Silence surrounded Yusuf so infinitely he began to wonder if he’d fallen deaf as well as blind. The desert was such a vast and empty place that it was possible to never wander near another soul for weeks, or even months. In this time, Yusuf had retreated so deep into his thoughts that something very strange was beginning to happen.

He was beginning to see.

Albeit this was not sight in the traditional sense. Yusuf’s mind had manufactured an alternate reality of sorts, one where his consciousness had divorced itself from his feeble body. The sensation felt very much like sleep, and in Yusuf’s dreams he was free.

To live in this state was like drinking music; the vibrations resonated powerfully through the air and lifted him up from the sand. He galloped across the clearest blue sky, uninhibited by the limitations of the physical world. He looked to the sun and it wrapped him in warmth and spoke to him, it’s voice bright and strong.

Yusuf, the sun boomed. You are not safe here.

“What?” the small stallion’s voice rang out, shrill like a meek child in the presence of the great giver of life.

Her gönülde bir aslan yatar, Yusuf. You will need to find yours, otherwise your fate is sealed.

“What fate? Why?” Yusuf cried, but it was of little use. Clouds of black, red and grey materialized from seemingly nowhere; they curled and rolled over the sun, blocking its light and plunging the sky into a deep darkness. He tried to run but found his legs useless, and instead he fell back to the earth like a comet from the heavens—burning and smoldering until completely broken apart.

The nearby sound of a nicker roused him from his semi-conscious state. He stood up from the sand slowly, finding his body intact and his eyes again useless. With a sigh, Yusuf pointed his nose toward the sound and struggled to speak again.

“Hello?” he called, his throat dry and voice cracking from dehydration.


-yusuf