MUKUNDA Chapter 4– The Night the Fire Spoke and Showed Me the Path I Was Destined to Walk

The night that followed the revelation at the great fire was not a night of rest, not a night of peace, not a night that let me close my eyes and drift into the kind of sleep that lets the mind forget, even for a few hours, the weight that has been placed on it. The fire that had spoken at the Pool of the Queen was still burning softly, the flames that had shown the people that I was the one who carried the name of the Spirit still glowing in the place where the ancestors had spoken, still sending their light into the darkness that surrounded the palace, still reminding everyone who had been there that something had happened, something had been revealed, something had changed. But the wind was different now, heavier, filled with the kind of waiting that makes the air itself feel thick, the kind of waiting that settles into your chest and makes it hard to breathe, the kind of waiting that comes before something that no one has words for yet, something that everyone can feel but no one can name.

I sat at the edge of the fire, watching the light of the flames playing on the walls of the buildings that surrounded the pool, watching the shadows that the fire made move and dance and change in ways that seemed to have meaning but that I could not understand. Beneath my feet, I felt the earth breathing, the way that the earth breathes when something is happening, when the spirits are close, when the things that have been hidden are about to be revealed. My heart was beating in a way that was different from the way it had beaten before, not faster or slower, but deeper, as if the spirit that had spoken through the fire was still with me, was still moving through me, was still telling me that something great was coming, something that I had been waiting for without knowing that I was waiting, something that would change everything I knew about myself and about the world that I had been born into.

My mother came to me carrying a small bowl of water, the water that had been taken from the spring that flows beneath the palace, the water that had been blessed by the elders, the water that had been used to calm the spirits of the ones who had been chosen since the first chosen one was given the weight to carry. She gave it to me gently, the way she had given me everything since the day I was born, the way that told me that even though I was becoming something that she had not expected, even though the weight that was being placed on my shoulders was heavier than anything she had ever carried, she was still my mother, still the one who had held me when I was small, still the one who would be there when the night got dark and the path was hard to see.

"Drink this, my child. This water calms the spirit that is troubled, that is restless, that is waiting for something that it does not yet understand. It was given to the ones who were chosen before you, the ones who carried the weight that you are being called to carry, the ones who stood in the place where the fire speaks and heard the words that the spirits were saying. It will not take away the weight that you are carrying, will not make the path that is opening before you any easier, will not give you the answers that you are seeking before the time has come for you to know them. But it will calm the fear that is in your heart, will quiet the questions that are circling in your mind, will let you be still enough to hear what the spirits are saying, to see what they are showing you, to be the one who has been chosen to carry what they have been waiting to give."

I took her hand, the hand that had held me when I was too small to hold myself, the hand that had guided me through the days when the world was too big and I did not know which way to go, the hand that had been there every time I fell, every time I was afraid, every time I needed something to hold onto. I looked into her eyes, the eyes that had watched me since the day I was born, the eyes that had seen me fall and rise, fall and rise, fall and rise again, the eyes that had never stopped believing that I was something, that I would be something, that I was carrying something that the world had not yet seen.

"Mother, why is all of this happening to me? Why is every spirit looking at me like I am something great that I do not understand, something that I have not asked to be, something that I am not sure I know how to carry? Why am I the one who was chosen when there are others, when there are sons who were born to carry what has been passed down, when there are men who have been trained in the ways of war, when there are people who have been waiting for this moment their whole lives and I have only just begun to understand that I was waiting for it too?"

She cried softly, the way that mothers cry when they see their children standing on the edge of something that they cannot protect them from, the way that she had cried when I was small and I fell and she could not reach me in time to catch me, the way that she had cried when she held me in her arms and knew that the world would ask more of me than it asked of the others, that the path that I would walk would be harder than the paths that the sons walked, that the weight that I would carry would be heavier than anything that had been carried by the daughters who came before.

"My child, from the day you were born, from the moment you took your first breath, from the time when you opened your eyes and looked at me with the eyes that are looking at me now, there was a fire that was burning that would not go out, a fire that had been lit by the spirits, a fire that was waiting for the time when it would be seen, when it would be known, when it would be the thing that would show the people who you were and what you had been given to carry. The elder Vengai, the one who has been carrying the old ways since before I was born, the one who has been speaking to the spirits since he was young enough to hear them, said that this fire was the sign of a prophecy, a prophecy that had been waiting for the one who would carry it, a prophecy that would be fulfilled when the time came for the one who had been chosen to stand in the place where the spirits speak and hear the words that had been waiting for her since before she was born. And now the time has come for the prophecy to be fulfilled, for the fire to be seen, for the one who was chosen to carry the weight that has been waiting for her since the day she was born, since the day the fire was lit, since the day the spirits spoke and said that there would be a daughter who would stand where only sons had stood before."

I could not speak, could not find the words that would answer the things that she was telling me, could not understand the weight that was being placed on my shoulders, the path that was opening before me, the fire that had been burning since the day I was born, waiting for this moment, waiting for this night, waiting for the time when I would be old enough to carry what it had been waiting to give. The wind moved through the room, moving the cloths that had been hanging on the walls, the cloths that had been woven by the hands of the women who had come before, the cloths that carried the stories of the ones who had carried the weight that I was being called to carry, and in the corner of the room, where the fire that had been burning since the prophecy was spoken was still glowing, a new fire caught, a fire that was not burning anything, a fire that was not touching the cloths or the walls or anything that could be burned, a fire that was just there, burning in the air, waiting, watching, speaking in a language that I was only beginning to learn.

My mother jumped, the way that someone jumps when they see something that they have not seen before, something that they know is not ordinary, something that tells them that the spirits are close, that the things that have been waiting are finally happening, that the time that was promised has finally come.

"Look! The spirit of the fire has returned, the spirit that spoke at the pool, the spirit that showed the people that you were the one who had been chosen, the spirit that has been waiting for this moment, for this night, for the time when you would be ready to hear what it has been waiting to tell you!"

The fire began to move, the way that the fire at the pool had moved, the way that a fire that is not an ordinary fire moves, the way that a fire that is carrying something, that is speaking something, that is showing something that cannot be seen in the ordinary light moves. I saw inside the flames the face of a woman, a woman who was wearing a white cloth, a woman who was carrying a spear that was shining like the lightning that comes before the rain, a woman who was looking at me with eyes that had seen things that I could not imagine, things that had happened before I was born, things that would happen after I was gone, things that were being shown to me now because I was the one who had been chosen to see them, to carry them, to be the one who would do what needed to be done when the time came.

"Mukunda," the voice said, the voice that came from inside the fire, the voice that was not like any voice I had heard before, the voice that was deep and soft at the same time, the voice that carried the weight of things that had been waiting for a very long time to be said. "The time has come, the time that has been waiting since the fire was first lit, since the prophecy was first spoken, since the spirits first knew that there would be a daughter who would carry what the sons could not carry. This fire will be your fame and your death, the thing that makes you known and the thing that takes you from this world. If you miss the path, if you do not walk where you are called to walk, if you let the fear that is in your heart stop you from doing what must be done, this fire will burn the whole kingdom, will destroy the things that have been protected for generations, will take everything that the ancestors built and leave nothing but ash and memory. But if you endure, if you stand when the world tells you to fall, if you hold when the weight is too heavy and you are not sure you can carry it another step, you will save this land, you will protect the things that have been passed down, you will be the daughter who stood where only sons had stood before and showed them that the blood of the kingdom does not know the difference between a son and a daughter."

I sat there in the silence that followed, my heart beating so hard that I could feel it in my throat, in my hands, in the place where the voice had touched me and left something that I did not yet understand. I did not know what to say, did not know how to answer the thing that was being asked of me, did not know if I was strong enough to carry the weight that was being placed on my shoulders, to walk the path that was opening before me, to be the one who would save the kingdom or destroy it, depending on whether I was strong enough, whether I was brave enough, whether I was the daughter that the spirits had been waiting for since the prophecy was first spoken.

"Who are you?" I asked, my voice shaking, my hands trembling, my heart still beating with the words that the fire had spoken, the words that had been waiting for me since before I was born, the words that were telling me that I was something that I had not known I was, that I would be something that I did not yet understand, that I was carrying something that I had been carrying since the day I took my first breath and the fire was lit and the prophecy was spoken.

"I am Queen Nyamunhu, the protector of the first fire, the one who was chosen to carry the fire before you were born, the one who was chosen to watch it and wait for the one who would carry it when I was gone. I bound my spirit to this place, to this land, to this fire that has been burning since the prophecy was first spoken, so that one day, when the time was right, a child would rise who carried the blood that was needed, who would be the one to carry what I could not carry, who would finish what I could not finish. You are that child, you are the one who was chosen, you are the one who has been carrying this weight since the day you were born, even if you did not know it, even if you could not feel it, even if the fire was burning inside you without you knowing that it was there."

The fire shook then, a small piece of it coming away from the flames and moving toward me, toward my chest, toward the place where my heart was beating, where the fear was living, where the thing that the fire was trying to give me was waiting to be received. I felt the heat of it, the heat that should have burned me, the heat that should have made me pull away, the heat that should have been too much for my skin, my body, my heart to hold. But it did not burn me, did not hurt me, did not do anything except fill me with something that I had not known was missing, something that had been waiting for me since the day I was born, something that was being given to me now because the time had come, because the fire had spoken, because I was the one who had been chosen to carry what had been waiting.

"When the tenth day of the Spirit comes," the voice said, and I heard in it the weight of something that was coming, something that I was being told because I needed to know, because the time was close, because the things that had been waiting were about to happen, "your light must join with the light of the water, the light of the stone, the light of the wind. If they do not join, if they are not brought together, if the fire that you are carrying does not find the things that it needs to join with, the land will break, will fall apart, will be destroyed by the fire that was meant to save it, the fire that was given to you to protect the kingdom and that will destroy it if you cannot find the way to join what has been waiting to be joined."

In that moment, the fire went out, the room went dark, the darkness that comes when a fire that has been burning for a long time is suddenly gone, the darkness that is heavier than the darkness that comes when the sun goes down, the darkness that fills the space where something that was carrying light has been taken away. I felt my heart fill with something that I had not felt before, something that was desire, the desire to know what the fire had been telling me, the desire to protect the land that had been given to me to protect, the desire to be the one who had been chosen, the one who would carry what had been waiting, the one who would stand where only sons had stood before. But there was fear in it too, the fear that I was not enough, that I would not be strong enough, that I would not be brave enough, that I would be the one who let the fire destroy the kingdom instead of the one who used the fire to save it.

The next morning, my father called me to the court, the court where the decisions that shaped the kingdom were made, the court where the king sat on the stone chair that had been carved from the rock that was at the center of the land, the court where the counselors and the elders and the wives of the king and the leaders of the warriors gathered to hear the things that needed to be heard, to speak the words that needed to be spoken, to make the choices that would determine what would happen to the land that had been passed down from generation to generation. He was sitting on his throne, the throne that had been carved by the hands of the first king, the throne that had been held by the kings who had come before him, the throne that would be held by the ones who would come after, and around him were the leaders of the warriors, the men who had fought in the battles that the stories still told, the men who had carried the spears and the shields and the weight of protecting the land that had been given to them. The elders of the people were there too, the ones who had been carrying the old ways, the ones who had been speaking to the spirits, the ones who had been watching and waiting for the time when the prophecy would be fulfilled. And the wives of the kingdom were there, the women who had given my father sons, the women who had been waiting for this moment, the women who had been hoping that the prophecy would not be fulfilled, that the fire would not speak, that the daughter who had been born when the kingdom was waiting for a son would not be the one who was chosen to carry what they believed should have been given to their sons.

"We must know the truth," my father said, his voice strong, the voice of a man who had been carrying the weight of the kingdom for as long as I had been alive, the voice of a man who had been waiting for something, who had been hoping for something, who was not sure what it was that he was waiting for, what he was hoping for, but who knew that the time had come to know what the prophecy meant, to understand what the fire had said, to prepare for the things that were coming. "What does the prophecy of Nyamunhu mean? What are we being told? What is being asked of us? What is being asked of my daughter, of the one who was chosen, of the one who has been carrying this weight since the day she was born?"

The elder Vengai stood, the elder who had been carrying the old ways since before I was born, the elder who had been speaking to the spirits since he was young enough to hear them, the elder who had been watching the fire that had been burning since the day I was born, waiting for the time when it would speak, waiting for the time when the prophecy would be fulfilled, waiting for the time when the one who had been chosen would be revealed. He held his staff, the staff that had been carved from the wood of the tree that grows at the center of the land, the staff that had been passed down from elder to elder since the first elder was chosen to carry the words of the spirits, the staff that had seen the things that the people of this land had done, the things that they had carried, the things that they had passed down to the ones who came after.

"King Magodo, what has been said is simple but deep, is clear but hidden, is waiting to be understood by the one who has been chosen to understand it. The spirit of the fire says that if this child, if Mukunda, the one who has been chosen, the one who has been carrying this weight since the day she was born, does not fulfill the joining of the four spirits, does not bring the fire that she is carrying together with the water and the stone and the wind, the fire will destroy the whole kingdom, will burn the things that have been protected for generations, will take everything that the ancestors built and leave nothing but ash and memory."

When I heard these words, the words that the elder Vengai was speaking, the words that the fire had spoken to me in the night, the words that had been waiting for me since before I was born, the people began to speak among themselves, their voices low, the way that voices are when the thing that is being said is too heavy to be spoken loudly, when the thing that is being said is something that everyone was hoping would not be said, when the thing that is being said is something that no one knows what to do with. Some of them looked at me with eyes that were full of the kind of judgment that comes when people are afraid, when they do not know what is coming, when they are looking for someone to blame for the things that they do not understand. They looked at me like I was the one who had done something wrong, like I had chosen to be the one who was carrying this weight, like I had asked for the fire to be given to me, like I had been waiting for this moment, hoping for this moment, wanting to be the one who would save the kingdom or destroy it, depending on whether I was strong enough to do what was being asked of me.

Taru, who had been standing near the door, the way that she always stood when the court was gathered, the way that she had learned to stand when she was in places where she did not belong, the way that she had learned to be in the world when the world was not sure what to do with her, came forward and spoke with a strength that I had not heard from her before, a strength that had been growing in her since we were children, a strength that had been waiting for this moment, for this time, for the thing that she was being called to do.

"If this spirit is true, if the fire has spoken, if the prophecy that has been waiting since before we were born is being fulfilled, I do not believe that Mukunda will fail. I do not believe that the fire that she is carrying will destroy the land, will burn the things that have been protected, will take everything that the ancestors built. This fire, the fire that she has been carrying since the day she was born, the fire that was lit before she took her first breath, the fire that has been waiting for this moment, for this time, for the thing that it was meant to do, is the fire that will give new light, new hope, new life to the land that has been waiting for something that it did not know it needed."

My father looked at her for a long time, the way that a king looks at someone who has spoken words that are not expected, the way that a man who has been carrying the weight of a kingdom looks at someone who is offering to carry something that he is not sure she can carry. The silence in the court was deep, was heavy, was the kind of silence that comes when something is being decided, when the words that are being spoken are the words that will shape what happens next, when the thing that is being asked is something that no one is sure should be asked, something that no one is sure should be answered, something that everyone is waiting to see what will happen, what will be said, what will be done.

"If that is what you believe, Taru," he said, and I heard in his voice the weight of what he was about to say, the weight of what he was asking her to do, the weight of what it would mean if she said yes, if she stood beside me, if she was the one who would carry what I could not carry alone, "then you will be her keeper, the one who stands beside her, the one who protects her, the one who makes sure that she does not fall, that she does not fail, that she does what she has been called to do. But if the prophecy fails, if the fire does not find what it needs, if the land is destroyed by the fire that was meant to save it, your blood will be the offering that is given to the spirit, the blood that is paid for the thing that was promised, the blood that will be the price that is paid for the thing that was not done."

Taru knelt, the way that someone kneels when they are making a promise that they know will cost them something, the way that someone kneels when they are offering something that they are not sure they have to give, the way that someone kneels when they are standing in front of the king and the counselors and the elders and they are saying that they are willing to pay the price, whatever it is, for the thing that they believe in. She told him that she was offering herself, that she was willing to be the keeper, that she was willing to stand beside me, that she was willing to be the one who would make sure that the fire found what it needed, that the prophecy was fulfilled, that the land was saved, that the thing that had been waiting since before we were born would finally be completed.

That evening, I sat by the pool, looking at the wind playing on the water, the wind that had been carrying the voices of the spirits, the wind that had been moving through this land since before the first people came, the wind that had been waiting for something, watching for something, hoping for something that it had not yet seen. Taru came and sat beside me, the way that she had sat beside me since we were children, the way that she had been there when I needed someone to talk to, someone to listen, someone to remind me that I was not alone in the world, that there was someone who saw me the way I wanted to be seen, that there was someone who would stand beside me when the weight got heavy and the path was hard to see.

"It is known now, isn't it?" she said, laughing a little, the laugh that I had known since we were children, the laugh that had carried her through the things that had tried to break her, the laugh that told me that even in this place, even with the weight of what she had promised hanging over her, she was still Taru, still my friend, still the one who would stand beside me when the fire was burning and the path was dark and the thing that was coming was something that neither of us understood. "First you are the daughter of the king, and now you are the prophet of the fire, the one who has been chosen, the one who is carrying the thing that has been waiting since before we were born."

I raised my head, smiling a little, the smile that she had known since we were children, the smile that I had learned to use when the world was too heavy and I needed to remember that there was still something light, something that could be carried, something that was not all weight and darkness and the fear that I was not enough, that I would not be strong enough, that I would fail the people who were trusting me to save them. I told her that even if the prophecy was true, it did not mean that I would survive, that the fire that was burning in me, the fire that I had been carrying since the day I was born, the fire that had been waiting for this moment, for this time, for the thing that it was meant to do, burned everything, burned the good and the bad, burned the things that should be burned and the things that should be saved, and that I did not know if I would be the one who was burned or the one who was saved, if I would be the one who found what the fire needed or the one who was consumed by the fire that had been given to me to carry.

"Yes," she said softly, the way that she spoke when the thing that was being said was too heavy to be spoken loudly, when the words that were coming out of her mouth were the words that she had been holding for a long time, the words that she was not sure she should say, the words that she was saying because the time had come to say them, because the fire had spoken, because the path that was opening before us was a path that we would have to walk together, whether we were ready or not. "But sometimes, the burning is what brings the light, what makes the darkness go away, what shows the people who are watching that the thing that was hidden, the thing that was waiting, the thing that was carried for so long without being seen, is finally being seen, is finally being known, is finally doing what it was meant to do."

I looked at her for a long time, looking at the face that I had known since we were children, the face that had been there when the world was too big and I did not know which way to go, the face that had been there when the walls of the palace felt too close and I needed to run to the river and feel the wind on my face and remember that there was something outside the walls that was waiting for me, something that was not the weight of being the daughter of the king, something that was not the fear of not being enough, something that was just the world, just the land, just the river and the trees and the sky that had been there since before I was born and would be there long after I was gone. I felt something that I had not felt before, something that was not the weight of the prophecy, not the fear of the fire, not the fear that I would not be strong enough to do what was being asked of me. It was the desire to know who Taru was, truly, deeply, the way that you know someone when you have seen them in the light and the dark, when you have been with them when the world was kind and when the world was cruel, when you have seen them fall and rise, fall and rise, fall and rise again, the way that I had seen her fall and rise, the way that she had seen me fall and rise, the way that we had been falling and rising together since we were children, and I had not known that there was something else, something that I was only beginning to feel, something that the fire was showing me, something that the spirit was telling me, something that was being revealed in the silence that was growing between us, the silence that was filled with the words that we had not yet spoken, the words that we were waiting to say, the words that would change everything.

A small fire rose from the water that we were watching, the fire that had been burning in the pool since the night of the great fire, the fire that had been waiting for something, watching for something, hoping for something, and it lit her face, the face that I had known since we were children, the face that I was seeing now in a way that I had not seen it before, the way that you see something when the light is different, when the shadows are different, when the thing that was hidden is finally being revealed. And I heard the voice of the spirit, the voice that had spoken to me in the fire, the voice that had been waiting for this moment, for this time, for the thing that it had been waiting to say, repeating itself in my mind, telling me that the joining of the fire and the water was the thing that would begin the love that would save the land, that would be the thing that the prophecy was waiting for, that would be the path that I was meant to walk, that would be the thing that would make me the one who saved the kingdom, not the one who destroyed it.

I looked at Taru, my heart filling with feelings that I had not understood before, feelings that I had been carrying without knowing that I was carrying them, feelings that had been growing since we were children, since the first time we sat by the river and let the wind carry away the things that were too heavy to hold, since the first time she looked at me with the eyes that saw me the way I wanted to be seen, since the first time I knew that I was not alone, that there was someone who would stand beside me when the weight was heavy and the path was dark. The prophecy of the fire had begun, the thing that had been waiting since before I was born, the thing that would decide whether I saved the kingdom or destroyed it, the thing that would be the fire that I carried and the light that I became and the love that would be the thing that joined what had been waiting to be joined, that would be the thing that made me the daughter who stood where only sons had stood before, that would be the thing that would make me Mukunda, the child who was freed by the Spirit, the one who had been chosen, the one who would carry what had been waiting, the one who would be the fire that saved the land that had been given to her to protect.