THAT day when the ruler stoned his brother a year earlier, it was only Maqwela who was left in the prison cell of his mind...
His brother had been free from his own cage.
Earlier that year, Zadeque’s caregiver who was employed to take care of him, had suddenly resigned. Then King Maqwela got a new person to take on the job.
The caregiver’s job was to prepare the prince’s meal, administer pills to him and do laundry.
She’d leave and return to the cottage each day using the back gate.
Yalowe was the new caregiver. She was a beautiful woman of thirty-two; and she’d got no one to call family.
So when the lady was offered quite a big sum to take the job and keep palace secret, she jumped at it and pledged her life to comply.
She agreed yet only wondered what monster lived there.
Now the thirty-two-year-old started work. Then she was surprised at the man she met inside.
She saw a pitiable soul hiding all day. She met a grown-up man who couldn’t meet people.
Zadeque wouldn’t talk when she spoke to him. He would stay in all dark corners, guarding his head with his hands.
So Yalowe felt so hurt for his sake. She wondered what made a fine man this.
The tender one began to care with a heart. She spent more time with the prince, hoping that he’d open up to her.
The lady started to listen for his heart in the silence. She tried to understand him from those things that he wouldn’t take… from his withdrawal and silence.
Then in a few more months she saw it. She realized that he must not have had love and family and people.
That he was like her who has no one in this dangerous world.
So when Yalowe saw herself in Zadeque, a man she was told to cater to, she recalled her miseries and the point where she found herself.
She recalled the message that she heard that restored her life.
It was a record titled, Nights and the Morning Star.
So she decided to play that audio file for Zadeque.
◘◘◘
Yalowe connected her phone to the sound device in the living room.
The lady played the audio as the sound came out loud, filling everywhere in the house.
The voice soared and found Zadeque where he hid. He was in a dark storage room.
‘Have you asked yourself this before? “Why do prospects suddenly turn bleak when people grow?
‘“Why do dreams of future turn into nightmares?”’
The voice was that of Philip Wadibe. The audio was his first talk when he took up work in Cape Islands.
It was his key message to a world in distress.
‘You see, when a person has the best form of sleep, we say they sleep like a baby. That they sleep like a newly born.
‘Then when you lose your sleep and wish to have it back, what you pray for is to sleep like a baby.
‘There is a reason why you want that kind of sleep. Why you want this beginning when you look for peace!’
Those words reached Zadeque, so the man got up where he crouched low in the dark.
It was the first time he would be hearing a new voice in a long time. So the words the stranger uttered made him curious.
Now the prince got up and stood there listening to the words. The speaker blared on.
‘At the beginning of your life, it didn’t matter what the parents did, there was a guardian angel by you.
‘It was because you carried treasure!
‘It didn’t matter if your parents sinned or not. It didn’t matter if the world was evil… you sleep and dream and you smile.
‘You dream of beauties, you dream of glory…
‘But that was the beginning!’
Zadeque moved and walked to door of the room. This thing that the preacher spoke of, reminded him of the things he’d got before he entered the palace…
The simple joys of life. His peace of mind and a self to call his.
It was as though the preacher knew his story. So he stood there to hear more.
Now Wadibe’s reader picked a text. It was the Book of Genesis I. 26 & 27.
She read out the passage.
Then God said, “Let Us make man in Our image, according to our likeness; let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, over the birds of the air, and over the cattle, over all the earth and every creeping thing that creeps on earth.”
The preacher pressed on.
‘At the beginning of man’s story, the Almighty crafted mankind out of sand.
‘Then He breathed into you and me a part of Him…
‘He dropped in man a piece of God!
‘The earth was filled with new creations then, still God made man whom He created last to rule over all things.
‘He had made day and night, and the powers of light and darkness...
‘His shining angels walk Heaven’s streets and the fallen stars roam our space.
‘Still He made His angels serve man and made the fallen angels bow.
‘That was the dominion God called man to!
‘He made them like Him. Like God Himself!’
Comments
Post a Comment