The Pilgrimage (13 page)

Relax completely. For five minutes, study the shadows of all of the

objects and people around you. Try to identify exactly which part of the object or person
is casting a shadow.

For the next five minutes, continue to do this, but at the same time, focus on the problem
you are trying to solve. Look for all of the possible wrong solutions to the problem.

Finally, spend five more minutes studying the shadows and thinking about what correct
solutions remain. Eliminate them, one by one, until only the single correct solution is
left.

that he, too, could make a decision regarding something. This made me excited, and I began
to do the exercise.

I did a bit of RAM breathing to put me in harmony with my surroundings. Then I noted on my
watch when fifteen minutes would have passed, and I began to look at the shadows all
around me shadows of ruined houses, stones, wood, and the cross behind me. As I studied
the shadows, I saw that it was difficult to know exactly what part was casting any given
shadow. I had never noticed this before. Some house beams that were straight were
transformed into shadows with sharp angles, and an irregular stone cast a shadow with a
smoothly rounded form. I did this for ten minutes. The exercise was so fascinating that it
was not difficult to concentrate on it. Then I began to think of the wrong solutions to
the problem of finding my sword. Many ideas came to mind I thought about taking a bus to
Santiago, and then I thought about phoning my wife and using some sort of emotional
trickery to find out where she had placed it.

When Petrus returned, I was smiling. So? he asked. I found out how Agatha Christie wrote
her mystery

novels, I joked. She transformed the hunch that was most wrong into the one that was
correct. She must have known about the Exercise of the Shadows.

Petrus asked where my sword was.

First Im going to tell you the most erroneous guess that I came up with as I looked at the
shadows: that the

sword is somewhere other than on the Road to Santiago.

You are a genius. You figured out that we have been walking all this way in order to find
your sword. I thought they had told you that already in Brazil.

Its being kept in a safe place that my wife could not enter, I continued. I deduced that
its in an absolutely open place but that it has been assimilated so well into its
surroundings that it cant be seen.

This time Petrus didnt smile. I went on:

And since the most absurd thing would be that it is in a place where there are lots of
people, it has to be in some locale that is practically deserted. And most important, and
so that the few people who see it dont notice the difference between it and a typical
Spanish sword, it must be in a place where no one knows how to distinguish between styles
of swords.

Do you think it is here? he asked.

No, its not here. The thing that would be most wrong would be to do this exercise at the
place where my sword is. I discarded that hunch right away. It must be in a city that is
similar to this one, but it cannot be in an abandoned city, because a sword in an
abandoned city would attract a lot of attention from pilgrims and passersby. It would wind
up as a decoration on the wall of a bar.

Very good, he said, and I could see that he was proud of me or of the exercise he had
taught me.

Theres another thing, I said.

Whats that?

The place that would be most wrong for the sword of a Magus to be left is a profane place.
It has to be in a sacred place. Like a church, for example, where no one would dare to
steal it. So, in a church in a small city near Santiago, visible to everyone but embedded
in its surroundings thats where my sword is. Starting now, Im going to visit every church
on the Road.

You dont have to, he said. When the moment comes, you will know it.

I had been right!

Listen, Petrus, why did we hurry for such a long while, when now were spending so much
time in this abandoned city?

What would be the answer that is most wrong?

I glanced at the shadows. He was right. We were there for some reason.

The sun was hidden behind the mountain, but nightfall was still some hours away. I was
thinking that the sun was probably shining just then on the Iron Cross. The cross was only
a few hundred yards distant, and I really wanted to see it. I also wanted to know why we
were waiting around. We had moved along so rapidly for the entire week, and now it seemed
to me that the only reason for that must have been that we had to be at this place, on
this day, and at this time.

I tried to make conversation to pass the time, but I could see that Petrus was tense and
preoccupied. I had already seen Petrus in a bad mood many times, but I

could not remember having seen him so tense. And then I remembered that I had seen him
like this once. It was at breakfast one morning in a small town whose name I could not
remember, just before we had run into ...

I looked to my left. There he was: the dog. The fero- cious dog that had thrown me to the
ground, the coward of a dog that had immediately fled afterward. Petrus had promised to
help me if we ran into him again, and I turned to my guide. But he had disap- peared.

I kept my gaze fixed on the dogs eyes while I franti- cally tried to think of a way to
deal with the situation. Neither of us moved, and I was reminded for a moment of the duel
scenes in the ghost towns of Western movies. In those films, no one would ever have
dreamed of pit- ting a man against a dog; it just wouldnt have worked. Yet here I was,
confronted with a reality that fiction would have considered too far out.

And there was Legion, so named because he was so many. Nearby stood a deserted house. If I
were to bolt suddenly, I could climb to its roof, and Legion could not follow. It seemed
absurd that I felt trapped by the physical presence of a dog and all that his presence
implied.

As I kept my eyes on him, I immediately rejected the possibility of taking flight. Many
times along the Road I had feared this moment, and now here it was. Before I could find my
sword, I had to meet with the Enemy and

either vanquish him or be defeated by him. I had no choice but to go up against him. If I
fled now, I would be falling into a trap. It might be that the dog would not appear again,
but I would travel the Road to Santiago de Compostela gripped by fear and apprehension.
Ever afterward, I would dream about the dog, fearing his reappearance at any minute and
living with dread for the rest of my life.

As I thought about all this, the dog started toward me. I stopped thinking immediately and
concentrated only on the battle that was about to begin. Petrus had left, and I was alone.
I was frightened. And as I experi- enced that fear, the dog began to move closer, making a
low growling sound. The growl was much more threat- ening than a loud bark would have
been, and I became even more terrified. Seeing the weakness in my eyes, the dog leapt on
me.

It was as if a boulder had been thrown at my chest. I fell to the ground, and he began to
bite at me. I remem- bered vaguely that I already knew about my death and that it was not
to be like this, but even so, my fear grew, and I was unable to control it. I began to
fight just to protect my face and throat. An intense pain in my leg caused me to curl up,
and I could see that some flesh had been torn away. I took my hands from my head and
throat, reaching toward the wound. The dog, seeing this, began an assault on my face. At
that moment, one of my hands felt a rock at my side. I grasped it and began to beat on the
dog with all my strength.

He backed off a bit, more surprised than hurt, and I was able to stand. The dog continued
to retreat, and the bloody stone gave me courage. I was paying too much respect to the
strength of my enemy, and this was a trap. He could not be any stronger than I. He might
be more agile, but he could not be stronger, because I weighed more and was taller than
he. My fear had lessened, but I wasnt in control of myself yet, and with the rock in my
hand, I began to shout at the dog. He withdrew a little further and then suddenly stopped.

It seemed as if he were reading my mind. In my des- peration I was beginning to feel
strong, and I began to think that it was ridiculous to be fighting a dog. A sense of power
suddenly came to me, and a hot wind began to blow across the deserted city. Then I began
to be tired of the whole thing; when all was said and done, I had only to batter him once
on the head with the stone, and I would have won. I wanted it to be over immediately so
that I could dress my wound and put an end to this absurd business of swords and the
Strange Road to Santiago.

But this was another trap. The dog hurled himself at me and again pushed me to the ground.
This time he evaded the rock easily, biting my hand and causing me to let it go. I began
to punch him with my hands, but I was not causing any serious damage. The only thing my
blows accomplished was to keep him from biting me even more. His sharp claws began to tear
my clothing

and my arms, and I saw that it was only a matter of time before he took charge completely.

All of a sudden, I heard a voice from within me. The voice said that if the dog
established dominion over me, the fight would be over, and I would be saved: defeated but
alive. My leg was aching, and my entire body stung from its lacerations. The voice
insisted that I give up, and I recognized whose voice it was: it was Astrain, my
messenger, speaking to me. The dog stopped for a moment, as if he had heard the same
voice, and once again I felt like leaving the whole thing behind. Astrain had told me in
our conversations that many people fail to find the sword in their lives, and what
difference did it make? What I wanted to do was go home, be with my wife, have my
children, and work at what I liked. Enough of these absurdities, fighting with dogs and
climbing waterfalls. This was the second time that this thought had come to me, but the
desire to give up was even stronger now, and I was certain that I would sur- render.

A sound from the streets of the abandoned city caught the animals attention. I looked in
the direction of the sound and saw a shepherd returning from the fields with his flock. I
remembered that I had seen this scene before, in the ruins of an old castle. When the dog
spotted the sheep, he jumped away from me and made ready to attack them. This was my
salvation.

The shepherd started to yell, and the sheep scattered. Before the dog got completely away,
I decided to engage

him for another moment or two, just to provide enough time for the animals to flee. I
grabbed one of the dogs legs. I had the absurd hope that the shepherd might come to my
assistance, and for a moment, my hopes about the sword and the power of RAM returned.

The dog tried to pull away from me. I was no longer the enemy; I was a hindrance. What he
wanted now was there in front of him: the sheep. But I continued to grasp the animals leg,
awaiting a shepherd who would not come and suddenly hoping that the sheep would not take
flight.

That is what saved my soul. An immense feeling of strength infused me. It was no longer
the illusion of power, which causes one to become weary of the battle and to want to give
in. Astrain whispered to me again, but this time it was something different. He said that
I should always confront the world with the same weapons that were used to challenge me.
And that I could confront a dog only by transforming myself into a dog.

This was the same craziness that Petrus had talked about that day. I began to feel that I
was a dog. I bared my teeth and sounded a low growl, and hatred flowed from the sounds I
made. I saw the frightened face of the shepherd off to the side and could sense that the
sheep were as terrified of me as they were of the dog.

Legion also saw this and became fearful. Then I attacked him. It was the first time I had
done this in our fight. I attacked him with my teeth and my nails, trying

to bite the dog in the throat, exactly as I had feared he would do to me. Inside, I felt
only a tremendous desire for victory. Nothing else was important. I threw myself on top of
the animal and pressed him to the ground. He fought to free himself from the weight of my
body, and he clawed at my skin, but I too was biting and scratch- ing. I could sense that
if he got out from under me, he would run away, and I did not want that to happen ever
again. Today I was going to beat him.

The animal began to show fear in his eyes. Now I was the dog, and he seemed to have been
transformed into a man. My old fear was operating in him now. It was so strong that he was
able to work his way out from under me, but I corralled him in the basement of one of the
abandoned houses. Behind its low slate wall was the precipice, and he had no escape. Right
there, he was going to see the face of his death.

I suddenly began to realize that there was some- thing wrong. My thinking was becoming
cloudy, and I began to see a gypsys face with vague images dancing around it. I had turned
myself into Legion. This was the source of my power. The many devils had aban- doned the
poor, frightened dog that a moment from now was going to fall into an abyss, and now they
were in me. I felt a terrible desire to destroy the defenseless animal. You are the
Prince, and they are Legion, whispered Astrain. But I did not want to be a Prince, and I
heard from a distance the voice of my Master. He said insistently that there was a sword
to be

won. I had to resist for one more minute. I should not kill that dog.

I looked over at the shepherd. His look confirmed what I was thinking. He, too, was now
more frightened of me than of the dog.

I began to feel dizzy, and the scene began to spin. I could not allow myself to faint. If
I fainted now, Legion would have won. I had to find a solution. I was no longer fighting
against an animal but against the force that possessed me. I felt my legs beginning to
weaken, and I leaned against a wall, but it gave way under my weight. Among the stones and
bits of wood, I fell with my face in the dirt.