Gregory David Roberts - Shantaram

And they marched, from freezing snow mountains to burning desert, and then, after twenty days of this unbelievable march through hell, they fought a great battle with the army of Prince Ayub Khan, and they defeated him. Roberts saved the British in the city, and from that day, even after he became the field marshal of all the soldiers in the British Empire, he was always known as Roberts of Kandahar."

"Was Prince Ayub killed?"

"No. He escaped. Then the British put his close kinsman Abdul Rahman Khan on the throne of Afghanistan. Abdul Rahman Khan, also an ancestor of mine, ruled the country with such a special wisdom that the British had no real power in Afghanistan. The situation was exactly the same as it was before-before the great soldier and great killer, Bobs your uncle, forced his way through the Khyber Pass to fight the war. But the point of this story, now that we sit here and look at the fires of my burning city, is that Kandahar is the key to Afghanistan. Kabul is the heart, but Kandahar is the soul of this nation, and who rules Kandahar also rules Afghanistan. When the Russians are forced to leave my city, they will lose this war. Not until then."

"I hate it all," I sighed, sure in my own mind that the new war would change nothing: that wars can't really change things. It's peace that makes the deepest cuts, I thought. And I remember thinking it-I remember thinking that it was a clever phrase, and hoping for a chance to work it into our conversation. I remember everything about that day. I remember every word, and all those foolish, vain, unwary thoughts, as if fate had just now slapped my face with them. "I hate it all, and I'm glad we're going home today."

"Who are your friends here?" he asked me. The question surprised me, and I couldn't guess at his intention. Reading my baffled expression, and clearly amused, he asked me again. "Of those you have come to know here, on this mountain, who are your friends?"

"Well, Khaled, obviously, and Nazeer-"

"So, Nazeer is your friend now?"

"Yeah," I laughed. "He's a friend. And I like Ahmed Zadeh. And Mahmoud Melbaaf, the Iranian. And Suleiman is okay, and Jalalaad - he's a wild kid-and Zaher Rasul, the farmer." Khader nodded as I ran through the list, but when he made no comment I felt moved to speak again.

"They're all good men, I think. Everyone here. But those... those are the men I get on with the best. Is that what you mean?"

"What is your favourite task here?" he asked, changing the subject as quickly and unexpectedly as his portly friend Abdul Ghani might've done.

"My favourite... it's crazy, and I never thought I'd ever say this, but I think tending the horses is my favourite job."

He smiled, and the smile bubbled into a laugh. I was sure, somehow, that he was thinking about the night I'd ridden into the camp hanging from the neck of my horse.

"Okay," I grinned, "I'm not the best horseman in the world."

He laughed the harder.

"But I really started to miss them when we got here and you told us to stable the horses down the mountain. It's funny-I sort of got used to them being around, and it's always made me feel good, somehow, going down to see them and brush them and feed them."

"I understand," he murmured, reading my eyes. "Tell me, when the others are praying and you join them-I've seen you sometimes, kneeling behind them and not very close-what words are you saying? Are they prayers?"

"I'm... not really saying anything at all," I replied, frowning.

I lit two more beedies, not for the need of them, but for the distraction they provided, and their little warmth.

"What are you thinking, then, if you're not speaking?" he asked, accepting the second cigarette as he tossed away the butt of the first.

"I couldn't call them prayers. I don't think so. I think about people, mostly. I think about my mother... and my daughter. I think about Abdullah... and Prabaker-I've told you about him, my friend who died. I remember friends, and people I love."

"You think about your mother. What about your father?"

"No."

I said it quickly-too quickly, perhaps-and I felt him watching me closely as the seconds passed.

"Is your father living, Lin?"

"I think so. But I... I can't be sure. And I don't care, one way or the other." "You must care about your father," he declared, looking away again. It seemed such a condescending admonition to me then: he knew nothing about my father or my relationship to him. I was so caught up in resentments, new and old, that I didn't hear the anguish in his voice. I didn't realise, as I do now, that he, too, was an exiled son talking about his own father.

"You're more of a father to me than he is," I said, and although I felt it to be true, and I was opening my heart to him, the words came out sounding sulky and almost spiteful.

"Don't say that!" he snapped, glaring at me. It was the closest he ever came to showing anger in my presence, and I flinched involuntarily at the sudden vehemence. His expression softened at once, and he reached out to put a hand on my shoulder. "What about your dreams? What are you dreaming about here?"

"Dreams?"

"Yes. Tell me about your dreams."

"I'm not having many," I replied, trying hard to recall. "It's weird, you know, but I've had nightmares for a long time-pretty much since the escape from jail. Nightmares about being caught, or fighting to stop them catching me. But since we've been up here, I don't know if it's the thin air, or being so damn tired and cold when I get to sleep, or maybe just worry about the war, but I'm not having those nightmares. Not here. I've had a couple of good dreams, in fact."

"Go on."

I didn't want to go on: the dreams had been about Karla.

"Just... happy dreams, about being in love."

"Good," he murmured, nodding several times, and taking his hand from my shoulder. He seemed satisfied with my reply, but his expression was downcast and almost grim. "I, too, have had dreams here. I dreamed about the Prophet. We Muslims, you know, we are not supposed to tell anyone, if we dream about the Prophet. It is a very good thing, a very wonderful thing, and quite common among the faithful, but we are forbidden to tell what we have dreamed."

"Why?" I asked, shivering in the cold.

"It is because we are strictly forbidden to describe the features of the Prophet, or to talk about him as someone who is seen. This was the Prophet's own wish, so that no man or woman would adore him, or take any of their devotions away from God. That is why there are no images of the Prophet-no drawings, or paintings, or statues. But I did dream of him. And I am not a very good Muslim, am I?

Because I am telling you about my dream. He was on foot, walking somewhere. I rode up behind him on my horse-it was a perfect, beautiful white horse-and although I didn't see his face, I knew it was him. So I got down from my horse, and gave it to him. And my face was lowered, out of respect, all the time. But at last, I lifted my eyes to see him riding away into the light of the setting sun. That was my dream."

He was calm, but I knew him well enough to see the dejection that hooded his eyes. And there was something else, something so new and strange that it took me a few moments to realise what it was: fear. Abdel Khader Khan was afraid, and I felt my own skin creep and tighten in response. It was unimaginable. Until that moment I'd truly believed that Khaderbhai was afraid of nothing.

Unnerved and worried, I moved to change the subject.

"Khaderji, I know I'm changing the subject, but can you answer this question for me? I've been thinking about something you said a while ago. You said that life and consciousness and all that other stuff comes from light, at the Big Bang. Are you saying that light is God?"

"No," he answered, and that sudden, fearful depression lifted from his features, driven off by a look that I could only read as a loving smile. "I do not think that light is God. I think it is possible, and it is reasonable to say, that light is the language of God. Light may be the way that God speaks to the universe, and to us."