Ольга Токарчук - Flights

So they whisper, in earnest, then get to grumbling. This ruler of ours has failed us. His father, of course, he was good, he would have immediately prepared a thousand horsemen for the battle, fortified the enclave, provisioned us with water and grain in case of siege. But this… Someone spits after pronouncing his name, then falling silent, afraid of what might come out of his own mouth.

There is a long silence. One man rubs his beard, another stares into the complex pattern on the floor, where bits of colourful pottery compose a labyrinth. Still another rubs the scabbard of his knife, elaborately encrusted with turquoise. His finger strokes the little bulges, back and forth. Today nothing will be determined by these brave advisors and ministers. Already outside the guards are posted. The palace army.

That night in the quiet of their minds ideas germinate, grow like plants, mature in the blink of an eye – soon they will flower and bear fruit. In the morning a messenger sets out on horseback with a humble plea to the sultan to recall this small kingdom no one ever remembers; the council of the elders has risen up, for the good of the righteous, those devoted to Allah, to rid themselves of their current inept ruler – the image of the plunging sword has crystallized – and requests armed support against the heathens on their way from the West, numerous as the grains of sand in the desert.

And that same night the ruler’s mother digs him out from under leathers and carpets, from among the bodies of the children he sleeps in bed with; she shakes him out of his slumber and tells him to get dressed.

‘Everything is ready, the camels are waiting, two of your steeds have been saddled, and to their saddles rolled-up tents are bound.’

Her son moans, groans – how will he get by in the desert without bowls and plates, without coal stoves, without carpets to lie down on with the little ones? Without his toilet, without the view from the window onto the square and the fountains with their crystal-clear water.

‘You will be killed,’ whispers his mother, and a vertical wrinkle slices like a dagger down her forehead. Her whisper is reptilian – the hiss of a sage snake at the well. ‘Get up!’

From behind a few of the walls now you can hear tripping steps, his wives having already packed their possessions – the younger ones more, the older ones less, not to give any reason for displeasure. Just modest bundles, only valuable scarves, necklaces, bracelets. Now they squat at the door, outside the curtain, waiting to be sent for, and since it’s taking too long, they look with impatience out the window, where to the east over the desert a pink moon is already rising. They do not see the enormity of the desert, which licks with rough tongue the stairs to the palace, since their windows only look onto the inner courtyard.

‘The branch on which your ancestors pitched their tent was the axis of the world. Its centre. Wherever you pitch your tent will become your kingdom,’ says his mother, pushing him towards the exit. She would never have dared to touch him in such a way before, but now with this gesture she indicates to him that in just these past few hours he has ceased to be the ruler of this saffron state.

‘Which wives will you take with you?’ she asks, and for a long time he does not give a reply, just pulling the children in – boys and girls, angel cubs, their naked skinny bodies covered by the night; the oldest boy can’t be more than ten years old, the youngest girl, four.

Wives? There will be no wives, not the older ones, nor the younger ones; they were fine for the palace. He never particularly needed them, he slept with them for the same reason he forced himself to look upon the bearded mugs of his advisors every morning. Penetrating their ample haunches, their fleshy nooks, never brought him too much pleasure. He was disgusted by their hairy armpits and the bulge of their breasts. Which is why he always took care not to spill even a single drop of his precious seed into those miserable receptacles, so that not a single drop of life would be wasted.

He was, however, certain that by withholding all his fluids, and thanks to the little bodies of the children he drew strength from as he slept, thanks to their sweet breaths on his face, he would someday be immortal.

‘We will take the children, my little ones, these dozen angels, let’s get them dressed. You help them,’ he says to his mother.

‘You fool,’ she hisses, ‘you want to take the children? We won’t last even a day with them in the desert. Can’t you hear the rustles and whispers approaching? We don’t have a moment to lose. You will take other children in the place where we end up, more of them. Leave these, they will be fine.’

But seeing his determination, she lets out a furious sob and stands in the doorway with her arms outstretched. Her son goes over to her; now they evaluate each other with their eyes. The children have them surrounded in a semicircle, some holding onto the bottom of his kaftan. Their gaze is calm, indifferent.

‘It’s them or me,’ his mother blurts, and when these words emerge from between her lips, when she sees them from the outside, she tries to snatch them back, with her tongue, but it’s too late. She cannot catch them.

In one fell swoop her son has struck a fist into her stomach, in the place that years before was his first home, that soft chamber, lined with red and crimson. In his fist he holds a knife. The woman lurches forward, and from the wrinkle in her forehead darkness pours across her face.

There’s no time to lose. Gog and Magog load the children onto the camels, the smaller ones in baskets, like birds. They attach the valuables, precious materials rolled up in coarse linen, to disguise them, and as the tiniest sliver of the sun first grazes the horizon, they are on the road. At first the desert lavishes them with lengthy shadows slipping from dune to dune, leaving a trail only visible to the initiated eye. In time this shade will be reduced until finally it disappears completely, when the caravan is able to attain the immortality it seeks.

A certain nomadic tribe lived for years in the desert between Christian and Muslim settlements, so they learned a lot. In times of famine, drought or threat they were obliged to seek refuge among their settled neighbours. First they would send a messenger who would observe the customs of the settlement from behind the brushwood and, based on the sounds, smells and costumes, determined whether the village was Muslim or Christian. The messenger would return with this information to his tribe, and then they would take out of their panniers the requisite props and head out into the oases, posing as fellow believers. They were never refused help.

Menchu swore that she was telling me the truth.

I rode a bus along with about a dozen fully veiled women. Through the slits in their garments you could only see their eyes – and I was astounded by the care and beauty of their make-up. They were the eyes of Cleopatras. The women gracefully drank bottled water with the aid of straws; the straws would disappear into the folds of the black material and find, somewhere within it, the women’s hypothetical lips. They’d just put on a movie up front, intended to improve our commute – on the screen was Lara Croft. Now all of us women looked on in fascination as that lithe girl with the gleaming arms and thighs felled soldiers who were all armed to the teeth.

On the plane between 8.45 and 9 a.m. To my mind, it took an hour, or even longer.

A donkey breeder confided his story to me.