I was sick for a long time. I don't remember any of it. So what I am telling you now is what was related to me by Pellenas afterwards. After I lost consciousness, they took me to the girl's house in Pellenas ship. Her adopted family were herdsmen and women, and were well aquainted with the healing herbs of the rift mesa. The girl was said to have an early gift in healing, and she, her family, and Pellenas nursed me for a period of three months. During this time I tettered on the brink of death many times. The girl said that I did not want to live.
I was told that this was the first time in ages that someone was made a Beaulani in this way. The barbs that shot into my hand contained special kinds of virus type DNA reprogrammers. My body was given an advanced type of helper cell that made my own T cells several times stronger than normal. I was told that this was because in the future my body would be poizoned in many ways by the dark ones. The beaulani were giving me a way to deal with this threat. Also, every cell in my eyes were changed, and an inner time clock for periodic cell replacement was implemented into the energy force of my body. Every seven years certain cells would change somewhat, their structure would be altered, even their DNA. By the time I turned 49, but starting very strenously when I turned 42, my whole body would by then be changed into a body closer to a Avalon body than an earth body. But the intial stages of this process nearly killed me. It almost killed me again when I turned 35.
Every day the beautiful dark haired girl sat beside me, as I lay in her own bed, which she gave up so that I could be brought to the closest place for help, which was her family's home. Each morning she rose early to gather herbs along the rift rim, and applied poltices to my hands, which were swollen from an allergic reaction to the barbs. She made healing teas, and sang softly healing songs. She made her adopted brother play a harp like instrument near my bed for many hours a day, until his fingers were raw from playing the metallic strings. She prayed constantly for my recovery, and consulted with Pellenas often about the best remedies for my affliction. Once when my eyes began to flutter like someone in a death throes she slapped my cheek and said angrily, if you die now, I will never forgive you. Many strange hive like bumps appeared all over my skin, and my tempature was difficult to keep low. Finally in the third month they called on Brignatia, who came in one of her great ornamented ships. Not to bring new herbs and remidies, but to speak to my heart, and to tell me a story. This is the story which she told, which returned fully to my consciousness one fine May on this earth, when I was feeling very lonly, and cursed by life.
In a land at the edge of a country called Rhean Rhe, there lived a calico mouse; which is a rodent that looks a little like a field mouse, but which is the size of a squirel, with calico colorations like that of a calico cat, and it has a melodic voice not unlike that of a child's voice. This calico mouse lived amongst the lute reeds that grew along the bank of the murky lake. Each day for him was a day of strife and terror, for he lived in mortal fear of the marsh dogs that lived in the lake.
One day as he was weaving his way home through the tall reeds, the white-eyed marsh dog of Deddu cove cornered him against a thick clump of reeds. The dogs mouth slavered with venom, and the dog laughed at him, and told him evil stories about how deeply the poison would course through his viens, and how over time it would poison his very soul.
The calico mouse prayed to the Mother Blessing all while the marsh dog's mouth slavered with venom, and as the dog lunged to snap him up, a gloved hand reached down and grabbed him away, and a booted foot kicked the marsh dog back into the murky lake
The young man who saved him was cloaked in grey. He was an odd looking man. His face was hooded, and what little part the mouse could see of it appeared to have been smeared with ashes and coal. But the young man did speak softly. "You had better come live in my garden," said the young man, but then said nothing more until they had reached the man's garden many miles down the old path to the river.
The young man's garden was half surrounded by the curve of a ditch, and there was a knarled maple stump at the garden's edge. The garden was full of vegetables that grew in thick rows. A wooden bridge arched over the ditch, and on the other side of the ditch was a path, that soon branched into two pathes. One went down to the river and lead to the kingdom of Lirnn, and the other lead to the murky lake and the hidden swamps of Galustrada.
The calico mouse thought it strange that when they arrived at the young man's home, that this cloaked man just set him down quicly by the maple stump, and without even a goodbye he was gone before the calico mouse had time to thank him. He just walked off toward a giant oak tree house on the other side of the garden, where he opened a door in the tree and slammed it shut behind him, leaving a very bewildered mouse to wonder what he had done to offend his new benefactor. When the calico mouse met him again, it was after he had once again been helped out of a desperate predicament.
A box trap had fallen down around him, and right after he had picked up a carrot that someone had left lying carelessly beside the path to the river, where anyone who was hungry for a large orange carrot could easily see it and declare it for themselves.
After the darkness had entrapped him, for that was how it seemed to him, that darkness had fallen down around him, he shouted in despair, because there was no way out, for this darkness had walls and a ceiling, and was unmovable besides. He hollered for the longest time, until he was sure the wrong person (the one who had made the darkness), knew that he was trapped, and would soon have him dead for picking up his rotten carrot.
The he heard someone walking down the path toward him. He shivered with fear to think of death finding him again, especially when his new life in the garden was so rich with new promise.
As the darkness lifted slowly, he cowered in a corner with his eyes shut, and was hoping that he would become so small as to become invisible. But when nothing happened except that beams of light streamed in, he opened on eye slowly and looked up, and saw the willow maid smiling down at him. But before he could introduce himself she told him to scurry, before the hag of Harrid Grove arrived with her terrible black cats, her nine green eyed cats, which loved to eat mice, but only after they had tortured them for hours.
He had heard tales of the willow maid, for she was widely known for her kindness to little animals.
Her hair was the color of willow leaves in autumn, and her eyes were the green color of young willow shoots. Her skin was the color of peaches and cream, and her breasts were as shapely as the hills of Lirnn. She wore a dress the color of the clear blue river that passes by the old willow tree near Brunzbory Farm. She was the most beautiful wood maid in all the land of Rhean Rhe, but she was the saddest one too.
At the word about the hag he scurried all right, but not before memorizing the image of the maid. Surely a description of her beauty would cheer up the young man, and indeed, it was on his way home that he ran into the young man again. He was sitting with a glum expression, and was fishing in a lake near the backwoods of Numptt.
"Have you caught anything today," he said.
"No," said the young man glumly, "I caught a white horse the other day, with the rope from an old anchor; I fished him out of the shallows and called him to shore, but he ran away with the wood maids as soon as I had petted the horse feathers upon his brow."
"White horses are a willful lot," said the calico mouse agreeably, "women too," he said, trying to get the young man to talk about himself, "but maybe the willow maid is different," he said, "I saw her today; she helped me to escape from a hag and her terrible black cats, and a horrible darkness with walls, and..."
"You saw her?" said the you man, his suddenly dimming with pain and sorrow.
"Yes," said the calico mouse, "on the path to the river. She set me free from a horrid shadow."
The young man looked piercingly at the mouse. "Were her eyes as green as young willow shoots?" he said in a pained whisper.
"Oh that, and greener still," said the mouse.
"Was her hair as yellow as willow leaves in autumn?" said the young man.
"My yes, and more than that yellow still," said the mouse happily.
"And her skin, was it like a white rose with peach blushes?" said the young man, a tear trickling down one cheek.
"Indeed it was," said the mouse with delight, for it appeared that the young man knew her already.
"Then I must leave," said the young man, and left without even packing his fishing gear, and went off limping through the woods, leaving a very bewildered calico mouse.
That night, as the calico mouse sat in his little house munching a tasty raddish from the youn man's garden, he decided that he would go take a peek through the young man's window. The mystery surrounding this young man was more than he could take. After he had finished eating, he scurried up the cobblestone path to the tree, climbed up the trunk to the sill, and peeked in through the round window. Inside, sitting in front of a mirror that sat atop an ordinary round table was the guliest creature he had ever seen. It looked rather horse-like, but such a horse would surely have been shot by any man that happened across it.
The creature did not look dangerous; in fact, it was crying in great racking sobs that shook the whole table and threatened to know over the mirror. It was whispering to itself, "Look at me, oh God, look at me." But the calico mouse could not stand to look at the creature for very long. He ran away in leaping bounds back to his stump house, where he tried to forget the ghastly sight of the beast that seemed to live inside the young man's house. But try as he might to sleep, all night long he couldn't help listening to the wailing sobs behind the oaken door.
Shortly before dawn the calico mouse was awakened by sounds of footsteps crossing the bridge. Being a curious creature he slipped out and followed to see who it was. He found that it was the young man, who was walking fast down the path that lead to the river. The calico mouse ran along behind him, sticking to the mouse pathes through the sword grass and the reel millet, so that the young man would not see him.
It was a foggy morning, and the calico mouse had to move quickly in order to keep the young man in sight. The cloaked youth looked like a grey ghost in the fog. When the young man came to a spot where an old willow tree stood across from him on the bank of the river, he knelt down in the lute reeds and waited. As the fog began to lift, a beautiful river nymph came out of the water to sit on the roots of the old willow. She was the willow maid's sister.
The young man watched her until the fog had disappeared completely. As the morning turned golden, the flying fish of Eslor began flying their patterns above the river. The river nymph was huming to herself, as if she too was waiting for the fog to lift, as if she too had a tryst.
The calico mouse was happy to see that such a beautiful morning had come to clear the fog away, and he had hopes that it would be a bright morning for the young man too. But he soon saw that the young man's foggy mood would not be so easily lifted, for in this young man's cloaked gloom there was no sun and no morning, no, for him all was cloudy night without end.
As soon as the fog had lifted completely, and the bright rays of the morning sun made the river look silver, the young man threw the nymph a ball of string, it was a magical ball, made up of threads he had collected from his dreams, there were blue threads of hope, tangled red threads of desire, and knoted black threads of despair. The water nymph picked it up and without paying him any heed threw it back across the river, where it landed in the young man's lap. The she knelt down by the river to collect pearls of white foam from the silvery currents of the river, which only river nymphs can take from a rivers streaming currents.
The young man turned away swiftly and fled like a phantom into the backwoods of Numppt. It was weeks before the calico mouse saw him again, but during that time the mouse heard harp playing and singing at night, coming from inside the tree house. But the young man never came out on his porch to play his music, where he could share it with the evening. It was a beautiful voice that the young man had too, and his harping was like a whisper of something from the Mother Blessing, or like that music that is heard in the winds from stars, that northern wind that passes the earth on midsummer nights when the wood maids and the nymphs dance to the star music of a distant star cluster till dawn.
So to make use of his spare time the calico mouse began to wander in the woods at night, because he wanted to find the willow maid and talk to her about the young man. It was on a moonlit night that he saw her again, near the mound of butterflies where lay the souls of dead queens. She was skipping along bare footed, singing and laughing in a joyful spirit.
The calico mouse tried to follow her, but no matter how fast he ran he could not keep up with her. The next day he went straight way to the young man's house and knocked as hard as he could on the door.
"Can I speak with you today?" he said in a flustered voice to the emotionless mask of a face, with his clear grey eyes that peered down at him. At first the young man showed no willingness to talk whatsoever, but suddenly something broke in him and he opened the door a little further. Without a word the young man picked up the mouse gently, took him inside and sat him down on a green cushion upon a shelf below one of the round windows.
"I suppose it is time," said the young man. "Yes, today I will tell you my story, and I shall not blame you if you decide to move away after I've told it."
The calico mouse smiled to himself; this young man could be quite nice when he wanted to be.
"Several years ago," said the young man, a glassy look of far off memories lit in his eyes, "I was a great wizard in a land near the golden palace on Llyndalf Hill, which is in a land on the border of the high peaks of Little Rhondland. I was born with great powers of sight, and with the shifting powers of transformation. But I misused them, and that is why I still suffer."
"One spring after a difficult winter, a beautiful maiden and her white bird came to our city from a distant land far to the north. Her beauty was purer than the crystal snows atop the Thunderbird Peaks. She was the fairest maiden I had ever seen."
"I went to her and showed her all of my charms, and laid the best of my powers at her feet, thinking that it would be easy to make her love me. I desired her, and knew that she would be the finest gem in my wizard's cap. But then I was told that she was in love with a wood carver, a simple man, whose only valuable possession was a white horse of incredible stature."
"This carver would ride his white steed into the woods, for many hours at a time, sometimes even at night, but he was never riding on any quest that people knew of, he rode for the joy alone. I tired to buy the horse from him, since the maid loved it so, to make as a gift to her. I offered the fool powers beyond his wildest dreams, and riches that would have made him a king. He refuse every offer, so I destroyed everything he had, and changed him into the form of an otter, and sent a pack of black hounds to chase him through the Dorlin marshes, forever."
"When the maid heard of my cruelty she cursed me openly and in public. I began to lose favor with the people, because she was greatly revered for her beauty and wisdom. I began to have nightmares, but I was still determined to have the maid."
"I begged her several times to reconsider her feelings, but when she would not, I kicked her white bird in a fit of anger, which killed it.
"I was banished from society, and since that day I have had a limp, and since that day I have had no remarkable powers to change the world."
"I wandered in misery and rage through many cities in the outland, until after a long time I came to this place near the wilderness. There was an old man who lived in this tree house, but he eventually left to learn how to walk on the water. He taught me music and patience before he left, and how to sing to the trees and the stars. He said that when I was ready he would return, but it has been so long now, and nothing has changed."
"My past, little mouse, has turned my powers against me. I keep my face under a hood and ashen because it is now the face of a beast. I am forced at night to stare into the mirror of my past deeds, and by day I am bound by the pains of a love that can never happen."
"It is my own powers which did this to me, not the spell of some evil witch. Oh, this spell can be broken, but only if a beautiful maiden falls in love with me, which of course is a hopless dream. The trouble is, that I love the willow maid. And it is love," he said fiercely, "I know it, for I do not wish for her to be my gem, but rather, I wish for her to be the petaled flame of my heart, and I the flame within her heart."
"So that is my tale little mouse," he said, and hung his head in shame and pain, to hide his eyes which were now full of emotion, "so you can quit wondering about me and go back to eating my lettuce."
The calico mouse had been smiling throughout most of the young man's story, mainly because he could see that the young man was truly sorry for what he had done, and partly because he knew that he could help him.
"I know a way for you to meet the willow maid," he said, and I'm quite sure that she'll fall deeply in love with you when she see how beautiful you are inside."
The young man looked away. It was clear that he did not believe the mouse.
"You must try something," said the calico mouse.
"You don't understand how deeply these powers have chained me," retorted the young man angrily, then, without warning, he grabbed the mouse from the green cushion, dropped him outside, and slammed the door so hard that leaves fell from the tree and covered the mouse.
The calico mouse was happy, despite being dumped outside like a common cat. He knew that the young man was in there thinking about the possibility of love for the first time in a long time, and he would still be thinking about it tomarrow, and the day after that, and on and on, until he would have no choice but to do something.
It was on the very next night that the young man came out on the porch in front of his tree house to play his harp to the stars. It was the loveliest music that the calico mouse had ever heard. Each note was like a tiny star shining its beauty into the distance. The calico mouse soon found himself sitting next to the young man's chair without remembering how it was that he'd moved there. When the young man had finished his harping, he smiled sheepishly at the calico mouse, and though his face was still hideous, the smile was very genuine.
"I will try," he whispered, "if you're sure it will work."
"It will all depend on you, my friend," said the calico mouse, "but all you need is the right stage setting, and then you will see how this spell will be broken." Then the calico mouse went home, leaving the young man to ponder his fate.
It took three days and nights to finish the preparations for the fateful meeting, and during that time the you man's mood changed. "He is almost happy," said the calico mouse to himself as he worked. Then on the fourth night the youn man and the calico mouse went to the mound of butterflies and waited for the willow maid to come.
Their plan was for the young man to use his music and the old magic locked within the mound of butterflies to break through the dakr chrysalis that encased him in misery, and if all went well, on the third night she would truly love him.
The willow maid lived in sorrow because she had been bound by the Great Mother, the Mother Blessing, to live bound to a willow tree, and though her roots sunk deep in the earth by the river, and though her canopy was a haven for birds and her home inside was comfortable and provided for all her needs, still, she longed to leave it behind forever. She didn't really understand why she had been bound to a tree as had her mother before her, all she knew was that she wished to be free. As things were, it was only at night that she could slip outside her trunk to frolic in the woods of Numptt, or in the deeper woods of Lirnn. Sometimes she was able to help small animals by day, mostly the little ones that fell into the traps of the farmer and the hag, but she could only help those that were caught on the land under her sway, which was the land along the river and on the paths to the river. And even then, it was her dream self that helped them. Her mother, who had been the last keeper of the tree, told her just before she had left to become the queen of a far off land, that only by finding true love would she be able to break free of her bonds. She had also said that sometimes love has a strange face, but that when it's love, it is always a true face.
It was the willow maid's habit to pass by the butterfly mound when the moon was full, while on her way to the spring near the shores of the Pool of Ripple Wand. It pleased her to see the lit wings of so many butterflies rising up from the mound into the full moon's light.
One night as she was dancing past the mound, she heard a mysterious music coming from the direction of the mound. When she drew closer, she found that the music was coming from under the mound itself. She listened for hours to the delicate notes, which seemed to carry the rainbow of butterflies up to where the moon was. But eventually the dawn came to take her back to her tree, where she spent the day sleeping and dreaming of harps.
When evening came she slipped out of her tree, and danced off to the butterfly mound, humming to herself the tunes she remembered from the previous night's concert. This time, she saw two hands playing a beautifully crafted harp that sat atop the mound. Again the music went on until dawn, and a beautiful willow maid smiled, her cheeks moist with tears, and during the day she loved a pair of hands as much as a harp.
As she neared the mound on the third night, her heart was full of anticipation, but two fears followed her: Who did this pair of hands belong to, and would he love a poor willow maid?Along the path this night there were star blossoms everywhere, which she blessed with her willow magic, for she knew that they had fallen to earth for love of the harpist's music. When she finally came to the mound, she was disappointed to see that the harpist she had waited so anxiously to see was cloaked in grey from head to foot.
The music this night was more mysterious than the cloak that shrouded the player, but she loved it better than any music she had ever heard. The butterflies seemed to love it too, for they flew as if they were born from the harpist's finger tips, or as if they were the notes themselves, rising up to where the distant stars shone with fierce light.
The willow maid eventually found herself sitting close to the harpist, just as the calico mouse had a week before her. She tried to see the face inside the hood; she was determined to see that face before the dawn. But then as the first rays of the sun began tugging her home, the harpist began to falter with his music. She took this as a sign that he did love her, so reaching up gently she pulled back his hood, hoping to see a gentle face with golden hair adoring her with the grey eyes of a lover. But when she saw his ugliness she screamed, and her sobs were heard everywhere in the light of the pink dawn. But before she rode the light home to her tree, she struck the animal face that had tricked her.
The young man flung down his harp andd fled recklessly, like a wounded animal. He ran deep into the woods of Numptt, and didn't stop until he reached the Dorlin marshes, where he fell down and cried for hours. After a time he began sinking into the marsh. He didn't care though, for he knew that he was lost, that he had lost at love. . .
After a time the young man looked up to see a white mountain lioness looking at him with eyes of great sorrow. She had come in answer to his pain, and in answer to the prayers of a little mouse. Her sun colored eyes were the most feminine eyes the young man had ever seen. She implored him with those eyes to leave the marsh.
When the young man first saw her, he was embarrassed by the tears on his face, and by how deeply he had sunk into the marsh mud. He struggled for quite some time to free himself, but the mud clung to his legs with invisible hands, for the marsh swites (mud creatures that pull innocent animals and people down into deep marsh mud), were attracted to his struggle, and were trying with all their might to pull him down into the land of the marsh dogs that lived underneath the murky lake.
Soon he was drenched in sweat, and was about to give up when he felt the white mountain lioness tugging him out. But when he looked around to thank her, he found that she was gone. She had fled into the nearby forest, faster than one of the Beaulani.
The young man, forlorn, wandered aimlessly in the woods until evening. He slept under a giant birch. During the chilly night he kept wishing for the comfort of his harp, and the friendly voice of his little calico friend. That night he dreamt of the most feminine woman inall the world, the Mother Blessing. Her eyes, which were the same as those of the white lioness, were full of joy and sorrow mixed. In his dream, she told him all about the willow maid's love, but upon waking he could not recall her wisdom or much about the dream except her face. He knew that for the rest of his life he would never forget her.
The willow maid spent her day weeping too. She did not understand how such lovely sounds could come from the fingers of such an ugly creature. She had always thought of beauty and ugliness as opposing forces. How was it possible for beauty and ugliness to live so forcefully in one body? And how was it that such beautiful hands were directed by such ugliness? These, and many other questions belittled her thoughts all day.
She spent most of her night watching the stars; she had not no spirit for frolicking in the woods. But then after the constellations of the seven swans rose in the east she finally slipped out of her tree, and went to visit her sister the river nymph.
She found her sister by the Pool of Ripple Wand, playing with an otter. "Have you any advise for me sister, concerning love?" asked the willow maid, after they had talked politely for a time about rivers and woods, and paths that lead to the river.
"No," said the river nymph, "but I do have some pearls for you. I gathered them from the waters near the lute reeds that grow on the old father's side of the river, where your secret admirer often peers at your beauty as you sleep.
She had many admirers, so at first she was disappointed that her sister would not speak openly to her, but when she looked into the pearls, she smiled to herself, for in each pearl was the image of a tan colored horse, magically locked inside its perfect roundness. And the eyes of this horse were the same eyes she had seen in the face of the ugly harpist.
With glistening tears the willow maid thanked her sister for the gift, and gave her seven special leaves, which the water nymph used to break the spell holding a man in otter form.
"Dear lady, I beg you, change me into a golden lion instead," said the wood carver.
"But don't you want revenge?" asked the lady with a bemused smile.
"No," he said, "the young mand does not know it yet, but I am his brother. He will have need of me before the day is through, yet he will not know that it is me who helps him. I tell you, that despite his anger and self pity, he is a good man. He does not yet know how good.
