His quiet statement of defiance struck his friend hard and Mkai watched as Fsol stood and started pacing before the empty hearth.
“How can you do such a thing?” Fsol finally asked stopping and sitting once more. “This could work! We could win Heaven! Why would you risk it all? The As’rai destroy us when they can, why do you think this As’hame will be any different?”
Mkai shrugged. “He may not be, but I think, of them all, he will give me space to speak. Once he hears all I know, I think he will accept me. If not, he may destroy me. It matters not, my friend. I have had my fill of this existence. I’m tired. So very tired. As long as he listens to me and acts to prevent this from happening, I don’t care if he kills me. As long as he listens.”
“But why?”
Mkai gestured. “Aren’t you tired of all of this?”
“How can you be so short sighted? We could win Heaven! And you would ruin our chances?” Fsol said, anger lacing his voice.
“Because I chose wrong last time, as did you. We have a chance to make up for it this time. Come with me, my friend.” Mkai implored, “Come with me and help me save the world.”
“No!” Fsol cried, “I can’t see any reason to risk all we could win for the barest hope.”
Heart breaking, Mkai watched his oldest friend, the closest to a true brother he had ever had, begin pacing in front of the empty hearth. He was getting more worked up with each step and it was then Mkai realized one of them would not leave this room. He sighed to himself and slowly stood to face his friend.
“I understand your fear Fsol, but honestly how can this life be more horrible? Ever since she took over things have been worse than ever. I know you’re not happy with some of the things that have been happening. Can you imagine for a moment what it would be like if she accomplished her goal?” Mkai said, leaning on the back of the couch, three short steps from his friend.
“Do you think God would allow her to take over Heaven? He might not destroy the humans but there is nothing stopping Him from simply obliterating us with a thought. Invading Heaven would accomplish nothing.” Mkai said, need rasping in his voice.
“I don’t ask you to believe, though I wish I could convince you.” Mkai paused stepping closer, “But I do ask that you not stop me. I won’t force you to do something against what you believe. Please extend the same courtesy to me.”
Fsol stopped his pacing and looked at Mkai, anguish apparent on his scaled face. He met Mkai’s eyes momentarily before dropping his gaze to the floor. Mkai could see the conflict tearing at his friend and hope stirred in his chest. It fizzled, twisted up and died as he realized he had no real choice. This was too big, too important to risk, even for Fsol. He steeled himself and took the final step, holding his right arm out to his friend.
“If you can’t, brother, at least give me some time to get away, a chance to follow my own path.”
Mkai watched, breath stuck in his chest, as Fsol stared at him. He sighed with relief when Fsol’s shoulders slumped in defeat and he nodded.
“For you, Mkai, for all that we had together I will wait.” Fsol said quietly. “I can give you two hours to get clear before I have to report this to Kalia. That should give you a solid head start.”
“Thank you,” Mkai said and embraced his friend, “The world thanks you for this chance.”
A tear broke free and slid slowly down Mkai’s scaled cheek as the dagger he had pulled from behind his belt slid between his friend’s ribs. Fsol stiffened with a gasp and he clutched at Mkai. He stumbled on knees suddenly gone weak and Mkai caught him before he could fall. He carefully eased Fsol back onto the couch, the dagger hilt standing up tall, a slight quiver in it as the skewered heart tried to keep beating.
“I am sorry, brother. More than you can ever understand. But this is bigger than you and me, more important than either of us. She cannot win. It would mean the end to everything. And I couldn’t risk it. Be at peace, and if there exists anything for us after death, wait for me. I doubt I will be long.”
Tears fell freely as he watched Fsol’s eyes dim. With a final rattle, he let go and death claimed him. Mkai arranged him on the couch, refusing to look at his dagger. With two gentle fingers, he closed Fsol’s lids and rising, quickly gathered together a couple things. Opening the mantle he gently took out the small doll.
“You will be avenged. After so long.” Mkai kissed the doll softly and placed it back into the mantle and closed it with a click.
***
Two days later found him standing in the shadows of an alley. His journey had been uneventful until now and his nerves were stretched thin waiting. He watched As’hame, the angel he had come for, as he worked through a gang of human thugs. They had come to prey upon a defenseless woman and the As’rai showed them why it was such a bad idea. Mkai tried to calm his beating heart. He prayed he’d be allowed to speak and couldn’t help but chuckle at the thought of a demon praying. The angel sent the last of the thugs running and Mkai judged it was time to speak.
“You enjoyed that a little much, don’t you think?”
***
Matthew has been obsessed with reading (and writing) since he could walk. Coming home on the first day of kindergarten mad because he couldn't read was just the first sign. It has just steadily got worse and the fascination with creating worlds with words finally exploded. This spring will see his first book, In Heaven's Shadow, in print. Edited by the fantastic Annetta Ribken, he is quite excited to share it with the world.
He lives in the Great White North...no not as far as Edmonton—in Calgary, Alberta Canada. Born and raised (notice the avoidance of the phrase grew up...) in a small town the move to the big city was a bit of a shock. He's traveled around a bit and that has helped broaden his experience. All of which comes out in his writing.
You can find Matthew here: authorsnotes.ca
***
DEATH
Transformation
By Timothy Bryant Smith
“Rose?”
Rose stirred in her sleep.
“Rose, sweetie, I need you to wake up.”
She cracked one eye open to see her mother leaning over her.
“Com’n, Rosie…you have to get up.”
Rose peeked her eyes open a little wider this time. Something wasn’t right. Usually, when her mother woke her up, the first rays of sunlight were already beaming down on her face, illuminating the walls of her bedroom in the light of daybreak. It was still dark…and wasn’t it Saturday? No school today, she remembered, why was Momma waking her up so early in the morning? She muttered something under her breath and turned over in her bed in protest.
“Rose. Now. Momma needs you to get up and get dressed right now.”
She didn’t sound angry, but she wasn’t kidding around either. Momma's voice sounded weird, too; gravelly and hoarse…stern but somehow sad. Rose wasn’t sure if she was in trouble or not.
“What, Momma?” Rose muttered, “What’s going on?”
A drop of liquid splashed down on Rose’s forehead as her mother stroked her hair. Rose opened her eyes all the way to see her mother’s face. Even in the dark, with just the hall light shining through the bedroom door, Rose saw something was wrong. Her mother’s eyes were puffy, her nose red and raw, her cheeks flushed, and she was fully dressed in her jeans and favorite Grateful Dead t-shirt.
“It’s your Pee Paw,” Rose’s mom whispered. “We’re going to go see your Pee Paw.”
They spent the next few minutes getting Rose out of bed and into some clothes. Rose’s mom packed her toothbrush, a few changes of clothes, and even grabbed her favorite comic, “V for Vendetta”, to put into the book bag she toted every day back and forth to her fourth grade class.
Rose knew it was going to be a long trip if they were going to see Pee Paw. He lived in Tennessee and it was an “all-day-long trip” in the van before they got to where he lived. Rose didn’t mind the time it took, though. She loved to see her grandfather during summer vacations and
there were always plenty of cool things Pee Paw would have planned for her when they’d visit.
Two summers ago, he’d taken Rose hunting for a week in the woods with nothing more than what they could carry in their backpacks. He’d taught her how to read a map with a compass, how to make a campfire with a flint, and how to boil water from the streams to cook with and to drink. He also taught her the constellations in the night sky while they ate.
Last summer, they tracked a buck in the woods for nearly two days before they found him munching peacefully on some wet, green grass in a small lea. When Rose unslung her rifle to take the shot, her Pee Paw quietly motioned to her to put her gun away. For the next hour Rose watched, crouched in a thicket, as her grandfather slowly closed the distance between himself and the buck—about thirty yards—from upwind, in broad daylight, not making so much as a sound. And when he’d gotten close enough, he smacked the deer on its butt with his hand.
The buck, instantly terrified, jumped straight into the air, kicking wildly about, and bolted away into the woods, never to be seen again. Pee Paw just laughed and laughed as he walked back to where Rose lay in the woods with her rifle.
“Why didn’t you shoot it, Pee Paw?” Rose asked him, astonished by what she’d just seen. “Why’d we track him for so long if we weren’t gonna shoot it?”
Rose’s grandfather looked sternly, but spoke to her in his gentle way.
”Listen to me, Rose. Any fool can kill something. It takes no skill to kill,” Pee Paw’s stern gaze dissolved quickly into the familiar smile Rose knew and loved. “I never said we’d hunt the deer to kill it. We hunted the deer to remind it of how much its life means. To remind it to be vigilant, to be aware; to live, fight, make babies, and survive. Yes, we could have killed it, but by sparing its life that deer now owes us a debt.” He then smiled slyly. “And one day, that deer now knows, we might come to collect.”
***
Rose slept most of the way in the back seat of the van. When she awoke, she saw the sun low in the sky. She counted the road signs for Knoxville becoming more frequent, and knew they were getting close. Normally when they went to see Pee Paw they would cross the big bridge over the Tennessee River. But this time Rose noticed her father turned a different way when they reached the city. Eventually, her dad pulled into the parking lot of a big building with lots of windows.
“Aren’t we going to Pee Paw’s cabin?” Rose asked.
Rose’s mother turned around in her seat, drew a deep breath, and looked at her daughter. “Pee Paw is inside the hospital, Rosie. There’s something I need to tell you, ok?”
“What is it, Momma?”
“Pee Paw’s heart has been very sick and last night it stopped working.”
“Is he gonna be ok?” Are we still going to go camping?” Rose asked.
“I don’t think so, sweetie. Pee Paw’s heart has been sick for a long time and the doctors told us it was time to say goodbye.”
"Say goodbye?" Rose repeated back to her, not fully understanding what her Momma was saying.
Rose’s mom drew in a deep breath. She tried to let it out slowly before answering, but Rosie saw the stoic face she’d kept plastered on her face all day start to break down.
“Yes, Rosie,” Momma half-sputtered. Her lips drew tight, her chin started to wrinkle, and tears streamed down her face. “He is going to pass very soon. So we have to be strong, ok? We have to not be scared and tell Pee Paw how much we love him.”
***
As they walked into the hospital, Rose and her dad each held one of her Momma’s hands. Rose’s mom warned her that Pee Paw wasn’t going to look very good and there would be a lot of machines and tubes. She said it would make it hard to see him like he used to be…and it was important to try not to ask too many questions.
They rode in the elevator to the 13th floor. As the doors slid apart, Rose saw a big desk with nurses and TV monitors. Her nose wrinkled at the odor of Mr. Clean and band-aids. She saw her Uncle Bishop and his girlfriend, along with her Aunt Faith, talking to one of the nurses behind the desk. Rose’s mom and dad hugged everyone and more tears and conversations followed, conversations Rose didn’t understand. She didn’t care, really. She just wanted to see her Pee Paw.
A white-haired doctor spoke with the adults as they walked down the hall to room 13-22, using words like “resuscitate”, and “heroic measures”. Rose waited patiently with her hand in Momma’s, and remembered not to ask any questions.
The florescent light tubes in the hall ran the length of the ceiling in pairs. Rose noticed a couple of bulbs had burnt-out or flickered on one side or the other. It reminded her of the last night she’d stayed with Pee Paw the previous summer at his cabin in the woods.
***
She and her grandfather settled into a nightly ritual of sitting on the porch, Pee Paw with a Pabst Blue Ribbon in one hand, a funny smelling cigarette in the other. Rose sipped off the cache of Diet Dr. Pepper Pee Paw procured for her and relentlessly masticated on a piece of venison jerky he made in his smokehouse out back. They sat in silence for the most part that last evening, listening to the sounds of the Tennessee summer night. The pale blue bug zapper occasionally arced off, announcing the introduction of yet another moth to its sudden and electrified end.
“Why do the moths fly into the light, Pee Paw?” Rose asked. “Don’t they know they’ll die?”
“Because the light calls to them,” her grandfather answered.
“Aren’t they afraid to die?” Rose said, “Don’t they want to live?”
“There’s a big difference between being afraid to die and no longer wanting to live, Rosie. A moth isn’t born a moth, you know. It’s born a worm.” Pee Paw drew deeply off his funny smelling cigarette, held his breath for a moment, then blew the smoke out into the Tennessee night air before continuing. “It hatches from an egg attached to a leaf, high in the trees where the light of the sun keeps it warm, way up in the sky. When the worm hatches, it falls far away from the light and onto the earth where it lives its life as a sticky, helpless thing.”
“So it has to become a moth to fly back to the light?” Rose said.
“Yes, but it has a journey to make first before it can return.”
“I don’t understand," Rose said through a mighty yawn. Her legs still burned from the trail hike they took earlier that day, but she loved these talks with Pee Paw.
“After the worm falls from the light, it spends its life in the cold wet mud looking for food and trying protect itself. It has a sad and lonely life. It only knows hunger and helplessness,” Pee Paw flicked the nub of his rolled cigarette off the end of his porch and grabbed his beer. “Its life in the mud is hard, full of suffering and danger. Most worms end up as food for other animals, so worms spend their time digging deeper and deeper into the mud, into the cold and darkness, hoping to escape these dangerous things. But the worm can only dig so deep before it grows tired and weak, so when it is done running from what it fears, it stops and becomes still.”
“Like it freezes?”
“More like it surrenders, but yeah.”
“What happens?” Rose yawned again. Rose saw her Pee Paw smiling at her in the dark. She loved hearing his stories, but she was so tired. The harder she fought to stay awake with him, the sleepier she seemed to get.
“When the worm finally surrenders to what it fears, and becomes still in the cold and darkness, it can feel the warmth of the sun heating it from above. That warmth calls out to the worm and draws it back towards the warmth and light.”
Rose listened to her Pee Paw’s voice as he spoke; steady and calm—low but with a consistent strangely sad cadence. His eyes searched out into the darkness of the woods as the words continued to flow from his mouth. It seemed to Rose as if her Pee Paw was not explaining, but remembering.
“Very few worms make it back to the surface, but those who make it do so knowing they must strive for the light rather than survive in the darkness."
“What happens,
Pee Paw?” Rose whispered as the sound of her Pee Paw’s voice lulled her closer to sleep.
“It must climb the great tree from which it fell, Rosie. The tree that will take it closer to the embrace of the Sun. When it reaches the top, the worm offers itself to the light.”
“How?” Rose’s eyes drooped…
“It wraps itself in a cocoon and hangs upside down from a single, silken thread where it waits.”
“Waits for what, Pee Paw?”
“It does not know…” his voice trailed off into the night air along with smoke he exhaled from his lungs.
Rose never heard the rest of the story of the worm’s journey and its transformation into the moth. She awoke the next morning in a warm bed, and felt sad when her mom and dad picked her up the next morning. She hugged her Pee Paw goodbye, as she always did, and promised to call him when she got home. Which, like every good grandchild, she never did.
***
Walking hand in hand with her mother and father down the florescent-lit hallway of the hospital, she wondered what she was about to see, and felt scared. Very, very scared.
As the door to room 13-22 opened, she saw a tiny room. Two beds, one by a window with the last of the day’s sunlight shining through onto the wall above it, and the other next to a small bathroom door. She saw someone’s feet sticking out from underneath a blanket on the bed by the window and heard all sorts of machines making strange noises—chirps and whistles, buzzers and blips. Rose decided it would be best if she stayed hidden behind her mother’s and father’s legs until someone told her what to do and where to stand.
“Daddy?” Her mother leaned over the bed of the person with the exposed, white, bone-like feet. Rose could not see her Pee Paw, as the rest of his body was hidden from Rose’s view by her mother’s body and a large machine with numbers that blinked like her alarm clock at home.
“Daddy? We made it. We’re here,” said Rosie’s Momma.
Allegories of the Tarot Page 14
