And so from then on Hamar began attending crownings. Casting star charts was one elementary skill he still had, a pleasant training from his grandmother in his Chaldean childhood. She was the one who embroidered his chart on his tiny infant blanket, and then when he was five years old, had declared its message to him; ‘One day you will stand alone having reached great heights as a discoverer of mysteries beyond all the rest.’ At the time, her interpretation seemed no more to the family than a proud granny’s blessing. Recalling her words there in his high cave, though, Hamar smiled a wry smile at the irony in them.
He wasn’t called upon often for his official duty but he always went gladly, breathing the thicker air of fields, the smell of hot goat-hair tents, or heard the clatter of many visitors arriving on donkeys and horses within tiled walls, re-entered rooms wonderfully crowded with new faces and normal voices.
The Fiend made sure his own choices were put in place, and Hamar bent his tellings to fit each power-mad man. Once the new chief’s position was endorsed by the stars no challenger would risk the wrath of the Heavens in going against them. Seeing to it vicious rulers got their territories was one more twisting of the knife in Hamar’s old dreams.
And so the years passed. His two companions turned out to be more burden than company, always interrogating him about hidden meanings in whatever he said, even writing down his mutterings, and always having spiritual skirmishes with the creatures in the place and wanting to know his advice afterwards. The two men seemed meant to weigh on him to counter any remaining big ideas he had, – pointlessly.
He proved a miserable master for them, insisting he not be questioned by lesser majicians, and telling them, “This is my sacred pathway in this place. Yours are against the walls.” Avoiding them became a new skill.
And easier to do, lately; in recent months Roman rule was in turmoil and many Roman outposts were being left derelict, so that the chaos in the region was producing local tribal takeovers requiring crownings. He was away a lot.
Always, he returned back from his trips bumping around agitated or depressed for days. “Tell us what troubles you, great one,” the men would ask, eager to do a majic to relieve him, sacrificing offerings which he had to dodge, and making him have to forego any human comfort at all.
His only relief from the two of them was in snatching looks at them as they acted normal, more like him, doing routines that bent them quietly together at some small task that reminded him of the village men of his childhood. If they but knew it their puzzling out some minor repair or how much cumin to put in a meat dish, their hesitating at the sunset with him out on the balcony, their absent-minded humming of their old folk songs or belching to themselves or scratching their behinds through their robes, meant more to him than all their high arts and reasonings, – for hours he secretly kept up the feel of their warm hand casually placed on his arm.
How he ached for old homelife and nothing greater than kindness! Oh how precious would happiness have been, any memories of it! Instead were the nightly warfares against the things they unwittingly chanted in, the fielding of their unending questions, the dread that he’d be heard whimpering or betraying the truth of himself in his sleep.
After many years he was resigned to this slow and meaningless path of doom. And then a few weeks ago it had all changed! That was when Hamar had made his magnificent discovery!
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