The Mul

[Iconoclast]

Zukwandi’s Unbearable Weight of Freedom




One by one, they fell to the sun, until they all fell, all but one; the Mul. His hairless copper sun toned skin zigzagged with tattoos branding him a slave and gladiator of the Tablesands.  While no stranger to pain, whether it be the sun or the slave master’s whip, he was a stranger to this; freedom, and it terrified him. The dry cracked stone underfoot kicked up clouds of choking dirt with each heavy step. The air rippled with searing heat. The sun in the cloudless blue called them all “boy,” slave and non-slave alike.


His clear water blue eyes, under a thick protruding brow ridge, gazed at the dying men around him. The other slaves had been the first to die, days ago, since when water became scarce, what profit would a slave bring, if the slave seller died of thirst first? Their path was littered with dwarf and human corpses, all slaves. But despite the slave masters’ best efforts, they too would succumb to heat stroke and dehydration. For some, delirium came, and that was how Zukwandi last experienced his slave master, who had been the only caretaker he’d ever known.


The Mul opened his gaping mouth, and bellowed a mournful cry to the sky, under the merciless scorching sun. Who would feed him now?  Who would tell him what to do? Where to go? Who would sing the sad song to bring the rain? With coppery hands, he crouched, and picked up the lifeless body of his slave master, and held the beloved corpse to his barrel bare chest. Nostrils flared, taking in the scent of his care taker. Then the agony and terror of freedom took hold again, and with a roar that echoed through the desert canyon, Zukwandi hurled his master’s shriveled corpse upwards towards the sun; upon reaching its zenith, the body fell upon the sand with an indifferent thump.


The overwhelming freedom born at the death of his care-taker bombarded the mul. He sought the one constant refuge, that one singular and relentless constant in his life, that had been there since his sterile life began; the breath. He sat upon the scorched desert floor with his large tale bone, spine straight, the crown of his hairless smooth scalp shining with the reflection of the fiery ball, and with his brawny legs crossed, skin glistening with a dark copper hue, hands resting upon each kneecap, it began. He pushed all the air from his lungs, and then once every last bit of air was squeezed from him, he held the sensation with a pause, before inhaling slow and deep. The air began to fill within his lower abdomen, and contracted, steadily rising up, massaging the internal organs, until his chest was expanded, and lifted. Once the air filled his sweating body to the brim, he held it. He began to experience a tingling in his forehead, just above the protruding brow ridge. And so it began, another exhale, as the one before, with the tip of his tongue placed against the roof of his mouth against the inside of his upper row of teeth. Each breathe always through the nostrils, in, out, in and out, steady, slow, and with mounting energy that seemed to bring the beating of his heart in sync with the pulsating heart of the sun and unseen moon.


And sat there the Mul did, for an hour, and then five hours, and then three days, on end, consumed by breath, to the point where it no longer felt that he was doing the breathing, but that the world was breathing him in and out. His five senses were acute, and experiencing sense-data as the Mul had never before. At night, once the sun sunk below the desert canyon horizon, the temperature dropped to near freezing. But the air surrounding the Mul, was a radiating bubble of boiling heat, that his body trapped and generated from the long day under the burning sun. It was upon the fifth night, when something most unexpected began to take shape within the desert canyon.  All wind had completely stopped, and no sound at all except the rumbling deep breathing of the Mul.  Surrounding Zukwandi, were mounds of corpses blanketed by sand.


For five days and four nights the Mul had not budged nor had he made any sound other than the deep rumbling of his breathing, until the fifth night, when a deep booming “OOOHHMmmmm……” rang out like a gigantic church bell from Zukwandi, and with this Ohm, the sands began to swirl above one of corpses that surrounded him. He did not know where this Ohm came from within, or why, but it came as if by destiny. The sand swirled until it became mists, and within the swirling of sand and mists, the corpse of his slave master rose up, and with black lifeless eyes gazed upon the Mul.


The sinewy dead remains of his master, animated by sand and swirling mists, pointed at him, and then out to the desert. The Mul’s eyes gazed into the direction of the skeletal finger, until his sight fell upon a mesmerizing  woman, with dark olive skin, and with a sudden thrust of her hip to the side, she began to dance, and with her first footstep in the dance, a drum beat struck the cold night air, in synch with the Zukwandi’s ‘Ohming’ exhale.


The Mul stood up, his breathing consuming him still without any change or distraction. He walked passed his master’s animated corpse, in the direction of the dancing woman, having no idea of what or who a Vistani was. He did not know if he was dreaming, nor did he care. At last, he was told what to do, where to go, and relief washed over him as the unbearable weight of freedom lifted and he lumbered towards the Vistani dancer, who would lead him from this desert, into a rising mists, as a drum beat pulsated and shook the sands under foot.