The true potential of human being

The boy approached the guard at the front of the huge white tent at
the center of the oasis.
"I want to see the chieftains. I've brought omens from the desert."
Without responding, the guard entered the tent, where he remained
for some time. When he emerged, it was with a young Arab, dressed
in white and gold. The boy told the younger man what he had seen,
and the man asked him to wait there. He disappeared into the tent.
Night fell, and an assortment of fighting men and merchants entered
and exited the tent. One by one, the campfires were extinguished, and
the oasis fell as quiet as the desert. Only the lights in the great tent
remained. During all this time, the boy thought about Fatima, and he
was still unable to understand his last conversation with her.
Finally, after hours of waiting, the guard bade the boy enter. The boy
was astonished by what he saw inside. Never could he have imagined
that, there in the middle of the desert, there existed a tent like this
one. The ground was covered with the most beautiful carpets he had
ever walked upon, and from the top of the structure hung lamps of
hand-wrought gold, each with a lighted candle. The tribal chieftains
were seated at the back of the tent in a semicircle, resting upon richly
embroidered silk cushions. Servants came and went with silver trays
laden with spices and tea. Other servants maintained the fires in the
hookahs. The atmosphere was suffused with the sweet scent of smoke.
There were eight chieftains, but the boy could see immediately which
of them was the most important: an Arab dressed in white and gold,
seated at the center of the semicircle. At his side was the young Arab
the boy had spoken with earlier.
"Who is this stranger who speaks of omens?" asked one of the
chieftains, eyeing the boy.
"It is I," the boy answered. And he told what he had seen.
"Why would the desert reveal such things to a stranger, when it knows
that we have been here for generations?" said another of the
chieftains.
"Because my eyes are not yet accustomed to the desert," the boy said.
"I can see things that eyes habituated to the desert might not see."
And also because I know about the Soul of the World, he thought to
himself.
"The oasis is neutral ground. No one attacks an oasis," said a third
chieftain.
"I can only tell you what I saw. If you don't want to believe me, you
don't have to do anything about it."
The men fell into an animated discussion. They spoke in an Arabic
dialect that the boy didn't understand, but, when he made to leave,
the guard told him to stay. The boy became fearful; the omens told
him that something was wrong. He regretted having spoken to the
camel driver about what he had seen in the desert.
Suddenly, the elder at the center smiled almost imperceptibly, and the
boy felt better. The man hadn't participated in the discussion, and, in
fact, hadn't said a word up to that point. But the boy was already used
to the Language of the World, and he could feel the vibrations of peace
throughout the tent. Now his intuition was that he had been right in
coming.
The discussion ended. The chieftains were silent for a few moments as
they listened to what the old man was saying. Then he turned to the
boy: this time his _expression was cold and distant.
"Two thousand years ago, in a distant land, a man who believed in
dreams was thrown into a dungeon and then sold as a slave," the old
man said, now in the dialect the boy understood. "Our merchants
bought that man, and brought him to Egypt. All of us know that
whoever believes in dreams also knows how to interpret them."
The elder continued, "When the pharaoh dreamed of cows that were
thin and cows that were fat, this man I'm speaking of rescued Egypt
from famine. His name was Joseph. He, too, was a stranger in a
strange land, like you, and he was probably about your age."
He paused, and his eyes were still unfriendly.
"We always observe the Tradition. The Tradition saved Egypt from
famine in those days, and made the Egyptians the wealthiest of
peoples. The Tradition teaches men how to cross the desert, and how
their children should marry. The Tradition says that an oasis is neutral
territory, because both sides have oases, and so both are vulnerable."
No one said a word as the old man continued.
"But the Tradition also says that we should believe the messages of
the desert. Everything we know was taught to us by the desert."
The old man gave a signal, and everyone stood. The meeting was
over. The hookahs were extinguished, and the guards stood at
attention. The boy made ready to leave, but the old man spoke again:
"Tomorrow, we are going to break the agreement that says that no
one at the oasis may carry arms. Throughout the entire day we will be
on the lookout for our enemies. When the sun sets, the men will once
again surrender their arms to me. For every ten dead men among our
enemies, you will receive a piece of gold.
"But arms cannot be drawn unless they also go into battle. Arms are
as capricious as the desert, and, if they are not used, the next time
they might not function. If at least one of them hasn't been used by
the end of the day tomorrow, one will be used on you."
When the boy left the tent, the oasis was illuminated only by the light
of the full moon. He was twenty minutes from his tent, and began to
make his way there.
He was alarmed by what had happened. He had succeeded in reaching
through to the Soul of the World, and now the price for having done so
might be his life. It was a frightening bet. But he had been making
risky bets ever since the day he had sold his sheep to pursue his
Personal Legend. And, as the camel driver had said, to die tomorrow
was no worse than dying on any other day. Every day was there to be
lived or to mark one's departure from this world. Everything depended
on one word: "Maktub."
Walking along in the silence, he had no regrets. If he died tomorrow, it
would be because God was not willing to change the future. He would
at least have died after having crossed the strait, after having worked
in a crystal shop, and after having known the silence of the desert and
Fatima's eyes. He had lived every one of his days intensely since he
had left home so long ago. If he died tomorrow, he would already have
seen more than other shepherds, and he was proud of that.
Suddenly he heard a thundering sound, and he was thrown to the
ground by a wind such as he had never known. The area was swirling
in dust so intense that it hid the moon from view. Before him was an
enormous white horse, rearing over him with a frightening scream.
When the blinding dust had settled a bit, the boy trembled at what he
saw. Astride the animal was a horseman dressed completely in black,
with a falcon perched on his left shoulder. He wore a turban and his
entire face, except for his eyes, was covered with a black kerchief. He
appeared to be a messenger from the desert, but his presence was
much more powerful than that of a mere messenger.
The strange horseman drew an enormous, curved sword from a
scabbard mounted on his saddle. The steel of its blade glittered in the
light of the moon.
"Who dares to read the meaning of the flight of the hawks?" he
demanded, so loudly that his words seemed to echo through the fifty
thousand palm trees of Al-Fayoum.
"It is I who dared to do so," said the boy. He was reminded of the
image of Santiago Matamoros, mounted on his white horse, with the
infidels beneath his hooves. This man looked exactly the same, except
that now the roles were reversed.
"It is I who dared to do so," he repeated, and he lowered his head to
receive a blow from the sword. "Many lives will be saved, because I
was able to see through to the Soul of the World."
The sword didn't fall. Instead, the stranger lowered it slowly, until the
point touched the boy's forehead. It drew a droplet of blood.
The horseman was completely immobile, as was the boy.
It didn't even occur to the boy to flee. In his heart, he felt a strange
sense of joy: he was about to die in pursuit of his Personal Legend.
And for Fatima. The omens had been true, after all. Here he was, faceto-
face with his enemy, but there was no need to be concerned about
dying-the Soul of the World awaited him, and he would soon be a part
of it. And, tomorrow, his enemy would also be a part of that Soul.
The stranger continued to hold the sword at the boy's forehead. "Why
did you read the flight of the birds?"
"I read only what the birds wanted to tell me. They wanted to save the
oasis. Tomorrow all of you will die, because there are more men at the
oasis than you have."
The sword remained where it was. "Who are you to change what Allah
has willed?"
"Allah created the armies, and he also created the hawks. Allah taught
me the language of the birds. Everything has been written by the
same hand," the boy said, remembering the camel driver's words.
The stranger withdrew the sword from the boy's forehead, and the boy
felt immensely relieved. But he still couldn't flee.
"Be careful with your prognostications," said the stranger. "When
something is written, there is no way to change it."
"All I saw was an army," said the boy. "I didn't see the outcome of the
battle."
The stranger seemed satisfied with the answer. But he kept the sword
in his hand. "What is a stranger doing in a strange land?"
"I am following my Personal Legend. It's not something you would
understand."
The stranger placed his sword in its scabbard, and the boy relaxed.
"I had to test your courage," the stranger said. "Courage is the quality
most essential to understanding the Language of the World."
The boy was surprised. The stranger was speaking of things that very
few people knew about.
"You must not let up, even after having come so far," he continued.
"You must love the desert, but never trust it completely. Because the
desert tests all men: it challenges every step, and kills those who
become distracted."
What he said reminded the boy of the old king.
"If the warriors come here, and your head is still on your shoulders at
sunset, come and find me," said the stranger.
The same hand that had brandished the sword now held a whip. The
horse reaped again, raising a cloud of dust.
"Where do you live?" shouted the boy, as the horseman rode away.
The hand with the whip pointed to the south.
The boy had met the alchemist.
~~~~~~~~~
Next morning, there were two thousand armed men scattered
throughout the palm trees at Al-Fayoum. Before the sun had reached
its high point, five hundred tribesmen appeared on the horizon. The
mounted troops entered the oasis from the north; it appeared to be a
peaceful expedition, but they all carried arms hidden in their robes.
When they reached the white tent at the center of Al-Fayoum, they
withdrew their scimitars and rifles. And they attacked an empty tent.
The men of the oasis surrounded the horsemen from the desert and
within half an hour all but one of the intruders were dead. The children
had been kept at the other side of a grove of palm trees, and saw
nothing of what had happened. The women had remained in their
tents, praying for the safekeeping of their husbands, and saw nothing
of the battle, either. Were it not for the bodies there on the ground, it
would have appeared to be a normal day at the oasis.
The only tribesman spared was the commander of the battalion. That
afternoon, he was brought before the tribal chieftains, who asked him
why he had violated the Tradition. The commander said that his men
had been starving and thirsty, exhausted from many days of battle,
and had decided to take the oasis so as to be able to return to the
war.
The tribal chieftain said that he felt sorry for the tribesmen, but that
the Tradition was sacred. He condemned the commander to death
without honor. Rather than being killed by a blade or a bullet, he was
hanged from a dead palm tree, where his body twisted in the desert
wind.
The tribal chieftain called for the boy, and presented him with fifty
pieces of gold. He repeated his story about Joseph of Egypt, and asked
the boy to become the counselor of the oasis.
~~~~~~~~~
When the Sun had set, and the first stars made their appearance, the
boy started to walk to the south. He eventually sighted a single tent,
and a group of Arabs passing by told the boy that it was a place
inhabited by genies. But the boy sat down and waited.
Not until the moon was high did the alchemist ride into view. He
carried two dead hawks over his shoulder.
"I am here," the boy said.
"You shouldn't be here," the alchemist answered. "Or is it your
Personal Legend that brings you here?"
"With the wars between the tribes, it's impossible to cross the desert.
So I have come here."
The alchemist dismounted from his horse, and signaled that the boy
should enter the tent with him. It was a tent like many at the oasis.
The boy looked around for the ovens and other apparatus used in
alchemy, but saw none. There were only some books in a pile, a small
cooking stove, and the carpets, covered with mysterious designs.
"Sit down. We'll have something to drink and eat these hawks," said
the alchemist.
The boy suspected that they were the same hawks he had seen on the
day before, but he said nothing. The alchemist lighted the fire, and
soon a delicious aroma filled the tent. It was better than the scent of
the hookahs.
"Why did you want to see me?" the boy asked.
"Because of the omens," the alchemist answered. "The wind told me
you would be coming, and that you would need help."
"It's not I the wind spoke about. It's the other foreigner, the
Englishman. He's the one that's looking for you."
"He has other things to do first. But he's on the right track. He has
begun to try to understand the desert."
"And what about me?"
"When a person really desires something, all the universe conspires to
help that person to realize his dream," said the alchemist, echoing the
words of the old king. The boy understood.

By: Paulo Coelho in "The Alchemist"