Uram

Lola Birdsong caught me stealing her flute. I had been sneaking into her tent when she went to the village to sing songs of love and sadness. She was twenty years older, but I was fascinated with her. We called her Birdsong, but her voice was sweeter. When she sang of love, everyone in hearing range dreamed of lovers gone and present. When she sang of sadness, everyone cried for lost their love. I grew up hearing her lullabies. She knew many children’s songs or made them up because she sang me new ones daily. In a way, she was akin to my mother.

“Uram, what are you doing in my tent?” she asked me as she entered her tent and wiped the sweat from her brows.

“Nothing,” I said, hiding her flute behind my back. She raised her brows at me because my back was too tiny to hide the flute.

“Come here,” she told me. I stepped closer, and she engulfed me in her warm embrace and plucked the flute out of my hands. “You want to play it?” she asked me.

I nodded. “I want to become a singer like you,” I told her. She smiled and ruffled my hair. “I will ask Tilwon to make you a smaller flute. Now run along; your mother is waiting.”

I hurried out of Lola’s tent and found my mother standing before our tent with her fists on her waist. She was a tall, skinny woman with long red hair and bright green eyes. She has woven flowers and colorful crystals into her hair, and the wide belt tied over her green dress was full of vials. My mother, Yelan Firesoul, was a potion maker. People called her a wood witch because she constantly roamed the forest looking for magical plants, bugs, and animals to grind into her potions and powders. She always made potions deep into the forest, away from prying eyes. Even I wasn’t allowed near her when she made potions.

“Where were you?” She asked me as I neared.

“I was with Lola,” I said. “She promised to make me a flute.”

“Did she?” Mother huffed. “Come inside and do your sums. I have gotten orders for fever-breaker and birth-easer. I’ll have to raid the forest for twinkle roots and Leaf snakes.”

“Can I come with you?” I asked her.

She shook her head. “Forest is no place for a child.” She squatted before the stove and lit the wood on fire by splashing red liquid from her vial. She put the skillet on and fried meats and vegetables as I did sums, multiplications, and divisions. Hami Falars do not believe in formal education. However, apart from hundreds of potion-making recipes, my mother knew five languages, basic math, and natural science. She may have known a few spells but never taught them to me.

When my mother went to forest hunts, she left me with Lola. In the evening, I found myself lying awake in Lola’s lap as she played flute and told me stories of naughty children tricking demons for treasures. I fell asleep dreaming of finding magical lamps that granted wishes and magical wands that made animals do as I said.

Hami Falars were free spirits who did not believe in coins. They traded their services for food, clothes, and anything they fancied. Our small group had only nine permanent people, while people from other groups kept coming and going. Apart from my mother, Lola, and I, we had Tilwons, the old tinker couple, who could work on any metal or wood. Yarna and Owen were lovers who put on doll shows and told stories. Jenner and his wife Lina were beast keepers who caught animals from forests and sold them to villages and cities. I had seen him catching griffins, wild Pegasus, baby dragons, and unicorns. He also kept forbidden animals like dread scorpions and one-step cobras and dealt with shady people. However, he was a generous man who liked to laugh and flirt.

When my mother was away, and Lola sang in villages and towns, I stuck my nose everywhere. Tinkers amused me by letting me help them haul sticks and nails. Sometimes I watched them make pots and pans, and sometimes they made things that turned my brain to mush, like clocks. The old Tom Tilwon told me he learned to make clocks from a broken clock he traded for three pans. I did not believe him.

Yarna always let me play with the dolls she didn’t need for the show, while Owen gave me candies he was constantly sucking on. I traded the kids’ stories and songs I learned on the flute for playtime with dolls. I was always the first recipient of their make-believe stories. However, some stories were not born of dreams. Owen knew stories of dozen kings and their various battles. His favorite was men founding the Liondale on bones and ashes of demons. The story always made me shiver and look at dark corners with suspicion.

Jenxer tolerated me at best because he feared my mother. He didn’t like kids, not even his own. Jenxer sent his two sons to another group when they learned to make a bear dance to their drums. Lina was a sweet woman, though, who fed me the meat of animals Jenxer had hunted in the forest and let me pet the docile animals.

I learned to fly on Pegasus with Lina. She taught me how to commune with griffins and hippogriffs. She taught me how to take care of baby dragons. Not too warm or cold, and don’t be bold and never bring gold. She used to sing when she babied the dragon kids.

We never spent more than a week at any place. We were merchants and entertainers whom people tolerated only for a few days. Once their women’s pots and pans had mended, their kids bought dolls, and their men listened to songs and bought animals they needed; people couldn’t wait to see our backs.

“We threaten them, kiddo,” Lola told me when I asked why villagers told us to leave. “We don’t follow any rules. We live under the skies. We do as we please, and we have lots to see.” She tickled me and told me to help my mother pack our bags.

Jenxer’s beasts kept us safe from bandits and thieves. No one wants to enrage a griffin or giant lions that rode on our wagons. Though they were tamer than caged parrots, bandits didn’t know that. My mother’s harsh words sent them away whenever a desperate group assaulted us. “Won’t you teach me the spells, Mother?” I asked her once when she washed her hands after spooking the bandits with her fire spells.

She frowned at me. “I know no spell,” she told me. “Making fire is easy when you have as many potions as I have.” She was lying. I knew that. I hadn’t seen her pulling any vial from her belt. She touched my cheek. “Sorcery is bad, Uram. Stay away from it. It makes people evil.”

This story is posted elsewhere by the author. Help them out by reading the authentic version.

From the stories I heard from Owen, I knew that Darnia has a whole city dedicated to learning magic. Tom Tilwan called it actual Capital in a hushed tone. Jenxer shivered whenever he heard the name of Darnia. Lola was the only one who said Darnia’s name fondly in her songs when her heroes went to Darnia and learned secrets of magic to punish the evil lords tormenting their people. My mother clammed whenever she heard the name.

Our group stayed away from the city of sorcerers until Lola grew so sick that even my mother’s potions failed to revive her. Every healer we sought in towns and cities told us she had cancer, an illness caused by demons and cured by sorcerers. However, only sorcerers we know of lived in Darnia. Even the king couldn’t force them to live in his Capital. Sorcerers saved the kingdom from demons, not hostile kings and bandits. Our group didn’t want to go to Darnia, not even Owen and Yarna, so they sent Lola to another group that took her to Darnia, and I never saw her again.

Two years passed, and I learned potion-making with my mother as my primary education. I dabbled in mending pots and making clocks with Tom. I tried my tiny hands to make puppets dance. I went on hunts with Jenxer because my mother wanted me to learn how to traverse the forest silently and cautiously. As my education grew intense, I missed Lola more and more. I missed her songs and the tunes of her flute. I tried a few notes I had learned from her on the tiny flute she had made for me, but nothing ever made the ache go away. People from other groups came and went. Some people lived with us for years, some for weeks.

Eventually, Tilwans moved to a more prominent group to spend their olden days in relative comfort. Horwans took their place. Their two sons and one girl joined me in irritating our older members. Our group grew from nine permanent members to seventeen as a family of card readers, woodworkers, and potters joined us. Our caravan grew too big for villages and small towns, so we spent months living outside city walls and selling our wares in the streets at day. We were living well. I had almost forgotten Lola, as a troop of three sister singers had joined our group, and they were happy to teach curious children how to sing and dance.

Then, King Remarin signed the decree outlawing Hami Falars, and we lost everything. He gave us one month to leave the Kingdom of Giara. Hami Falars had already become outlaws in six of seven nations of the Seridy continent. Giara was the only country to tolerate us until Remarin caved under the pressure of his superstitious people. Folks believed that Hami Falars worshiped demons. Whenever their crops failed, their cows died, or their women died in childbirth, they blamed Hami Falars. Whenever their girls and boys stopped following their orders, they blamed Hami Falars. Their hypocrisy numbed me. “They need us to mend their pots and pans. They need your potions. They need Jenxer’s animals. Why has the king outlawed us?” I asked my mother.

She shrugged. “They don’t understand us, so they fear us.”

“We never harmed anyone,” I said.

My mother just sighed.

King Remarin was not cruel. He has let Hami Falars live as they desired as long as possible, but he wanted us to conform to society. He knew that illiterate folks of the villages would never tolerate him giving their lands to Hami Falars, so he allotted us lands near forests, away from cities and towns. Soldiers guided us to the wilderness and left us to rot. Without trade, we would have starved, so our people did as any desperate will do. They took to crime. Stealing and looting became our norm. My mother didn’t want to see her only son become a thief, so she left the group and brought me to one place she most feared. She came to Darnia.

Hiding her identity as a Hami Falar was easy. All she has to do is get rid of flowers and crystals in her hair and wear a skirt and blouse like an ordinary woman instead of colorful robes. She changed her surname from Firesoul to Brightstone, a common Jalqin name. My respect for my mother increased when she bought a small house in Darnia’s poor locality.

“Don’t tell anyone you were a Hami Falar once,” she told me. “If you do, they will kill me and throw you into the sea.” This was the most fearsome instruction anyone could give a child. It showed how much she feared people finding her identity. I became afraid of all people around us. I remained in the house reading books my mother brought. She worked as a cleaner in rich houses and forgot she was a skilled potion maker. I tried but couldn’t forget everything I learned as a Hami Falar. Staying inside a small house, I longed for open skies and fresh air.

Forests surrounded Darnia on two sides and the sea on one side. Only the southern side was open for trade. The docks on the sea were only for fishing. I saw no big boats on the Darnia Sea when I sneaked to the beach to play in cold seawater and build castles of sand.

One day, I was making a replica of the four towers of Darnia, unaware of anyone approaching, when I heard someone ask me, “What’s your name, boy?”

I turned about and saw a tall man with silver hair wearing a blue cloak over a dark suit. He was a pale man with a hooked nose and eyes like sapphire. “I am Uram Brightstone, Sir,” I answered. “Can I help you?”

“I am Professor Telvin Icekeeper,” he told me. “I teach in the school of magic.” My eyes grew wide, and my tongue froze in my mouth. “Don’t you want to learn there?” He asked me.

I scratched my head. “Mother said the school is only for the rich.”

He shook his head. “She is wrong. We admit everyone if he has the talent.” He smiled at me. “Don’t you want to become a sorcerer?”

I gulped. “I am not a bad kid.”

He frowned and then blinked at me in confusion. “You think only bad kids become sorcerers.”

I shrugged. “I don’t want to become a sorcerer. I want to play on the beach, read story books, and play my flute.” I picked my small flute and played a happy note.

He smiled and sat down to look into my eyes. “You play beautifully,” he said. “We have singers and musicians at the school. They will teach you to play.”

My eyes went wide. “Really?”

He nodded. “Let’s talk to your mother and get you enrolled. I think you will become an excellent sorcerer.”

My mother didn’t know that a sorcerer could see a spark in a child, and Professor Telvin had seen me shining like a bonfire as he walked to the School from his mansion on the beach.

My mother wasn’t home when we reached our small house. Professor Telvin stared around the house with a small frown and skimmed the books in my room. His eyes widened when he saw various potion-making recipes, complex mathematics, and formulas in my notebooks. My mother has left Hami Falar but has not stopped my education. While we waited for my mother, Telvin asked me various questions on potion making, maths, and science. I could say that I impressed him.

We heard the front door opening, and I stepped out of my room and said, “Mother, Mr. Telvin wants to talk to you. He says I can become a sorcerer, and I can also learn music like Lola.”

My mother’s froze when Telvin came out of my room. “Hello, Yelen,” he said. “Your boy is too bright to hide in darkness.”

Mother grew pale. Her hands shook as she wiped the sweat from her face. “You can’t tell anyone he is my son,” she whispered.

Telvin put his hands on my shoulders and said. “I’ll say he is my nephew.”

Mother shook her head. “He doesn’t know anything. He can’t lie about me.”

“You can’t live here, Yelen, and you can’t hide your son from us,” Telvin said.

Mother chewed on her lips. “What can I do?”

“Leave him with me.”

Mother nodded and touched my head as tears spilled from her eyes. I fell asleep, and when I woke up. My mother was gone. Telvin took me to his house and enrolled me in the school the next day.

I won’t bother you with my emotional breakdown and heartbreak, Marian. I miss my mother to this day. I do not know if she lives or not. However, I know that she did everything to raise me better. I do not blame her for leaving me. She did it to save me from her dark past.