Trilogy of Origin

My first piece of writing for this site. These were written for a school assignment; each was based off of a visual prompt. The reoccurring character was an unexpected surprise for my teacher.

Visual Prompt 1: Two bears wrestling on a beach

Long ago, in an ancient time of war and peril, peace could not be found by man. Kingdoms raged against one another, kings waging war, fearful to lose their power to one greater than they; all were scattered in the chaos, with none united by their trust, as lies abounded. Yet within these wars, all was counted of no worth in comparison to the war within the people’s hearts, the war for ever-fleeting peace.

One particular young boy, however, Amor was his name, seemed unfazed by the brutality of the darkness. He knew of places long forgotten, places where the peace of man transcended that of nature; he knew, and thus, he sought. Ridiculed, he was, for his endless pouring over the maps. Why study maps for the places forgotten? A waste of the young man’s strength, strength which should pledge unwavering loyalty to the King of his land, strength to fight the wars, strength to bleed and die yet not cry out in retreat.

For strength young Amor had aplenty, rewarded for countless days in the fields of his father, cultivating what little greenery was left in the scarred and barren kingdom. And it was this strength that called upon his name to join the ranks in the perpetual struggle for his kingdom’s survival. He submitted without complaint, but vowed never to lose hope of setting his eyes upon beauty untouched by war.

For days he travelled to the grounds of his training; for weeks he trained to join in the war; for months he fought with all of his strength to overcome the death which took his fellow soldiers. The months turned to years, and his kingdom was lost, burned to the ground; yet there remained with him a shred of the past, the ancient maps he always carried. And, at long last, the final missing scroll was found in the vast libraries of the kingdom which conquered his own, the map of the wild Northern borders of the known world.

Having spent the prime of his life in the horrors of war, Amor knew he would likely never return from the arduous trek, for his remaining days were dwindling; but still he held on to his youthful hope, his shred of the past, that he could see beauty untouched by war. High mountains he climbed, and low valleys he crossed, ever onward, ever North, North to lands forgotten for generations. The North seemed fleeting, hiding behind the warring kingdoms, ever out of reach, until at long last, the ashes stopped falling, the smoke no longer permeating the air.

He came to the trees; bright greens and reds, filtering the sunlight on the forest floor. He came to the meadows, endlessly rolling, stalks of grass whispering the sounds of the breeze. He came to the streams, bubbling brooks, silver gleams of fish shining in the summer light. Amor came to these places, breath stolen by their peace, but through it all, one thing overshadowed all others in its beauty: the dancing of the animals. The birds fluttering in the trees, swirling in spirals with one another; herds of 4-legged creatures all running in unison through the golden plains; the fish in the stream jumping through the air, glimmering and flashing, circling and spinning.

All of this seemed foreign to him; he knew of the stories of when man used to dance, but it remained an art forever lost. To see the dancing of the animals was to see into the past, into the times before the endless battle for dominion. So he continued onward, ever aging, ever feeling younger with each step, until he finally reached the edge of the land. It was called a beach, though the word would not reveal itself to him in his older age.

The golden sands sparkled before him, paving the way to the crashing sea; chaotic as the wars, yet in a peaceful way. And dancing upon the shores were two young cubs, cubs of a bear. Clumsily tripping over their feet, the cubs would fall and stand, spinning and circling like the fish, running like the 4-legged creatures, and spiraling like the birds.

Old Amor gazed his fill and felt peace breathed into him by the beauty untouched by war. By now hobbling with age, he realized his journey was not yet over; if he could hold on long enough, he had one final task to do. Back over the streams, through the plains and forests he wandered; South through the low valleys and over the high mountains, back to the skies clouded over from the burning of the wars. Back to his home he went, his kingdom gone but his house still standing, his garden green in the blackness. And there he taught the children the Dance of the Bears. He showed them how to spiral like the birds, to run like the 4-legged creatures, to spin and circle like the fish. He breathed his final breath that very day, the last sight before his eyes being of the children dancing, together, in unison, free of the troubles of life, if only but for a moment.

Prompt 2: Stone giants drinking from a stream of lava

We now bring back our old friend Amor, the man who taught the Dance of the Bears. For while his story has been told, parts remain unsaid, and among these, his journey through the mountains. The journey was no easy task, as you may recall, yet it was not only the rough land which slowed Amor down.

As he wandered near the edge of the kingdoms, a great black spire rose before him, a spire of stone, the Mountain of Wrath. The townsmen at its foot were friendly and welcoming enough, providing him a place to stay, food to eat, and drinks to drink, yet a strange tone of fear hovered over the quaint little village.

Many of these villagers asked him from whence he came, and where he was going, and his answer was always the same: “I come from war, and I run towards peace.” But word soon got out that he intended to scale the Mountain of Wrath. 

“Good sir,” the townsmen pleaded with him, for they had grown fond of his many stories and his kind nature. “The Mountain of Wrath is dangerous; cursed, even! We fear that if you climb over that mountain, then you will live to see the peace you seek.” But Amor heeded them not, for he was determined to climb the mountain pass.

For a full day he climbed as the trees faded away, replaced by the charred black rocks of the Mountain of Wrath. But at dawn on the second day, a strange quiet draped over the pass, interrupted only by the breathing of Amor. He continued upward with danger ringing in his mind; the air thinned and filled with ash, but he was determined never to turn back. It was on this day that he learned of the true danger of the mountain.

As he crested the ridge before him, he saw a strange sight, one that he could not comprehend… giants, made of stone, drinking the lava of the mountain, glowing red from the heat. Humanoid in form, yet devoid of civility; they greedily drank from their cups, spilling and sloshing the life-taking liquid, jostling one another in barbaric fervor. And Amor was terrified, for the giants saw him immediately, and they gave chase.

With shouts and growls and grumbles, the beasts quickly gained on Amor, heedless of the roughness of the rocks beneath their feet; yet they soon lost sight of him, for Amor cleverly ran around a boulder and wedged himself into a crevice. The giants howled past blindly, and Amor slowly found his way back to the river of lava from which they drank; despite his fear, curiosity drew him to look upon their home. Yet he was not alone… laying next to the river was another one of the lava giants, but this one smaller, weak and frail in appearance, while still dwarfing Amor in stature.

Amor cautiously approached the small giant, careful to remain out of arm's length. He tried speaking to the giant, but the giant either could not or would not understand; he simply stared back with sad eyes, devoid of the rage within the others. And Amor pitied the giant, for he saw the cause of the small giant’s plight: The giant’s legs were entirely deformed, and Amor surmised that such deformity would be looked down upon in a society so lacking in care. He abandoned his fears for his own safety and kneeled down next to the giant’s legs; he saw the cup the giant held in his hand, but knew he could not dip it into the lava, for the heat was more than he could bear.

Instead, he grabbed one of the giant’s frail arms; he felt the giant tense, but the giant slowly relaxed. He helped the giant crawl closer to the fiery river, and then, without a word, he walked away. It was at that moment that the horde  of giants came rumbling back, but then they stopped in confusion at seeing Amor near their home once more. And they also saw the small giant drinking from the fiery river. They thought long and hard, unable to understand what had just happened, unable to understand the grace that drew Amor to help the outcast among his enemies.

By the time they comprehended the scene before them, Amor was long gone. But they asked the small giant about Amor in their language of grunts and growls. And the small giant told them. And without a single word, and in a single day, Amor tamed the Mountain of Wrath, showing the giants how to care.

Prompt 3: A shoebill bird

There once lived an old man in old town Shoebill, a small medieval town hidden in the hills. He was known for his small treasure-house, nothing much by the kingdom’s standards, but a fortune to the farmers of his town. Nobody knew exactly where the treasure came from. The most common belief, though, was that he brought it back from adventures beyond the borders of the known world.

One day, however, the man came to the tavern looking dejected. “Why so downcast today, good sir?” the tavern keeper asked, for the old man always had a merry look about him.

“I can’t seem to figure it out,” the old man responded. “Every day for the last couple of weeks, a small treasure or trinket has gone missing from my shed. Now, as you well know, I have always made sure that none in this town are wanting for money, so I don’t know who could be taking it. I finally plugged that window in the back with a sheet, but this morning, it was torn to shreds, and a trinket of great value to me was taken in the night. It was a golden circlet, it was, given to me by the hands of my late bride’s father, a king in a distant land.”

“Very strange indeed, for I know not who would dare steal from a man as generous as you. They mustn’t know that they have but to ask, and they’ll have a month’s work in silver.”

“Indeed, my friend, indeed. And may it never be conceived that I am dejected that the treasure is in use; sooner or later, it would have been given away anyway. But that circlet was especially dear to me, as it was borne of the most valuable treasure of all, that of love. Would that I was young once more, so I could find the one who has taken it from me.”

“Well,” said the tavern keeper, “I know more than a few folks in this town; I’m sure I can find a young lad to hunt down that circlet for you.” And so it was that the tavern keeper indeed found a young man to find the golden circlet for the retired adventurer, a young orphan farmer named Amor. Few knew him well, save that he spent endless hours pouring over old maps, dreaming of a place to find peace in a war-torn kingdom; what little time wasn’t spent studying his maps was spent cultivating his father’s field, blooming green on the otherwise rocky hillside.

Amor nevertheless put his maps away and proved his dedication to the task, wandering around the town, looking for strangers within the town of Shoebill. Yet every man in town was one he knew well, one who wouldn’t dare to steal from the kindest man in town. So he decided simply to wait outside of the treasure-house and catch the thief in the night. And so he would have, had the thief not been able to fly.

For as he watched and waited, a peculiar black bird screeched into the fabric stretched over the treasure-house window, shredding it and landing on a stack of silver coins. And the bird picked up the coins in his long, curved talons and took flight, nearly invisible in the darkness of the night. Amor had keen eyes, however, and gave chase, for he and he alone could keep pace with a bird in flight when running. The bird led him across the hillside and into the darkness of a small cave.

Amor quickly made a makeshift torch from the sparse trees on the hill, and struck his flint to light it; the torch blazed bright, and he stepped into the shadows. The light immediately caught on many glittering objects: coins of gold, rings of silver, and even a dagger inlaid with jewels. Amor heeded none of these things, continuing onward to find the mischievous bird. And finally, in the very back of the cave, he did. The bird was a devilish thing, all black and greasy, pale yellow eyes glaring over a large, flat beak; within this beak was the very golden circlet stolen from the old man.

As evil as the bird appeared, though, Amor did not wish to hurt it without cause, so he set his glimmering torch upon a stone ledge and slowly walked up to the bird. Each step he took sent the bird back three small hops, even as he dropped to his knees so as to appear smaller. But he finally got close enough to grab the circlet; so he tried, and the bird pecked him in the forehead.

Each time he reached for the circlet, the bird would jump and peck him, playing some sort of devious game, until at last Amor seized the circlet in his hand; the game quickly changed into a tug-of-war. They spun in circles, Amor still winded from the sprint, and the bird showing impressive strength, until at last, with a grumble, the bird let go of the golden circlet; suddenly free from the tugs of the birds, Amor careened back into the wall behind him, and the bird let off what sounded like a chuckle of sorts, if birds could laugh.

And so it was that Amor brushed himself off and gathered the rest of the treasure in the cave under the watchful eye of the mischievous bird. He set off to return the treasure to the kind old man, with the strange bird waddling after him, chest puffed out to retain some degree of pride after having lost his amassed treasure to Amor. Rather than chase the bird away, though, Amor welcomed the company on the walk back to town, laughing at the clumsy bird’s antics all the way back to the old man’s house.

He knocked upon the door, and as the wooden door swung open, said, “Good sir, I have found the treasure and the culprit.” And he lowered the sack of treasure onto the old man’s floor, handing him the golden circlet, as the bird tried pushing past him to enter the home. The moment the old man saw the strange bird, his eyes widened.

“Why, that’s old Shoebill! I thought I had lost him long ago!”

“Who?” Amor asked, thoroughly bewildered by this declaration.

“Shoebill! I found him as a little hatchling on one of my journeys, and took him under my wing, so to speak. He always had a fancy for all things shiny, the little rascal! But he disappeared one day, years ago, and I figured he was lost. Yet somehow, I am really not all that surprised to see that he was the thief this whole time… I suppose he wanted his own treasure-house for a change. I named the town after him, you know; how else would a town get such a strange name?”

Shoebill charged through the door and bumped into the old man, and the old man gave a hearty laugh. “Thank you, my dear boy, for bringing me my beloved circlet, but what’s more, for bringing an old friend.”

Amor responded, “Think nothing of it, good sir, for I was merely helping the kindest man in town.” He bid farewell to the old man and to Shoebill amidst a chorus of happy chirps and laughs, barely comprehending the scene that just unfolded before him, but happy himself for having the chance to help. And so began the tale of Amor, the very Amor who would go on to journey beyond the edges of the known world, taming the Mountain of Wrath; the very Amor who would live a legacy of peace and teach the Dancing of the Bears. For even the greatest of journeys have humble beginnings.

Author's Note

Hello, there!

Reviews

[TheCentury]

It's kinda strange that I can review my own writing...