Zollocco: A Novel of Another Universe (21 page)

At the mention of the Toelakhan, the old man started and looked at me. Wheezing he asked me to help him back to the tables of food. I took his elbow firmly and led him away, glad to have this small duty to shield my nerves from view.

CHAPTER ELEVEN
Troubadour Tales

Later, after all had feasted and put away the leftovers, the troubadour signaled his readiness with the brisk initial strum of his harp. The townspeople looked up pleased at the prospect of digesting to the music of the harp and the stories of the man. The evening was growing cool and so I wrapped my blue holy robe about me. I settled myself comfortably in one of the chairs set at the garden's edge, where the sweet smells of the growing things could reach me. Everyone else also made themselves comfortable. The audience, the entire town of Oasis, quieted.

The troubadour played the opening notes of his song on his beautiful stringed instrument. He inhaled, easily, fully, and opened his mouth to sing.

"Pardon me troubadour," called the older woman who led the girls' rite. "We have consulted with each other and are not sure we should listen to your words tonight." Her soprano voice carried clearly in the still night air. Her razor like but dignified form I perceived dimly on the opposite side of the audience from me.

"And why is that good woman?"
"Because you admit to being sent by the Toelakhan. The troubadours of our world have always maintained their independence from all allegiances except that of their Poetry. Even the Beloved Forest World respects our troubadour's rightful independence. Yet, you allow yourself to become a mouthpiece for demagogues. That you are the willing tool of the Toelakhan, an organization that our planet has the distinction of first recognizing as twisted and corrupt, is appalling to us."
"Good woman, I have heard your words. Must I speak in my own defense? I would rather bring you the stories you have waited to hear, the news of other places you need to know, the history you wish to learn, and the musical power you must use to heal."
The troubadour set aside his harp and stood up. He looked out across the audience, squinting at the light. He gaze fell on me. "Is that a Priestess I see in the audience?"
By my Holy orders, I was not to answer this until he asked for me in the ritual way.
"Yes, that is a Priestess!" the young man who had given me the basket rose to his feet to answer, "Forests let the dark night of our indecision be illuminated by the Blue Dawn of a new day."
I cursed inwardly. I was being called upon to speak, and because of my vow, I could not say one sappy stalk of a sentence. As was required by ritual, the townspeople repeated twice over the invocation already raised by the young man. I stood. At least my robe of Holy Orders gave me the stature of drama and authority the moment called for. I kept to my oath, saying not one word.
"Ah, Priestess if you say so I will pack up my harp and leave no music, no history, no stories. In short, I will leave no Poetry of any kind in this place. I will leave a barren Oasis."
The petri dish was threatening me, threatening the people with a terrible curse if I spoke against him. I ground me teeth together. How I wanted to expose him, tear his words apart to reveal the rotten threat. But not one word could I speak. I was bound. I kept to my vow, saying not one word. The troubadour waited. The Townspeople waited. I could not turn from the confrontation until granted dismissal by those who had invoked Forest aid, but I must keep my vow. The troubadour smirked and tried to hide his smirk. The audience was perplexed and agitated.
At last a young woman whom I could not discern in the dark stood and spoke: "Good Priestess, truly of the Forests do you speak! Your message here is clear. We must hear out this false troubadour and form our own conclusions. Does not the Poetry of our own history warn us that we must `listen to the Poetry of our enemies'? By listening to him, we will learn how to protect ourselves from Toelakhan guile. Thank you for this most profound lecture."
The audience smiled in relief and understanding. I smiled sweetly.
The townspeople chanted thrice over the ritually needed release, "Thank you Forests for this streak of blue light, the dark night of our indecision has passed."
The troubadour, not too pleased, sat behind his harp and played a snappy, cheerful tune. Absorbed in his playing he lost his aggravation and moved on to melodies of different moods.
Then he stilled his harp and looked out over the myriad faces surrounding him. "Call out the names of your relatives, and I shall report to you the news I have of them," he invited the townspeople and then played a soft, sweetly sad hint of a tune on the long glimmering strings of the harp.
The names came, some eagerly, some nervously, some with vexation, some with longing: "Sweetspring! Toughwall? Shimmersand. Dunestar."
The answers told of schooling mastered, of health regained, of prosperity, of marriage.
More names were called out: "Dawnheat. Drystone? Sandprint! Wellkeep. Yellowsand. Redheatsun? Nightdry! Coldune! Lonewind. Bigsand? Shimmerair?"
His answers continued. Sometimes the troubadour had knowledge of a death, of a birth of twins, of a safe arrival, of an infirmity. Sometimes the troubadour had no knowledge, sometimes just a rumor. The troubadour embellished each piece of news with the humming of his instrument: a commendation here, a eulogy there, a story about this one, and a tale about that one...
When the calling of names dwindled into stillness, the troubadour looked up inquiringly. Then he nodded a note of finality. Soft, gentle music from the harp ensued, allowing the people a spell to grasp the thoughts the reports had brought them.
Then a girl of about eleven pregnancies in age spoke, "Troubadour, tell us a story!"
The troubadour laughed and said that he knew of a fine one for the little ones to send them to sleep with sweet dreams; and he told a tale the adults had heard many times, the children less, and the babies not at all.

There once lived a desert rat. This desert rat was in actuality a beautiful youth transformed into rat form by an Ollave -- master of harp, verse, and curse. When a boy, the youth had angered the Ollave; that was why he was now a desert rat. The desert rat lived in a town like this one. He lived in the town's wall and would scamper across the sand catching seeds that had been blown over the wall by the winds. The rat always carefully examined these seeds before he ate them because the Ollave had told him that one day he would find a seed that was really a troubadour student who had gotten sad and turned herself into a seed. Naturally, the desert rat was terrified he might eat the seed that was really a student troubadour. Then he would be a desert rat forever and have a terrible bellyache too.

So for many years the desert rat lived in the wall, and scurried out to collect his seeds, and lined those seeds up for inspection, and ate them one by one. Carefully so, lest he chew on a troubadour pupil by mistake.

One day, some children threw sand at the desert rat and pulled his tail, and it was quite a while before he was free of them. An oldlady finally freed him of them. She shooed the children away from the desert rat with a broom. Unfortunately, the old lady was not content to shoo the children away! Oh no! She wasn't content until she had chased the desert rat with her broom up and down the wall. Finally, the desert rat, which was really a clever youth and not a desert rat at all, figured out how to get away from her by hiding under her long skirts as she ran. At last, the old lady grew tired and sat down to catch her breath. The desert rat then sneaked away into the wall and out to the sand to collect his seeds before the day died away.

Well, as you can imagine that desert rat was hot, tired, and cranky by the time he got out to collect his seeds. To make things worse he didn't have much time left either. Well, he gathered up his seeds as fast as he could, and at last, he had a good-sized pile to drag up to his nest. Well, the desert rat was so hot, and so tired, and so cross that he didn't line those seeds up like he usually did to get a good look at them before he ate them. He just started to cram them into his mouth and chomp them up. He was just grabbing up the two seeds he hadn't managed to stuff in his mouth with the others when he saw that one of the two seeds looked peculiar.

He swallowed the seeds in his mouth (it took several swallows) and he stared at that peculiar seed. It was the normal color for a seed, light green in the middle and gold around the edges. It was as light as a seed should be. It was shaped as a seed should be. It was the size a seed should be. But what was it about this seed? He just had the feeling this seed was different. Now this must just be his imagination because after all the seed was like any other little seed, so he lifted it to his mouth. But he couldn't do it. He just couldn't eat that little seed.

Well, what should he do?"
Here the children shouted out different answers: "Eat it! Plant it! Throw it in the sand! Eat it! Bury it!"

The troubadour feigned looking appalled. "Eat a magic seed? Throw a magic seed into the sand? Bury a magic seed?" The troubadour shook his head sadly at the immorality of the young generation.

The desert rat spoke to the seed. `Oh Sanda, if it is you, if you are this seed, it is I, Zephro! Your father promised me that if I found you he would turn me back into a human! Oh little seed, please be my little Sanda, turn yourself back into a student troubadour! You must let your father know you are still alive and love him! Even if he breaks his promise to turn me back into a human, you can't spend your whole life as a little seed! Oh, my love, be my beautiful Sanda again.'

And lo and behold, the seed began to shimmer and shimmer and shimmer, and don't you know, the seed was not a seed but a beautiful, beautiful girl newly in the bloom of womanhood!

`Oh Zephro,' she cried picking up the desert rat, `I will bring you to my father and I will make him turn you back into my beautiful, clever boy!' She put the desert rat in her pocket and ran on her quick feet across the sand. She ran and she ran for days; she ran for pregnancies. She ran until her hair turned dark, and she ran until a faint line appeared in the soft skin of her face. She ran until gray appeared in the dark hair and the line deepened and doubled in the soft skin of her face. And all the while, she ran she sang songs and told stories to the desert rat in her pocket. Sanda ran so far and so long that she sang more songs and told more stories than anybody had ever heard, or sung, or told before. And then, she cried out that she saw on the wall of the town ahead of her, she saw--yes, she saw her father.

She ran up the stairs of the wall to her father. She tenderly held the desert rat out to her father. She told her father the story of a little boy and girl who were in love and how they had heard the father of the girl laughing at them. She told how the little boy stood up to the father and told him not to laugh, that he was a fool not to hear the music of love when it swelled up before him from the lungs of two children. She told how the father was an Ollave who had furiously turned the boy into a desert rat. She told how the little girl, his daughter, was his pupil troubadour and how she in her grief had turned into a little seed and was lost to her father among the reeds at his feet. She told how the father let out a wail that was heard as far as the Forest World and how he told the desert rat that when his daughter was returned to him alive and whole again, he would reverse his spell.

`Now father! I am here! I am your daughter Sanda and I have told more stories than anyone has heard and sung more songs than anyone has sung, for love has carried me from the distant city to you, and I have carried my love, Zephro, who you turned into a desert rat.

At this the old man collapsed to the ground moaning that he could not. His daughter, anguished, asked him why. Afraid for her father, afraid for her Zephro, she knelt at the side of the stricken old man.

`Because you are a little girl no longer; you are a full grown woman; and this little rat who is not a rat, can never forgive me for the wrong I have done to you both!'

At this Zephro, the man who was trapped in the body of a desert rat, jumped to the shoulder of the old man. The little rat tenderly licked the tears streaking the old man's cheeks. The old man wept now in joy. He knew he was forgiven. He smiled, and with great power still unfaltering at his command, he waved the spell away. The desert rat leaped from his shoulder and landed beside Sanda, the most fine and handsome of men.

So ends this tale, for it seems reasonable to assume that Sanda and Zephro were married and lived happily ever after.

There was much laughter and applause at this end. A pitcher of water and a plate of sliced berries were set before the troubadour. While the performer took his break, the townspeople settled their children down on pillows and blankets to sleep. This done, the troubadour stood and asked what we would like to hear next.

"Soft music to lull the children to sleep," a young father called.
"A story of a distant planet!" called a teenage girl.
"Something exotic," agreed the teenager's friend.
"Something sad, mournful, a tragic death maybe," called a jolly middle-aged fellow.
"Yes, a serious story that we can think about, " chimed in a few others.
The troubadour held up his hand to halt the number of suggestions, "A sad story, set in a distant and exotic location, done to gentle music to lull the children and sooth the savage beast within our hearts. I have just the thing, a mie."
"A mie!" the old ones were quite pleased, "A mie hasn't been given to Oasis in over forty pregnancies!"
"What is a mie?" asked the teenager.
"A mie is a striking portrait," answered one wizened lady.
"Shhh! If you are quiet you will find out!" snapped another white-hair.
The troubadour placed himself behind his harp and plucked gently sweet strands of music, from the strings. He intoned:
Into the formal garden stepped Lady Mia to walk. Her thoughts gathering chill like the air. The afternoon sun was shrouded. No shadows fell from the cluster of stunted spruces. Mia liked this garden; foliage selected for subtle harmonies of hue. Long-stemmed plants flowered so that one bud colored the composition of one spot, then slowly died, as another flower, nearby, would bloom. For all the intricate cultivation, the garden seemed perfectly natural and simple. Foliage, flowers, rocks; all seemed randomly and unintentionally placed. Yes, the Royal Gardener (who bowed rake in hand to Mia whenever she passed) had tended this garden well. A slight breeze blew.
Within a few days, a foreign princess would arrive for a short visit. Mia's age, she was said to be. The palace, rigorously cleaned to make for an occasion particularly beautiful, was filling with those of import. Most were politicians, some were Nobles. A few artists had been invited to oversee the affair's aesthetic excellence.
Mia, pausing to gaze at the patterns in the mulch, was thankful for this break in selecting robes, screens, and tea cups. Some kind of scandal concerning the foreign princess's father was rumored to be the cause of the visit. Mia walked along the flagstone path. Cobblestone, pebble, gravel, one was never sure where a path would lead. A path would wind through plants growing in width thinner until it dwindled to an end. Another path would turn abruptly to surprise the walker with a bed of flowers. Or a path would halt with a jagged, black rock. Mia admired all of this. She found herself thinking of the old man whose creation this place was. Two days ago the Emperor had been walking through another palace garden with a young, visiting diplomat who, during a pause in the walk made some small criticism. The Emperor had agreed. The Royal Gardener, hearing of this, felt he had lost face and committed suicide.
Mia, stopping a moment, chose a path which led to a little bridge crowning a stream. Standing, reflecting on the little bridge, Mia felt a sympathy for the foreign princess. A pair of leaves floated down the spring. The old gardener did not have the reason to commit suicide this princess did. When the princess did not choose to die, why did the gardener? Small winds scented with rain -- time for Mia to go back inside.