City of Legends

The fire was still burning, late into the night.

The traveler sat in front of it, his mind darting in and out of it, capturing the sparks and finding shapes in the tongues of yellow and orange and red and the occasional blue.

He did not stir, except to occasionally stretch his legs, aching from a long day’s walk. His boots were wearing down on the hard packed earth and stone.  It had been more than two years since they were made for him, and well were they made.  But now, with time and use, they were beginning to show the hard life of their owner.

He reached into the fire, and pulled out a branch as big around as your thumb, charred for most of its length and burning on the end with small yellow and gold flames.

"I can see you out there," he announced, to the night air.  "I can hear you move, I can feel the breeze as it eddies about you and carries your scents to me.  You may not even be aware of one another, but I am aware of you.  All of you."

He continued to look into the flames.

"I mean you no malice. If I have offended by camping here, or by the wood I have gathered or the food I have consumed, I do apologize, but I mean you no malice.  And, perhaps, you mean me no malice, you are just…curious."

He shifted and heard, faintly the sounds of skittering footsteps in the darkness behind him, as if in moving he had startled a rapt observer.

"I will sleep soon, and if you mean malice, that will be your best chance.  I sleep deeply, when I am tired, and I am most tired.  I say my prayers to myself, for you should not eavesdrop between me and my God.  The scrap pile is on the other side of the fire, if you are just looking for food."

He tossed the burning stick back into the fire, creating a small flutter of sparks.

"If you are a thief, my bags are over there," he continued, pointing off to one side.  "The only thing of value that I will have with or on me is my robe of many beasts, which I will use as a bed.  If any part of it is of someone or something you treasured, I apologize.  I do ask you leave my cithara, as that is how I make my living, but even if you should steal it or damage it, I shall endure and it is not worth my life to guard a mere piece of property."

The footsteps, small, padding footsteps, circled the fire and for just a moment he thought he caught a reflection in the eyes of something small and feral as it watched him.  He smiled, enigmatically, and yawned.

Sleep overtook him and he lay down, having made his peace with that which lurks in shadows.  He slept well, and was undisturbed.  When morning came he noted the signs that someone or something had rummaged through his pack, taken a few of the scraps he had left, and had briefly encountered, as best as he could tell, some other lurker in the shadows and been surprised by it.

In any case, the lurkers were gone and as the sun continued its ascent, the traveler pulled on his boots, wrapped his robe about him, took up his cithara and his pack and returned to the road, following the morning towards Ka Latil.

It is not certain where, precisely, in the timeline of the Amomancer that this tale comes from. Indeed, there are those who argue even some of the more provable details.

Judging from the details given by the old man, it was before the bloody incident at Taranta, and most likely even before his sojourn up North with his elder friends whose names he will not say in public. We can tell it takes place in the Autumn, as by the setting, but since most of the tales we have to discover take place in Spring or Autumn, that is not unusual.

It has been conjectured that the Amomancer lingers where he is in Winter and in Summer, and that he does most of his traveling in the Spring and Autumn, as that is when it is neither too hot or too cold for long journeys on foot. There is, of course, the question always as to whether or not the seasonal setting is actually just a subtext for whether the poet is, at the time of the story, falling in love (the Spring) or recovering from his latest lost love (the Autumn). It is hard to say, as so much comes down second or even third hand, sometimes even altered by individuals to suit their sense of the man and his life.

In any case, here is how it was relayed to me.

It was a cold Autumn morning when the young man first saw the Amomancer, approaching the camp where the youth and his family, and several other families, had bedded down for the night while traveling from where they had been (the East) to where they were going (the West). The man approached from the West, walking the middle of the road, whether to avoid potential highwaymen who may lurk along the road in the bushes, or merely to show as best he could to strangers he may encounter that he was not seeking to, himself, surprise them, that is to others to interpret. I merely report what I am told.

As she approached the camp, which was just beginning to stir in the frosty morning air, the young boy, Theron by name, who had risen early to prod the fire to a more congenial flame for breakfast, ran to let his parents know that there was a stranger approaching.

He shook his father awake and gave him word that there was someone approaching and the father, being the good father that he was, tumbled from the wagon, clutching his staff, and cursing the comforter he had tangled in during the night. He landed with a resounding thud. The boy’s mother, upon hearing his husband do his usual graceless fall from the wagon, rolled over and returned to sleep.

The father followed his son the the edge of camp and there, still a good ways off, came a man who may or may not have been drawn by the fire or the sight of the small caravan, bedded down for the night. But there was no use in taking chances.

"Hello," cried out the father, mildly brandishing his staff. The figure stopped and regarded him, still at a distance, then continued walking towards the camp with no obvious change in path or speed of approach. As he approached, the father regarded him, as did the boy.

The first thing the boy noted was his size. While not unusually tall, he was broad of build and wore a massive cloak of some sort about him, in such a manner that it was impossible to tell if he was armed or armored.

The father took note of the man’s hair and beard. Both wild and unkempt and more salt than pepper, which he took as a good sign, as an old man was less likely to be much trouble. He also noted the large pack that was slung over a shoulder and moved as if possessed of great mass as the stranger approached, and the stranger’s black boots. Well made, expensive. Either he was a man of some fortune, or he had taken the boots off the last traveler he had waylaid.

The father gulped, nervously.

""I said ‘Hello’," called out the father, again. The stranger, now much closer, stopped and regarded the father.

"And I did not respond," replied the traveler, "As I had no notion of whether there were those of your party still sleeping and did not wish to disturb them."

By now a small group had gathered around the boy and his father, as they stood, confronting the traveler. One of the older men of the group stepped forward and squinted his eyes, studying the stranger before speaking.

"I know you," he said, as if a clever thought had just occurred to him.

"Indeed?"

"Yes, I was in the Arbors a few years ago, you passed through there on some business," said the old man, smiling. "May we show you some hospitality?"

"A place to sit and a drink of water would do wonders for my spirit," came the reply. "I have been walking all night, since I left Bellingwood."

With word of the nearness of a substantial town there was a sudden hubbub in the camp and a few of the party made a space for the traveler by the fire and gave him a cup of water. He drank it down then stretched, like a yawning man, you could hear his weary joints pop and crack like a great tree, leaden with ice, preparing to fall in a snowstorm.

"Thank you, that was good," he said. He looked at the faces around him and smiled a broad smile. "Peddlers, refugees or gypsies?"

"Pardon me," said the boy, a bit peckishly.

"I meant no insult. Usually when you see such a large party traveling the roads, they are either a camp of peddlers, or people fleeing the wrath of some tyrant or fool, or those who travel the roads just because that is their home, the road."

The father cuffed his son gently for having spoken up so abruptly. The stranger smiled and waved it off, then spoke.

"If you are on your way to Bellingwood, with your wagons, if you break camp in the next hour or so you should make it by nightfall. Beware as you approach the last bridge, near a stand of very tall trees, as that is a spot where highwaymen sometimes lurk. You have numbers, so it is unlikely they will bother you, but be cautious nonetheless."

"Where are you headed," asked the father. Perhaps thinking he could get the experienced traveler to go with them for the day and help watch out for trouble.

"I am heading to the mountains to wrestle a manticore," he replied. He paused, then rose to his feet in a single smooth motion, as though raised by a rope.

"And I best be on my way," he added, looking at the sky. "It looks like there may be rain and manticores are slippery when wet."

He patted the boy on the head who had first seen him and as he did he slipped him a small leather pouch.

"I thank you for your hospitality, but I must be on my way," the stranger said, then without a word or glance back, began his trek towards the mountains in the Northeast.

A few of the party glanced up from time to time to see him recede in the distance, and soon they too were on their way. As they walked the road the father noticed his son’s new pouch.

"What is that," asked the father of his son.

"The stranger gave it to me, I guess for us having been kind to him."

The father took the pouch and opened it. Inside was a handful of coins and a brown and gold stone the size of a small hen’s egg. He took the stone out and examined it, calling over the old man who had recognized the stranger.

"What do you make of this," he asked him.

The old man took the stone and looked it over carefully. He then gently gave it back to the father.

"It is an eye of a manticore," he explained. "No doubt he did not want it on him when he reached the mountains, as it is said they came smell their own kind and they would have tracked him as prey and enemy."

"Is it worth anything," asked the father, curious to know if he might be able to sell it for provisions.

"I wouldn’t sell it," replied the old man. "He may be back for it. In fact, I am sure he will be back for it, for I know the story of where he got that one…"

No, I am not confused, I know today is July 1st.

I am just putting emphasis on that date. It’s going to be a brutal day for me. Deadlines that extend beyond the not-dead and the undead. Impossible goals.

Bring them on.

On that date, at 12 noon, EDT, a select group of people (even they do not know who they are, nor will they, in advance) will receive an email invitation to download and listen to previously unreleased tracks from Evangelist, my new CD. This will be all of the previously unreleased tracks.

They will be asked to give comments and rate them. Not that I take seriously anyone’s counsel but mine own, I just like hearing how other people perceive things (even whack jobs sometimes have epiphanies, you know).

The new protest track, Kitabu, will be linked to multiple sites that already embrace my politically conscious works.

My internet radio station at Live/365 will be getting a major overhaul. You have no idea how arduous that is.

I will also be unveiling a series of new chapters to Tales of the Amomancer on the Random Drafts and Chapters blog.

I will also be announcing the three next book projects being put out by Peacat Press (As such was the first). The Peacat site will be getting a facelift that day.

I will be unveiling my new, mighty 100+ blogroll on this site.

All of this will be accomplished between 0000 hours and 2400 hours, EDT, on July 5th.

On the 6th, I will rest. Yeah, right. Why July 5th? Well, it works with my schedule and it is, believe it or not National Workaholics Day here in the US of A.

I am not as clueless as I sometimes seem.