by T. Wyse
"No, simply showing power was not enough. The observers must know of the artifacts themselves. This was a truth that the two saw, that as long as none knew of the artifacts themselves, their power would be untouched. They roamed the land as a pair of healers and miracle workers, taking little in payment, and doing what they considered to be good. Where there was famine they strode in, sharing knowledge and giving blessings upon the land, creating plenty where there had been little. Where they heard there was disease, they strode into the heart of the epidemic slicing into the plague and creating a cure. Where there was injustice they strode in, judging without error or pity."
"To you, these things would seem to be virtuous and wonderful. In those days the concepts of the three were versions unlike your own knowledge. Where they had cured the land of blight, they enraged the ancient druids who the people had turned their backs upon, and thus suffered their indifferent wrath. Where they had cured disease, they caught the dark omens of the gods of pestilence, whose wrath had turned upon the people who had become blind to the need for sacrifice to them. It was not these two who became the downfall of the Copper Egg and the Oaken Coin's swath of charity, but rather the hands of men."
"The justice they had dealt out caught the attentions of the knights, and through them the nobles. Through the nobles the king heard of them, and through the king his advisors and through his advisors those who knew of these things, of the subtler magic of the underlying earth. In those days much of the injustice was perpetuated by the knights and nobles upon the lower class, the peasantry, who were considered little but vassals. The two relic holders stood against that moray, seeing the injustice all of their lives, and finally empowered enough to take the unstoppable bull by the horns."
"It wasn't until their swath had cut into the kingdoms directly under the king of the borders that their path was finally ended. A nobleman had done terrible things, used people as dolls and tools, and tossed them away as trash in the dirt. The Copper Egg and Oaken Coin sentenced him to live the rest of his days in torment, hearing the voices in his waking, and feeling the earth closing upon him while he slept. His dreams were monotone and smothering, his waking hours were progressively maddened as time went on."
"It came to the king, who sent his hidden order of sages and priests to attempt to cure the man. They found the magic that was woven to be primal in nature, something beyond their experience, and something that would need to be undone by those responsible themselves."
"It was time for the king to face the two, a meeting he had hoped to avoid. The king was different than the leading nobles, and had found the path the Copper Egg and Oaken Coin to be one of inspiration, of hope and mercy. He knew that it would be impossible to simply gather the two to a meeting with his knights that force would be irrelevant to people with such power at their side. Instead he called for the least of his subjects, a task delegated to a trusted advisor. The advisor sent out a single little boy, from an impoverished family, but one utterly loyal to the kingdom."
"The Copper Egg and Oaken Coin were the ones to find the boy inside the wilderness, drawn to his suffering and his faithful spirit. They fed him, healed him, and clothed him, while keeping their secrets close to their hearts. The boy begged them to come speak to the king, that it was his only wish to do the sovereign’s bidding. The two refused to abide the request, and left him behind with enough food to return to his home."
"The boy did not return home, but followed the two of them. They knew he followed them but felt that if he saw the things they did, the difference that they made, that his loyalty to the king would be overcome and that he would give up on his small mission. This was not so, however. The boy had been chosen both because of his wretched situation, but because his fealty to the king was unwavering, even in the face of the death of his family while the kingdom looked on with indifference. There had been no reward promised to the boy, no mercy would follow his task. The boy was simply loyal because it was all he had known, all he could hold on to."
"The boy followed them and watched them as they performed their miracles. He saw them cure the sick, to ease blight, and to dole out justice in favor of the common folk. Rather than melting his heart, he found the actions they took deplorable, their motives in utter error."
"As he followed them for three days, observing them as a subtle shadow, he came to know something of their power. He could feel the power's source inside his mouth, a weight beyond his eyes. The source was with them somehow, and was substantive, something he could hold in his hands, as the sages had told him was possible."
“He had been given the wisdom of truth, the flawless insight of the three, yet he had rejected them wholly. His blindness lead him to keep watching, though he had already seen everything they could offer. It was upon the fourth day that he changed, taking action instead of simply observing.”
"The relic holders knew of the truth of three, and were as blind as the boy. They were so sure that he had left their shadows that they took to camp, unchecked and undefended. He stole upon their camp and found the possessions with little difficulty. They had many things, foolish baubles and gaudy artifacts, but it was the two relics which shone outwardly. It took the eyes of the child to see the simplicity and crudeness, the weight beyond the lusterless rusted surfaces of the relics.”
“The two woke to him searching their possessions, but would not strike at him, the kindness in their hearts preventing them from violence against someone as misguided as he. This proved to be their downfall, and he escaped into the night. The boy was quick enough to use the magic within the artifacts instantly. The boy had become both the Copper Egg and the Oaken Coin."
"Usually the story would speak of the boy becoming a trickster, abusing the power of the relics for his own amusement and gain. Perhaps in another story he would have taken the relics and his family away from the kingdom, leaving the two foolish lovers to themselves, thankful that they still had each other. In this story however the boy brought them back to the king, wrapped up in a filthy cloth to hide them from prying eyes."
"He presented the cloth to the king, and began to speak of what they were. He didn't know the rules of the objects, but he could feel the power they had even through the cloth. The king too, could feel the substance of the things, and eagerly unwrapped them."
"The king looked at the objects a moment. 'What are these?' He asked one of his advisors. 'They are nothing m'lord, useless baubles.' The sage replied, and he was correct. With the three words the king had spoken, the sureness and fragility of their power had been all but extinguished. The advisors sought to punish the boy, but the king knew better, and sent him to his family, with enough reward to help them live in comfort for many generations."
"The king, unsure that they had been disarmed fully, waited for more tales of the couple. They had stayed away from him, sparing him their wrath perhaps, or simply disinterested in meeting the man who had stripped their power away.”
“The reports of the two had stopped, their justice and curative path too had ended. Ensured by this, the king sent for them with the full fury of his guards and knights.”
"The two were brought before the king, whereupon he ordered everyone from his room. The two were unarmed and weak, and despite being a monarch the king was quite strong. He held the artifacts to them each, asking which belonged to whom."
"’They never belonged to us.’ The man who had been the Copper Egg sighed. ‘But rather they were ourselves. They have moved on from us now, and the inferno of their power is nothing but a kindling ember. Not enough to even bring comfort to the suffering.’”
"'As he said.' The woman who had been the Oaken Coin nodded sadly. 'There is a glimmer of the power remaining, but not enough to bring a single seed to life.'"
"The king begged them to know their stories, and they told the lineage of the artifacts and the stories of the bearers."
"'If only you had come to me in peace.' The king looked at them both in misery. 'Had you even come to ask my p
ermission to walk the lands, you could have acted as sages, in my employ. I wanted to change the way things worked, I wanted your mercy, your healing, and your justice. We, all three of us, are guilty, but I fear that it is your heads that the nobility is hungry for.'"
"The king promised them that he would still attempt to change, that he would use their choices and path as an inspiration for the remainder of his life. He told them of the reward given to the boy who had betrayed them, how his family would live in comfort for the remainder of their days. He promised them that they would be given a place of honor in burial."
"The two said nothing, and went to their fates without rage or curse. They had lost the thing which had given their dreams of a more kindly world substance and power, and they longed for release."
"They were buried in the cemetery, in places of relative honor, their headstones marked with stone etchings of the relics they had carried. Upon the mouth of the man, the king's servants had placed the egg. On top of the woman's right eye they placed the token. They had hoped that the act of returning their items would help, and the declaration of the king that their graves would be left forever untouched by robbers as long as his kingdom stood would avoid any curse from the gods for the actions they had taken."
"Their hopes proved wrong. Perhaps because of the crime they had committed against the two relic holders, or perhaps simply because the people expected it to happen, the kingdom was beset with three dark plagues. Their crops withered on the field, a great plague overcame the kingdom to the point that it seemed to be the end of the world, and the justice of the land became more desperate and chaotic, persecuting the noble and peasantry with an equal unfairness."
The tale had stopped. "So that's the end of the Copper Egg and Oaken Coin, then." Amelie murmured. The story had been rather needlessly dark, but those were the ways of the old world, she supposed. Perhaps the point was that the world was just not ready for that sort of kindness, that sort of mercy in those times.
He lay silently on the edge of her bed, the red of his eyes was gone once more. His fable was over, leaving only the flapping of crows in the night.
12
Life in the Menagerie
In the darkness Amelie dreamt. A great white cat, shining with nobility, bristling with power sat atop a mountain throne. The mountain jutted from the earth to the sky, an almost impossibly vertical ascent. Yet even with this obstacle, people made efforts to see him, to pay him homage. He was a trickster at heart, not because of malevolence, but because he believed misdirection and subtlety would allow them to grow stronger. He believed the lesson a soul learned itself, or at least believed it had learned itself, was the most potent variety.
He played with them, sometimes seeming gutturally cruel. A man, weeping, knelt before the creature, his pleas unheard by Amelie's intruding ear. The man, unsatisfied by the muffled, unknown reply, cast himself off of the cliff side. The great cat made no effort to stop him.
He played with them, sometimes kind. Another man, again in a state of near madness, of utter grief, came to the creature on bent knee. This time the great cat gave a somber nod. The man's face, alight with joy, descended the mountain, returning from whence he came.
She saw him in the waxing and waning of time, the passage of years. He remained ever the same, yet the people coming to see him changed. Their faces changed, their garb and tattoos changed, yet he was eternal. The followers began to turn to brashness, demanding, daring to stand before him. His kindness soured, his rage ignited. He became crueler, darker, yet still ever the same.
Then finally, they ceased to come. He waited a long time, a dearly long time. At last the great cat decided to stalk the earth, to demand of those who followed him, demand explanations, demand tribute, demand a satiation of the wrath he felt in his belly.
The creature had changed, ever so slightly, yet this variance was unthinkable to the eternal creature.
He leapt down from his mountain, the earth shook, lightning clouds erupted from his footsteps. He found his villages, he found them empty, uncared for, vacant.
He looked elsewhere, crossed deserts, mountains, hills, searching for what had become of his people. He found none of them, his borders expended he walked slowly back home, defeated by the unknowing itself. He slunk back to his mountain, and now he began to change outwardly. His great coat began to fade, the hairs trickled off, planting themselves in the ground, becoming silvered plants, weeping softly in empathy with the mournful creature.
He patrolled the lands in those times, growing ever wearier, ever more miserable. It was a place where he came to rest, upon a sun-heated rock, that he met a fellow traveler, a great crow. Amelie felt chills, felt naked even in the dreamlike memory. This crow, however, was not hers. It did not sense her, for it was merely an echo of the past. She saw into it, and saw that it was something different than the thing she had come to know, the difference being something intangible, but potent.
They spoke beyond Amelie’s ears, the cat lying down on the heated rock. The crow danced around him, tauntingly, provokingly. The great cat looked up with half interest, weary of the world he walked.
The crow continued his mad dance, the words not piercing the borders of the dream, then suddenly the great cat pounced, pinning the crow on the ground, massive claws locked the creature down.
"WHERE" The great cat bellowed, the word piercing through the wall of silence, shattering it. The very earth shook at the raging roar.
"Gone, gone foolish god. Stingy and tricking you were!" The crow's voice pierced through the broken veil of silence. "They sought out easier pickings, tired of your harsh dealings, your barren lands." The wall of silence began to return, the words became a whisper.
"Where." The cat rescinded its claws, lightening the load on the crow. The words were tiny, a buzzing nothingness.
"Across the great sea, far from your cruel claws, foolish god." The words faded into something not even a buzz. The crow laughed in silence, the cat spoke further nothings as well. Finally, the cat's head bowed and the crow left, cackling in mockery.
The old god, the ancient creature, took up residence there, on that very rock. He waited, for some fate unknown. His appearance grew wretched, faded, and his very form seemed to slip away. His radiance pooled like water, trickling down into the cracks of the mountain, becoming purest silver. In the end he was a wasted thing, his nobility gone, now a wretched primalistic beast.
He had nearly become so faded, so immobile, so uncaring that he had become stone. Yet in that darkness, there was a spark, a tiniest spark of light.
The world around him changed, sweeping across like the blackness of a blink. Even in this strange dream the veil of omission reigned, but she could understand it. It was the coming of the Silent Season, one far in the past. The form of the season was nothing but darkness to her, and for a lingering moment of eternity she was encapsulated in that blocked memory.
When the blackness passed finally he stood again, now a man. There were people once more, people who knew him. They were unlike those before, seeing him as a lower creature than the resplendent worshippers yet it was a sweetness to his being; he enjoyed his new role. He played with his people as before, and they acknowledged his importance, he tried to help them see him not only as a trickster but as an essentiality to their existence.
There came another blackness, it was unlike the blink of the Silent Season, coming slowly with time. Images of a constant state of the god of men flurried before her, then a sudden blackness overtook it. When this new darkness passed he was surrounded by another cadre of followers, though these towered over him, clearly different. The new people who knew him inspected him, dissected his very being. The blurred image resulted in another flash of omitted blackness, yet something was in there, something so familiar to her that it chilled her dreaming self.
And with that jolting chill she stared again into the carved white wall. The chill boiled into dread as her hands ceased the flurried motion and the pen trickled int
o her perceptions.
Yet the blue bladed grass trembled in the gentle wind once more. The invasive roots no longer nudged and drowned it. The warm golden aura surrounded her still, and nothing struck against it nor whispered into her ear.
She turned, allowing her senses to stretch out, and she again felt the intruder, but this time it was different.
The shape sat dead in the centre of the pen, hunched over. It still bore the cold veneer of tar, still the vague rounded edges, but now there was a clarity of form. It looked like a girl, smaller even than Amelie, wrapped up in a wrinkled and oversized cloak. She bore the contemplative pose and garb of some monk, arms clasped tightly so that if there were hands they were wrapped and unseen. Her legs showed the shape of being crossed but were again lost within the cloak. Only her face, from the nose down, showed a sort of clear and recognizable human shape, and even that was bobbed down as if in great thought.
The creature sat in a blob of its own golden light, a bare halo of warmth in the dark garden.
Her words echoed somewhere from the dreaming canvas of the pen. No more fear, just annoyance. Yet even annoyance didn’t follow her here. There was safety here, despite the things that had happened. She was only curious.
“Hello?” She crept up beside the creature, braced for some kind of monstrous striking out. The creature didn’t move, no breath crossed out from its lips. The words shot out in a green stream and tickled at the creature’s halo.
“Excuse me?” She leaned in closer, crawling with a catlike stealth and still not daring to cross more than half the distance from the wall. “I thought, I thought we could talk.”
“If you had come to me in peace,” the king’s words echoed from the wall.
“If you’re what…what you must be…then maybe we need to actually talk. You’ve spoken before, right?”
The creature’s head bobbed away from Amelie with a curious tinge, and then a great sighing breath echoed: “What.” It coughed out in a red cloud and then fell gently into the swaying grass below.