Gypsy King Chapter II

Gypsy King

Summary of first chapter

 

Into this lonely town has come a fabulous storyteller who the townspeople know as the Gypsy King.  To a rapt audience he is telling a tale of an ancient demon knight and a Saint who fights him.  The demon is ‘Neela Gilihad Nigela of the ninth circle of hell’ and is the master of all negative emotions.  There are nine demons present in this plane of earth and he is their overlord.  He has grown powerful enough to manifest physically upon the earth now.  He has become a hunter of men at the end of the cycle of the moon as well as during the times the sun blacks out.  The only way you know he is coming is to hear your full name whispered by the wind and the trees.  The only way to save yourself is to call on justice and ask her to send the Saint Elisha to you.  This is not without its own dangers, as the Saint will judge your worthiness to receive his help.  At present, the Storyteller has just finished a break and is preparing to begin the story again.  The special thing about this story though, is that he is the main character and was the one being chased by the Demon.  He nearly took his own life driven mad by the whisper/shout of his name, however a series of visions of his mother and her plan for his life may just have saved him.    

 

 

 

Chapter Two:

 

‘You there, up front, please clear this space for me, yes like that, in a half circle. That way I can look upon more faces then when you are crowded in my vision.  Thank you sir, why this is a delightfully cooked foul, might I bother you to get me the recipe from your wife for my wife would love this.  I shall allow a few questions before proceeding as long as you keep them short and to the point.  Why yes Sir, I would love a fresh tankard of beer.  My, my, brewed by your own hand you say?  Delightful, such a wondrous skill and the darkest thickest brew I have ever had the pleasure of drinking…Hmmm, I would be happy to trade you a recipe of our people for a zesty red brew if you are willing.’ 

 

‘Hearken People:’ 

 

‘As I said, I was trapped and desperate.  I relived my childhood on those moments and drew strength from my mother’s comfort and words.  I remembered her story about Elisha the man; become a saint, born of the Tish’-bite: Elisha and his flying mansion.  Yes, a flying wondrous mansion ma’am.  Now back to the story.’ 

 

‘Hearken, hearken, hearken:’

‘Beset and harried, facing my own death and mortality, I did call out in my desperation on the Lady Justice and beseech her to send to me the Saint Elisha.  I called Elisha, Elisha, Elisha.  I called it out with all the longing in my heart and all my desire to make my mothers dreams for me become a reality.  I had never known of these desires afore, and I was a tremble with the power of them.  Most likely I would not be here to tell this tale if something within the heart of me had not changed.  I had rejected my people’s ways.  I had not honored my mother and my father long dead.  I had committed sins with an unfeeling heart and there was no one to blame save myself.   Yet, the visions had changed all of that and my one true desire was to make it all right.  As I called out the name of Elisha, I suffered a change in vision.  Suddenly I could see my own aura and with each calling it shifted from darkness to light.  The aura that only a holy man or the gifted can see, yet though I had seen it on others it was the first time I had ever seen my own.  It was beautiful and I was overcome by the emotion of the moment and did drop to my knees and clasp my hands before me.  I lifted my eyes to the heavens and saw an incredible sight.  A cloud formed far above me, starting in my vision as small a s a pea or a kernel.  It seemed to boil as it expanded across the sky not unlike the steam from a cauldron on a freezing day.  In seconds, it had replaced the night sky in a curtain of white that glowed and spat bolts of light.  The ground shook below me and the sound of it through the air carried a power that shook my body like a rag.  There was a thrumming like unto being inside of a large drum as it is being beaten.’

 

‘Something behind me in the distance let loose, a frustrated roar that sounded as hellish as a platoon of demons descending upon me.  Though it was the most un-holy sound I had ever heard it had not a bit of effect upon me.  For, I was mesmerized by what was going on before me.  The heavens as I said had replaced the night with a curtain of glowing white, suddenly though, a hole formed directly above me.  Out of that hole, a host of Angels launched out blowing upon Golden horns.  It had been these self same horns that had been shaking the earth and close up they shook the entire world.  There was a roaring scream of agony behind me that e’an overwhelmed the song of the horns.  With no small amount of trepidation, I turned to look upon my adversary for it was almost upon me.  It was still a goodly distance away, yet that made it all the worse.  At a distance of thousands of cubits, it still looked as tall as a man, and was eating up distance at a hundred cubists a step.  Its face was like a lion with a wreath of flames for its mane.  Its eyes shone with an unholy green light visible even at this distance.  Its mouth was like that of a scavenger fish and had row upon row of teeth.  Its arms and chest were manlike except they had four elbows and like the legs moved with grotesque unnatural movements.  The hands had twenty fingers each and the fingers were clawed and barbed like a harpoon or a fishhook.  I never by his grace, saw it too closely, however I knew that the claws alone were taller then myself, and I all of 5’11”.  It ran on cloven hoofs and had hairy legs like an ox except obscenely muscled.  Also like the arms, there were two knees on each leg and they moved in unnatural directions.  The land behind it was in flames and the land it traveled through burst in flames with its passage.’

 

‘Whereas my first instinct was to run like Hades, I was stopped by a kind, yet stern, and motherly voice.  “Fear not child for he is come.  A light will appear before thee and thou are to step into it.  Look not up into the light for it will blind thee.”  A bright dot appeared within the hole in the clouds and speared down like a lightning strike.  It was bright as the sun and formed a circle before me.  It beat upon the earth and made a buzzing sound not unlike a hive of bee’s right next to my ears.  I stepped into the ring of light and the voice came back.  “Stay in the light or meet thy death.  He comes, and his vessel will land near to thee.  Move and thou will be crushed.”  I heard another roar from the demon and turned to see that the Angels were now in pursuit of the demon and it had turned to flee.  Horns blasting the Angels harried it like a pack of hounds on the trail of a fox.  They were forcing it back over its own path and it let out roar after roar and flailed its limbs to attempt swatting them out of the sky.  Suddenly all the Angels broke off as if on cue and headed back towards the sky.  As they ascended, something else was coming down to meet them.  It was big enough to fill the hole in the sky though the vision seemed to waver, shrink, and expand. It fell from the sky like an eagle diving after prey.  As it got closer it seemed to shrink, then suddenly it loomed over me.  At a distance, it had appeared to be a disc with lights dancing about it.  Up close however, I saw spires and towers atop it, and to my astonishment, wings.  It was an edifice not unlike a castle yet closer to a foreign palace.  I myself am well traveled yet I had never seen the like.  The wings beat with slow measured strokes and rent the air with booms and cracklings.’ 

 

‘I almost turned heal and ran once more but remembered the voices warning just in time.  For the edifice that had been, diving on me like an eagle, flipped its tummy down and now appeared as a disc.  It looked like it was going to land on my head and was tremendously large now.  The wings gave a last tremendous beat and then faded away as if they were no more then ghost.  The disc hit the ground and to my astonished gaze did sink into the ground as if it too were air.  There was no impact that I could hear or feel, just the impact that I could see.  Into the earth it went until the edge of it settled as gently as a butterfly.  I had a moment of disorientation when I could see the land as well as the God like vessel.  They seemed to melt together and become one.  Now the castle/palace was level with the land itself.  A few feet in front of me was a moat with a bridge across it.  “Quickly,” said the voice in my head, “Get across the moat where it cannot follow for it comes again.”  This time I noticed that the voice sounded much like my own mothers, comforting and stern at the same time.  What moved me quicker across the bridge then the voice though was the roar of the beast again moving in on me.  I made it across the bridge and turned just in time to see the bridge rising behind me.   As it rose up behind me, it also sank into the ground by what mechanism I do not know.  The air shimmered into a golden glow on the other side of the moat and I could no longer see the monster or the land on the other side.’

 

‘I began a healthy pace up the path on the lane, which was paved with golden cobblestones.  The land itself had many trees and all of them bore wondrous fruits of a kind and size never seen upon this Earth.’  I tarried not to taste or marvel on them for well had the lesson of the forbidden fruit been a part of my education.  I would not risk the enmity of my saintly savior.  A long time did it seem I traveled upon the path for though I did not stop, I slowed for each wonder that I saw.  There were fountains everywhere, each of a different design and scheme and each with its own statues.  I had never seen the like of some of the statures and scenes; however, I had read of some of them in the holy book and heard of them from my mother as well as other storytellers.  There were griffins, dragons, unicorns, fairies, sprites, as well as lions, tigers, bears, elephants, until I lost count of the myriad creatures represented.  Some of them spouted crystal clear water, while others spouted everything from colored liquids to the clear ringing tinkle of diamonds, rubies, and emeralds.  Also scattered along the path were many amphitheatres descending level upon level to intricate upraised stages made of black marble, white marble, chalcedony, agate, and many varieties and colors I was not familiar with.  Oh to tell a story from a stage such as those, then would I really feel like a king.’  

 

‘Yet even with all the wonders I saw among the path nothing could have prepared me as I came around a corner and the palace came into view.  Were I not already breathless from my jog, then it would have rendered me so.  It was of such surpassing beauty as to slow me almost to a stop, yet did I continue on at a walk.  I felt my jaw drop and did not care.  I was like a country bumpkin seeing a city for the first time.  For there was not a couple of towers, nor ten, nor twenty, yet hundreds of peaks, spires, towers, turrets and e’an shapes that made no sense to my mind but seemed to touch me with unknown emotion.  These strangely shaped and colored pieces of the palace seemed to defy gravity and have no connection to the ground.  Some of them were seemingly upside down and some were sideways, and some I cannot even describe so unusual were they that it made me dizzy and queasy to look at them, for they seemed to pulsate and fade in and out of existence.’

 

‘Just the colors alone were enough to befuddle the mind, for much of them were colors that never existed in nature nor even in rainbows.  I am at a loss to describe them because there is nothing I can compare them too. The path no longer meandered but led straight to the palace, however it was quite a time before I reached the first ring of edifices surrounded by a moat, for distance here was deceptive.  The moat itself was more like unto a river of gigantic proportions; so gigantic in fact that it broke in waves upon the shore like the ocean itself.  The most amazing part though was the bridge that spanned it.  The bridge fell like a cliff face several hundred cubits to the water below.  The water broke violently against these walls sheeting up a thousand cubits into the air, yet not a drop fell upon the bridge.  The falling and spraying water formed a dome about 50 cubits above with the sides parallel to the cliff like exterior.’

 

‘It took quite some time to cross the bridge which brought me up against a tremendously huge golden barred gate with bars as thick as a man’s thigh and about two hands apart.  The gate was intricately embossed with reliefs of Angels and religious scenes; too many to possibly absorb and apparently encircling the bars so many could not be observed from this angle.  There were no pull ropes nor any obvious means of attracting attention, however as I was studying the reliefs, the ponderous gates suddenly and without a sound began to swing inward.  There was a dot in the sky that I mistook for a bird, yet as it got closer, I perceived that it was a manlike figure.  As the figure approached I saw that it, actually he or she, possessed three sets or six wings, and I was suddenly afeared for this could be none other than an Arch Angel.’ 

 

‘As the Angel approached I respectfully went to one knee and bowed my head and I will tell a man without shame that my limbs trembled at the Angels approach.  Yet, the voice that addressed me was full of nothing but compassion and as sweet as an over full hive dripping honey upon my visage.’  “RISE, MIHĂIȚĂ AND FEAR NOT, FOR I WOULD NOT HARM ONE OF MY NAMESAKE, ESPECIALLY ONE WHO HAS STRUGGLED SO HARD TO REACH THIS POINT.  BE EASY OF MIND FOR YOUR TRIAL IS NOT WITH I, BUT WITH ELISHA; TO WHOM YOU WILL NEED TO MAKE YOUR PLEA AND CONVINCE THAT YOUR CAUSE IS WORTHY.”

 

‘For it was none other than the Arch Angel Michael for whom I had been named by my blessed mother, for MIHĂIȚĂ is the Romanian form of Michael.  “TAKE MY HAND FOR A MOMENT” he said extending a finely lined hand as pretty as a woman’s.   It seemed like a spark passed from hand to likened to a tiny bolt of blue lightning.  It was also light-en-ing, for suddenly I felt as light as a feather and my feet rose above the pebbled road.  Although we were no longer touching, I flew a prescribed number of cubits from Michael as he flew inward from the city.    I was besieged with so many images of the city that they were beyond number.  It brought a pang to my heart with the beauty of it all.  I will only touch a few of the wonders as a full description would take half the day, and even then could not convey it all.’

 

‘Have you ever walked to the edge of a cliff and looked into a valley below’ ‘Yes sir, it can indeed be a daunting experience.’ ‘Yes ma’am, such an action is not for everyone, and I can understand a fear of heights.’  ‘Really child, that takes a lot of courage for one so young, even if it was on your hands and knees.  I however have never had such a fear. However; it is one thing to look over a precipice, and totally another to look from the perspective of a bird with nothing beneath your feet.  The ground was hundreds of furlongs below, yet we were only a few spans above the rooftops.  It was not one single palace however, but hundreds of separate and distinct palaces of every type of material ever thought of by man, and dozens of materials never even conceived by or of man.’

 

The wonders I had perceived upon my approach when I thought it a mere palace now faded into insignificance.  Some of it was too bizarre for my mind to cope with, and some of it seemed to fade in and out of sight as if escaping to heavens or the spirit world and returning; sometimes translucently and sometimes solid.  It was more like a city composed of nothing but palaces.  Each palace had its own gardens, statuary, fountains and such.  Yet the palace in the middle surpassed them all and was almost as big as all the rest put together.  Although we were well above the roofs of all the rest, the towers of the main palace soared almost as high above us, as below.  We angled down to a tremendously large gate that appeared to be composed like the palace of various sheets of crystal like, amethyst, beryl, chalcedony, diamond, emerald, jade, and all the way to topaz and beyond. Bear in mind that those were only ones which I recognized from my travels.  The variety was endless. 

 

 

We approached the entrance and, believe it or not people, passed through it as if it was air. 

Yet on the other side I put my hand against it and felt only stone.  Unlike earthly stone though it was body temperature and pulsated faintly as if the palace had a beating heart.   The wonders that awaited inside were just as stunning as those of the outside, however, I tire and wish to take and give repast and we shall pick this up at where I met the Saint Elisha.

 

Written by Anthony Hotopp

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Revised Edition Edited 2016

All Rights Reserved: ACH INK