Entr’acte: Berceuse
Mother sang softly as the corner of my vision began to grow fuzzy. Her fingers hovered over the strings of her cittern, the instrument uttering but a whisper. I was battling sleep, as any boy would. I was being dragged by heavy lids and wondrous song into the comfort of rest. There I would dream of animals in the grass, of defeating monsters and villains of the old stories and wear glory like a crown and cape. I would dream of mud, and blood, and dirt, and pretty girls. I would dream of fights, and toys, glory, and adventure, and wondrous sweets.
And suddenly I remember something. It was a question that boyhood made an IMPERATIVE. Something needing to be answered at that very moment. With this realization my eyes shot open.
“Mother?” I said with building enthusiasm.
I heard her sigh through a smile and tilt her cittern away.
“Yes, Callum.” My mother did not match my volume. She spoke at a whisper. I wondered why. There was no one around for miles. We were camped between towns on our way to the village of Vistar. The stars had quieted to a dull shimmer above our dying fire and dinner was long in our bellies. We sat on a plane blanketed by yellowed grass, dotted with the occasional prickly weed. Her whisper cut the knight like a warm razor, and though I saw it as completely unnecessary, when I spoke again, I matched her volume.
“Will they have pies in Vistar?”
She gave a soft and whole-hearted laugh. “Did they have pies in Ashwick?”
“Yes.” I muttered. “But…”
“Did they have pies in Alrekhammer?” She leaned a bit closer.
“Yes! That’s where we had that delicious quince pie! But…”
“Did they have pies in Skohl Mosthy?”
“You know they did, mother! But they DIDN’T have pies in Terre!”
My mother’s smile curdled a bit, “Amongst all the world we’ve walked, in your five years upon the dirt, we’ve come across one town without pies, two years ago, and I still am haunted by the uncivilized culture that could carry on without the majesty of pie.”
“They also believed chestnuts are made by taking regular nuts, then pouring milk over them!” I spat defensively.
“Callum, I have explained on end that I believe the man who said such a thing to you, based on the status of his personal hygiene, was suffering from a soured mind, or fogged by poppy milk. Do not take a man like that seriously in any fashion other than as an example of poor choices and even poorer circumstances.”
“He also told me that I should look up Avice Bennett’s skirt. I know that I shouldn’t… but I get curious sometimes. Why would he tell me that?”
“Because he is a silly man, and wants to see little boys get a hard slap on the rear end if they EVER try such a thing.” My mother said sternly. “I was once a little girl like Avice and a little boy tried that once with me. I gave him a hard wallop, and his mother followed suit.”
“I won’t, mother. I promise.”
“You bet your cute little hind parts, you won’t!” My mother slid her hand along my jawline and let it rest below my chin. “Now my inquisitive pika, you must rest. We have much walking to do tomorrow, and you need to rest that head before I fill it again with lessons.” My mother called me pika, after what she described as the cutest, and the most mischevious little creature she’d ever encountered. She once awoke to a pika sleeping on her chest… only to discover it had eaten her shoelaces as she slept.
“I do love lessons! Will there be books? And music?”
“You’ve read all my books, dear pika. And there will always be music.”
I smiled and my mother brought her cittern up again to begin playing.
“Mother?”
“Yes, Callum?”
“What should I be when I grow up? I want to be like the heroes from your stories. Should I be like Great Grady and challenge mean old nobleman to duels for hurting people? Should I be like Csaba’s Cowled Wraith and steal whole tax wagons from the rich to give to starving mothers and children? Or a healer like Johnson Nicolas? I wish I could be a God King like Emperor Paultine.”
“Well Pika, Great Grady the Glorious drank himself to death, celebrating all of his victories. The Wraith was pinned to one of those tax wagons with arrows by a vicious Baron and his body burned in a city square. Johnson Nicolas could heal entire villages, but could not heal his own mind and went mad from the guilt of those he failed. But Paultine… Paultine’s empire was built by fear, and therefore is sickened by corruption and violence. He brought about an empire that destroys and burns those it can not control. It owns the ideas of it’s people, and that is evil at it’s most pure.”
“Yes, mother, but Paultine could call wear shadows, and summon the strength of storms. Paultine was a God!”
“You sound like the first people. Those who ended Csaba. I’ve taught you better. You must appreciate what is given to you. You will learn the power to strengthen minds and move hearts when you become adept with the True Song… and you do so at such an unheard of rate. You have your own story to weave into history’s tune. Take the time to sing it from your spirit. You will shape the world with the power you hold. Learn from the faults and misfortunes of Wraith. Become humble as Great Grady could not. Appreciate your OWN victories as Healer Nicolas could never do. You, my Callum, have new wonders for this world.”
“Ok, mother.”
She smiled, her thick red hair tumbling across her jawline.
“Mother?”
“One last question, pika.”
“Tell me again where father is.”
“He’s passed on, Pika. He’s gone from our world. But he is also still here. He is in our song. The true song. He lives in it, as everyone does. Melody carries memory. Tune for Truth. Lives and legends lie in her harmony. But your father lives in another song. In your very lullaby. Sleep while I sing.”
“Have you finished your grits, Pika?” My mothered called.
“YESHMUM!” I called through a mouth at full capacity.
“Eat slower or you’ll choke, Callum.” Mother scorned dutifully. “You eat as if someone waits to take the very food from your plate!”
“SHORY’M’M!” I swallowed hard. “So what are we learning today? Will I learn to shoot a gun today?!?”
“Callum, you know we don’t carry guns. We’ve no need to shoot anything!”
“Doesn’t mean I shouldn’t learn!” I said both defensively and pleadingly.
“I will not be the mother that gives a boy a gun under the guise of self-defense, knowing full well that a boy’s intent to shoot things will overcome my guidance will the second my back is turned!”
“But you beat up that bandit and shot him in the hand with his own gun back in Braystead! It was amazing!”
“You and I recall the energy of that moment quite differently, son. I was terrified… and I assume after I shot that bastard, the feeling was mutual.” She smirked devilishly. “In the end, the answer is no. Besides, Pika, you know the drill. Every morning, after morning meal, you sing the basics.”
My mother, Scartlett Ann Thayer, was a Keeper of the True Song. The Oral History of my culture is collected and graphed to rhythm and melody, in order for other’s to be more likely to remember and share with their children the songs of their ancestors. It began centuries ago, and is a pillar of our society. Keepers sing their songs for cities and solitary vagrants, in amphitheaters, and around campfires, in universities and stockyards. They are scholars that publish their findings directly into song to carry and distribute throughout the world. Pride cannot be a boundary for a keeper. The only restrictions a keeper must abide by are preserving the honor and truth of the true song, and asking only for what you require to continue your work as payment, often by donation.
Mother had carried a lyre for me, a gift from a noblemen when he heard she was with child. Another weight added to the pack of a pregnant woman, travelling the countryside for her calling. When my fingers became nimble enough, (and at the cost of sounding prideful, was not long) she gave me the lyre and began teaching me the basics of the song.
As a child, each morning after we would rise, my mother would prepare breakfast and I would help her pack up the camp. We would eat together as we completed our chores and then mother would call upon me to sing. The morning song was always acapella. Mother said it was to strengthen my voice… but as I grew older I could feel the reverence of not complicating the story with accompaniment, the purity of the past, sung through a new generation. It was best as a simple offering, pure and honest, like the best of prayers.
I would close my eyes in concentration and sing:
“Let us gather in grace with kin and kind
And share bread, flame and warm words
Our quarrels and rows be forgotten with time
And lend ears, lest the true song be heard…
Time began as a field of light,
Our creator, burdened to harvest the glow
So he used his will as a glorious scythe
And shaped the world we know.
He shaped the sheep and the shepherds,
He formed the willow and wind,
He cast the crests and the clover
Endowed us with light, so to live.
He shaped us with great swells in our hearts
And mirrored the shape in the seas
He nurtured and blossomed our thoughts
As we watched the same growth in his trees
The sun rose and fell upon all of our kind
And we grew into a curious nation
Shaping wonders cultivating our spirits and minds
But questioned our source of creation
His heart become swollen with fondness
For the peoples he formed with his hands
So he took form here as one among us
And was named Csaba, creator of man.”
My mother’s eye grew distant as I retold the creation story, her head bowed slightly in reverence. I told of Csaba’s brotherhood with man. I told of how he used his shaping powers to aid in the development of civilization, teaching us of fire, teaching us how to shape stone and wood, how to harness the strength of water to grind grain for bread, rather than by hand. Giving us the the strength of iron, that our society might grow into a prosperous people. I spoke of man’s early reverence and appreciation for Csaba’s gifts. And of man’s great fall, and the killing of a God. I would sing for quite some time every morning as I approached the end of the story, and the creed of the keepers, my mother’s eyes grew misty, as they always did. For something about the events seemed to be bound to her spirit, as if she’d lived them herself.
“Very good, Pika.” Mother softly choked out. “You are an unmatched student and your voice is pure.”
“Only under the will of Csaba…”
“Your talent is your own, the song belongs to Csaba, take credit for your achievements, as you would your faults.”
I paused. Mother rarely spoke against the doctrine of the Keepers.
“But mother…” I hesitated. She paused for a long moment… and then met my eyes.
“Not every path is divine, Callum. Not every event a blessing. I have shared with you the benefits of our order, but it is not without fault. Our order was made by men, not by Csaba. Though the order would never say it, they would not deny it either. We are imperfect, but we strive for perfection. You must find your place among the teachings and hold fast to what you believe to be honorable and true.”
I grew afraid. My lifelong teachings were being re-shaped before my very ears… by the teacher who both taught me and birthed me. I trusted no one more than my mother. Dare, I say I did not even trust Csaba as much as my mother, as I had never met the man and certainly had never seen him point a nine-gun in the face of a bandit to protect me.
“I don’t understand.” My voice was trembling. “Why are you saying this? Something has changed.”
“You learn at an alarming rate. I fear it may be too early to set you free but I can teach you no further under such dogma as the order instructs. History, just as our spirit, does not hold universal verity. Truth fits each spirit to its shape. Our disciplines leave little room for circumstance. You enter uncharted territory, son. It is not something you will find easily, or even quickly, but I do not wish to guide you too strongly, for it is wrong to force you to be someone you would not have been, yourself.”
“You’re leaving.” I said with some contempt.
“You are so quick, son. I will be here when I feel it is appropriate, but I will be taking you somewhere, to enter this new chapter in your life. You must learn from another. Please forgive me, I do not want to do this, but I must. You are growing beyond my teaching, Callum.”
“Do you abandon me? Do I fail you?”
“My sweet boy, you eclipse me. I am your mother, always. I will not leave you, until you trust yourself without me… but I can no longer tell you what to believe, Callum.” My mother drew close, kneeling down to set her eyes inches from mine. She placed a hand upon my cheek. “I only tell you TO believe. The rest you must find within you.”
I held her fingers in my hand.
“Come, son. We’ve much distance to Ayur.”