Chapter
6
The break-thru came during
the seventh month. I seemed to be having some visceral connection with the
number seven in my life.
One day, when it was about
to get dark, I followed the sadhu like
a shadow into the hills. Now, I was also more familiar with his usual route and the following him was less arduous. After some distance into the hills, I saw something
very strange. There was a massive tall
rock and the sadhu suddenly climbed
the near- vertical rock with ease like a lizard, only to disappear from the
top. I couldn’t clone his performance; the rock was vertical, slippery and
there was hardly anything to hold on to. ‘But, how could he do it?’
I looked around for a
solution. I found some thick roots of trees hanging loose from above in another
corner of the rock. Holding those roots and hoping that it wouldn’t come off
the ground, I slowly climbed step by step between smaller rocks. In some places
I slipped, but I managed to hold on. My feet and hands ached. I scratched my
skin all over and bruised myself. After some strenuous climbing, I managed to
reach a plateau where I rested for a while before I continued my climb. The
route was circuitous, but I reached the top of the steep rock. The sadhu was nowhere in sight.
I was crestfallen at not
being able to catch the sadhu . I was
equally horrified being left alone in the darkness of such a wild place.
Darkness and silence frightened me. The humming sound coming from insects was
the only noise I heard and even this noise was frightening. Some insects
crawled over me. I jumped screaming and shook violently to shrug them off. In
the small shimmering light from the sky, I saw a snake disappearing into a
small hole. My heart pounded heavily and I started shivering and perspiring.
When I steadied myself after
some time, I looked through the darkness to find out where the sadhu could have disappeared. He was
nowhere.
It was cold on top of the
rock. Some animal, could be a wolf, howled and it terrified me. I blamed myself
for coming here. I sat on a small rock trying to recoup some energy. Sudden
unsettling sounds from the different corners of the darkness froze my blood
repeatedly. I trembled violently. My breathing became quite hard. My knees
turned weak and starting caving in. Quite suddenly, I felt like throwing up.
Then, all of a sudden, I saw
the sadhu , moving swiftly between a
few bushes. There was a sudden rush of blood all over me and I felt excited. I
jumped from my seat, quick on my feet and rushed behind him, only to bang my
head against another rock in the darkness. I yelled in excruciating pain. Rubbing vigorously
my forehead with one hand, I made quick strides to follow the sadhu .
‘It is either now or never.’
I decided. The sadhu was moving with
lightning speed and again, I was no match for him. Then he disappeared again
behind another rock.
When I reached that spot, I
saw nothing – there was no place to disappear.
‘Is he a magician or a witch?’
I had heard stories of some
mysterious people practicing witchcraft luring and trapping children from
decent families only to be given away as ‘bali ’
(sacrifice) at the altar of the fearful Kali
(a feminine form of God). These human sacrifices were invariably done during
midnight only, I had been told. Some mysterious ‘raappaadi’s (night singers) visited
residential areas, only at midnight, singing queer verses in frightening
voices. I recalled the story of one young boy from my village, who was lured behind
a ‘raappaadi ’ after being mesmerized,
during odd hours at midnight. The boy was in shambles when he was rescued after
several days. Some fearful tales had been told to me that a few kids never
returned back to the village as they were given away as human sacrifice at the cremation
grounds. The people who practiced witchcraft, I was told, prepared some black
paste from the remains of the skulls of those sacrificed bodies to perform
black magic and lure more kids. Some people used these black magicians and
witchcraft to take revenge on others. To what extent these stories were true, I
never knew.
The thought about black
magic and witchcraft, once again chilled my spine. ‘Is the sadhu one such wicked magician?’
Then I reasoned to myself that
if the sadhu ever wanted to
exploit me for any of his wicked intentions, he had plenty of opportunities
during the last six months, but he never harmed me in any way.
‘May be, he is preparing me
for a grand sacrifice, yet to be made!’ I once again shuddered at the thought.
I stared at the rock as
though I had the power to pierce through it. It pained my eyes.
But what a surprise! I was
dumfounded to notice a small slit under the huge rock. What lay beyond I
couldn’t guess. I dared not to find. I vacillated. My heart pumped faster,
hands and feet trembled, stomach churned, and, deep inside, something told me to
run away as fast as I could.
But I didn’t.
I approached the slit and
narrowing my eyes, stealthily peeped through the slit focusing on what was on
the other side. After some painful moments I could notice a small descent
behind the slit. Kneeling down, I squeezed myself in through the narrow slit,
moved down crawling, twisting my body at a few places and soon I found myself
on a flight of stairs going down. It looked like a cave and now I had
sufficient space to sit inside. With great alacrity, I slowly descended, taking
every step with trepidation. After a few steps, I was on a small level ground
from where I could see some small light in one corner. It looked like an
entrance to another cave.
I slowly crawled towards the
second cave. The entrance was narrow. Carefully, I stepped inside. What I saw
therein was hair-raising and spine chilling and I stood there in great
bewilderment! How would I describe it!
There, in front of a small
lamp, I saw the sadhu sitting on a
stone, like Lord Siva sitting in tapas posture,
in very deep meditation. I thought I saw Lord Siva himself – Lord Siva with a
high rising jada mudi (matted hair), his
legs in Padmasan, the right hand in ‘abhaya mudra’ (indicating his readiness
to protect those who take refuge in Him) and the left hand holding the thrishul . I felt a powerful radiation
around the sadhu . A circle of glowing
light above his head ill uminated the roof of the cave. I felt a million
lightning all at once landing on me. I trembled violently and fell to the
ground. I didn’t know what happened after that.
*****
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