by Thomas Sabel
“What does that mean?” asked Edgar
“I haven’t any idea,” Ulrik replied, rubbing his forehead in confusion.
Barty called from around the bluff, “It means you’d best wake up and follow me. Hurry on.” Barty cursed the mule as it brayed loudly.
“We’d better go after him, if for no other reason than the sake of the mule,” Ulrik said. Edgar’s deep laughter echoed off the bluff’s walls as they hastened down the path to Barty and joined him.
CHAPTER FIVE
When Ulrik rounded the corner of the bluff, he saw that his cousin had told the truth. The pathway meandered on for miles down the shallow valley, lazily winding through a garden of bright wildflowers. Because of his urgency, Ulrik wanted the path to cut straight through to the other side.
“Come on, isn’t it great!” called Barty. He tugged on the obstinate mule and shouted, “Move, you dumb animal.” He swatted its rump with the flat of his hand, raising a small dust cloud. The mule snorted and obediently trudged down the path. “This poor dumb animal doesn’t know when he’s got it good,” he commented. Barty’s argument with the mule gave the other two an opportunity to catch up. Ulrik agreed that this road offered a better prospect than attempting to make their way through the swamp and bog.
They walked on in silence for more than an hour until Edgar broke the quiet. “Uley,” he said in a half whisper. “It’s quiet here. It hurts my ears.” A deep silence gripped the land. The grass on the path muffled their footsteps so that only the occasional snort of the mule or the creak of the leather packs on its back broke the stillness.
“What are you two whispering about?” Barty asked. “Bothered by the lack of noise? Nothing wrong with peace and quiet, but if you don’t like it, I’ll change it.” He cupped his hands in front of his mouth, leaned back his head and let loose what he intended to be a powerful yodel. The noise traveled a short distance and died. “That’s odd. I used to be able to yodel for a mile or so.” They closed ranks and walked closer together.
Edgar and Barty looked to Ulrik. “Maybe we should sing,” Ulrik said.
“Sing what? And what would it matter, this place crushes sound,” Barty replied.
“Let’s sing a song Helga taught us.” Edgar said hopefully.
“Don’t know that one. I didn’t hang around the kitchen like you two.” said Barty.
“I’ll teach you,” Edgar proudly said. In gentle tones Edgar began to sing:
“Have no fear, little flock;
Have no fear, little flock;
For the Father has chosen
To give you the Kingdom;
Have no fear little flock.”
Ulrik joined him on the second verse, “Have good cheer, little flock.” The memory of Helga’s kitchen gave him courage that remained as long as he sang.
Barty scoffed at their singing, but then tried to join in as they sang the verses through a second time. As long as they were singing on the pathway, they kept the stillness at bay. The moment they stopped, the silence oppressed them, and so they sang the simple hymn over and over until they exhausted their jaws. By the time they grew too tired to sing, their wandering had taken them deep into the valley, following the labyrinthine pathway forward but never sure of their progress. With no roads branching off, they had no opportunity to go anywhere but along this single path.
“Barty,” Ulrik asked, “why doesn’t your path have any sound? Not even the buzz of insects, no bees, no mosquitoes, nothing.”
“It’s not my path,” Barty snapped back defensively. “And I don’t know. At least we’re not being bitten by pesky bugs.”
“Only flowers live here,” Edgar observed.
When they were singing and walking, they hadn’t paid attention to the flowers that lured them to follow the path. The blossoms and leaves on the top of the stems were perfect and flawless, but immediately below the glimmering colors and various shades of green, the colors changed to a sickly brown except for long red tendrils interwoven through the stems.
The sun’s brightness kept them trudging on, each footstep more tiring than the last. When the light began to fade so did their strength. At sunset Barty threw down his pack and sat in the middle of the path. “I’m tired and I’m not going on.”
Ulrik looked to Edgar who looked back for an answer. The big man was exhausted as well. He would have gone on if the prince had said so. Ulrik’s legs ached. He sat down and gestured to Edgar to do the same. Since they’d met no one, they assumed that the path was not well traveled, even though it was well tended. The middle of the path struck them as the safest place to rest. Surprisingly, the mule lay down in the middle of the path as well. Without bothering to eat or drink they stretched out and quickly fell asleep.
The warm earth soothed and comforted Ulrik, lulling him into a deep sleep and into a dream. In his dream, a woman greeted him— familiar but not fully recognized. He wanted to go to her, to be with her, to be held by her, to listen to her gentle voice singing to him. He went willingly, drawn by her beguiling voice and the promise of a tender embrace. Was she his mother who had crossed back from death to love her son? How he hoped.
He began to cry, not in the dream, but with genuine tears. His sobs revealed his loneliness, and persistent longing for the one he had lost and had never known. He tried to call to her but his paralyzed throat only croaked. But in the dream he called out to her. He made his way to her, to her love, to her song until finally he was with her. She embraced him, and he felt her care, her gentleness, her song around him. The rhythm of her singing combined with the rocking of her arms gave him the place he longed to be- he had met his goal. Nothing else mattered now, nothing at all. Gone was everything but the need to be held tightly and surrender to the woman he believed to be his mother.
“Hold me now, hold me closely, hold me tight,” he said in his dream. “Don’t ever let me go.”
“Yes, my dear, as you ask.” Ulrik felt her arms tighten around him, completely around him—arms and then legs and feet.
“Take me with you,” he said in his dream.
“Yes, my dear, as you desire.” Her embrace grew tighter and tighter as he felt himself being pulled along, being taken away with her, taken far away from the land of …
“Uley!” He heard Edgar’s voice.
“Go away,” Ulrik thought, “let me dream on and on forever.”
“Uley!” Edgar began pulling on him. “Uley! Wake up!”
“Go away. Let me sleep and dream.”
“Uley, no!” He was half-awake and wanted to go back to sleep. He felt Edgar uproot him, tearing him from the ground.
“God, help me!” the big man cried and with one great heave wrenched Ulrik free. Ulrik heard sounds like ropes snapping around him as Edgar threw him over his shoulder and began to run. Still half asleep, he had no sense of what was going on. He saw the empty outline of his body where he had lain and now he was being carried into the darkness. “Mother,” he murmured.
Edgar ran as fast as he could, straight across the valley, trampling the flowers, snapping the fragile stems, heedless of the winding path. At last they were out of the valley. “Edgar, let me stay. I want to go back, let me go back to sleep.”
Edgar said nothing but plunged on toward a light that appeared impossibly far away, a small light in a cottage window. When he was close enough, he bellowed for help. Nothing happened so he bellowed again, running as fast as he could, carrying the prince. The door opened, throwing more light into the night. Edgar ran into the cottage, past a man standing in the doorway, and unceremoniously plopped Ulrik in the nearest chair.
“Please, help my Uley,” Edgar pleaded. Ulrik, as if sleepwalking, got up and moved to the door, still drawn by his dream. Edgar noticed, grabbed him by the shoulders and yelled into his face while shaking him. “No! Wake up!” Ulrik tried to get past him, his eyes looking beyond him back towards the valley. Edgar did what he had never done, nor believed possible: he slapped the prince across the face. Ulrik was st
artled, shocked and awake. Confused, he looked around, unable to understand what was going on.
The moment that Edgar saw that Ulrik was awake, he ran back out the door calling, “Must get Barty.”
“Don’t let him out the door, Elijah.” said a woman with a voice of wisdom grown from imperishable roots. “Take him out through the back and dunk him in the water trough. I’ll put the kettle on.” A few minutes later a wet and shivering prince was led back into the cottage. “Here he is Joanna, what do you want done with him?”
“Don’t dry him off. The chill will wake him up. Set him over in the corner, away from the fire.” Elijah brought him in and Ulrik, dripping water, sat on a low stool shivering. “Drink this quickly.” A steaming mug was placed in Ulrik’s hand; he took a tentative sip. “Don’t sip it, swallow it quickly,” she commanded. He took a gulp and his face went sour. “It’s not meant to taste good, it’s meant to wake you up,” she said. Obediently, Ulrik gulped the hot, bitter tea. Each swallow nudged the dream away until it began to fade.
“Mother,” he whispered and began to sob.
“The dream wasn’t real,” said Joanna. She handed him a blanket. “Now that you’re awake you can wrap up in that. Go stand by the fire to warm up. Don’t sit down. Move around.” He did as ordered. The more he shuffled around with the blanket, the more he woke up. Edgar came crashing in again with Barty on his shoulder. Barty slept on, muttering about a big win with one more roll of the dice.
“Do the same with him,” she said. “Dunk him out back. The big one can stay. He’s untouched by the dreams.” She went over to Edgar. She stood less than half his size. She reached up high and thumped him on the back. “Good work. Very few could do what you did.”
A sopping, shivering Barty was brought in and plopped on the same stool Ulrik had recently occupied. Barty’s eyes were open but failed to focus on anything in the cottage. “One more roll, please,” he groaned. The woman shoved a mug of the same tea Ulrik had drunk into Barty’s hands with the same command to drink it. He didn’t, only holding it in his hands. She put her mouth to his ear and shouted, “Drink it, you young fool. Drink or die.” He meekly drank.
Edgar accepted his cup of tea, his large hands engulfed the mug as he drank and questioned, “Uley?” Ulrik turned to hear his friend ask, “You all right now?”
Before he could answer, Joanna went to Edgar and said, “He’ll be all right. Don’t worry. You got him out in time. You got both of them out before it was too late. I don’t know how you managed it, but you did.”
Barty, still on the stool, began to wail, “I almost won, I almost had it all. One more roll could have done it.
“He’s coming out of it,” she said. She made Ulrik sit down on a bench beside her as she explained, “The dream continues to hold onto his mind, the same as it did to yours when you were brought here. These dreams are deadly. That place you came through is a death-trap, beautiful to look at and very inviting, but still a death-trap. It lured you in to wander around, twisted you to believe you were making progress when you really were not. As you tired, the aroma of the flowers lulled you to sleep and once you were in a deep sleep, the Dream Demons came. They sent tendrils to wrap around your body to gently hold you down; they entered your mind and filled you with dreams so beautiful, so wonderful that you never wanted to wake, most people don’t.”
“What do you mean, they don’t wake up.”
“They sleep and dream unto death. Then flowers grow over them and they’re gone.”
Ulrik rose and went to stand by the fire. “What about my dream . . . my mother?”
“It wasn’t her. A demon read your mind to take hold of you with your greatest temptation.”
The pain of the loss for his mother came over Ulrik again. Several minutes later he asked, “What about Edgar? Why wasn’t he trapped? Why didn’t the Dream Demons get him?”
Edgar perked up at the sound of his name, “It was scary. Dreams tried to hurt Uley.”
The dim light from the fireplace lit the cottage. A table, a few stools, a single stewpot on the fireplace hook, a simmering kettle on the fender made up the contents of the cottage. In the corner opposite the door a ladder led through a hole in the ceiling to the sleeping loft.
As morning grew, the sun sent more light through the cottage’s single window, allowing closer inspection. The walls bore the color of the mud from which they were made, rough cast over wattle that poked through in the places where the daub wore thin. The table and backless stools bore the grey color of wood that had never seen paint or varnish. The exception to the drab furnishings was a small cabinet on the wall. The intricate carvings of the frame and door spoke of a craftsmanship of some forgotten time, as did the tarnished gilt workings revealing remnants of some kind of image once painted on the door, barely discernable now.
“My husband, Elijah, will be back soon; then we’ll have breakfast.” The pot on the fireplace hook rattled its lid in postive reply. “Nothing fancy, mind you.
“Whatever it is, it doesn’t smell fancy at all,” quipped Barty in a sleepy yet sarcastic tone.
“You best be quiet and give thanks that you are alive, young one.” she scolded. He sat more upright, anger beginning to flush his cheeks. “And don’t start looking all mad like. You do that and no breakfast for you.”
“A word of advice, lad, don’t ever get the one preparing your meal angry. It can prove to be a long time between meals,” said Elijah who had slipped back into the room. He motioned for them to pull stools up to the table. He took the bowls of steaming gruel from Joanna and placed them in front of their guests as each took an unadorned spoon from a tray on the table.
“Nothing fancy,” he said.
“I’ll say,” muttered Barty. Joanna reached out to snatch the bowl away. “But I’m thankful for it,’ he was quick to add.
Ulrik tasted the bowl’s contents and realized his cousin’s words were an understatement. Saltless, sugarless, and spiceless grain boiled long in plain water were offered. Barty did indeed eat it with thanksgiving for fear of losing it. Ulrik followed suit as did Edgar; the boys asked for seconds, Edgar for thirds.
“Plain food for rough times,” said the woman as she refilled the bowls.
By the time they were finished, the midmorning light flooded through the window. Edgar rose from the table, gave a long stretch, yawned and looked about the room as if searching for a place to nap. The cottage’s pair had gone off to a corner and whispered an argument. It was apparent who won, for Elijah put on his hat and left with a shrug of resignation.
Little time passed before he returned with a handful of long vines carried in a heavily gloved hand. Joanna wore the glove’s mate. She took the plants, placed them in a heavy, wooden bowl and began mashing them with a large pestle. Using a regular, practiced rhythm she ground the plants to pulp, chanting quietly over her work. While she mashed, Elijah took the empty bowls and set them by her. Each bowl had been scraped clean of the breakfast, leaving no need to wipe them. Each received one third of the mixture: plop, plop, plop. She turned, looked from Ulrik to Edgar, and took some from Ulrik’s bowl and put it in Edgar’s. Elijah carried the bowls to the table. Ulrik looked down into the mass of greenish brown pulp. The thick layer made the bowl look much deeper, as if it were a hole leading down, down through the table, past the floor, and into the earth. Ulrik was about to take up the bowl when the woman gave a warning. She held the kettle, hot and steaming in her hand. She poured the water into the bowl and the pulp began to release an aroma Ulrik yearned for.
“That’s right,” she said. “Breathe in the fumes. Good long breaths through the nose.” The travelers followed her orders. Each closed their eyes and inhaled. The fumes were neither sweet nor sour.
“That’s good, my boys. Through the nose all the way in, deeply, deeply,” she said as if repeating an ancient charm. “Deeply, deeply take it in and when ‘tis cool drink. Drink the top and only the top. Neither eat nor chew; keep greed at bay. Drink and be cle
ansed, my children, drink and be cleansed.”
The soothing repetition of her voice lulled them into following her command. The steam filled Ulrik’s head with emptiness. The deeper he inhaled the more his mind emptied. When the cup felt cool he began to drink, aware that the others were following the same rhythm. It tasted of nothing- if nothing could have a taste. As he drank, his feet took on the sensation of being purged, as if a valve had been opened so that his body could be flushed clear. This sensation moved up his legs- neither pleasant nor unpleasant but simply there. He continued to drink and the emptiness moved up to his stomach, then chest and through his arms. Before the empty feeling in his head met the emptiness of his body he looked up to see Elijah opening the once beautiful cupboard on the wall. The last thing he saw was a glimmer of gold and a portrait of a young man with very kind eyes looking out at him, eyes that broke through the veil of his heart, pulling his breath away until he fainted.
When the prince woke, the light through the window cast the same shadows as when they had been served their potions. What time was it? While he was trying to figure that out, something tickled his ear. He discovered, as he tried to brush it away, a bit of straw. That led to more straw until he realized he was lying on a pile of straw with a worn quilt thrown over the left half of his body. The rest of the quilt covered Edgar and half of his cousin, for all three lay next to each other on the heap of fresh straw. He looked over to the cupboard hoping it was still open so he could see the eyes and face of the portrait, but it was closed. All seemed as before except for the lingering aroma of some sweet, smoky perfume that was faintly familiar. Before his memory could recall the source of the smell, Edgar moved, sat up with a start, and looked around.
“Uley,” he whispered, “what happened?” He leaned over to Ulrik and whispered again, this time in his ear, “I’m hungry.”
“No doubt you are,” commented Barty who reached for the quilt and tried to take all of it. “Who knows how long we’ve been here.”
