Channa pointed to the high palace walls. “He throws them out. That’s what I hear.” Channa thought of the horses he and his father buried beyond the walled perimeter. “Only they’re not dead.”
Siddhartha knew in his heart of hearts that the horses that disappeared from the stables didn’t leave alive, and it made him anxious that something dark happened to a lord or lady who suddenly vanished from the morning levee when the king assembled the court for a greeting and allowed them to watch silently as he ate breakfast. None of Siddhartha’s favorites had disappeared yet, thankfully.
“When I’m the king, nobody gets thrown over the wall,” he said, but that was a rare remark; Channa would never recall another time when Siddhartha referred to taking the throne, not in the near future, the distant future, or ever.
Siddhartha’s mind was wandering through these gloomy thoughts as he stood alone by his favorite pool, the one surrounded by tall reeds. He knelt down and paddled his hands in the cool water. The pond was shallow there, and in the shadow of a floating lotus he saw something-the nymph of a dragonfly creeping slowly over the mud. Siddhartha watched it. The miniature monster moved steadily, fearlessly, on the prowl. A tiny silver minnow swam by, and with a startling leap the nymph snatched it in its jaws. The minnow shuddered once and was still, its eyes open and shiny even as it died. Siddhartha shuddered along with it. Why did he feel the pain of such a tiny, insignificant creature?
“A very good question. Maybe it’s your gift.” Startled, Siddhartha stood up to see an old man in front of him, a hermit. His skin was brown and weather worn. He wore a flimsy silk shawl thrown over his torso and a rough hemp skirt. The hermit was leaning on his staff by the waterside, gazing at the boy, his eyes unreadable in their depth.
The hermit said, “You found me. And very quickly at that.”
“I didn’t find anyone. I was just here,” Siddhartha protested.
The hermit smiled, which made papery creases at the corners of his eyes, something Siddhartha had never seen before. Everything about the stranger made him seem like an apparition. “These things don’t work quite the way you suppose. I am Asita.”
An older boy, or a very different one, would have wanted to know how someone else’s voice got into his head. Siddhartha accepted that something inexplicable could still be real. “Why are you here? Does my father know?”
“Another good question. To which I can give a simple answer, since your other question is more complicated. Your father would be very displeased to see me here. Does that matter?” Before Siddhartha could reply, Asita said, “Of course it does. He’s the one you look up to.”
Siddhartha took this as a criticism. “Everyone looks up to him. He’s king here.”
“Let’s not worry about that for the moment. Have you heard other voices in your head? Tell me the truth.” Siddhartha hung his head. “I thought as much. You have a feeling nature, a very deep one. You will sense things that other people can’t. Unfortunately, not all those things will be good for you. There’s nothing I can do about that, do you understand?”
“I don’t want to be different, but you say I have to be. No, I don’t understand.”
Asita took a step toward him and laid a rough hand on his shoulder. “No mother, and a father you trust completely. We have to take that into account.”
Siddhartha grew more uneasy. “I can hear the guards coming. You have to go. You said you shouldn’t be here.” Soldiers were shouting at each other from the far side of the pond, and the voices were getting closer.
The stranger shook his head. “I can take care of them.”
Whatever he meant was a mystery to Siddhartha, because Asita did nothing that he could see. Yet when three guards came combing the tall reeds, they didn’t see the two of them standing there in plain sight. The boy hesitated.
“It’s your choice,” said Asita calmly. “Call for them, or stay and listen to me.” Without a word, the boy waited until the guards were safely away. “Good,” Asita said. “I am only here to show you a few things. If I keep protecting you, you won’t find your own way, and you must do that.”
“How have you been protecting me? Are you the one who keeps me here, inside these walls?”
“No. I have been protecting you in many ways, but not physically.”
Asita bent down and looked the boy in the eye. “Your father wants to live through you. But he doesn’t have that right. Believe me.” Siddhartha looked away, biting his lip. “You are so young. I only wish-” Asita’s voice trailed off, and he stood up again. “No one’s fate was ever decided by talking. I have something to show you, and now it’s time.”
Overhanging the water was a large rose-apple tree in full bloom. “I told you that you have a gift, but it’s not a simple one. Already you have begun to experience it, but each time you do, you are tempted to run away. Does this tree remind you of anything?” Siddhartha shook his head.
“You were barely four years old. It was time for the spring plowing, and your father held a feast like this one. It was his role to go out into the fields and plow with the common farmers, a great sight. Everyone wanted to see it, including your nurses. So they left you under a rose-apple tree, just like this one. You don’t remember at all?”
Siddhartha didn’t know what to say. A strange sense inside him, like a clearing mist, made him uncertain. Asita went on. “Nobody realized it, but you were watching closely, and as the plow blades turned the fresh earth over, you saw something very tiny but very disturbing. The bodies of insects and worms had been chopped into bits by the plow, along with other small newborn creatures. How did you feel?”
“I can’t remember how a baby feels.”
Asita’s gaze didn’t waver, and Siddhartha hung his head. It took a moment before he murmured, “I wanted to cry. Why should I cry over a half a worm?”
“You felt as if you had seen your own family hurt, and this frightened you, didn’t it? No need to answer. We both know. The feeling was too big for you. But something else happened next-”
At that instant Siddhartha lost the sound of Asita’s voice, because the clearing mist inside him revealed the scene the hermit was describing. Siddhartha saw himself in his baby’s robes sitting under the tree. He saw himself look up at the overhanging blossoms, and suddenly he was back there again. But what he felt was no longer anguish at the small creatures cut to bits by the plow. Something new had washed over him. The beautiful tree, the immense blue sky, the inrush of the spirit of spring-they made him hurt again, but this time with a pang of pure joy. And yet somehow the two things were connected. The sight of violence, which hurt so much, transformed into a joy that wanted to burst out of his chest.
Siddhartha came back to himself, gazing at Asita, who seemed to be reading his thoughts. “That was your gift. You mustn’t run away from it.”
“Did I run away then?”
“No, you didn’t have a conscience then.” Asita said. “You didn’t know enough to feel ashamed or different. You fell into that beautiful thing for hours, and when they found you, everyone was astonished that you hadn’t moved from the same spot all day. They were so astonished they didn’t even notice something much more interesting.”
Siddhartha held up his hand. “Don’t say it.”
“Ah. So someone did notice.”
Although he had sat under the rose-apple tree all day, the tree’s shadow hadn’t moved. It stood in the same place overhead. And so the child was shielded against the sun’s fierce heat until his nurses ran back again.
“Is that what you call protecting me?” asked Siddhartha, unsure whether to look upon this as a miracle or just one more thing that made him not like other children.
“You are troubled, and you shouldn’t be. Come.”
Asita sat down under the tree now. Siddhartha watched as the hermit crossed his legs and straightened himself until his spine was perfectly erect. From long practice he made this look effortless.