Chapter 7 Ignorance Is Bliss #2
“You know nothing of power,” Muya says. “Demons have more power than a human could ever comprehend and hold. I’ve lived for centuries, long enough to know that you humans cannot be trusted with magic.
You are liars, backstabbers, and idiots by nature.
You will not be able to withstand whoever is after you. ”
“Who hurt you?” I ask sarcastically, but when Muya flinches, I laugh. “What, nursing a broken heart?”
“That is not something you need to know,” he snaps. “I am trying to help you, you insufferable idiot. So give me back my magic and let me.”
“Why don’t you just take it?” I ask. “If you’re so powerful…”
Muya gives me an incredulous, almost pitying look.
“If you think I can just separate the magic from you that easily, my fate has been linked with a fool’s.
However it came to you, it’s part of you now.
The easiest way would be for you to hand it over.
If I find an alternative method—you might not survive. ”
“You might think I’m stupid, but I know better than to give you something for only the vague promise of help.
I need a lot more first. Here.” I take his phone and input my number, under the contact, Your Only Friend.
We both laugh for a moment before I remember with a start that I shouldn’t be joking around with a demon.
This is just a transaction: I have something he wants, and even if I don’t trust him, I would be foolish to reject him outright.
“By my estimate, you’ve gotten far more information out of me than I have from you.
If you want my help, you need my trust. Give me something I can work with. ”
He looks intently into my eyes. “You really know nothing?” He shakes his head.
“The power that is in you now—my power—you were not the first human to touch it. I have shared it with others, people I chose, unlike you. They were able to feel the imprint of each other through that lineage of power. Though I did not choose you, the power is the same. Dig within yourself and find that connection. Then perhaps you will believe in me.”
“What, you’re telling me to unlock my seventh chakra to find the power within myself?”
“Yes.”
Muya looks so serious that I bark out a laugh. “And how, exactly, will I find this connection? Drugs? Have you been a dealer all along?”
He rolls his eyes. “I can’t tell you everything. Each one of my chosen had a different way of looking back, something that made them feel peaceful, transcendent. Some walked in the fields or bathed in the river or practiced meditation.”
“You want me to wade into the Chicago River?”
Muya just shrugs. “Whatever you want.”
I used to be one of those kids, a weirdo with an unshakable belief in magic.
I found these faux-scientific books about magic in the library, a whole series entitled Dragonology, Fairyology, and Demonology.
The first two contained little gimmicks like “dragon scales” embedded into the pages that even my child-self dismissed.
But Demonology was a different story. The book housed tales from around the world about demons, recontextualizing great historical acts as instances of magic.
Demon magic. In India, the book claimed, the greatest rulers made deals with benevolent rakshasas and asuras to protect their people, their strength fueling armies, their foresight saving entire regions from ruin.
Armed with this knowledge, I spent my childhood dreaming of magic, finding and devouring other books on the topic.
At the time, we lived in an apartment complex in Rogers Park, so I was never without playmates.
While other kids pretended to fly or teleport or turn invisible, I explained that there was no historically verified documentation of those abilities.
Enhanced speed or strength, sure. The ability to bring rain or heal wounds, yes.
Elemental magic, absolutely. Unsurprisingly, I wasn’t very popular.
It didn’t bother me—I was more occupied with searching for a demon to grant me my own magic.
Although the books all said they had died out, I still believed I could find one.
Then one day, a playmate of mine laughed derisively at me for believing in demons.
I remember asking Aai about it later, cheeks burning with shame.
And though she spoke to me kindly, I could see the laughter in her eyes, too.
Maybe that was when the trajectory of my life changed, when I internalized, deep down, that the foundations of the world I lived in were shaky, that there was no special magic that could change that.
And yet I want it to be real. I want to unlock some secret power, I want to believe that some sort of impossible magic is at my fingertips if only I can find it.
Once Muya has left and I’ve texted Aai that I’m fine, I meditate.
I try it on my own, using the breathing exercises Aai taught me, and when that fails, find the YouTube video she sent me and follow an older Indian man’s droning instructions.
I take a brief break to email the potential volunteers signed up for training that we’ll be doing it remotely this evening instead, since there’s no way I’m trekking out to the clinic with everything going on.
Then I fill up the bathtub and put on relaxing string music.
It’s the first time I’ve used the tub since I moved in, and I immediately hate it.
My skin itches and the part of me outside the water is cold.
The bubbles have a cloying, fruity smell.
I heave myself out of the tub. I’d pulled my hair up into a bun to avoid getting it wet in the bath, and when I catch my reflection in the mirror, I realize I always knew what I was going to have to do.
From the moment Muya said I had to find my inner peace, there was only one option.
I grab a simple kurta from my closet, tie my dupatta around one shoulder to the opposite hip, and let my body take over and do what it’s wanted to do for years.
From the moment I first danced Kathak, I was terrible, but I couldn’t stop.
“Practice makes permanent,” my dance guru would always say.
But my problem wasn’t that I didn’t know the steps.
I was a bad dancer because I thought too much.
And then, out of the blue, it all clicked for me.
One moment I was continuing to struggle, and the next, just for five or ten seconds, my brain let go.
I was immersed, my body flowing as emotions poured out of me—I didn’t remember what happened after.
I loved it. It was my meditation. It’s why I haven’t danced in years, because I didn’t want to taint that joy.
But now, I discover the muscle memory hasn’t left me.
From the moment my right foot steps forward to start the namaskaram for the session, my brain starts to let go.
It’s awkward and imperfect, but I manage, the bol ringing in my head—ta thei thei tat aa thei thei tat—erasing all other thoughts.
I push myself to perform one of my old technical pieces, a twenty-minute classical set of progressively more difficult compositions.
And as I slip into my flow state, I meet a woman.