There is no imbalance, only not yet balanced. Every imbalance of excess and want, of health and illness, feast and famine, is a scale which, in some moment, has too much on one side or the other. All the scales are moving toward proper balance. Their contents shift pendulum-like toward an eventual equality.

Every ecosystem knows its own needs, and so does the world. For every hunger, the satisfaction exists. Every resource is proportioned for the need it satisfies. Only proper and fair distribution is wanting, and only wanting for a time.

Brudt read this passage of his teacher’s philosophy and felt the truth of it burn in his core, in his bones. He looked down at his own disfigured body knowing that the injustice nature had dealt him was to be recompensed back to him by nature, somehow. He dwelt on the imbalance within himself, within his own body, seeing it as a microcosm of the world and its deeply embedded imbalance. He was a man who was half humanus, half horse. His half and half nature was not what was out of balance though. He had come from a noble line of hurse-hu (people with human torsos and two legs which resembled those of a horse) and was proud to be one of them. His dis-equilibrium came from the fact he had been born with the wrong proportions of horse to humanus. He had a deformity of the spine which, on top of causing him to look contorted and producing a constant ache, gave him an extra horse-like appearance. Where Brudt’s powerful, bay colored legs met his tanned, brawny torso, the spine jutted out horizontally before righting itself and becoming vertical. It somehow made him look both gnarled and formidable. His large stature gave the impression that he was almost a centaur. On the other hand, it seemed like he was always leaning forward, trying to catch his balance. Nature had chosen him for a new type, one more natural and instinctual, but it had accidentally gotten the formula a little wrong. As the world did have all things in their right balances, it would make up for its errors in him and would restore. He was on the path of discovery and restitution now, studying under Noin the Full Headed. As he dwelt on these things, he rubbed his lower back, the spot that was always a little sore.

Brudt had found in his philosophical teacher, Noin the Full Headed, someone who confirmed his earliest beliefs. Brudt agreed with the teachings of Noin, now it only remained for him to find the key to solving his imbalance.

Brudt looked across at his teacher, hungry with questions. Brudt was Noin’s most passionate follower and student, though not his most disciplined or his best at listening. Brudt rubbed his sore back, filled with frustration at his plight. His decade old angst bubbled up into a verbalization.

“Tell me, teacher, how to bring balance to those who need it,” Brudt asked in an angsty and aggressive tone, toward the center of the tent. Noin sat in the middle of the large tent, very still, in meditative thought. There were various other students and scribes in the large tent, most of whom were writing, or else sitting in meditative quietness.

This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there.

Because Noin had been so deep in thought, it took him a long moment to realize he had been spoken to. After the realization reached him, deep in his own mind, it then took awhile to bring some part of him back to the surface and to his physical surroundings. After another blinking and silent moment, Noin made a drowsy effort to recall exactly what question had been posed. Finally, he seemed as if he might favor the room with an answer. The scribes and students stirred in quiet anticipation. Noin rarely spoke. When he did, it was always to say something profound.

Finally, Noin looked up at Brudt, though it seemed more like he was looking past him and through the back canvas of the tent.

“To bring balance, is to apply force. It is to push the swinging pendulum,” Noin said in a flat placid voice, in the direction of Brudt. Half a dozen students scribbled excitedly, though quietly, as if in a library.

“No. What can I do to take and put things where they are needed most?” Brudt asked frustratedly.

“Take?” was Noin’s only answer.

“You understand. People need retribution, and as you say, the world wants them to have it. How can I bring it?” Brudt asked with rising frustration. Most of his conversations with his teacher had gone this way and had ended in frustration. Only in his teachers’ writings did Brudt find much satisfaction. Even so, Brudt persevered in trying to get answers from his teacher conversationally. Brudt had read and reread most of Noin’s writing and was looking for something past the philosophical, for something actionable that he could do. He knew life owed him, and he meant to discover the right way to bring about repayment.

“The world has brokenness,” was Noin’s only answer.

“So, help me restore it!” Brudt accidentally answered in a shout. The students and scribes all turned to stare at him in disapproving shock. Their scribblings silenced. They all looked back to Noin to make sure that he was unharmed.

Noin’s mouth curved, just a little, in disgust. His eyes almost came into focus on Brudt, but then flickered back into their cool placidity. He sipped from the cup next to where he was sitting, and then closed his eyes and returned to his meditative posture.

Brudt stormed out of the tent. Again. He had tried this many times, but could never get a satisfactory answer. He went back to his own tent to read through the works of Noin again. He knew that the philosopher had the answers and that they must be somewhere in the writings.

In approaching his room, he saw a little man, unusually short, with deep, velvety tan colored skin and very dark, soft, kind eyes. The little man held a letter in his hand.

“I would have just slipped it under your door, but they asked me to tell you that this would be a final notice,” the little man told him sheepishly.

“I thought the last one was final,” Brudt shouted at him as he shoved him out of the way of the door. “I’m not ready to leave yet. Go away.”