by Jeremy Marr
“Papa, I brought you some food,” a boy whispered.
The man opened his eyes and reality started to flood the void where sleep had abruptly taken off in search of a tired host to nap in. Lifting his head hurt his neck. He looked down and saw the Book of the Faithless opened up on the desk that had been chiseled out of the back rock wall where the Cave of Remembrance ended. He had fallen asleep while reading again. He knew because of prior experience with this, that pain would be keeping his back and neck company for a good, long time to come. His vertebrae groaned in protest to his arms straightening his upper body into a sitting position. Brendon-Jago then looked up at his son of nine years standing before him. Long, black hair fell off the boy’s head and rested on lean shoulders. “It is almost time to give the boy his own headband and step him up to TheOneRemembering,” he thought as he reached a hand out and patted the lads back.
“You, yourself, are too skinny, my son, to be wasting food on me,” he said. “How am I to eat knowing that it is taking that same food away from you?” he asked.
“Papa, it was a gift. It came not from the people. She wanted us to h...”
“Stop right there,” the OneWhoMustRemember interrupted the boy. “I am to believe that someone just gave you food, as a gift, on top of the food the People give me and my family? I am too old to believe such lies.” His tone of voice remained neutral and so did his grip on the boys shoulder. Not being able to see his son much was harder on him now then it was when he was the son growing up within the outskirts of the mountain. Not seeing his father much, except for the spell when he was learning how and what to remember, taught him why the short spells like now, when he could spend time with the boy, should never be spoiled by anger.
Jago remembered how his Papa died suddenly one day, while in the middle of one of his never-really-ending rants. Jago was twelve years of age. His papa was mid-way through a word, in the middle of a myriad, tempter tantrum explosion of words cutting young Brendon-Jago down about one of, according to his papa, a never-ending list of failures attached to his son when his papa’s face turned a deep red color. He placed one hand on his chest, and the other flew straight out to catch himself as he pitched forward. His inner being left his body and was off to the Eternal Darkness long before his body fell lifeless to the cave floor.
All these years later, Jago still believed it was the anger that finally killed his papa. This must have been what was meant in some of the writings held within the many books written by all the other OneWhoMustRemember before him. They wrote about how most in this station die from what was loved. "Don't love, don't get hurt," one wrote. His father had loved to yell and to be angry. In the end, he was killed by all of it that had collected within him over his entire life.
Jago planned to be much older before the boy at his side, Brendon-Kyle, was forced to take his Mama on the walk to the herding farm; the closest farm to them. That was not the hardest part of a death day, though. He truly wanted Kyle to be older for later that same day, when it was time to throw his father’s body off the Cliff of Offering, located further up the One-Day Mountain. This particular cliff was where all OneWhoMustRemembers were laid to rest after entering the Eternal Darkness.
After that deed was complete, the boy would have to travel out of the mountains to see the OneWhoPlaces for a woman of his own to birth him a son. Then there was the Act of Gathering, where the newest OneWhoMustRemember must gather whatever amount of wood he could find and add it to…
A gentle arm broke him out of the daydream.
“Papa, it is the truth,” the lad pleaded. “She said...”
Again, the man cut in, “Who is this ‘she’?” he asked.
“The lone woman in the house next to us, Papa,” the boy answered, looking his father straight in the eyes. “These potatoes came from her cellar garden. She said she boiled them last night to make them easier for her to chew, but she has grown tired of potatoes. She asked me to bring these to you and nobody else. She wanted you to know she sees how Mama treats us both when it comes to giving out the food given to us by the People. She is not going to allow another day where the men of the house eat little to nothing because someone else wants to eat all three meals brought to the house, four times a day,” Kyle continued.
“I hate to keep cutting into your story,” Jago said, “but as the OneWhoMustRemember, I get three PLATES of food a day, not MEALS. You should have said, ‘One plate for us all to share, three times a day.’ It says so in the book, and has been that way since the OneWhoBroughtUs brought us to this place over nine-hundred years ago.”
“Mama changed that, Papa,” the boy whispered. He knew that although his father never showed anger in front of him, he was capable of great fits that could be heard echoing across the mountain range that dominated the complete Northern section of the land. “She said that what the People were giving for food lacked substance enough for the OneWhoMustRemember. That the OneWhoMustRemember himself said he wants three meals, not plates, four times a day to make up the difference that he and the former men in his position were cheated out of. She also added that you would be mad if you had to come down and request it yourself.
After that, the people started bring three plates of food, four times a day.” With all that said, the boy could not contain his excitement any longer, and placed the small woolen bag into his father’s lap. He then looked up at Papa’s face with an almost blank expression.
Whispered or not, the way the boy said what he did told Jago that the lad really did not know what a horrible thing his mother had done. “No matter,” Jago thought, “I WILL come down off this mountain soon, and mad will not even begin to describe my mood that day.”
He then untied the sack and dumped the contents into his lap. Four of the largest potatoes he had ever seen came tumbling out. He picked one up and was amazed to find himself unable to touch his thumb to any one of his fingers. He looked at his boy and smiled pleasantly. The boy’s face mirrored the smile and he sat down on the rock floor at his father’s feet.
“You did well, Kyle,” Brendon-Jago said handing down the biggest of the four potatoes. As any good father should, he made sure his son had what he needed to survive before taking care of himself. It overflowed the hands of the youth and the wide eyes of the boy made him smile and shake his head. Seeing his son gobbling away at the potato truly did bring joy to the man’s otherwise work consumed life. He picked the smallest of the large potatoes left and placed it on the desk, before handing down the last two to Kyle. “How is your Mother, Kyle?” he asked as the two of them made eye contact over the food. He could not possibly mistake the sour scowl of hatred that swept over the boy’s face.
“Ok,” was the one word reply Kyle gave as he stuffed another large chuck of soft potato into his mouth and looked down at the rock floor between his feet.
Papa stood and walked to the mouth of the cave. He bent down and picked up a bucket that had been hiding in a carved hollow within the rock wall. Walking back to his son, he paused at the chiseled shelf of stone made along the right side of the cave wall. He picked up a wooden cup and continued on his way to where the boy was sitting. He placed the bucket on the floor in front of Kyle and then picked up the smaller potato he had placed on the desk before sitting himself on the floor in front of the bucket. He dipped the cup into the bucket and drew up the cool, clean water that collected there. The water was dew that was gravity fed into the bucked from the smooth walls of the cave each morning after the cool nights. He handed the cup to Kyle, whose eyes went wide at the sight of it all, and asked, “Kyle... about your mother?”
His son finished the drink in a few swallows and Jago motioned for the boy to take another cupful, never minding that it would take almost a week of collecting the dew to replace just the small amount of water already consumed.
Kyle set the cup on the ground next to the bucket and looked up at his Papa. “She is much, much worse then when you s
aw her at your last visit, Papa,” the lad spoke. “She tells me not to say anything if I have nothing good to say, but all she ever does is complain about how life was not supposed to turn out this way. I do everything around the house, as I should, while she sits on the chair and calls ME a good-for-nothing following-in-HIS-footsteps lazy body.” Then, after Kyle realized what he said, even if it was the words told to him, and the way he emphasized the word “HIS” as his mother always did, made him stop for a second and think how his father may have take it. He did not like what he thought his father’s reaction would be because he shrunk himself into a ball on the floor. The potatoes were forgotten about, and the boy started to quiver and shake. “I’m sorry, Papa, I’m sorry. I will not talk bad about anyone again, I promise. Please, not the chair, Papa! Do not do what she does with the chair, Papa, please! I will watch what I say, I will. Yes, I will. Please, please, please!! She said you taught her it for when I was misbehaving, but please don’t do it, Papa!”
The OneWhoMustRemember found he was confused. What thing was it that she does? What within the Land of the Faithless was that about? As well as the ending plea that would have been a match for someone begging over the butcher block for his or her life.
“What thing?” he asked. He only, after asking, realized how little of value a question like that was at a time like this. He set the potato he had in his hand down on the chair in front of the desk and slid around the water bucket over to the boy’s trembling body. He stroked the boy’s hair, and with a few words had coaxed the lad into a sitting position next to him on the cool rock floor. While putting one arm around the boy’s shoulder, he drew him in closer and rapped his other hand around him from the front. They sat like that for quite some time before the sobs of pain and anguish subsided from the boy, not long after his shaking did. His breathing had evened out, and Papa knew that it would not be long before sleep had another host to occupy.
“It is time for me to go now, Kyle. The sun will be rising in a few hours,” the man said. He released the child from his protective hug, and lifted the boy’s chin with his hand. “When I come back, I have many things to show you and to talk to you about. I want you to rest now. Your mother is not here, and I cannot foresee her walking all the way up here at anytime. It is safe, and it would be good for you to get some sleep.”
He reached over to his chair and grabbed the boiled potato, the only one that was not either eaten or mashed when Kyle balled himself up earlier, and placed it in the lad’s hands. He picked up the cup from beside the bucket and filled it to the top with water before setting it down on the floor next to Kyle. He then dipped his hand into the bucket and placed it to his own mouth. He stood up and walked back to the cave opening where he replaced the bucket into the notch carved into the rock. He turned around and saw Kyle staring back at him. He waved his hand and smiled at the boy, who smiled back warmly while waving the hand not holding his potato. Brendon-Kyle turned and walked out of the Cave of Remembrance and the OneWhoMustRemember started his climb of the One-Day Mountain to look for a sign that the Coming was here.
CHAPTER FIVE
SONG OF THE GODS
