He sat on a flat-topped white stone that stood by the side of that creek of crystalline waters that cut through the noisy jungle. Ald sook water out of thirst, but also out of a need for the known. A tributary of the Worldvein hurrying downslope sounded the same here as the ones near Felsia did.
He held in his hand another black beetle, and considered if he was hungry enough to bite into this one too. Ald had settled for a bug without markings, the kind that seemed to rely on camouflage and living under rotting logs instead of killing off any predator that dared eat one of them. They tasted bitter, thrice as much as an unsweetened tereptes, and their flavor lingered on the mouth long after the initial crunch that splattered the beetle’s guts all over tongue, palate, the inside of the cheeks and every surface of the teeth.
But he had to eat them. It was, and he had tested this by taking small licks at first, an inoffensive food. So down the beetle went, with Ald cursing after the gulp, drinking a handful of water to pretend to wash away the taste that, he knew, wouldn’t go no matter how much he tried.
After this, he extracted the jar with mushed flowers, a handful of wide, long, rounded and velvety leaves, and a delicate brush from the bag. Then he got a hang of the mortar, used the brush to transfer a bit of the fresh pigment into it, and, wetting the same brush into the stream, he added a few drops of water to the mixture. After a bit of fidgeting around with the brush, he decided the paint had reached an adequate texture and was ready for use. He stood from the rock, extended one of the leaves on it and kneeling, he began painted the runes upon the leaf.
It was a tranquil activity, magical scripture. As a blacksmith, he had experimented with all sorts of offensive enchantments to engrave on weapons. Blades with the fury of a volcano, blades as loyal as dogs, blades that caused the smallest cut to hurt like an amputation. But he had also forged gates that opened when told to do so, chandeliers that ignited the candles when the sun settled, and uncountable other one-ofs that some friend or neighbor had asked him for.
It was an exercise of finesse, for the calligraphy had to be readable. It was an exercise of creativity, for the runic circles were composed of clauses, and clauses left wiggle room for the scribe to play with. The words were in Felsian, and clauses were often a single word: if a clause were longer, the comportment when activated could become erratic. In this way magic had shaped the Felsian tongue as much as the Felsian tongue had shaped magic: It wasn’t uncommon for words to get compounded when they shared certain desirable commonality. This had caused Felsians to have a different word for every color of light, for example: it was the root of the word “light” with a prefix clarifying the color, plus small modifications for ease of spelling. It also had made Ald to stash a single book in his bag: The Scribe’s Dictionary. He preferred not to use it, he preferred to rely on his memory and try to conclude his work swiftly, but he never knew when he would draw a blank and need the aid of his predecessors. And it was more than an exercise of memory, for not only the meaning of a word mattered, but also the feeling it evoked: “fire” had an effect in the final result, “flame” another, and “blaze” a third one. Ice wasn’t frost wasn’t rime wasn’t cold. This was the main reason for the scribes to have their own dictionary.
A rune circle could have any number of clauses, and one had to be the starter word. There were subtle variations on it, but this clause served as a sort of punctuation to the, for an ironic lack of a better word, sentence that formed the ring. Ald had a favorite one, as every Felsian who had ever drawn or carved a magical inscription did.
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When inscribing —when choosing the words to get the most out of the incantations— time normally seemed to fly by for Ald. Not here, as he was breaking the ensorcellment of his art every few seconds, his attention divided between the task and his healthy paranoia. Not every noise could kill him, but any noise could kill him. Even silence could kill him out there, alone and faced by uncountable misshapen.
Yet he needed to forestall his hatred from seeping into the runes. Inscription was writing a letter to Mother, a plea that would be heard so long as the price of bodily fluids was paid. Mother aided her morsels when they used her preferred means of communication. Mature souls were more nutritious, after all. It goes without being said but, for Ald and every other living Felsian, they were her beloved children.
So Ald painted trying to remain unbothered by his material reality, to make sure that the runes were properly drawn, that the clauses were appropriate and ordered according to best practice. Mother favored certain metric in runes; certain rhyme, if used sparingly.
IT came the time when the macaw like a ghost landed unheard on his shoulder, startling him.
“How long is Mirn’s day?” Pandemonium asked.
“The same as everyone’s, Unkindness,” Ald answered, not paying major attention to her.
“You, Ald, are wrong: the Felsian sage wears flesh as a veil no more.”
Ald let the pencil inside the mortar that he was using as a container for the paint, and extended a finger for the brid to land on it. “A sage died?”
“If you wish to put so bluntly, yes. And if you don’t wish to put it so bluntly, yes, too. Discourse hardly abolishes death.”
“It’s a morning day for Felsia. Stay your mockery,” Ald blurted out, far from the verge of tears, but unable to help feeling a little downtrodden by the news. “How did he die?” He asked. Ald wasn’t a friend of Mirn, but he had known the man. Once his team had gone to Ald’s farm, asked very politely to take some soil samples. Ald, barely in his early twenties back then, invited the naturalists in and provided them with a tereptes and some bread. They spoke in terms he didn’t understand between themselves, but he didn’t care. They were coming and taking a bit of dirt from the farm, and he had more than enough for his crops needs. He imposed a small condition upon them: if any of the results of the study were relevant for his job as a farmer, he asked to be informed. Mirn, speaking as the head of the investigatory team, had assured him he would send a letter with the results when all was said and done. And half a year later, when Ald had forgotten about the whole business, he opened his door to find a smiling Mirn holding out a sealed letter. “Sorry for the late response. I forgot until Gleur reminded me of the soil study.” Ald remembered how he rejected the envelope after noticing its weight. “Take the coins off, I need no payment,” He had told him. And after he closed the door, the Sage tossed the card in through an open window, careless about Ald’s humility. “How did he die, Unkindness?
“Pandemonium!” She corrected him, spitting droplets of parrot saliva on his sweating face. “His heart got stilled by his own hand, with the aid of a misshapen’s toxin.”
Ald got away from the stone and paced around a bit. “He committed suicide?”
“A desperate measure. Animosity against each other, I can put a stop to. I can intervene for the greater good. But animosity against oneself? No intervention of mine will suffice. Drip drip, Ald, the Felsia you know is crumbling. The pillars that hold it falling like the blood drops inside its clocks.” The bird then flew to a nearby branch, freeing Ald’s finger.
“You are going to use this to spur me on, won’t you? You have some despicable tendencies, Unkindness,” Then, the blacksmith and farmer gathered the leaves and rinsed the pencil and mortal in the creek’s refreshing waters. “Am I progressing towards Father?” he asked without dedicating the macaw a stare.
“Yes. A bit today, a bit tomorrow.”
“Good.” Ald sentenced, and carried on in silence, washing his tools in the stream with only enough care to not ruin them.