Imaswan seconded him by releasing the muscle that does not confirm or corroborate: “A person who disdains the exegesis of prophecy is like someone who deliberately provokes a viper.” Silence returned to the chamber, but sanctity — the being that had fled to the most distant land once stillness was slaughtered — would never return.
Then people heard from the tongue of someone who normally did not speak. At that time the voice of Amasis the Younger, who was known for being taciturn, burst from his corner. “We won’t obtain a trustworthy interpretation of the Spirit World’s prophecy until we follow the path of the ancients.”
Their curious, inquisitive looks preyed on his eyes. Then the man with two veils turned toward him to take charge. “How did the ancients do exegesis?”
“Isn’t it said that they retired to the pastures and sought refuge in caverns and in deserted acres whenever they wished to proceed with any weighty matter?”
The chief merchant looked round at the eyes of the council members, who seemed as astonished as he was. Then he gazed at the eyes of the speaker, as if seeing him for the first time. He declared, “I acknowledge that this reading had never occurred to me. Doesn’t this idea provide the key to interpreting the first section of the allusive statement?”
Imaswan repeated the first half of the prophecy like a poet chanting verses of poetry. Ah’llum, without meaning to, repeated it as a refrain after him. The man with two veils, however, silenced them with a new prophecy: “We must head to the grazing lands. Prepare to depart tomorrow.”
The hero asked with astonishment, “But what about the second part?”
The man with two veils jumped to his feet and replied, “Solitude brings another prophecy!”
4
In the solitude of the pastures the Spirit World returns from the labyrinth to dwell in stillness. Then babbling confusion escapes from souls to satisfy their thirst by fleeing to realms that within their fortresses shelter bazaars where creatures’ desires and the fortunes of the physical world loiter. So the desert steps aside with the wayfarer to give him the good news that has always been a secret with which wanderers in the desert homeland have been enamored: “All corners deceive you when they tell you that you are a transitory creature. I differ from the Law of the spiritual lands and tell you that you are an immortal creature — immortal, immortal.”
Every corner, every void, every empty space, every rock, every height, every tree, every bird, every mirage, and every song of silence brings man the good news of immortality in the world of the desert. So only a minority know that solitude’s splendor derives from this and that the obscure delight sorcerers call happiness comes from the loins of a glad tiding the tongue cannot communicate. Then the deluge intensifies, and those people find themselves captives of an ecstasy they had never previously experienced — not even when their ears were assailed by songs of yearning. So they released shouts of madness and approval, intoxicated by the voices of the girls singing and astonished by the vision that glowed in the sparks of longing.
In the emptiness of solitude, the council members separated and the desert tempted them with the magic of silence. So the first of them climbed a nearby hill to visit a massive tomb, which resembled a barren stone slab, because foreign adventurers had profaned its sacred space and excavated the tomb to search for treasures. The second man crept into the barren land to the north. There a mirage seized him and led him a long way into the labyrinth before casting him into a pit that rains over the years had filled with clay ripples and dirt buckles that hid truffles. The third man strolled down the trail to the south, and solitude tempted him with road dreams. So he went a long way and reached the foothills of the blue mountain chain, where he lingered on the slopes, struggled past boulders, peeked into caverns, and visited the dwellings of the jinn as an invited guest with whom they shared treasures. Then he spent an entire day touring the cave walls to experience the life of the first people through their rock art. The fourth man headed west and climbed the heights, descended onto the plains, traversed austere expanses strewn with gray stones that had been burned by the lava of volcanoes and the eternal fires of the suns. Then he perceived in the distance a camel that herdsmen had lost. She was trailed by startled newborn calves. Braying around her were camel studs expectorating the froth of their rut and extruding from their mouths dulla faucial bags the size of water skins. So he approached her swollen udder like a calf, thrust his head between her thighs, and seized the teat to nurse from her milk.
5
Amasis the Younger shouted in an unfamiliar voice, “The key! I think I’ve found the key.”
The members of the council stared at him while pressing into a circle, seeking refuge near the fire from the evening chill and pretending to catch tongues of flames between their palms the way boys do. Curiosity gnawed at them, but the pride of the noblemen prevented them from uttering a question.
Their comrade stood above them, groaned from exhaustion, and bared his forearms, which he thrust into the flames as if he had decided to add them to the fire. He pulled them back deftly once he had absorbed some heat. He explained, “The second line is the key. Or — have you forgotten that we have buried seven moons and seven suns in this place for no other reason than to bicker about prophecy?”
They drew back, retreating en masse as if repulsed by food after tasting only a bite or two. It seemed that the word “prophecy” awakened in them the ancient gravitas that the desert’s emptiness had pilfered from them. They had neglected to pay attention, had forgotten, had rushed off to rove around, raced each other, wrestled with one another, snatched pieces of bread and dates from each other like young men, and shouted back and forth the way slaves and herders do.
News of the prophecy awakened the ghoul of gravitas and with one blow cast them into the fetters that restrain rulers. Amasis, however, showed them no mercy. He raised his eyes to the horizon, which was flooded by twilight rays, and repeated the second line as if singing a plaintive ballad: “Once you have finished, solve the riddle with sticks.”
Darkness continued to advance on the western horizon. Then moisture, perhaps tears, gleamed in his eyes. He said with a soothsayer’s intonation, “In the ancient tongue, the first peoples called casting lots ‘sticks.’ Have you forgotten?”
They exchanged a supercilious look. Afterward they fled to the wasteland, to a stern, barren wasteland that shot off to eternity in every direction, strewn with gray rocks of extreme severity. In the distance loomed a lone acacia tree, which looked depressing in the labyrinth’s desolation and — by its very existence — made the labyrinth all the crueler and sterner.
But the evening turned the matter head over heels and converted the sky into a desert and the desert into a sky. Darkness slipped down to spoil the beauty of the horizon. In the plaza of the heights, another nakedness was born and stars began to raid it. In its precincts, stars and spheres began to call back and forth to each other with allusive winks, as if eager to divulge a fear that the sovereignty of the lights might take them by surprise and erase their glow when the moon rose. A seditious charm was born in the upper desert while the lower desert died for the time being.
Imaswan objected, “Do you want us to cast lots to see which one of us will be conducted to the ghoul’s corral?”
But the chief merchant could no longer bear the inspiration patiently. So he crept forward till he almost stuck his knee into the fire. He shouted zealously, “Wait! I think Amasis is onto something. ‘Sticks’ in soothsayers’ jargon really means casting lots, because our ancestors only knew how to cast lots with sticks, but the prophecy that directed us to leave the matter to chance did not place us in the pool of candidates.”