They took him to a very special clearing they had found in their youth. It was surrounded on all sides by tall trees. It had a large pond with a long flat rock that extended over part of it. It was the place they shared their first kiss. The place where he proposed marriage. It was the place where they were wed.
It was in this special spot that they built the baby Mouse a shelter of branches, leaves and mud. It was there that they left their child. They left him there for his own safety. They said that to themselves over and over again as they walked away.
They visited often. They brought their exiled infant food and supplies and every year at the time of his birth, a gift. They told him stories, played silent games and taught him everything they knew.
Well almost everything.
Their visits were always short. They stayed longer when they could. It was all quite civil for the first few years, even a little longer than that. Then the child began to talk and ask questions.
At first, Mouse began to imitate the sounds of the forest and the creatures in it. Occasionally, his parents would find small piles of berries and nuts at their sleeping child’s side and animals nearby watching their every move.
Then the young Mouse began to imitate the sounds of his parent’s voices. He began to repeat their words to him and to each other. Whether they came separately or together, they always spoke to him in calm reassuring tones. They spoke to each other in whispered calm and reassuring tones.
He began to think that they sounded frightened of being caught in the forest. Frightened of something they called the Fetcher. Frightened it was going to find them.
Mouse was confused, so he asked, “Why are you afraid?”
They never really answered him.
It was shortly after that when the sadness overtook his parents. They came less and less, and on their last visit, they barely spoke at all. They came together and brought a great deal of food and supplies, but no gift. Mother knelt before him and spoke the last words Mouse felt he would ever hear her say.
“There is no need to fear the void up above,” she said in a soothing tone. “We believe it is where all questions and answers come from. It is neither good, nor bad. There is no need to fear the void around you. Learn from it. Make it your friend.”
She put her hands on his shoulders and drew him close to her. Mouse couldn’t really see her face, but even in this very dark place, he could see the sparkle in her eyes.
“Your father and I are doing what we think is best. We love you. Please forgive us.”
Mother never said another word as she kissed him on the forehead. She cried quietly as she walked away. She never stopped crying after that. Father knelt before him and spoke the last words Mouse felt he would ever hear him say.
“Never go to the village, they will betray you,” he said in a stern but caring tone. “Never go to the castle, the thing we all fear most lives there. Always hide. Always run.”
It was on what Mouse believed to be the tenth year since his birth that his parents left him alone in the woods. There would be no more visits. There would be no more gifts. Then the mist came, and with it the fog, and the first tears.
There were many tears after that, but Mouse didn’t always cry.
He spent most of his time hiding and running in the forest. Practicing. Quietly. Silently. He would devise clever plans for hiding using the natural places all around him. He would run as fast as he could through the natural obstacle course all around him. But he never strayed too far from the clearing. He would stop where the sounds of the animals stopped.
That circle was getting smaller and smaller. Like a trap snapping shut very slowly.
Mouse was asleep at the exact time he turned eleven. He was having a dream. The forest was brilliant with light. Butterflies and birds filled the air around him. A great golden bird flew high above and a woman stood in the forest.
She was tall. Splendid. Her hair was long and black. Her green dress stretched to the horizon. The golden bird cried out as it landed on the top of her staff and the animals all followed her as she walked away.
Before she vanished, the woman turned and smiled at Mouse.
Mouse knew before his eyes had even finished opening that the woman and all the animals had left him alone in the woods. Mouse called for days but they never came. It was not sadness that overtook them. It was fear. The Fetcher was finished in the village and had come to the woods. The woman in green had come to save the animals.
Mouse wondered if anyone was coming to save him.
He survived by using what he learned from the animals, so he never starved. He was never snatched because he always remembered what his father had told him. The Fetcher would search and Mouse would hide. The Fetcher would chase and Mouse would run.
It was all quite civil for almost a year, even a little longer than that. Then Mouse turned twelve and the voices in the forest came to him. They came out of the fog, through the trees and up from under the rocks. Anguished voices searched the woods.
They shouted.
We are all trapped. Trapped in the castle.
They whispered.
We are all imprisoned. Imprisoned in the Academy Darke.
Mouse could not fight both the Fetcher and the sadness in the forest. Not like this.
He found a place to hide in the crook of a tree and there he pondered. He covered his ears to mask the voices while he thought. He closed his eyes to the darkness around him in order to find the darkness in his own mind.
His mother had told him there were answers in all that nothingness. He was trying to think of the proper question to ask when he began to see his mother’s eyes in his mind. He remembered the sparkle.
He remembered she told him not to be afraid.
Mouse turned thirteen when he decided enough was enough. It was time to go to the castle. In the hope that his parents would someday return for him, he left a note where they first left him.
Dearest Mother and Father,
I hear voices in the forest where you have hidden me and I can no longer abide them. The madness must be stopped and the sadness must be faced. I will travel to the castle to defeat the Fetcher and free the voices. If I am successful, I will return to this spot and wait for you. If I am not, know that I love you and I forgive you.
Your Son
Not long after that Mouse arrived at the doors of the Academy Darke and knocked. He boldly came out of the woods. He walked across the bridge whistling a joyful, yet melancholy little tune.
He walked past the buildings and structures of the long ago abandoned Exchange. He made sure to make his presence known every step of the way. He walked up the set of stone steps to the big wooden doors, and then he knocked.
There was no answer to his first attempt so he knocked again. The response he got was not what he expected.
At first there was nothing but the sound of the wind circling the castle and the waves gently washing up against the shoreline. Then there was a series of powerful and violent explosions. Three in a row. One immediately behind the other as the land bridge, and all the other buildings and structures slid down the rock tower and into the sea, leaving him standing on a small ledge of steps with the big wooden doors to his back.
Mouse stood quite still as rubble rained down everywhere. He stood there resolutely, as he heard the massive chunks of debris crash to the water below. Then he waited a little longer until there was nothing but the sound of the wind and the waves.
Then he knocked again.
From behind the imposing doors, he heard the slide of a large metal bolt. When the doors opened, he laid his eyes directly on the thing everyone feared most.
The Fetcher was standing in the center of the entrance chamber to the Academy Darke. He raised his gloved hand and beckoned the young man to join him. Mouse stepped through the doorway and towards the cunning cat, to his shrewd mouse. Then he stopped, turned and closed the doors to the Darke, imprisoning himself as he slid the bolt home.
Hundreds of candles lit the room. The chamber was a vast and open space with vaulted ceilings. Mouse recognized the floor beneath his feet. It was in the pattern of a gaming board. Black and white squares opposed themselves in the distinctive scheme that is always the foundation of conflict and strategy.
There were two players on the board and each waited to see who would move first.
The Fetcher pointed to a small table next to him. On it was an open book. Next to the book was an ink bottle. A quill pen lay between them. With a gesture of the Fetchers hand, the quill pen lifted into the air and dipped itself into the ink bottle. It then moved towards the open pages of the book. It stopped there.
Mouse stepped towards his first assignment in the Darke. He took the pen in hand and signed his name in the book. His was the last. He dropped the pen onto the page and turned to face the Fetcher again. He stood in profile to the boy and did not move a muscle or make a sound.
Without turning away from the Fetcher, Mouse picked up the ink bottle and slowly spilled its contents onto the floor.
“There’ll be no others coming,” he said as the last of the ink dripped to the floor.
The hooded caped figure remained still and silent. Mouse dropped the bottle and the Fetcher let it shatter on the floor. As it did, the light went out of the room. As the void settled around them, Mouse could hear the cat beginning to laugh.
The Fetcher knew the legend of the boy called Mouse, he was after all, a significant player in it. The Fetcher knew a great many things. It was quite possible, he thought, that he knew everything there was to know. He knew he was tired of knowing.
He knew he was tired of this place and all the pathetic people in it. He knew it was just a matter of time now and then he would be able to destroy the creature that created and enslaved him.
But he was growing tired of waiting.
When Mouse first arrived at the academy, the Fetcher allowed him to enroll like every other child. He put him in with the general student population. He knew there would be trouble and that Oracle would create a circular corridor of cells to house a handful of special troublemakers. Fourteen of them to be precise.
One hundred cells had been created.
The Fetcher knew from the beginning that there were eighty-six too many.
As the Fetcher escorted the boy down the torch lit corridor of cells for the second time since his arrival, he was surprised by his thoughts. He had grown to respect this boy.
The first time he was made a prisoner, it was over a minor thing. He had imagined the taste of branchberries. When he appeared, the boy admitted it and stood his ground. The Fetcher respected his bravery and appreciated the fact that on both occasions the boy did not have to be dragged away, or tied up for kicking, or gagged for screaming.
He never told the head monster about the boy’s first imprisonment. It had to be done to set things in motion. He never told him the boy had been wandering free for a very long time. The creature in charge didn’t care about the details. The creature didn’t know that this boy, and the pretty little blonde girl that became his friend in the Darke, would become keys to his downfall.
The creature didn’t know as much as it thought it did. The Fetcher enjoyed keeping It ignorant.
This was all part of the Fetcher’s plan. But the Fetcher knew that it wasn’t really his plan at all. This was all a series of events that were unfolding and everyone had their part to play.
The Fetcher’s role was to rule while Oracle reigned and to make sure that nothing stopped the inevitable conclusion, the end of this world and the death of Oracle Darke.
So Mouse had for the first time, once again, been sentenced to become a prisoner of one, destined to spend the rest of his time in the Darke alone in a small cell with no other contact until he has learned his lesson, submitted to the reality of his situation and abandoned all hope of ever using his imagination again.
The Fetcher waived his hand and the door to the cell pushed open. He stood in the doorway as Mouse quietly walked past him. He watched as the boy turned when he reached the center of room in order to face him. Mouse raised his hand and beckoned the Fetcher to join him.
The Fetcher raised his hand, closed his fist and the door slammed shut. A key appeared in the air and inserted itself into the lock. With a flick of his finger, the key broke off in the lock. He closed his fist again, and this time, the doorknob crumpled in place. With a flick of his wrist the bolts at the top and the bottom of the door slid home quickly and solidly.
The silly ritual complete, the Fetcher began his walk down the corridor. So much unnecessary drama, he thought, since he knew that somewhere between the slamming of the door and the sliding of the bolts, the clever little boy had vanished from his cell.
The Fetcher did the same, as the torch fires went out.
13.
The Sandbox
Mathias walked, jumped and swam the debris filled expanse to the rock tower. Upon reaching its base, he began to climb up towards the Academy Darke and closer to the cursed castle with the mysterious and terrible past.
The climb, while fast, was not easy. Just like the cliffs, the laborers that worked here had made outcroppings to make their way up to the top. Some were still there. Some crumbled to the touch or the step. Mathias took care but kept climbing higher and higher as quickly as he could.
He rested for only a moment at the steps to the doors of the academy. The doors would not open, of course, so Mathias sat on the steps leading to them and looked down at the world he was in, but of course did not know.
There was no need for the green glasses anymore. The energy emanating from his destination was casting dim light below. He could see Ulysses laying on the black beach. He was sleeping off the effects of his wine. There would be no such rest for Mathias.
With the doors locked Mathias had no choice but to scale the walls. This was not easy at all. He had to find footholds and spaces to grasp onto. He wedged the edges of his boots and crammed the tips of his fingers into every cramped space between the stones. He clambered over the top of the wall and dropped onto the roof of the Academy Darke and the courtyard of the castle.
Mathias looked around the large open space. Columns and archways framed several dramatic entrances to the castle portion of the compound. Those doors were closed and sealed shut with planks of wood. Where the planks crossed, the image of a shield crest was burned into the wood.
The floor of the vast space was laid out in a chessboard pattern. Polished opaque black stones filled in the dark spaces. In the white, there were clear polished stones. Those clear stones were emanating the faintest glimmer of light. Mathias was the only player on the board. Then just like that, the Fetcher appeared in front of him.
The Fetcher dispatched Mathias quickly. There were several blows to vital parts of his body, all in rapid succession. The Fetcher then grabbed him by the hip and neck. The specter lifted the intruder up and hurled him over the wall with ease, but with great force.
Mathias was flying. All was quiet as he glided through the air. He could hear his clothes rippling as he began to pick up speed. He was dropping now and dropping fast. The surface of the lagoon was coming up to meet him. He hit it hard. The next instant the water opened up and swallowed him whole.
He gasped for air and drank in salty water. Mathias struggled to swim to the surface, but a strong current took him. He was being pulled down deeper. An underwater whirlpool was forming. It sucked him in and propelled him through the water. Mathias was certain he was going to drown.
He never thought he would die in this way.
Mathias was near blackout when he broke the surface of the water. He choked as he tried to take in as much air as he could. He thrashed and swam wildly as he tried to make his was to the shore. Once he made it, he stopped and sat waist deep in the lagoon.
Wanting to see if the Fetcher was looking down at him, he looked up to the castle. It was gone. So was the rock tower. There was nothing but ocean. Everything else was gon
e. However, in the night sky there was a single, small faint moon.
“That’s the world you just came from,” came a voice from behind him.
Mathias turned towards the beach. There at the shore just out of reach of a fading wave stood a tall, stylishly dressed chimpanzee. He was looking at the same dimly lit moon as Mathias.
“We dance around each other. We pull away and then we turn closer in one continual genesis,” he said lovingly. “Time curves round us. Everything that has happened, is happening now. Everything we are to become will be born in an instant. Everything will be created in one perfect moment, and our creation will be the greatest mystery of all time.”
The unusual poet before him wore dark brown boots that stopped mid calf. The bottoms of his dark blue silk pants were stuffed into them. Around the top of his head, he wore a black bandana tied in a knot at the back of his neck. The tails of that knot were draped over a white silk shirt. He had one hand on his hip, and in the other he held a shovel that he had slung over his shoulder.
“My, you’re different,” Mathias said.
The chimpanzee looked down at him. His eyes were soulful.
“I am Simon James Fox,” he stated boldly. “Welcome to the Sandbox, Mathias Bootmaker. We’ve been expecting you.”
Having said that, the ape walked away from the water's edge, and to his encampment by the sea. It boasted a fire and an assortment of books, colorful costumes, and musical instruments. He stopped just outside a small, colorful, pointed tent. Simon stabbed the shovel into the sand, pulled a large cello from the small tent and sat on a modest bench fashioned out of sand.
He pointed at Mathias with his bow and then pointed to the spot across from him by the fire. He put the bow to the strings and his fingers on the neck of the instrument. Simon closed his eyes and began playing a joyous, but melancholy little tune while he waited for his guest to join him.
It Is Said (Mathias Bootmaker and the Keepers of the Sandbox) Page 11