Part 2 The early years
1. Time passed. Kassir grew. Three years later, Malna and Rashed had another child, a girl, this time. Then they had another son. One would have thought they were a happy little family, content with the lot given to them in life, worried only about the daily troubles of life in the Desert. Hidden beneath this peaceful existence, the shadows lay. The people of Red-stones had long memories. The village was small and uneventful enough, so that something unusual was remembered and discussed for generations to come. Malna and Rashed’s first child had become a legend before he had a chance to grow up.
The people of the village did not exactly shun Rashed and his family, but they were not entirely friendly with them, either. They treated the child with caution, expecting him to lose control and attack at any moment. They did not encourage their own children to play with Kassir. They did not tell them to avoid him, either. They just advised them to be careful around him. And such vague warnings were enough to influence the children more than any explicit threat would have. Even as a small child, Kassir felt that the others his age did not quite warm up to him.
Malna and Rashed could not blame the parents. They knew that, had they been in their place, they would have perhaps acted in the same manner. It was easy being afraid of what could be interpreted as ominous signs. And none of the villagers took the time to know Kassir. Malna was sure they would have been singing a different tune if they had.
Kassir was an engaging child, quick-witted and energetic. From an early age he gained the ability to think on his feet. He was friendly to others, even if he was painfully aware that few others were friendly to him in return. At first glance, there seemed to be nothing wrong with him. He was not very different from the other boys his age. But even Malna could not deny the signs, the little moments when Kassir seemed something else. When he stared in the distance where nothing could be seen or acted as if he was aware of the hidden things that did not show themselves to mortal men.
No doubt, an agent of the priest would have been able to read the signs. Rashed even suggested making use of the next one that came to their village. But Malna kept postponing the plan, afraid of what she would find out.
2. Kassir was six years old. By now, he had become a fixture in the village and people were used to him. Somehow, he had managed to find a group of children that accepted him. With them, he would run all over the village and even sneak away outside, though it was forbidden. At first, he did not give much thought to the strangeness that surrounded him. The series of incidents following him were not enough to draw the attention of a child. All that changed the day he spotted the red eagle.
Red eagles were a menace in the desert. They descended in flocks of great numbers over settlements, attacking everything in sight: fowls, pets, even small children, nothing was safe from them. And always, so the people claimed, two days before a red eagle attack, one of them would scout the chosen settlement, as if to see what could be taken from there. That was a useful thing to know, only it did not do very much good. No one could usually spot the scout. It flew high and many times it was mistaken for a speck of dust in the horizon, if it was seen at all.
One morning, a few weeks after Kassir’s sixth birthday, he and a few other children went on the edge of the village to build sandcastles. At one point, he looked up. He spotted something then, and knew immediately what it was. He sprang up.
“Look!” he cried to the others. “Look up! Quickly!”
Drawn by his shouts, they all looked up.
“Look at what? There’s nothing to see.”
Kassir shook his head disbelievingly. Why were they saying that? It was plain to see, after all.
“There!” he exclaimed, starting to panic. “The red eagle. Surely you can see it, too. It must be flying lower than usual.”
Linir, a boy of about ten and until then Kassir’s favourite playmate, laughed indulgently at the smaller boy’s antics.
“Really, Kassir,” he began fondly. “If you want to fool us, I think you should try something else. Although,” he added, his eyes twinkling with mischief, “I do admit it would be rather fun to burst into the village crying about a red eagle invasion. Imagine the panic! We would be in quite a lot of trouble when they find out there are no red eagles coming, though.”
Kassir did not know what his friend was after, still pretending he could not see the red eagle and acting as if it was only a game. But if that was the only thing that would have made them warn the villagers, so be it.
“It will be worth it though,” he said slyly. “Imagine the look on their faces!”
The other children laughed. They were at an age when, although they feared punishment, they relished the effects of their mischief even more. This was an opportunity they found hard to resist.
They left their sandcastle unfinished and burst into the village, waving their arms and crying about a red eagle. The villagers could not afford to doubt them. For the next two days, Red-stones was in chaos, as they prepared as best they could for the attack. Beasts were driven into caves and someone stood guard there all the time to prevent them from wondering off. Doors were locked and windows were barred. Children were warned not to leave the house. Even the grown-ups were reluctant to step outside.
During the second night, Linir managed to sneak out of his house and go to Kassir’s unnoticed.
“I do not like what we are doing,” he told Kassir. “It is not right. I think we should tell everyone it was a trick, that there are no red eagles coming.”
Kassir gaped at his friend.
“You know it’s not a trick. You must have seen the eagle.”
Linir shook his head furiously. He had fully expected Kassir to be reasonable.
“Well, I’m not playing anymore,” he stated firmly. “I’ll tell my mother tomorrow it was all a game. And I’ll tell her you were the one who put us up to it!”
The next day the red eagles attacked. They swooped over the village right after dawn, surprised and frustrated to find the people aware of their coming. They flew away unsatisfied, in the search of a place where they were not expected.
3. No one knew it was Kassir who had spotted the red eagles – except for Kassir’s own friends. Most of them were sure the arrival of the eagles had been a coincidence. Only Linir thought differently. He was sure Kassir had something to do with the red eagles. After all, people said strange things about him. If Kassir really had powers – of course he would use them. It was not the first time, now that Linir thought better of it.
He remembered other incidents – not as serious as the one with the red eagles, but still notable. Only a week before, Kassir swore to Linir that, as he and Lusa – another friend of theirs – were playing by the village well, they had overheard Linir’s mother claiming she was going to punish her son for neglecting to feed the chicken that day. Lusa said she had heard nothing of the kind. But, sure enough, when Linir got home that night, his mother was waiting for him red in the face, about to deliver one of her long-winded lectures that usually precluded a punishment.
Afterwards, Linir would think it was Lusa who had lied about not hearing his mother. Lusa was like that. She was eight years old and trailed after the group only because they had all realised it was too much bother telling her to go away, as she never listened. She was a little odd and a natural liar. Only now did Linir suspect that, in that case, at least, she had not lied. She really had not heard Linir’s mother. Kassir must have made her want to punish Linir, to play some kind of prank on him.
A few weeks after the foiled attack of the red eagles, Kassir and Linir left for a small pond they thought was known only to them. They liked to bathe there, even if the water was dark and muddy. Linir said nothing on the way to the pond and even kept silent while he and Kassir splashed around the pond. Once they lay down on the sandy shore to dry, he thought Kassir was relaxed enough to be taken off guard.
“How did you do it, then?” he asked.
Kassir looked up, puzzled. But Linir was not going to be fooled by that display of innocence. He was certain now Kassir could dissemble with the best of them.
“The red eagles,” he pressed on ruthlessly. “How did you summon them here?”
Kassir shook his head.
“I did not. Why do you say that I did?”
“Oh, you can tell me. I would not turn on you, would I? We are friends, after all. The games we could play. And no one need know. We could tell no one. Not our parents, not our friends. Not even Lusa. It would be a secret known only by the two of us.”
“I don’t have any powers,” Kassir said morosely. “I did not summon the red eagles, I saw their scout. Why is this harder to believe than me having powers? Where would I have these powers from?”
“Oh, people like you always get them,” Linir said sagely.
Linir liked to appear all-knowing to his younger friends. It impressed the little ones, when he acted as if he knew more than them. This time, however, he was starting to suspect that he really did know more than Kassir.
“I suppose your folks did not tell you. I know my mother wouldn’t. I reckon she’d be afraid of me enough, without me aware of the truth.”
Kassir was shaking his head as if he wanted to tell Linir to stop but did not have the courage to do so. Linir pressed on, ruthlessly
“You were born on the second rainy night of the year,” he told Kassir. “And I need not tell you what that means.”
Kassir took a step back.
“I didn’t know,” he said shakily. “I swear, Linir, I did not know.”
Linir regarded him with little sympathy.
“Well, now you do. And we can make use of it.”
Kassir clenched his fists. There were tears in his eyes.
“I don’t want to make use of it!” he shouted. “And I won’t let you make use of it, either!”
He sprang up and ran down the path, away from the village. He half expected Linir to come after him, to plead with him not to be angry, to comfort him and assure him that nothing of what he had said was true, that it had all been a game. Linir stayed where he was, though. And it was that lack of solidarity from a previously steadfast friend that made Kassir break down in the end.
Sitting on a jagged stone in the red glare of the afternoon sun, he cried with a misery he had never felt before. He cried for the barely understood realisation that he was not like the others, and if Linir was disturbed by this, so would anyone else that met him. And he cried for the terrifying notion that he was alone, and most likely would be so for the rest of his life.
Copyright Simina Lungu 2022
Comments