Pink Noise - Leonid Korogodski [23]
He has to teach her that. But where to begin? One cannot do that just because one must. He knows faps are triggered by the emotional background. But he can’t invent a new emotion by order, can’t discover a new state of consciousness like that. The girl must find it for herself, just like the great masters of old had through long years of practice.
Unlike them, she has only two days to master inner forms.
Can she?
“NANNY, TELL ME MORE ABOUT UNNIYARCHA. PLEASE?”
“Again?”
Her Nanny is a gentle arm around her shoulder, a voice descending from above her head. She looks straight up—into the shining blur of memory. She’s maybe eight. “Again.”
“What would you like to hear about? I can tell you—”
“How beautiful she was.” She smiles. “Was not she beautiful?”
“She was.” And Nanny’s fingers lightly brush her hair. “The most beautiful of women, as the ballads say.”
“But she was also a good fighter, right?”
“She was the best—”
“With her urumi?”
“Yes. The flexible sword she kept hidden in her belt.” Her Nanny smiles—a warmth from up above. “See? You already know everything.”
“Not everything! Why did she fight?”
Her Nanny sighs. Her fingers lightly tap the girl’s bony shoulder—the fingers that could cut an enemy in half. “She lived in difficult times. Never-ending wars, constant feuds.”
“Like now?”
Nanny doesn’t smile.
“Was she the same caste as we are?”
“No. Castes were different back then. For she lived very long ago, in the 16th century, in South India. She was the Chekavar caste. Their men were born to fight in the ankam—duels to the death to settle disputes for the higher castes.
“The ballads say:
“One born a Chekavar
Earns his bread at the point of his sword.
If anybody comes for an ankam
He can’t refuse to go.
Better far to die with honor
Than to die a plain death.”
Goose flesh over her skin.
“Nanny, did Unniyarcha too fight in ankam?”
“No. Not everyone must fight and die.” Her Nanny sounds wistful. “Unniyarcha had a son. But hey! She had enough adventures of her own. In a fight, she was as fearsome as Kali in raudram state. Why, once she fought against the fighters of a rival clan who tried to kidnap their women—and she beat them, single-handed!”
Yes! She claps in joy, but quickly stops. “Like Kali? Does it mean she too was always naked, and she had blue skin?”
“Well, no. If she did, she never would have had to fight.”
“What does raudram mean?”
“Translated from Sanskrit, it’s anger. That is its plain meaning. But it’s also more than that.” Now Nanny pauses, and the brilliance of memory is dimmed. “One isn’t in control when angry, like chaff blown by emotions. One must have mental power to banish doubt. Then you fight.”
And dance!
“Raudram is the kind of fury that only makes others afraid, caught in emotions that make them want to run, the kind that makes the mighty shrivel when facing the small—before you act.”
“How does it feel?”
But Nanny doesn’t speak at once. “Like meyya kannakuka, we say in Malayalam. When the body is all eyes.”
SHE MOVES—A VORTEX SPINNING IN THE SPACE MARKED BY the angles of her limbs, her body turning, bending, snapping back in flight. Her dancing phrases—a vocabulary of triangulated movement, punctuated with sharp turns. She is a fury transformed, the chaos of the external world turned into a controlled kaleidoscope of movement swirling around the center of her focus—their focus. Nathi’s mind is shared with hers; he can’t but stare deep into the maelstrom—the force of consciousness behind the liberated patterns of her will.
He cannot speak. He understands without words.
These patterns have been churning like an endless mantra while she was in the coma—disconnected