 years back. My task was to work as a potter, which I have done as honestly and in as committed a manner as I could have. During this time, I have come to interact with some of the most interesting people I have ever come across. And even as I realized this within myself, I could see all around me a great amount of disenchantment, and an increasing detachment from the lives that the people here felt had been forced on them.

I am a human person who has always found enough in my surroundings to make do with, be it in terms of subsistence, or the need to think, be questioned, and explore. It is this higher level need that I feel demarcates us from the rest of the inhabitants we share this world with; this ability to think is what enables us to experience the myriad emotions that colour us, to make sense of the world as a place that is larger than what we know and perceive. When I first came here, I found this propensity to think for one's own self to be severely lacking in all the people I met. The whole village seemed shrouded in a pall of gloom, one which everyone freely accepted, without putting up any form of resistance to protect their own happiness. This really pained me. In my time here, I have always sought to find out the reason behind this passivity. And for this, I have spoken to people; I have asked questions that seemed most natural to me, which would often surprise many people in how simple they were.

My guiding light, in all I have done wherever I have traveled, has been my Father. That you don't consider your Creator to be your Father is your perception, but to me, there is no truer form of guidance I have experienced, ever. How we see our relationship with that higher power is of course a highly personal matter, one that I have never advised or questioned anyone on. The time I have spent outside my shop here, and in some ways even the time within, has been a continuing exploration of the human nature, through the diverse sample presented to me here. Wealth, social position, family issues, vocational conditions, and a thousand others are the parameters that characterize each and every one of us, thus giving rise to a countless number of unique entities in our individual selves. Yet, there are these commonalities that transcend different boundaries in different cases, peculiarities that colour all of us in a similar shade; which is a fact that I find too interesting to not explore. And thus, I do. I question, I inquire, I find out.
I find out why the local barber is unhappy even after having married off his 2 daughters, and built a new house at the ripe age of 65; I question how the ruler of a land can stake claim to the produce of his subjects without being their servant, if not by brute force; and all of this I do, simply because these questions come to me, they surround me, as they surround us all. To ignore these little facts and puzzles is to ignore the very essence of life itself, which I hold too dearly, and which I find precariously deficient in all the people around me here.
If to open your eyes to the hardened, numbed unhappiness that you had come to espouse, is to "create unrest", then I have nothing to say in my defence there.

Honourable Mr. P1 had mentioned a "most compelling instance of my seething unholiness" in a sight witnessed by the priests. If that were to be true, then every namaaz we offer is an instance of said holiness. For if one were to attain communion with one's Creator, and seek His blessings and direction, how must it matter if that be attained in a bejewelled monument to His name, or in a hut that is as much His creation. What I see in that time, and how I perceive its presence in my existence, is a matter to be determined by none other than my own self, for it concerns no other being in this world. As for the sight per se, if it surprised or shocked the spies following me, then it is by virtue of the sin that they themselves have within them, for how can the embodiment of the Creator be evil or dark; how can the loving embrace from the purest light to have existed, made to a pure heart, be the seed for anything dark. The seed, thus, must lie in the mortal observer.

I am but a creation in the hands of my Father. My work here is done. I rest my case.

With that, he sat down.
The audience in front of him, judge, prosecutors and public, that had sat motionless, entranced and unblinking, suddenly came back to the earthly recesses of the courthouse. Karim on the other hand, could only weep.

In the potter's village: Chapter - 8 (of 12)

The trial was uniquely carried out, in that there were 2 prosecutors, one each representing the priests and sheikh's court. In defence, Rahman stood for himself.

The crux of the proceedings may best be stated by way of quoted sections of speech made by the different players in this little game that ensued. For the sake of convenience, the prosecutors shall be referred to as P1, P2.

Judge Masood: Opening statements, first by the prosecution.

P1 (standing up, exchanging a glance with P2): "If I may begin, this is a case of unprecedented stature and significance, for we have in front of us a man from an alien land, with a talent for a craft that surpasses human imagination. But even while he has fascinated all, including traders, children and far off royalty with his skill, his actions outside the potter's shop have been far from the diktats of socially acceptable living. He has been known to incite unrest in the minds of the peace loving people of Khemnuur, by means of ideas that go against the Holy Word. This is not a one off instance, rather something that has become synonymous with his presence. Finally, the prosecution would like to bring the attention of the court, to the single most compelling instance of his seething unholiness, the sight witnessed by the priests at a small hut in the nearby market region of Farakhi, only a week back. I would now hand over the floor to my esteemed colleague, P2."

P2: Thank you P1. The prosecution would now like to bring to the notice of the court, the charges of sedition and intrigue against the sheikh and his rule of law. As previously stated by P2, this man is known to spread ideas that are against the very fabric that underlies any social setup. His origins are unknown, and the motivations that drive his actions can only be imagined. He could be a spy from a distant kingdom, an agent directed to enter the social structure of our land, infest it with ideas that shall one day leave it hollowed out and empty. The truth appears rather dark in his case, and we hope to unravel the details in the course of proceedings here.

Judge Masood: The accused, and defendant, Mr. Rahman, you may now speak.

The public assembled in the room took a collective deep breath, for they knew that this statement would go a long way in determining the outcome of this case. All present were struck by how composed the man was, facing a trial which could cost him his life. Karim, seated on the second row could feel the tension building within him. With the judge asking Rahman to speak, all eyes moved to him, as did Karim's. And at that instant, he knew exactly what was to happen.
The smile that graced Rahman's face at that instant seemed singularly untouchable, with a sense of awareness and knowing that seemed to resonate with his surroundings, in a manner which lent the entire scene an air of surprising tranquility. It appeared as if the person of Rahman was in a bubble, deeply enmeshed yet inexorably insulated from the world, and from all that it wished to throw at him. Karim was the only one who saw this scene for what it truly was, with each passing moment spelling out a story that was reaching its conclusion.

With that, Rahman stood up, and started to speak.

In the potter's village: Chapter - 7

Rahman was produced in court soon after, where Masood, the oldest judge in the land had been called upon to preside over this rather exceptional case. His exemplary record and experience notwithstanding, the fact that he was a staunch believer in the written word of God made him a clear choice for the priests.

Masood had been born to the second wife of an aging clerk in the sheikh's court. The fact that his father died when he was just 11, leaving behind two wives and four children, and that he was the youngest of the lot, born to the considerably younger wife, meant that his childhood thereafter was a continuous stream of challenges. In fact, had his sharp academic drive not been noticed by an affluent trader named Jamaal, just returning from the high seas, he would probably not have received any formal education. The grapewine would tell one that the education and nurturing he was provided with was more a result of his mother being prepared to go to any lengths to ensure her son's future. By the time Masood was 17, his mother had formally become the fourth wife to the trader, even in the midst of considerable hue and cry in social circles. However Jamaal with his considerable clout ensured that the union was blessed by none other than the sheikh himself, thus silencing any voices that had even considered dissenting. Even though biologically not his parent, Masood was Jamaal's favourite. By the age of 26, the young man had been a part of several of his patriarch's travels, and had seen much of the known world. In his travels, he was struck by a sense of oneness among all the disparate races and societies he had interacted with; something which showed him an underlying layer of what may today be referred to as 'humanity', beneath the superficials which differentiated these peoples.

Overcome by this feeling, he felt stifled in the trade business he seemed set to inherit from Jamaal. Thus during one of the trips to the Orient, he fled the ship, handing it over to the able captain to reach back home. From there, the next 9 years were spent in traveling and studying at universities across the world, subjects ranging from philosophy and literature to astronomy and mathematics. When he felt he had had enough of this world, the much learned Masood returned to his homeland. Initially greeted with skepticism, he soon proved the veracity of his claims, made easier by the presence of the ship captain who had last seen him. Jamaal had since handed over the business to the captain, who always had been the most capable, and innately talented to take up such a responsibility. Masood knew that his father had given the business to deserving hands. And yes, he did refer to Jamaal now as his father.

Within 4 years of Masood's return, Jamaal died in a freak accident during the loading of a ship bound to Africa. And with that, Masood's life took another critical turn. Unable to reconcile with the loss dealt to his mother and himself for the second time in their lives, and now increasingly conscious in retrospect, of how his father had never completely approved of his academic explorations, wanting instead for him to take forward the family business, he found himself coiling up into a shell. Desperately seeking any semblance of relief and anchorage, he chanced on one of the imams at the local mosque which he would visit regularly. The words he heard during one of the readings of namaaz seemed to resonate with his state of being, "Turn off your mind, relax and float downstream; for the answer shall come to you in the Word of the Lord". Intrigued by this line, and unable to comprehend its full meaning, yet knowing completely that it was key to him regaining his peace, he met the imam later that evening. He was Maqbool Hasan, known to be radical and rigid in his beliefs, and a purist when it came to following the Word.
Over the course of the next 12 months, Masood would meet him and spend hours discussing several diverse issues at least twice each week. At the end of this period, he was a changed man - more orthodox, bordering on radical, and soon entered the judicial system, where he created quite a fan following, by virtue of the strictness and fairness of his judgement, sometimes laced with a touch of the philosophies and thought he had chanced on in what now seemed like a previous life, but always agreed upon as just.

It had been 21 years since then, and he now proceeded towards the court to hear the curious case of Rahman, a potter from an alien land, who had been witnessed indulging in blasphemous practices, and even cited as spreading ideas and thoughts that were labelled 'anti-social' and 'seditionary' in nature. Several of the quotes attributed to him reminded him of his traveling years. The proximity that the potter exhibited to those ideals of yore interested Masood greatly, and perhaps even made him a tad uncomfortable, as he walked into the court that bright spring morning.

In the potter's village: Chapter - 6

In front of them, and the innocently watching Karim, was a scene playing itself out in truly unaffected glory. It was not entirely human, and not entirely mortal, the meaning of what their eyes read to them at that instant.

The little hut, with no furnishing whatsoever, had Rahman kneeling at its centre, gently bowing to a light that seemed to unfurl out of itself, in a continuous, unrelenting song of power, grace and majesty. It was a sight that instilled an overwhelming sense of fear and awe into its onlookers. For minutes, both Karim and the priests stood frozen at their positions, unable to make sense of what it was they were witnessing. Finally, Rahman broke the deafening silence, asking the light what he was to do, in a tone that was in contrast to his usually elevated self. His voice bore the signs of a continuous and unconditional surrender, albeit without the flavour of resignation that one may have expected to find.
This question was followed by a long and pregnant silence, which would be breached by a voice that would send shivers down the spines of all the assembled bystanders. It was a loud, bellowing voice, which emanated from the very centre of that regenerating mass of light. It said, "It is not yet time for you to leave. There are eyes and ears to these walls, which shall guide you to your destiny."

Both Karim and the priests jumped back at the allusion made to them. They stuttered backwards, and then fled back to the village along the respective paths that they had taken.

While Karim was intrigued by what he saw, convinced that the incident was key to the question that had been haunting his very existence for over 3 years now, the priests felt they finally had one key accusation to make against the seemingly flawless potter; A convenient mix of idol worship, blasphemy and bigotry. It was armed with this weapon, that they headed to work the next morning.

Said next day passed off just as planned by the priests. After a closed doors meeting with the king and his court, a decree was issued against the potter, denouncing him as an outlaw who had offended the holy word of the Lord, and indulged in practices earning him the title of infidel. A prize of 100 gold coins was placed on his head, and within hours he was presented at the royal palace with a line of claimants on the reward money. The priests smiled at their partial victory, for it had been a long and arduous task till now, which seemed on the verge of delivering the results they had set out to accomplish.

In the potter's village: Chapter - 5

As Karim walked hurriedly from the priests' quarters he could feel a sense of urgency in that which he had somehow become a part of. And he knew Rahman was at its very centre. Without a second glance, he sped off to the potter's shop where Rahman spent his nights. It was now late in the night, and such footsteps often attracted unwanted attentions, for it was the hour when clandestine deals were struck and cosummated. He thought of none of this however, and knocked on the potter's door repeatedly, till finally Rahman opened it, weary eyed yet with a smile on his serene face. Karim was quick to narrate to him the details of that evening. Rahman's unchanging expression had an air of having seen it all before, or so Karim felt. Puzzled and concerned, he asked him the reason for that. He replied with, "My father once said: Make your work the goal of your life, and you shall find me in all you see; in me you shall find all from the oceans to the sky and beyond, and in them, me."
Karim was speechless at the level of incomprehensibility, loaded with an equally compelling sense of the mystique that greeted him in those lines. Overcome with that feeling, he picked himself up, muttered a "Rahman, please take care.", and stumbled out of his door. The state of bipolar perceptionary extremes that he had been thrown in from the moment he had met Rahman, was now entering another level.

As he sat in his bed, his wife now increasingly aware of the distance creeping into their relationship, he could think of nothing else but Rahman, and the words he had so effortlessly spoken. At some level he was concerned for his safety, and at another, he felt envious of the kind of conviction with which he lived. He knew only that he had to know more about his origins, and the source of that sense of immovable calm.
Thus he awoke the next morning, and headed off straight to the potter's shop. Unbeknownst to him, the priests had sent a messenger him to the court, who had promptly been redirected to the shop by the concerned wife. The messenger proceeded towards the shop, only to find it closed for the day. He brought word of this to the priests, who were astounded to hear it, for never in the last 3 years had Rahman been unavailable at the shop during the opening hour of business. They knew this was a potentially critical moment, and called on the royal guard which immediately dispatched its spies, who traced Rahman to a small hut located 4 miles outside the village. The priests reached the spot by evening, taking care to approach it by a different path, so as to escape the attentions of Karim, who had been kneeling besides the northward facing wall peeking in through a gap all this while.

As they approached it, they caught sight of a light moving within, and carefully perched themselves along the southern wall, peeking through the aging cracks in the wood. Their eyes widened at the sight that beheld them.

In the potter's village: Chapter - 4

Within a few days of his arrival, Rahman was a much sought after member of the community. The potter had obtained special orders from the sheikh himself, courtesy the latest talent acquisition he had been gifted with, children flocked by him when he sat down to work, and the local traders vied for his work to be shipped to the farthest places in their imagination. The people also found themselves captivated by the refreshing change he brought to day to day conversations, that had grown numbing and trite otherwise.

People found themselves more interested in their own lives somehow, and even appreciated the elements that they had come to scowl at perennially. However, none of them was quite as affected by his presence, as Karim was. The sense of openness and liberation he experienced, and which he used when he viewed the world, would alternating-ly provide him with an overwhelming sense of joy, and a maddening sense of meaninglessness. He wasn't sure of whether it was really good, or even healthy to have such thoughts, but knew that he had 'grown', on some dimension scale, along some scale.

It was now 3 years since Rahman had arrived at Khemnuur. As with all objects of such beauty and shining quality, he too had managed to create rivals, emanating from a sense of jealousy, and being threatened. This emergent class of individuals comprised a disparate assortment, from high priests, to members of the royal court, to traders who had missed out on his business, and even the potter who employed him, Shimad. Being the owner of a business increasingly dependent on his output, and the aging husband of 3 young wives, he felt threatened on several fronts all at once. The cases with each of the other rising enemies was unique in the mix of factors that caused them to resent his presence, but exceedingly unifying in the impact they had on them.It wasn't long before these voices found company in each other, and attempted to better assess the situation. A social reformer might have been glad to see the manner in which the boundaries that separated these disparate individuals came melting down in the face of this common foe.

In the course of their discussions they couldn't come up with any substantial about the potter, leave alone against him. The manner in which he had just dropped by from an alien land meant there was little in terms of tracks that he had left behind. Upon inquiring, they discovered it was Karim that had first interacted with him in person. Thus the priest summoned up Karim one day, and spoke to him at great length about the mysterious ways in which God functions, and the need to keep the soul cleansed at all times. Discourse complete, they proceeded to the real matter at hand, asking him about Rahman, the nearly sacrilegiously gifted potter from an alien land. If the occasion of this special audience was not hint enough, Karim now knew something was amiss, and that this conversation was surely not in the realm of that which may be termed 'ordinary'. He started to analyze each question closely, and choose his words carefully, a fact that didn't miss the attentions of the eagle eyed priests. A few queries later, they ended this particular session, asking him to maintain a customary silence on the same. As he walked out their doors, a figure from behind the trees lining the exit follwoed him stealthily. A couple of hours later he would confirm to the priests what they had suspected, that Karim had visited Rahman straight after his meeting.

In the potter's village: Chapter - 3

Karim was intrigued by Wajid's description of the potter from Shizami. It seems he had appeared out of nowhere, early one January morning, carrying little more than a shiny blue pot. Upon being asked who he was, he had said he was a potter who had been swept ashore after a shipwreck on the nearby coast. The state of his clothes seemed to suggest likewise. The pot he was carrying, with its fine print work and shading caught everyone's eye, and soon enough he was employed by the local potter, whose business grew manifold quite overnight. Word of the artistry that now seemed to emanate from his humble establishment spread far and wide, and orders started pouring in from distant royalty as well as businesses such as Wajid's.

The hour had crossed 11 o'clock. The ship had been delayed by 2 hours now. Just when Karim was starting to grow concerned, the distant lights of a ship caught his eye. Within minutes, it had docked on the port, and after all the cargo had been unloaded, came walking a young man about 25 years of age, clean shaven and clad in fine white silk, with a bag slung around his shoulder. Karim approached him and asked, "You must be Rahman?". "No, I'm Qadir. The man you seek is walking behind. There..", came the curt reply, with a finger pointing towards an older man with an unkempt beard and hair, wearing a robe patched in places, and holding a pot. "Ah! The famous potter with his pot," thought Karim, as he proceeded to greet him.

Karim would never forget the look in Rahman's eyes as they shook hands. They seemed to be in a half sleepy daze, composed and relaxed, and yet contained a piercing quality, one that seemed to see straight through one. While it was slightly unsettling at first glance, within minutes the former quality succeeded in putting Karim at ease, and they walked the way to the village talking about an eclectic mix of subjects. As with most conversations across the globe, they too began with the weather, but then digressed to talk on the livelihood occupations prevalent there, the reign of the current sheikh, his feared secret service, his relations with the high priests, the level of social liberty and the rare instance of artistic expression from among the mostly working class populace. The walk thus far had lasted a good 2 hours, and in the following pause, Karim was struck by the unprecedented depth and scope of this discussion that he was a part of. No longer had this thought passed his mind, that Rahman asked him, "So Karim, What do you like about the work you do?". To this, Karim replied with a broad description of his daily work, elaborating on the business cycle, and some peculiarities of his trade. To this Rahman replied by reiterating his question, this time stressing on the 'like', with a look in the eyes that revealed they might know more than they reveal. Karim found himself perplexed, and after a pause that seemed to last ages, gave up and changed the subject to Rahman's village. An hour or so later, they had reached the village, where Karim dropped Rahman off at the potter's place.

The rest of that night Karim spent in a rather disturbed state, not that it was very apparent. His mind was somehow stuck in the conversation with Rahman. He now questioned several aspects of his life, from the tangibly significant, such as the sheikh's rule, his business, to even the trivial, such as the way the moon was nearing its daily submergence, the shadow of the clothes stand in the lamp light. For a brief phase, that could well have lasted for years, nothing seemed to make sense to him, as he found the very bases of his understanding of the world collapsing. Eventually, around the wee hours of the next morning, he managed to get himself together, returning to a fully functional state, though not quite recovering completely from the experience that had so unexpectedly shaken him within. Such a 'recovery', if one may use that term for escaping from the truths that he now saw bare, would never accede to the continuous requests made by his rationalizing, sense seeking self.

In the potter's village: Chapter - 2

Rahman, as he was called for the last 4 years, had been a potter for that time. This stint of his had started when he arrived on the shores of an African town, Medinez, located on the shores of the river Khibuki. Prior to this, he had been a blacksmith, a practitioner of medicine (which many believed to be black magic), and even a soldier, in reverse order. At the still maturing age of 27, this was a shockingly varied resume he was amassing with his life.

He wasn't particularly bright as a child, named Shikhnir and brought up in a village named Perouz in inland Peru, learning the tenets of frugal survival, which was the most one could aspire to learn in that place and time. As with the majority of the male population there, he too joined the king's army at the age of 16. At the time he left home with 4 others from his neighbourhood, none could have predicted the course his life would go on to take, most of all, he himself.

And none of the magic would have taken place either, had it not been for the chance encounter in a tiny hut in the middle of a dense forest, during a royal hunting expedition, the second such assignment in his fledgling 14 month career as soldier. It was a gloomy winter afternoon, neither too cold nor too hot, and he was part of the group that ventured forward, scouting for any signs of danger, by way of animal or man. Still new to the paths of the forest, he managed to lose the entourage, and soon enough had no inkling of where he was and should have been. After 6 hours of futile searching, a tired and thirsty Shikhnir stumbled upon a broken down hut. Catching a light moving within and desperate for relief, he plucked the remnants of life and his gun, and made his way into the establishment, which was little more than 10 feet both sides.

What he would experience in that place, where he spent the large part of the next 2 days, would change the very basis of his existence. The change began with him leaving the hut, now named Khalid, bound for a village some hundred miles southwards. He left the hut keeping only the things he had learnt to be essential for the journey ahead, given the river and marshes that lay in the way. As he left, an air of dire desolation returned to the hut, as it had been for the last 287 years, and would be to date.

Upon having reached a stream some miles from the village, after a walk lasting 4 nights and days, the first sign of life that came his way was incidentally on the doors of death. A cow had been attacked by a wild animal it seemed, going by the deep wounds suffered on its side. It was trying desperately to drag itself back to its home. Armed with little more than a gauntlet of water and a staff, Khalid felt a deep need to alleviate the creature of its suffering. Not knowing why exactly, guided perhaps by a force invisible, he walked along the stream to a shrub that grew all alone. Mashing it with the rocks on the stream bed, he soon had an ash-green paste which he went on to apply on the suffering cow. Giving it some water, he then sat next to it, comforting it as the night wore on. The next morning, he propped it to its feet, and the two headed into the village.

Thus entered Khalid the miracle healer, into the lives of the 40 odd villagers that comprised his destination, and his home for the next 3 years. One fine day, one not too dissimilar from the day of his second hunting expedition back in Perouz, he found himself ambling empty handed towards a little hut next to the stream where he had found the cow. And from there, 2 days later, he had emerged as Darim, heading onwards to Africa in a vessel belonging to a local slave trade mafioso, to a kingdom by the name of Rhiwana. There he would go on to succeed the business of a blacksmith who died a day before his arrival. He would lead the family out of debt and despair, and train the young sons of the deceased patriarch. Three years into Rhiwana, and the family that he had made his own, he left for a walk one night and never returned. Within days he would be Rahman the potter, the newest member of a village in Northern Africa by the name of Shizami. A year later, he found himself walking out of another desolate hut, this time still as Rahman, heading to the port, onwards to Khemnuur.