THE MAGIC OF KISSING

Copyright (c) 2017 by Randall R. Peterson ALL RIGHTS RESERVED This is a work of fiction. All persons, locations and actions are from the author's imagination or have been used in a fictitious manner.

By R. Peterson

The gilded Ambrosius Lamm porcelain plate looked at least a hundred years old as it slipped from the teen’s soapy hand and shattered on the kitchen floor. “I’m so sorry,” Allison moaned as she ran sudsy fingers through her hair and turned toward the old lady seated in the living room. What a horrible thing to do her first day on the job!

“What’s wrong?” Melania Descombey asked as she motioned for the young girl she had hired as a help mate to come to her.

 “I just can’t seem to do anything right!” Allison said as she wiped her hands with a towel and then stepped over the ebony Tom-cat, Melania had introduced as Simon. The affectionate feline was rubbing itself against her leg as she walked away from the sink filled with dirty dishes. Her normally bright-blue eyes were beginning to overflow with a flood of emotion.

“That plates, along with others, were purchased by my mother in 1890 … I believe they were made in Germany,” Melania looked thoughtful as if staring through more than a century of years.

            “I’m so sorry,” Allison said again as she approached the old woman who had been so kind to her. “How can I ever replace something that old … and that valuable?” she added. Hopeless tears were now running down her cheeks.

            “You can’t … at least not yet!” Melania smiled. “I’ve had those dishes forever,” With a wave of her hand, bits of Inchyra-blue broken porcelain flew across the Carrara Sallow-Marble floor and joined, forming a tiny whirlwind that resembled a spinning wagon wheel. The black cat leaped into the air with an arched screech and then zoomed rocket-like from the room. Seconds later, a flawless plate clattered as it spun and rocked to a stop on the expensive stonework. “This isn’t the first time they’ve been broken!”

Allison unconsciously fingered the amulet that she had found in the ashes of Melania’s burnt mansion. The house had miraculously rebuilt itself the next day but the old woman had forbidden Allison to use the charm, without her permission, after a rude classmate, Marsha Hicks, had been slightly injured in an automobile accident.

Melania was seated in an antique armchair, beside a Tiffany pole-lamp and under a soft-hued Charles Marion Russell painting of running buffalo. With the shifting of light in the room the painted bison sometimes appeared to be breathing and floating ghostlike above the western plains.

The old woman held out her arms and a still weeping and slightly giggling Allison staggered into them. “I didn’t know Simon could move that fast,” she sputtered.

            “I wasn’t worried about the plate just about you,” Melania laughed with her as she hugged the girl. “What’s wrong?”

            “It’s the start of my junior year and I still haven’t had a date,” Allison told her after a moment of embarrassment thinking about going roller skating with Ted Johnson and his sister. “Not a real one.”

Her voice took on a note of desperation. “I’m taking drama this year and I got cast as the teenage nymphomaniac Rachel in Back Off Boys. Miss. Wolf said I couldn’t back-out if I wanted to keep my grade. There are plenty of scenes where I have to kiss boys and first rehearsals are tomorrow… it’s just Vern Hicks this time and he has enough acne galloping across his face to start his own pimple-ranch! But what if the school’s biggest nerd thinks I’m awful and tells other people?  I don’t know enough about kissing to know whether I’m sucking face or trying to steal someone’s gum!” Allison was making jokes, but she looked like she was ready to start crying again.

            “Boys-is it?” Melania smiled. “That is trouble!”

-------2-------

Allison held onto Melania’s arm as they walked into a large library. Twelve foot high bookcases filled the room except for a long table in the center. Most of the volumes looked hundreds of year’s old, hand-bound and were covered in burnished leather.

The old woman pointed to a small book on a high shelf and blew dust off an even older wooden cover, gilded with copper, when Allison handed it to her. “La Magia di Baci... E Come Usarlo … a Juliana Hiker,” Melania read the title and then translated. “The Magic of Kissing and How to Use It.”

She opened the fragile book and a light seemed to come on in her eyes. “This was written in Italian by a close female friend of  Masuccio Salernitano’s grandfather in the fourteenth century. Some say that they were lovers and that Shakespeare borrowed ideas for Romeo and Juliet from this work and later ones … but who knows?”

She handed the book back to Allison. I believe you are taking Italian as your foreign language credit this semester. Read to me and I’ll translate, my eyes aren’t what they used to be  even with glasses … that way we can kill two birds with one stone …” She added almost as an afterthought a grin spreading across her wrinkled lips. “Or if they’re love-birds … at least see them successfully mated!”

-------3-------

Melania and Allison sat next to each other at the big center table. Allison was aware of the cat portraits that adorned the walls between the bookcases. Almost all the feline paintings seemed to be staring at her. “You really like cats don’t you?”

“I’ve befriended more than a hundred in my lifetime,” Melania said. “They can be more exhausting than children and always underfoot.”

“Then why keep them around?”  Allison said. “Is it for the company … or do you have other reasons?”

Melania closed her eyes as if thinking. “I know their language but we don’t converse that much anymore. Their stories, like me, have grown old and are mostly used up. I keep them now for the mice. Rodents can steal magic and hide it the smallest of holes. A good cat can catch things before they happen.”

            “How can a mouse steal magic?” Allison’s eyes glowed with interest.

            “There is magic in everything,” Melania said. “A dropped thimble, a bent spoon covering a fork, a curtain moving when a window is closed. All things have reason and purpose; the unusual and odd … even more so. That which is unseen does much more than what we see.”

There was a long silence while Allison tried to understand what the old woman had told her.

            “Start your reading on chapter two,” Melania said as Allison opened the book. “The first fifty-eight pages are false praise meant to appease the Roman Catholic Church and especially Baldassarre Cossa known as Pope John The Twenty-third - now listed in church records as one of the anti-popes. Those were hard times and already people were beginning to believe that Juliana Hiker was a witch. Although shy and soft-spoken, her written words had a compelling otherworldly power that had no base in Holy Scriptures. She succumbed to a forbidden love and didn’t relish the idea of being burned at the stake in the name of a benevolent and merciful god.”

Allison sorted through the brittle pages and then cleared her throat before she began. "Nessun bacio è da prendere alla leggera per esso è la chiave che apre la porta alla creazione".

“No kiss is to be taken lightly … for it is the key that opens the door to creation.” Melania repeated the words in English.

            “Why would a kiss be like a key?” Allison asked her.

            “The mouth is like an entrance to something warm and wonderful and the throat is a hallway,” Melania said. “The lips are like a closed door and a kiss can make them open. Inside every living thing lives the irresistible urge to procreate.”

Allison blushed. “I knew this was going to be about sex when you read the title,” she said.

            “There is more than one door to desire.” Melania laughed. “But let’s put our thoughts on the main entrance.”

Allison was still smiling when she read the next paragraph. "Avvicinarsi lentamente la bocca e assicurarsi che le labbra si incastrano... consentire un battito cardiaco di indugiare …facendo una perfetta tenuta."

Melania closed her eyes as she translated. “Approach the mouth slowly and make sure the lips fit together … allow a heartbeat’s linger … making a perfect seal.”

            “Why is it so important that they fit?” Thinking about kissing was making Allison lick her own lips.

            “Love has always been an unfinished puzzle. People are always looking for that missing piece. When they find the one that fits they feel a sense of joy and release that their search is over. But love must never be rushed … anticipation stores a kind of chemical energy that passion needs to ignite.”

            “You talk as if love were a fire!”

            “The desire that two people feel for each often burns hotter than any wood,” Melania told her.

Melania reached into a pocket and handed Allison a thimble sized metal container. “For your kiss tomorrow,” she said. “Juliana Hiker used a mixture of melassa secca e vaniglia powdered in a pedestal to lure her army of suitors before she found the one that truly fit, but I believe this will suffice for you needs.”

Allison laughed when she read the label on the tin. “Lalicious Brown Sugar Vanilla Lip Butter. Am I kissing a boy or baking cookies?”

            “The right fragrance can open lips and a kiss involves all the senses,” Melania told her. “Touch and taste are but two … many things create magic when mixed properly. These two spices have been considered aphrodisiacal for thousands of years. We’ll go a little deeper into this tomorrow!” She gave the girl a wink. “After you finish vacuuming the upstairs carpets.”

Allison felt better when she left the mansion on the corner of Main Street and Galbraith and headed home. It was beginning to snow. Large flakes fluttered to the ground like dancers in a winter ballet and she thought she was beginning to understand Melania when the old woman had said there is magic in everything.

-------3------

Mrs. Shanna Wolf’s drama class was the last one after lunch and Allison was so nervous she couldn’t eat. “How does she do it?” Vicky Jenkins forked her green eyes at Chloe O’Brian as Cloverdale High School’s most popular girl sat at a table on the other side of the cafeteria with Greg Johnson the captain of the football team and her cheerleader friends. She blabbered between bites of a tuna on rye sandwich. “Greg is a gift to women and everything that rich bitch wears makes her look thinner.” She looked down at herself in disgust. “No time to flirt with dreamy boys for me. I have to drive the herd of reindeer on this ugly Christmas sweater into the bottom of the south pasture to cover-up my mother’s two-car-garage butt.” Vicky stuffed the rest of the sandwich in her mouth and moaned. “What would it be like to be her … for just a day?”

            “Long sculpted legs that go all the way up to her neck, breasts that could make astronauts abort a moon landing, a panther that sleeps in your room and a smile like Shea Stadium lights at an Eagles concert aren’t everything,” Allison mused sipping a Coke and unconsciously touching the amulet around her neck. If her friend only knew about the magic that Melania had forbidden her to use again … she had literally walked in Chloe O’Brian’s shoes for a day and night. “But if I ever find out what’s missing … I’ll let you know.”

            Vern Hicks had also been caught in the head cheerleader’s traction beam and he tripped, spilling a tray loaded with food as he passed by their table. “Watch what you’re doing you moron!” A furious Vicky jumped up wiping spaghetti sauce off her pasture-green Just My Size stretch pants. Vern was on his hands and knees, scrambling to catch rolling and bouncing peas and scrape the spilled food back onto a broken-tray. “Gee I’m sorry Jenky,” he blubbered, then noticed Allison and began to strut. “I’m looking forward to our first rehearsal … Rachel.” Vern grinned showing a large chunk of hamburger and basil caught in his crooked teeth. It looked like it had been there for at least a day. Allison pretended to be absorbed in her food for what seemed like hours until he finally lurched away. “I don’t need rehearsals; what I need is a gas mask,” she moaned to her now smirking friend.

-------4-------

The stage at the front of the auditorium was crowded, thankfully Vicky had a study hour and came along to watch and lend her support. Allison was struggling to keep nerves from metamorphosing into terror. Mrs. Wolf was having members of the football team carry in painted set panels and other heavy props. Marsha Hicks hung on a curtain smiling like an exotic dancer, chewing on a script cover and showing off her legs as the jocks marched past. As an understudy for the part of Rachel, Marsha was obviously delighted at Allison’s distress … too bad her own dorky cousin had the male lead.

 “I don’t expect you to have all the lines memorized,” Miss. Wolf said. “But you can read from the scripts and go through the actions.” Allison moved to the masking taped X on the floor with her name on it and the number one. Vern Hicks took his place and she noticed he was chewing gum … she wondered if she’d be able to snag it.

            “I’ve been looking everywhere for you,” Vern read. His voice had the nasal quality of snot dripping into a bedpan.

            “So you came here looking for me … in the girl’s dressing room?” Allison was trying to get into character, but finding it extremely difficult. “Did you expect to find me naked?”

            “Cut!” Miss Wolf yelled. Allison tried to choke back a laugh; there was no film but Miss. Wolf obviously fancied herself as a future Hollywood director. “We’re going to have to change some lines,” she said taking a red marker from the top pocket of her French painter’s smock.

“I’m not sure the royalty fees the school paid for allow for any kind of script change,” Miss Wolf’s assistant told her.

            “Nonsense,” Miss Wolf thundered. “Wallace Bates is a hack writer at best … a draining boil on the proud face of theatrical literature. He just happens to be the vice principal’s brother-in-law and he should count himself lucky he gets the forty-dollar a night production fee he charges for this three-act trash liner … besides the one dollar and seventy-five cents the plagiarizing embolicant extorts for each script.”

An aggressive teacher with seven-year tenure, Miss Wolf swept the now quiet stage clean of litter and dissention with a scowl and a burning pair of thick glasses before she went on. “I want you to substitute the words a la nude for the word naked. We’ll have plenty of parents here on opening night and I want them to see our production as artistic and culturally refined … not some vulgar stage exhibition.”

           

Several people laughed and Allison turned her head and pinched herself. Vicky Jenkins voice was a whisper from backstage, but easily carried to the ninth row of the auditorium. “Sounds like Master Bates doing something dirty to a piece of pie.”

The entire auditorium broke into howling fits of laughter and Allison stepped back just as a still wet backdrop toppled over breaking a painted-on-paper scene over Vern’s head. The red paint used to depict bricks on a wall looked like blood to Vern, and with a gasp of overacted pain and treachery he fainted dead away.

Two students dragged Vern toward the first aide office as Miss. Wolf yelled the assembly into order. “This is your fault!” She wagged a finger at Greg Johnson. “If you and your ball fumbling teammates hadn’t been so gauche … this wouldn’t have happened!”

            “What do you want me to do?” he protested.

            “Read Vern’s lines until the school nurse says he’s able to return to class,” she said. “We have three pages to get through today …. And we don’t have time for puerile delays.

-------5-------

Allison was terrified when Miss Wolf picked-up the Back off Boys script from the floor and handed it to Greg. While the drama teacher was showing Greg where to start his lines Allison fumbled in her pocket for the tin of Brown Sugar Vanilla Lip Butter and smeared a tiny bit on her lips. When she looked up the entire stage had gone quiet. Several people including Greg and Miss Wolf were scanning the room, their noses twitching. Obviously they had detected the strange fragrance but couldn’t tell where it was coming from. Miss. Wolf finally broke the silence. “Let’s get on with this,” she said and showed a befuddled Greg Johnson where to stand.

            “I’ve been looking everywhere for you,” Greg said. His voice was a rich baritone and not the ridiculing mockery for the benefit of his teammates that she had expected. Allison noticed he wasn’t even looking at the script and his gorgeous blue eyes seemed to be peeling her clothes off and taking their time doing it. Her throat was dry and she didn’t even know if she could make a sound let alone read the script.  She was surprised when, as if listening from a distance, she heard herself speak the lines. Her voice had a rich seductive sound almost like a late night whisper coming from a bed chamber. “So you came here looking for me … in the girl’s dressing room?” Allison felt like she was swimming in a shimmering lake filled with desire as she stared into his eyes. “Did you expect to find me … a la nu?” The last word trailed off which somehow gave the line the sexy yet subtle impression of succumbing to unbridled passion.

            It was time for the kiss and she felt the delicate fragrance of brown sugar and vanilla drawn her to him and him to her like a shaft of sunlight to an opening flower. Tingling ambiances flowed down her legs and exited from the tips of her toes and then doubled, beginning again and again until they became raging rivers of desire threatening to overflow her banks of chastity. She wanted to gasp … but she couldn’t breathe. The words of the fourteenth century text echoed in her mind from the depths of her soul. Approach the mouth slowly and make sure the lips fit together. They were close now and she turned her mouth so that the fullness of her lips all but brushed the corners of his. As the ancient witch’s only apprentice she was trusting in her instructions and understood, if only on an intuitive level, that the first sensual touch between two people had to be complete and without flaw, a perfectly formed cap of craving if the appropriate magic was to come about.

She moved closer until she could feel his breath demanding haste as the edges of their lips became the thinnest of fractures just before an amorous sealing.  Allow a heartbeat’s linger. The pause was a hammer that stiffened time as the frozen countdown clock of delightful expectation shattered, flew outward beyond the galaxy and became icy, floating stars …  flickering pieces of eternity lost and drifting on the tides of the solar wind.

Making a perfect seal. The instant their lips touched, all the lights suddenly became dog-stars, searing the vast area of the stage and the dimly-lit High School Auditorium with the brilliance of sunlight on white sand. A fractional moment of intensity lingered that promised forever … and then with a tremendous bang that echoed as if they all floundered in a hollow drum emptied of passion … teacher and students were all plunged into withering darkness.

“Must have blown a fuse,” Vicky Jenkins husky voice came from offstage as red emergency lights flickered on and illuminated silhouettes floating in the dim glow and a reeking smell of ozone. Greg Johnson had dropped to his knees and was struggling to stand. Allison stepped back, suddenly wary of an ancient power that had been unleashed and that she didn’t know if she could control.

“That’s all for today,” Miss. Wolf yelled. “We’ll try again tomorrow … after the maintenance contractors have a chance to explain and elucidate their wiring to the school board.”

-------6-------

The sound of melodic slamming lockers and chatter stilled as Allison ran down the school corridors. Boys and girls all stopped what they were doing and turned as the previously unnoticed student flew down the long hallways. She could feel Vicky Jenkins behind her struggling to catch up, but Allison didn’t slow until they were safely outside the building.

“You don’t think that perhaps Miss Wolf might choose me for your understudy …” Vicky gasped trying to catch her breath. “Say if Marsha Hicks happened to get ran over by my father’s hay truck!”

“Why would you want anything to do with this … nightmarish high school tragedy?” Allison glanced over her shoulder still shaking with fear. The students all seemed to be looking in her direction as they filed out of the school.

“That kiss with Greg had to be the most wonderfully passionate thing I’ve ever been close to,” Vicky gushed, beaming a shamelessly orgastic even though unrequited, smile at her best-friend. Vicky’s eyes closed and Allison could see them roll back in her head. “I would sell my soul to Vice Principal Adams and even my anatomically-correct collection of nasty Barbie dolls to his licentious brother the shower-peeping janitor … if I could only have a small part in whatever it is you’ve discovered.”

“What’s with everyone?” Allison turned. She was suddenly annoyed. Students were still filing out of the school. Small and large clusters had congregated on the icy, leaf-strewn lawn and the overflowing parking lot. All of them were staring … at her.

“It’s you!” Vicky gestured toward the flimsy ski-coat, sweater and jeans Allison was wearing … her voice singing with wonderment and a touch of jealousy. “You’re glowing … you have become the fire of desire!  My God … you’re burning!”

TO BE CONTINUED …

            

OMBRE and DEMILUNE part 2

Copyright (c) 2017 by Randall R. Peterson ALL RIGHTS RESERVED This is a work of fiction. All persons, locations and actions are from the author's imagination or have been used in a fictitious manner.

                                        

By R. Peterson

Devor didn’t know he’d been sleeping until the witch shook him awake. The inside of Banya’s house was a dark labyrinth of pots, books and kettles stacked into stalactite-like columns with narrow passages in between. The only light came from holes in a thatched roof casting beams of sickly yellow light on the littered floors. “I’ve been watching long … and expecting you,” the witch said leading Devor to an open area next to the kitchen that contained a bloated, flea-infested couch shedding last year’s stuffing like a brown itchy horse in springtime. “Do you insist on sugar …with your brew?”

Devor looked at the moldy furniture and thought he would rather stand. “I really can’t stay,” he muttered. “I stopped only for a drink from your well and must be leaving.”

Blind Banya spun about the room tapping her walking stick on the floor and gasped as if discovering it for the first time. “Flying cats! While my welcome faltered soft and rotten … looking for a cup.  I have ignored, misplaced and forgotten … to tidy all things up!”

She rocked her fleshy head backward and opened her mouth in a terrific yawn. A gleaming blue and green translucent bubble apparently made of mucus, spittle and gastric sauces expanded from her throat like a balloon until it filled half the room and then burst. A bang like a crack of thunder shook the house. And before Devor’s ears stopped ringing, the moldy couch became a white settee supporting soft pillows sewn with golden thread. Luxurious white carpets covered the floors wall to wall and the garbage and litter was gone.  A fire blazed cheerfully from a rock hearth.

Banya set two cups and a steaming kettle on a glass table with carved and gilded legs and smiled. “I serve two with your worries … both you must stay,” she said pushing Devor backward. He was trying to think of an objection when the soft pillows half-swallowed him. “Is fearing our Demilune … your only way?”

“That horrible Hun warlord has murdered all the people in my village and keeps the only girl I ever loved captive in his castle,” Devor moaned. “His armies are like the stars. What can I a simple woodcarver do?” The steaming cup before him smelled delicious. He wanted to drink but he was afraid. Banya looked at him and smiled showing green and rotten teeth … the smell suddenly became irresistible and so he lifted the cup and drank.

“All stars flee before the fires of daybreak’s early morning,” Banya cackled wiping Devor’s mouth with a bit of her woven hair. “Half-moon bakes his wedding plans to feed the cries of warning.” She was up dancing about the room now, waving her stick in the air like a wizard’s staff. Devor was a bit dizzy and felt as if he were in a dream.

A pop came from the hearth and a tiny chunk of burning wood flew outward and landed in the center of the room. A flash of fire scorched the white fabric and spread outward in all directions. “I hear the sound of saws,” she said cocking her head to one side and placing a claw-like hand to her ear. “Mallets, lumber, pound and pin. All new dwellings he constructs … with gates to keep them in.” Tiny houses and buildings began to appear in the dark circle around the smoldering ember … a new tiny village was being constructed in the center of the room complete with the castle Andelka was imprisoned in, and all of it perched on the cushion of a chair.

“I know Demilune plans to rebuild the village with an army of slaves that he kept alive for that purpose,” Devor said remembering what the man cleaning up the rubble had told him as he watched tiny buildings springing up like grass between the furniture.  “I don’t see how I can stop him or force him to release my love and his soon-to-be bride from her dead father’s castle.”

Banya picked up the tiny piece of smoldering wood, representing the Zivot from the center of the miniature village. She scraped away part of the charcoal showing a tiny bit of unburned wood. “All things gone that linger still … are never what they seem.” She cackled. “Bring what remains of Gifting Tree … and you shall have your dream.”

The witch turned the tiny chunk of burnt and slightly glowing wood around in her clawed hands and peered closely at it from all directions. Then she uncorked a bottle from a dusty shelf and gulped it down in a dozen gurgling swallows. She belched and then slowly breathed vile fumes on what remained of the wood and it burst into flames.

She flung the burning wood into the midst of the tiny village and first one, then a dozen, and then all the miniature houses were in flames. “He pays his army flesh and blood … all murderers for hire,” Banya whispered as she approached Devor. Her skin-covered eye sockets were wide and shimmering like distorted moons reflected from the watery bottom of a deep well. She pulled him from the couch and flung him toward the door. “Bring to me the Zivot tree … to quench his life with fire.”

Devor stumbled out of the smoking cottage coughing and a moment later Banya slammed the door behind him. A full moon peered from behind dark clouds and then slowly crept across the sky. After he found some bushes and vomited behind them, his head began to clear. The forest was deathly quiet and the cottage behind him looked like it had been deserted for ages. No smoke came from the roof or from any window. In the distance he thought he could faintly hear the sound of saws and hammers. “I’ll do anything to rescue Andelka,” Devor vowed to the darkness as he wiped his mouth and walked toward the village.

-------2-------

Devor was less than half a mile from the village and the sound of hammers and saws was much louder. He was wondering how he was going to be able to retrieve what remained of the Zivot tree in the town square with so many soldiers and workers around when he was almost ran down by a team of six horses pulling a wagon loaded with a dozen large barrels. The man driving the wagon pulled to a stop as Devor extracted himself from a clump of thorny bushes and introduced himself as Charva. Devor noticed the driver wore a white cloth tied on his sleeve. “You’re not going into the village without one of these on your arm are you?” Charva asked touching the rag. “You will certainly be killed on sight.”

“I’m not one of Demilune’s slaves,” Devor told him brushing himself off. “I’d rather die than serve the man who murdered my friends and relatives.”

“No one serves the Half Moon Lord willingly,” Charva said looking grim. “I lost two brothers and their families. These barrels are filled with highly potent Cerevisia. The soldiers plan to have a celebration as soon as the new village is complete which should be tonight. Many of the residents that were spared have been working day and night to finish. Everyone is afraid that when they are no longer needed Demilune will allow his soldiers to kill them for sport. After the soldiers are muddled from these extra strong spirits I plan to smuggle out as many slaves as possible in the empty barrels.

“Then count me in,” Devor told him climbing onto the wagon.

“Then you had better put this on,” Charva said handing him a piece of white cloth. “I wouldn’t want my new assistant shot on sight.”

Devor was astonished when they rolled into his hometown. Where once charred and blackened foundations and a few sooty timbers were all that remained of the hamlet a new village had been constructed complete with a stable, Inn and a tiny church. “This town looks better than I ever remember it,” Charva gasped.

“Except for the people,” Devor told him. A greatly reduced number of half-starved citizens were once again cleaning up and a few were putting finishing touches and paint on the buildings. “Why go to all this bother to restore a village when you’ve already burned it once?”

“The lady Andelka whom Demilune keeps prisoner vowed not to become his bride unless her village was spared. This is his monstrous way of deceiving her.” Charva said pointing to the castle on the hill.

“How is Half Moon going to replace that?” Devor pointed to the blackened tree stump in the town square.

“Demilune has a thousand men digging-up another Juhar tree from the forest and transporting it here.” Charva said as a group of thirsty soldiers ran toward the wagon. “The only reason that stump remains is because all the villagers refuse to touch it.”

“It won’t be the same without the Zivot,” Devor said. “No other tree in the world has the same magical powers.”

“It’s just as well,” Charva growled as a soldier yanked him from the wagon and he and Devor were forced to unload the barrels and open them. He looked at the charred stump with distain. “I curse even what remains of that tree. The magic of the damned source of pain and terror has failed this village and all the people in it.”

-------3-------

Judging by the position of the moon in the darkened sky it was nearing midnight when the last barrel of Cerevisia was emptied and the last of Demilune’s drunken soldiers finally collapsed on the ground. Only a handful of terrified villagers remained huddled inside the church; many had been killed for sport during the boisterous celebration.

Charva helped the few remaining villagers hide in the empty barrels he and Devor had stacked on the wagon, and then he went looking for others. Devor used his absence to carry the charred remains of the Zivot tree and place it in a barrel near the back of the wagon.

“There are no more …. Alive!” Charva told him when he returned. Devor thought the man’s face resembled the color of his dead mother’s clean sheets and when he gazed in the distance he knew why. Moonlight showed the bodies of villagers hanging from every lamppost on the winding road that led to the castle.

Charva wasted no time whipping the team of horses to frenzy as they thundered out of the village filled with slumbering soldiers. It wasn’t until they passed the guards stationed at the town gate, who demanded that the barrels be refilled and brought back, that Devor was able to breathe. “If you don’t mind can you drive past the cottage of Banya and drop me and what remains of the Zivot there,” he asked patting the barrel with the burnt stump in it.

“Banya is a witch,” Charva thundered. “No better than Demilune! I want you and that godless stump of misery out at once!” He flung Devor from the wagon and then rolled the barrel with the charred remains of the tree from the wagon’s tailgate.

Devor opened the barrel and had just started to drag the stump through the forest toward Banya’s cottage when he heard a large company of soldiers thundering down the road. The screams of villagers and Charva’s own anguished cries told him all including the horses were being slain.

It would have been almost impossible to drag the charred stump through the forest, what remained of the burnt roots kept snagging in the brambles, but a bleeding horse, dragging a harness and broken reins and with an arrow grazed in its side ran past and stopped just beyond him.  Devor discovered the animal was not too badly hurt and after calming it, rode on to the witch’s cottage with the burnt wood strapped to the horse’s back.

-------4-------

Banya was pleased to see Devor return with what remained of the magical Zivot. She set him to work at once carving a marionette out of what remained of the wood. Devor had seen the strange puppets operated by strings in the city and tried to follow her instructions. “The face must be of Demilune … with fingers grasping, stout!” she chanted. “With eyes that look for blood to let … and lips that pleasure shout! “ She paused to catch her breath and then went on.  “With magic dark … and magic light … and unknown fate to bend the night!”

Devor carved a round head that resembled Demilune’s bald one and painted it a fleshy red. He made a sneering mouth that he remembered and was about to paint on some yellow eyes when Banya stopped him. “Leave but holes inside his head … for places which to see. The eyes that gaze on conquered worlds will … surely come from me.”

He looked at the blind woman and shook his head. The witch had no eyes of her own. He didn’t know how she was going to supply them for the puppet, but he complied and carved out two sockets in the strange scornful face. Banya took the marionette into her cottage to finish it, sending Devor on numerous errands to fetch string, bits of cloth and other things. Devor noticed with horror one evening, when he returned and caught the witch sleeping, a pair of intact eyes staring at him from inside a glass bottle filled with a foul smelling liquid on a dusty shelf. It looked as if the witch had blinded herself sometime before he arrived … she really had been expecting him. And after that time he always found a reason to sleep outdoors.

Devor mostly waited outside for the witch to finish. She forbade him to watch what she was doing. As he sat under the moon one evening fingering his mother’s ring which he wore on a chain around his neck and looking at the wood scraps left from the Zivot he suddenly remembered picking the leaf with Andelka’s name on it. He still had to make a present for her. He decided there was just enough wood left from the charred tree to carve her a small box that she could keep her most treasured items in. Over the next two days he secretly fashioned the box and then carved every magical symbol he knew on it with the name Ombré on the front, which meant the coming of darkness, because of the unknown properties of the tree’s shadow. He only hoped that whatever Banya was doing would be successful and that he could rescue his love before she became Demilune’s bride.

Devor grew impatient with the waiting and was gathering all his possessions when he saw smoke coming from the cottage and heard Banya’s shrill voice. He quickly placed the Ombré box into a bag on the horse’s back. “A new terror walks the land … new fear to conquer old.” The witch cackled. “Burning wood and fire brands … that I might be so bold.”

Banya was hanging from the rafters when he burst through the door. Strings stretched from a cross of wood in her hands to where the marionette made in the image of Demilune strutted through a miniature replica of the village on the floor below. A lighted firebrand clutched in the puppet’s hand fired each building as the dancing monster swept through the village. “Boiling water, flesh and bone … cut to flowing ink!” the witch chanted as the puppet set fire to each building. “The blood that pours to quench his thirst … is forever mine to drink!”

“No!” Devor screamed as the puppet holding the burning piece of wood strutted toward the tiny castle sitting on a chair to resemble the hill. “Andelka is locked in there! She will die!”

“Better for love to vanish in flames … than to slowly burn with time.” Banya replied. “Better you promise your box to me … for all things will be mine!”

She knew about the box he had carved!

Devor ran to the witch’s kitchen and came back with a large knife used to chop cabbage. He cut the strings of the marionette and it fell to the floor. Banya’s eyes popped out of the puppet and rolled across the floor and were taken by two mangy rats into a hole in the wall. Devor scooped up the eyeless marionette and ran with the bundle toward his horse. “You fool!” Banya cursed at him from the rafters and as she jumped to the floor. “There is more holding Andelka than just a room … a door with bars and stone! Return to me my strings of power … or you shall be alone!” She was on her hands and knees searching for her eyes as he mounted the horse.

Devor could still hear the witch’s screams as he rode away … a glow on the horizon told him that indeed his ravaged homeland, that had just been rebuilt, was once again becoming ash.

-------5-------

The village was a raging inferno when Devor galloped into the town square. Demilune’s soldiers were running in all directions fleeing for their lives. Devor noticed the murderous Hun Warlord that everyone had called Half Moon lying in the village square where the Zivot tree had once stood; he was burned almost beyond recognition. Devor turned and thundered up the winding road to the castle. Hungry flames were already licking the walls He fought his way through smoke and flames and forced the horse to climb the winding stairs that led to the highest tower. The entire stone structure was becoming hot like an oven. Suddenly he could hear Andelka’s anguished cries coming from behind an iron door. “Help me!” she screamed. Devor jumped from the horse and beat on the door but it was locked and wouldn’t budge.  

            “I can’t get inside to save you!” he lamented as he collapsed outside the heavy door.

            “Devor is that you?” Andelka’s voice came from behind the door. “I knew that you would come for me!”

            “I fear I am too late!” he said. “But I will never leave you. Where ever the smoke and flames take you there I will go too.”

Andelka was quiet for a moment and then she whispered between coughing from the smoke. “If only we could slip into the shade of the Zivot tree and let fate take a chance!”

Devor knew the tree was gone forever but he suddenly remembered the carved box he had made for her from the magical wood. Anything placed inside it would surely be in Zivot’s shadow he reasoned since it was covered by enchanted wood on all sides. He looked around for something small enough to place in the Ombré box and then he remembered his mother’s wedding ring. He took the golden band from around his neck and placed it in the box as he said a silent prayer. He remembered the words his mother had spoken to him two years before. “You can’t control the wind,” she had told him. “It blows where it will.”

The hopeless woodcarver decided to accept whatever fate had in store for him as he opened the box. A golden key lay where the ring had once been. He held his breath as he tried it in the lock …. and the door opened. Andelka kissed him as he pulled her onto the prancing horse behind him and they thundered down the stairs and through the smoke and raging flames. Somehow he knew they both were going to make it.

-------6-------

Andelka’s gift to him turned out to be a baby girl that they named Melna a year later. The village had once more been rebuilt and a new tree had been planted in the public square. The witch’s powers had been broken. Devor and Andelka were both so very happy and prosperous living in the rebuilt castle on the hill that they soon forgot about the Ombré box and the marionette made to look like Demilune. Both objects lay in a chest in a dark dusty corner of the castle’s dungeon.

            But Banya hadn’t forgotten, and when she learned that Devor and Andelka were going on holiday to Rome she convinced a band of wandering gypsies one foggy morning to break into the castle and bring her the puppet … and the box. She told them about a secret entrance beneath the stone structure. “Six golden coins I’ll give to you … and pleasure all your days. If you will bring the box to me … and puppet through the haze.” The old blind woman told them.

            The band of gypsies agreed but craftily persuaded Banya to give them the six coins first. After they retrieved the carved Ombré and the marionette plus all the loot from the castle they could carry, they left the village by another road and vanished into the forest. They were never seen again … at least not in this story.

But the box and the puppet emerged from time to time in many different hands and under different circumstances. They were always close by when they appeared, century after century, never one without the other. They were both carved from the same enchanted tree … good and bad like all things in the universe … with magic dark … and magic light … and unknown fate to bend the night.

THE END?

OMBRE and DEMILUNE

Copyright (c) 2017 by Randall R. Peterson ALL RIGHTS RESERVED This is a work of fiction. All persons, locations and actions are from the author's imagination or have been used in a fictitious manner.

By R. Peterson

Devor watched his exhausted mother take off her prized wedding band and place it in a crack in the stone foundation. It was where she always kept it when she was washing clothes in a cracked wooden tub that leaked water on the stone floor. She was afraid the lye in the soap would tarnish the precious gold her late husband had worked for years as a woodcarver to purchase. “Hurry Mother!” Devor said. “They have already formed a circle around the Zivot and it’s time for the picking!”

Each spring a huge and ancient Juhar tree growing in the center of the tiny forest parish of Ajándék in Foederati, a former Roman providence north of Italy, sprouted buds with the name of a village-resident hidden inside each growing leaf’s blade.

In the fall, when the leaves turned from green to red and then to a rich shade of gold, the names became visible. During Fesztivál-ajándékok (the Festival of Gifts) each resident picked a golden leaf and secretly made a present to place under the tree for the named person the following year.

The ritual created twelve months of expectation as each villager secretly observed the person named on the leaf, and tried to decide what would be the most appropriate gift.

Devor’s mother, Lucija, suspected her son was more anxious to catch a glimpse of Andelka Kitosh, the beautiful daughter of the Providence Lord who lived in the large stone bastion above the village. And to find out what his present was rather than finding out who he had to supply a gift for the next year.

Picking a leaf from the tree was a serious responsibility. The gift you selected for the person must not only be something they would enjoy, but it also had to be useful to them in some way.

Tradition said the magic of Zivot would always help to create or procure the gift; all you really had to supply was the desire … and the belief. She sighed. If only her son would realize his infatuation with the lord’s daughter was hopeless.

            Lucija rinsed the clothes one last time and then had Devor help her carry the heavy basket behind their small cottage to a thin cord stretched tight between two trees. She could see faint wisps of her breath. “It’s getting cold,” she said. “I hope these don’t freeze before they have a chance to dry.”

            “Who cares,” Devor said as he helped his mother hang the garments using crude wooden pegs with tapered slits cut in them for pins. “The clothes we have on are clean and should last several days!”

            “Night often lays traps in a creeping gloom, so you must always be ready for the morning,” Lucija told her son. “Those who don’t are often caught by misfortune.”

            Almost the entire village stood with their backs to the tree as Devor and his mother arrived. No one was supposed to know who the wrapped presents came from.

Devor had drawn the name of Leona whose job it was to feed a large flock of ever hungry ducks and geese in the pond next to her husband’s mill. He anxiously placed her wrapped present under the tree.  It was a special double bucket he’d designed and made. When you removed the outer bucket, holes peppered in the inner bucket’s bottom and sides would spread the grain evenly as Leona charged through the flapping and fighting gabble.

Lucija had worked a hundred nights to sew the mayor a new blue dyed wool coat with bone buttons and fancy embroidered sleeves.

The village trumpeter blew three long notes to announce that the gift giving was complete and the villagers formed a half circle around Zivot. The sun was sinking into the western horizon and everyone was careful not to step in the long shadow cast from the massive tree.

“Last year Adj Beroslav was too busy looking for his present and forgot where he was walking,” Andelka whispered as she stood next to Devor. He caught a scent of lavender coming from her golden hair as she brushed against him. “He stepped in the shadow and then drowned in the river when spring came.” Andelka made her eyes go wide and then she smiled playfully at Devor.

“Does stepping in Zivot’s shadow always bring about evil?” Devor asked. Andelka had attended a very expensive school in the city and was knowledgeable about a great many things. “Everything about the Zivot is magical,” Andelka said moving closer. “Good and bad. The shadow is just the unknown or hidden parts. Who knows what might happen?”

“Does anyone know about the bad parts?” Devon asked. He felt a weakness in his chest each time she looked at him.”

“An herb gathering old woman named Banya once claimed to know all of the tree’s secrets,” Andelka stepped back; she was disappointed. “But the village elders banished her to the forest – mostly out of fear … they said she was a boszorkány!”

“A witch!” Devor gasped. From the time he was little, Devor had heard frightful stories about the dark magic that also inhabited the tiny hamlet.

“Shhhh …” Devor’s mother silenced him. She was always afraid that her son’s fascination with Andelka would turn into hopeless love. The pretty girl, whose father she cleaned for, although pleasant to be around, was obviously too far above her son’s humble station and she didn’t want him to be hurt by a forbidden desire. “The ceremony is about to begin!”

“In the year of our lord 417,” The mayor began. “We gather here to observe another season of great prosperity by the grace of God and the power of the Zivot that he has blessed us with …”

“I hope I pick your name,” Andelka whispered to Devor and squeezed his hand.

“And I hope I pick yours!” He blushed.

After an excruciating long spiel, the mayor finally finished his speech and the villagers lined up to open their presents and to pick next year’s name. Andelka had moved to the noble side of the tree where her father stood glaring at the ragged son of one of his servants.

Devor received a set of wood carving tool from some anonymous person and his mother received a small barrel of lye soap.

Devor gasped when he saw Andelka’s name glowing on the back of the leaf he picked. He carefully placed the leaf in his coat pocket and smiled as he watched the girl he was enthralled with, climbing into a fancy carriage.

It wasn’t allowed to tell anyone whose name you had picked and Devor wondered why his mother seemed unusually upset. He found out a moment later why when Andelka’s furious father appeared beside them roughly pushing Devor out of the way. “You keep that vacak son of yours away from my daughter … or I’ll see to it that both of you starve!” he threatened.

            “Yes my lord!” Devor’s mother bowed.

Devor reached his hand into his pocket as his mother yanked him toward home but all he found was tiny bits of broken leaf … the magic of Zevot had been crushed.

-------2-------

            “By why must I go away mother?” Devor watched his mother carefully fold his clothes and put them into a small travel bag.

            “Your uncle lives in the city and will teach you to be a master carver,” she said. “Someday you will be as good as your father was and be able to take a wife and provide for a family. Until then you must work had and try to learn everything your uncle shows you.”

            “I’m already the best carver in the village … everyone says so,” Devor told her and then added. “What would it take to make a home for someone like Andelka?”

            “You must put the lord’s daughter out of your mind,” Lucija scolded and then relented and hugged her son as tears came into his eyes.

“But I love her,” he cried.

“You can’t control the wind,” she said as she stroked his red hair. “It blows where it will.”

The city was much larger than anything Devor had ever seen before and his uncle kept him busy almost every minute of the day in his furniture shop carving birds and flowers into the back of chairs and shaping legs on a lathe. It was only at night that the loneliness and love sickness overcame him. He often watched the stars from the window of his small attic bedroom and wondered where Andelka was and what she was doing. “I’ll find a way to be with you forever,” he promised the stars. The way they twinkled in reply he couldn’t tell if they were agreeing or laughing … he hoped it was the former.

-------3-------

            “We just received some ghastly news from you home,” Devor’s uncle told him two years later when Devor came in from delivering a magnificently carved wardrobe to a client. “A Hun Lord named Demilune who even church leaders are calling the Scourge of Hell has attacked and burned most of the northern provinces with his armies. I asked about your village but the constable told me that none were spared.”

Devor dropped his uncle’s payment for the wardrobe on the table and began to stuff his tools into a bag. “Where are you going?” his uncle demanded.

            “To find my mother!” Devor told him.

            “You have another year on your indenture and she is most surely dead,” his uncle said. The furniture maker’s nephew had been making him lots of money with almost no outlay. “I won’t let you go!”

            “Try to stop me!” Devor pushed him out of the way.

-------4-------

It took three days for Devor to arrive home walking down endless dirt roads past burnt fields and piles of smoldering soot and rubble that used to be houses and barns. Every cleared area of the forest was smoking. Rotting farm animals lay where they had been senselessly slaughtered adding starvation to the endless misery plaguing the lands.

 Throughout Foederati, and most of the providences north of Rome, unbelievable destruction was wrought by the unmerciful armies from the steppes of Eastern Europe.

                        As he neared his village Devor noticed a man he barely knew from another town pushing a cart and helping to clean up the rubble. Both of his ears had been cut off and dried blood made it look as if he were wearing a helmet. All the forced labor workers seemed to be wearing white cloth tied on their arms. “Have you seen my mother?” Devor shouted as the man hurried past.

            “If she was anywhere near the valley when Half-Moon’s plague of soldiers surged through the lands she is dead,” the man moaned. “I will be too if I don’t get this rubbish swept away. Lord Demilune spared a few to help clean and make this place ready for his wedding celebration coming in just a fortnight. After that … I can only guess at our fate!”

Devor turned teary eyes to the stone bastion above the village; it appeared to be the only dwelling left intact. “Do you know if the girl who lived in that castle survived?” He pointed to the fortress on the hill hoping without hope for a miracle.

            “Of course she did,” the man replied as he began to shovel ashes into a wagon. “Our late lord’s daughter Andelka, was always the most beautiful girl in the country. She is to be the sorry bride of Demilune and he’s keeping her in one of those towers … a tragedy she didn’t go fast,” he added with a look of revulsion.

            Devor was growing more and more horrified as he searched for the remains of his family home. There were no intact landmarks. It was as if the entire countryside had turned to ash. Cracked and blackened stone was all that remained of the house he grew up in. Devor was just about to walk away when a gleam from the charred foundation caught his eye. He reached down and plucked his mother’s golden wedding ring from the rubble. She must have been doing laundry when the armies came he thought

-------5-------

The horror he had endured before was nothing to that which assaulted him when he entered the village proper. A few burnt and blackened timbers were all that remained, rising from the charred stone foundations of the homes. Frozen puddles tinted with blood came from melted snow. In the town square hundreds of spikes had been driven into the frozen ground in a circle, with a severed head of a village resident atop each one.  In the center the magnificent Zivot tree lay uprooted and burned only a charred stump remained.

The shocked boy tried not to look but he couldn’t. The miller’s head stared at him from atop a sharpened post next to his wife.  The village priest looked as if he had swallowed a crucifix and the end protruding from his neck cavity was lashed to the spike with rosary beads. The shoemaker who had made him a pair of boots in return for a new door looked toward heaven for eternity with one eye and a spike thrust through the other. Too many familiar faces appeared each one a vision from a horrible dream.

Time appeared to slow. The buzzing of flies entering forever open mouths became a low rumble like thunder. Devor couldn’t breathe it was as if he were drowning gasping for air. Everything about him began to spin. Then shock suddenly covered him like ice water and his mind treacherously cleared. The severed head of the dear woman who had nursed him as a child who had loved and watched over him all his life rested on an iron spike looted from a cemetery fence … her downcast and closed eyes forever frozen in quiet acceptance of the horrors of society.

            Devor didn’t know he was screaming “Mother!” until he heard shouts from the soldiers. An arrow whizzed past his head and tore a chunk of skin from his ear. He was running and heard malicious laughter as dozens of arrows flew past him. Devor was shocked to find they weren’t really trying to hit him … just having fun … for now. A trumpet sounded just as Devor dodged another arrow and sprinted behind the remains of a chimney hearth and crouched in a shallow well half filled with rubble, blood and bone.

            Devor slowly rose from the well and peered back at his attackers. The war lord who was obviously Demilune thundered into the village with at least a hundred others all on horseback as the soldiers who had shot arrows at Devor formed two regimented lines. The Hun lord’s un-helmeted head was round, stained red with blood and without hairs except for a few strands coiled like black wire. Wild bulging eyes the color of diseased wheat scanned the area with malicious satisfaction as his horse pranced around the carnage. “When they are finished you may turn those white rags red!” He said waving an arm carelessly toward the workers with the white cloth on their arms. “Leave the heads,” he ordered pointing to the massive circle on bloody spikes. “I rather like the way they look!” Then he added with a laugh almost as an after-though. “My new less-than-respectful bride should be suitably stifled.”

The soldiers stood at attention, raised their bows in the air and clashed them together in salute as the monstrous war lord rode away. By that time, Devor was hurtling through the underbrush that surrounded the village escaping deep into the forest, trying to wake from a nightmare with eyes wide open … filled with shock and unbelievable sorrow.

-------6-------

            Devor hadn’t eaten for three days, ever since he’d left his uncle’s workshop, but he was still not hungry. He didn’t really care if he ever ate again. Horror and sorrow rolled off him with a weight that seemed to fill his boots with rocks. Each step was a labor. Thirst was like a worried parent calling from a distance.

Just before night a looming two level cottage made of sticks and dried brambles appeared in the bottom of a jagged gully surrounded by a vile, snake-like mist. It was the first intact dwelling he’d seen since leaving the village. Crows perched on a thatched roof and pigs grunted in a pen … the only non-enslaved living things he’d thus found. Twisted trees grew up and away from the house as if it contained a leaching, heated poison. Fumes came from a large pot boiling over a fire. Devor noticed a rocked well with a crank and bucket and his throat suddenly cried for water.

            He cranked the bucket to the rim and was just drinking when a voice like splintering wood came from behind the house. “Those be tears from a mourning sky,” a wild woman cackled as she limped from behind two mulberry bushes pointing to the water. “Embrace all weight from whence you die,” she declared. “Snakes and sneezes wicked things … break your sleep and steal your dreams.”

            “Who are you?” Devor gasped. She spoke like a crazy person with gibberish rhymes. The woman stood no more than four foot tall with raven-black hair woven together in tiny braids that covered her body like a hoary gown. White skin the color of a frog’s belly glistened from a face radiant in the foggy light. Two gaping pits covered with skin appeared where her eyes should have been. She was obviously blind as she tapped the ground with a dripping stick that she’d been using to stir the large pot. “I am Banya,” she whispered, a toothless scowl breaking cracked lips. “Come closer that I might see you with my hands, pick the fruits of your dreams and squeeze fresh blood into my jams.”

            “You are the one Andelka told me about! You know the dark shadow-secrets of the Zivot don’t you?” Until this moment Devor had thought of the old woman as just a scary story that didn’t really exist.

            “Calamity births all tempers … be they present or past,” The blind Banya said with a twisted smile. “I am at your poor gyilkos (murderer) at your service … you have only to ask.” She snapped her fingers.

Fear and revulsion swept through every part of Devor’s body as he slowly approached the witch. He moved toward her against his will. Fish-heads and slimy bones floated to the top of the boiling pot and then suddenly began to swim as Banya started to laugh.  Long bony fingers with fingernails like claws reached out for him. Fear rushed down his legs like cold rain … as she dragged him into the house.

TO BE CONTINUED …