by Nancy Yi Fan
“Which way did Maldeor go?” Wind-voice wondered. He looked at the image of the poor birds on the left. He pushed it and it swung inward.
The left door didn’t lead to a room at all but into a deep green forest. Above was a clouded sky. A shining light low in the mid-distance caught Wind-voice’s attention. “A fallen star,” he whispered, and drifted toward it. But the light spilled from a crystal casket, caught in the twining boughs of an oddly shaped tree. The sheer intensity of the light made the casket glow like a white cylinder.
Where is the hero? Where is Maldeor? Wind-voice thought. Since the hero’s sword is here, and since Maldeor is near, Maldeor could get the sword at any moment. I’ll stay here and fight him if he does. But what if I lose? I must take the sword out and hide it somewhere for the hero so that Maldeor cannot find it.
A golden disk remained visible where the keyhole should have been. At the very center a heart had been etched, so painstakingly detailed, it seemed to throb in the flickering light. Seven round, clear stones were inlaid in a circle around it. A miniature object was suspended in each stone: a ruler’s crown, two crossed swords, a treasure chest, a bird holding a green sprig, a rose, a book, a grass nest. What you love most is the key, Wind-voice said to himself.
Suddenly a deep, rich voice echoed out of the darkness. “You have only one choice.” Wind-voice turned around, but there was nobird. Mystified, he looked down again at the stones.
A crown…ruling, he thought. I certainly don’t want to control others. His eyes fell lower. The two swords together could only mean battle, and battle is cruel. Then the treasure chest? With riches, a bird can help the poor… he thought, and hesitated before continuing. The bird with the branch is the only image that contains an animal. He hesitated again, longer this time. The rose might mean love; the book, learning; and the nest, family…All of those are surely important. Wind-voice swayed in a second of indecision. He looked back up again, and his eyes stayed on the stone of the bird with the branch. It looks like an olive branch. It must mean peace, he thought. How can families stay together and survive in the cruelty of battle? Aren’t books destroyed in war? Even if there were books, how could fighting birds have the time to read them? War is synonymous with death. Can riches stop any of it? No. To have love, learning, and family, peace must come first. I care about peace, he thought. He raised a foot and pressed the stone with the bird holding the olive branch.
Though it was only a click, in the echoing forest it sounded like a loud clattering bang as the casket opened, the lid slowly rising and swinging back.
The voice spoke again. “This is the hero’s sword.”
How often had Wind-voice thought about the sword since the first time he had heard of it from Fisher?
The beauty of it was its pure, strong simplicity—it was long and straight like a ray of sunshine. The ivory scabbard’s designs of water and wind were clean and flowing; the bold curves on the dragonlike hilt seemed alive. The source of all the light was the Leasorn gemstone embedded in the hilt. A living rainbow seemed to swirl inside.
“How can I make sure Maldeor doesn’t get the sword?” asked Wind-voice.
“There is only one way. You must use the strength of your heart to seal the casket from evil. This is a sacrifice. Are you willing?”
Wind-voice gazed at the sword. Then he closed his eyes. He could almost see the figure of his mother in the sunshine. His memory was blurred by time, but Wind-voice tried to bring the picture into focus. Then, in the background, a lost heron drifted into view. “He made the most beautiful candles,” Aredrem whispered. “Even ones of heron chicks…it’s a pity, but they’ve all burned out now…”
Appearing out of the darkness, Winger spoke. “I am an orphan. With my eyes, I have seen the deaths of my mother, father, and sister.”
Then Forlath’s voice rang out. “Fleydur let himself be disowned by his family, where he was a prince, so that he could bring joy to war-stricken birds.”
At last Stormac’s voice carried to him, again telling Wind-voice his regret. “I was like the fool who flew through a rain cloud, thinking it was cream, and came out wet on the other side.”
Wind-voice opened his eyes. “Yes,” he whispered. “How shall I do it?”
“All you need to do is to place your right claw on your heart.”
Somehow, the figures of his mother, Irene, Ewingerale, Fleydur, Stormac, and Aredrem seemed to linger in the corners of his eyes, waiting. Why isn’t the hero here? he wondered. Facing the sword, he raised his claw slowly and pressed it on his chest, next to Stormac’s strawberry. Thump-thump…thump-thump… His heartbeat filled his ears, faster and faster, louder and louder. With each loud pound, the crystal lid moved. The lid swung closed with a click. Before his eyes, the casket, the sword, and the shining light disappeared.
There was only a swirl of dark mist where it had been. The distant tolls of a silver bell—dong…dong…dong—sounded the time of midnight. Hero’s Day had ended. Wind-voice took a deep breath and looked around at the empty, misty forest.
There was nothing more for him to do.
He took off, flew past vines and branches, landed, and then trudged slowly, tiredly back to the milky crystal door. Laboriously he pulled it open. Like a fire-stunned moth he fluttered back into the dark hall, just in time to see the right chamber’s door swing open and a figure rush out. A small source of light illuminated Maldeor’s gloating face, long, ragged shadows blotching below his hooded eyes and neck, further distorting them.
The archaeopteryx held a glowing golden sword aloft.
Is there another hero’s sword? Wind-voice was horror-stricken.
“You fool!” Maldeor laughed maniacally. “I’ve got the hero’s sword. It was waiting for me to take it. You’ve got nothing…nothing but death! Grown even bigger, have you? I’ll test the magic of this sword on you first!” Shrieking with glee, he propelled himself toward Wind-voice, who was unarmed.
The darkness around them seemed to whoosh in surprise. Pinpricks of light flared up all around them. They were not in a dark stretch of nothingness but in a magnificent hall with pillars soaring to the ceiling and twenty-four torches lined up on each side.
The archaeopteryx raised his sword with his claws and cleaved down mightily.
Wind-voice ducked with a nimble spin to the left. As the torchlights turned into streaks in his vision, he felt a warm, certain glow in his heart. Something solid materialized in his claws. He gripped it instinctively and brought it up in an underclaw as he snapped out of his spin. The torchlights all jumped higher.
The object in his claws clashed with Maldeor’s sword. The archaeopteryx cawed with surprise. Wind-voice looked down at what he was holding, but he only saw a whitish rod that faded away again.
Angered, Maldeor attacked again and again, and the strange rod reappeared each time so that Wind-voice was able to block each blow. Every fifteen minutes, a torch burned out, and they clanged all over the hall, till only eight torches were left.
Working himself into a rage of frenzied frustration, Maldeor raised his sword and started hacking down again and again, moving forward. The rod shimmered and shook as the blows rained down upon it.
Where are you, hero? Wind-voice thought. He closed his eyes. Then all of a sudden a great burst of energy swelled his heart. He let it run down his leg, to his foot, to the rod he was holding. Maldeor’s sword crashed down on it.
Maldeor screamed. Wind-voice opened his eyes to see the rod solidify into something familiar, and the ivory sheath of the true hero’s sword shattered into a thousand pieces. The shards flew all around him, but none fell on him because the hero’s sword was in his claws. A sudden brightness blazed from the bare blade.
There had never been two hero’s swords. There was only one.
Maldeor felt a great pile of sand slipping through his claws as his sword crumbled and dissolved into dust. The ceiling above them shivered and cracked, letting in the early sunlight. Chunks of stone rained down.
>
This is the most magnificent day in the history of all birds.
—FROM “EWINGERALE’S DIARY,™ IN THE OLD SCRIPTURE
17
HERO
Under a round, bright moon, one of the most important battles of birdkind was taking place.
“Let us form a twin for the moon!” Ewingerale cried.
Forlath echoed him, sending the message far and wide with his bellow. In the midst of murmurings and shouts, Fleydur raised a silver trumpet that his brother had just given him and blew to the stars.
As the bell tolled midnight, scarlet macaws, green parrots, petrels, gulls, black-browed albatrosses, and the golden eagles linked wingtips in the night sky, hovering in a gigantic dome around the pyramid. The edges of flashing wings were gilded silver by the moonlight. “We may not hold them forever,” Forlath said. “But for the sake of a better future, we shall try!”
With vulgar screams erupting in waves, the archaeopteryxes fell on them, their yellowish eyeballs and teeth catching the light, their filthy brown-and-khaki uniforms making them look like a stream of mud. The battle raged on, minute by minute, hour by hour.
Despite the seabirds’ agility, the eagles’ strength, and the parrots’ alertness, by the time the sun appeared above the ocean, they were faltering. “Come to us, hero,” Winger whispered.
Then a rumbling shook the ground beneath the armies and sent tremors into the air. Two swords shot out of a chute on the side of the pyramid. One was Maldeor’s old sword, and the other was Wind-voice’s. The battling birds paused, looking down to see the pyramid tumble into rubble.
“What’s happening? Is the hero dead?” Murmurings traveled from one beak to another. The archaeopteryxes lingered in the air, calling for their emperor.
Birds backed away. Stunned, Winger fluttered forward. A great cloud of dust rose from the ruin. Shafts of sunlight streamed through it, and the golden dust looked beautiful.
“Wind-voice,” Ewingerale called. Had the white bird gone into the pyramid? Had he been crushed by the falling stones? “Oh, Wind-voice, no…”
Then a small figure flew up through the sun-spangled cloud of dust, almost glowing in the golden light.
“The hero!” one archaeopteryx cheered, and others took up the cry. “The hero! Hail thee, great Ancient Wing!”
The figure spread its wings wide. They flashed white. He held a sword in his claws.
The hero wasn’t Maldeor, Ewingerale realized. It had never been Maldeor.
It was Wind-voice.
Blazing light burst out from the sword in the white bird’s grip. It spread across the battlefield. Swords and spears of the archaeopteryxes shimmered brightly as if in response and then began to glow as if they had just come from the forge. Maldeor’s army flung their hot weapons to the ground. Panic spread among the archaeopteryxes. Scrambling in the air, squawking with fright and dismay, they turned and fled.
Wind-voice alighted on the ground, looking stunned. He hopped slowly down the fallen pyramid toward Winger, from one rock to another, his sword held so loosely that the glowing blade almost dragged in the sand. Silence prevailed.
When he reached the woodpecker, he stopped. Winger’s red head and the curved tip of the harp on his back stood out in the gentle haze of dust. The two looked at each other. Then the woodpecker said “Oh, Wind-voice!”
Something in the woodpecker’s voice caused Wind-voice to turn around. He gasped. The path he had just walked was marked by a lush line of green, for the dead vines that had once curled in the sand had sprung to life, their heart-shaped leaves unfurling at the touch of his dragging sword. Green, that splendid color, was filling the barren desert around them, almost blinding their dazzled eyes. Wind-voice looked down at his sword, amazed.
He raised it slowly and pointed it at a withered olive tree. With a whoosh like a faint breeze, buds popped out of the dry branches and tiny fruit sprang forth. Smiling now, Wind-voice whirled his sword and pointed to the ground. The sand melted into rich brown earth; grass sprang from it and flowers opened, turning their faces to the brilliant sun. He flicked his claws, and where the sword pointed, the ground suddenly split open and a river flowed out.
Then he raised the sword high in the air.
White light was all they could see.
When they recovered, they found themselves in a green, dense jungle.
Wind-voice looked in amazement at the sword in his claws. “I—I’ll keep it safe,” he muttered to Winger. “For the hero, when he comes…”
Winger was smiling a light, dreamy smile that radiated all over his thin face. “The hero is here, Wind-voice,” he said, awed. “You’re the hero.”
“Hero…” Fleydur, Forlath, and the rest of the rebel army landed in a circle around Wind-voice. A wave of greetings surrounded him. “Show us the way, hero,” somebird cried. Everybird looked at Wind-voice, waiting for him to do something. Wind-voice glanced around. He noticed a small break in the dense jungle—a path.
He flapped toward it. For some reason, he knew it was the right way. “Follow me, friends,” he called. Together, Wind-voice, Ewingerale, Fleydur, Forlath, and their army flew along the path to a magnificent castle, the walls of which were living trees linked together.
Standing at the gate was a golden figure. “You have healed our island,” the phoenix king cried gratefully to Wind-voice. Toucans and birds of paradise surrounded them. “We have waited three years for your coming! So has birdkind. Look!”
On the horizon, thousands of birds were arriving to witness the awesome arrival of the hero. Those who could not fly were riding on the backs of those who could or were arriving in hot-air balloons. Birds were swimming, too, and some even sailed there in boats. Hour after hour, more birds flooded Kauria.
At noon the ceremony began.
As Wind-voice stood on a balcony listening to Pepheroh’s words carrying to the birds who’d come from far and wide, a thought that had buzzed persistently around his head like a bee bothered him again. Maldeor had said that birds fell into two categories: good and evil. For a time Wind-voice had wondered if that might be true…but…
No, the world was not split distinctly like two wings on a bird: white and black, good and evil. There was gray, plenty of it—like Dubto, caught between his compassion and his loyalty; like the eagles of Skythunder, who thought it was right to disown their own prince; like Stormac, brave and loyal, but fighting the weakness that had, in the end, taken him to his death. Perhaps even like Maldeor. Wind-voice felt calmer then, as if he had passed a test.
Indeed, life is full of tests, he thought. You don’t know what they are, so you must treat everything in life with the same care you would bring to a test on which your future rests. I realize that the most important test of all, Wind-coice marveled, in my quest, and in every bird’s quest, is the test to be the master of fate.
“Wind-voice.” Pepheroh called gently to him.
He turned to face the phoenix, bowed deeply, and knelt down. In his claws he held the sword, offering it to the king. The phoenix grasped the hilt. He held the sword solemnly before him, and the birds below were quiet. Wind-voice opened his left wing. King Pepheroh ran the flat of the blade slowly along it. The metal felt cool and heavy. “May your heart be strong and true, forever passing on the meaning of love and friendship,” the phoenix said.
Wind-voice spread his right wing. The blade stroked it as well. “May your mind be brave and just, forever showing us the importance of peace and freedom. Now rise,” murmured the king, and then louder so that everybird could hear: “Rise!” His old, fatherly face broke into a deep smile, and he held the sword out to Wind-voice. Wind-voice closed his claws slowly around the hilt. They turned to face the sea of silent birds, and Pepheroh firmly wrapped his own claws around Wind-voice’s. They raised them high so that all could see the light glinting off the blade. Pepheroh called out, “From now on, Wind-voice shall be also known as Swordbird!”
“Swordbird! Swordbird! Swordbird!” Wave after wav
e of deafening cheers rose.
Wind-voice stood there, dazed. A choking joy mingled with a deep gratitude filled his whole being. Such an honor it was, to be given the responsibility of caring for birdkind.
“Thank you. There are heroes all among us. Without many birds, I might not have achieved this today. I want to thank my companions, Winger the woodpecker and Fleydur the eagle, for their support, poems, and songs. I want to thank Stormac the myna”—Wind-voice touched the berry charm around his neck—“who was like a brother to me. I want to thank Fisher, Rhea, Kari, Gwendeleine, and the birds of their tribe for their help and care, and I want to thank all of you here. I also want to thank my mother, Irene. I don’t know who my father is, though—”
“Perhaps your father is the Great Spirit,” said Pepheroh, smiling.
“Then I want to thank the Great Spirit too.” Wind-voice gazed into the sky. He took a deep breath. He addressed everybird. “We are all heroes. One hero isn’t enough. We must all take care of one another.” A new wave of applause traveled from one end of the crowd to the other. Birds fluttered together in the sky, forming the words “Peace,” “Freedom,” “Love,” and “Justice.”
He had started this—this nightmare, this dream, the journey, this…quest—as a muddled youngster, weak, wanting only to escape violence and servitude. Yet instead he had unexpectedly found glowing treasures—Stormac’s wooden berry, Winger’s harp, Fleydur’s songs. He had found his place. He had found himself.
Closing his eyes, he heard snatches of conversation from a long time ago:
“When is this hero coming?”
“Soon, soon.”
He opened his eyes, smiled, and saw thousands of birds cheering before him. The hero was ready now.
18
EXCERPT FROM EWINGERALE’S DIARY
—EXCERPT FROM PAGE 341 OF “EWINGERALE’S DIARY” IN THE OLD SCRIPTURE