A Journey Never Begun

Copyright (c) 2018 James Miehoff, All Rights Reserved.

This work may not be published whether for fee or free without this copyright.

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This is one of a series of stories set in the Land of Etherium, a place out of time where wizards channeled mana and a host of creatures we call fairy tales roamed the lands. It is said these tales occurred almost 27,000 years ago before a set of cataclysms shaped the face of the earth and the fairy folk retreated or we in our smugness, no longer saw them.

In any case, there are just stories after all, aren't they?

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Muddled stepped out of Three Finger's into the light rain.

"Perfect," he thought. "I delayed a day in order to copy the old man's grimoire into my own and now I have to start in the rain."

He turned to look longingly at the door he had just quit when the voice of his Master rang in his head, "A journey never begun is a journey never ended."

Muddled shook his head to clear the thought, sighed and reached out to pull some mana into himself.

When he had enough he released it and whispered a cantrip for water repelling and cast it on his clothes, his traveling cloak and his boots. When he was done, he pulled up the hood of his cloak and started walking to the West Gate through the squishing mud and the rain that ran off of him.

Several hours later found him miles from his old home with night beginning to fall. He had not gone far enough to get to the inn he knew was down the road. But looking at the setting sun, he knew he would not make it to the inn that day.

Looking left and right as he walked he began to look for any sort of shelter and finally settled for a thicket beneath an ancient oak tree.

As he approached the oak he began the words of greeting in the old tongue. Just as he approached the base of the tree and bowed his head to complete the greeting a maiden appeared in front of him.

"Who are thee who remembers the old ways?" the maiden asked in a very pleasant tone.

"I am called Muddled," he replied. "I seek your permission to shelter in the thicket that lies beneath the boughs of your home."

The maiden laughed and said, "Verily, it has been many lives of men since any has sought my permission for anything. In such manner as I may permit anything in these times, I welcome you to shelter beneath the arms of my home."

"I thank thee fair lady of the tree. If it is not unseemly, I would ask a second favor," he said. "It has been a long and wet journey for me this day. Would it be allowed if I gather such branches as have fallen and are no longer part of you to build a small fire to cook supper and to warm up before I sleep?"

Her eyes widened and her face hardened, but then she reached her hand out and touched his cheek.

"Thou are a wizardling," she said in awe. "Thou knowests that trees and fire do not love each other. But I sense that you know the true name of fire and would not let it take its head to ravage my home. Promise that you will control the fire and send it back when you are done with it and I will allow it."

"My great thanks to thee, great lady of the tree," Muddled said softly. "I promise to keep the fire under control and to return it when I am done.

"Would you accompany me to find suitable branches that have fallen long ago so they will not hurt you when I gather them?"

Her eyes grew big again and she spoke gently, "You master has taught you much of the ways of the trees and the dryads that share them. He must be very proud of you."

Muddle's eyes misted over and he shuddered a little before her replied, "My master is dead, great lady. He was killed less than a week ago when our home was burned to the ground. I am on a journey to find his brother to see if he will consent to continue my training."

"I am very sorry for thee," the maiden said. "I know what it is to be alone.

"If you look around, you will find the stumps of my sisters' trees. Cut down in the prime of their lives to be hauled away in wagons to I do not know where. It was only chance that saved my tree. If you look to the side, there it still bears the scars of an axe. The man that was chopping did not hear me and I was powerless to stop him, but another man called to him and he stopped and shouldered his axe and the two men hopped on a wagon that had one of my tree's younger children on it. My sister dryad of that tree cried and cried and soon was no more. And I could do nothing."

Muddle stared at the tears the maiden was weeping and gently brushed them from her cheek.

"I am sorry my lady," he said at last. "If you could see it in your heart, please leave me some acorns that are ready to sprout and I will plant them around you in hopes that you will have sisters again some day."

She nodded and then said with a weary voice, "Please take any branches that you need from the fallen. I just ask that you do not take ones that still have green leaves as they may still be attached to my beloved home."

"I thank you great lady," Muddled said while bowing his head in respect.

He turned and gathered some old dry branches and then placed them beside a space where the thicket had grown over making an arched cave. He went out by the road several times and came back with some stones to make a small fire pit.

Knowing that the dryad would not like to see an axe, Muddle had chosen branches that were small enough to break over his knee. After had had reduced the armful of branches to a suitable size, he placed a couple of them in the fire pit and called forth a small flame. Showing the flame the edge of the fire pit he exacted a promise that it would not try to go beyond those bounds. One the flame agreed, he let it begin to feast greedily on the dried branches and he settled in to get supper prepared.

After he finished his supper and cleaned the pot and his spoon, Muddle noticed a pair of eyes at the edge of the darkness. They were small and low to the ground.

"Hello, my friend," he called out to the eyes. "I have had my supper and I am no longer hungry. I apologize that I didn't know you would stop by or I would have saved you some. Can you come into the light so that I may see whom I am addressing?"

The eyes blinked slowly and then a moment later Muddle could make out the shape of a large bullfrog waddling into view.

"Hello Mr. Frog," Muddle said. "Welcome to my humble abode."

The frog said nothing, but just blinked his eyes again slowly as if in acknowledgement.

After a bit, Muddle addressed the frog once again, "I don't know about you, but I am not yet sleepy and I think a story is in order. What would you like to hear?"

The frog again blinked slowly and sat silently.

"Of course," said Muddle. "The story of how I came to be on this journey. I'm afraid it may take several nights. Since I cannot take you with me, you will only hear the first part, but telling it may help my resolve to see this through.

"I was born in the little town of Throgmorton, just a few miles from here. The plague was running rampant in the world and it came to my little town as well.

"I was found by one of the teams of the Collectors of the Dead. There were three of them, two men and a woman. They entered a small house on the outskirts of town and found all of the family dead except for a very newborn baby lying next to the mother.

"Do you have any idea who that baby was, Mr. Frog? Of course you do. That baby was me.

"It turns out that the woman who found me had just lost her husband and young son to the plague as well. She had joined the Collectors of the Dead in order to catch it and be with her family. But she did not catch the plague.

"When she saw that I was alive, she tucked me up inside her shirt. She had heard rumors that one of the Collectors on her team was known to kill small children and babies and say the plague did it. Once I was tucked up inside her shirt I fastened on to one of her teats and fed until I couldn't take any more. It hurt her at first because she had begun to dry up, but I didn't know anything but the need to feed.

"After collecting my family and loading them on the cart, they took their load to the fire pits a mile outside of town and dumped them with the others they had located and collected the bounty from the plague doctor. The men immediately headed off to drink themselves into a stupor. But the lady headed home smiling because of the warm bundle now sleeping inside her shirt.

"She had told no one about the death of her child so it was easy for her to pass me off as her own. And so it was until I was almost 5. The only woman I knew as Mother got sick and called for me to get the doctor. I ran to the doctor's house and begged him to come see my Mother.

"When we got there she had coughed up a lot of blood and the doctor knew she was not going to live.

"Being a kind man, he told her so. Mother took the news and nodded. Then asked me to stay and bid the doctor to leave.

"After the doctor left, Mother told me the tale of how I became hers and warned me to not tell it to anyone else. The plague born are often not tolerated well.

"She bade me go and get the elder woman who ran the orphanage and I did so. When we returned, Mother's eyes were open but she was not breathing. There was a note with a small bag of coins and a locket. The elder woman put the locket around my neck and closed Mother's eyes. She read the note and took the bag of coins. She held out her hand and together we left, never looking back.

"I lived at the orphanage learning to read and write and the duties of honor and hard work. And I learned the punishment of discipline. The latter was hard because I was an unruly child. I lived there until I was 10.

"That was where I got my name. In our town, orphans got child names that included Mud for boys and Dirt for girls somewhere in their names. Dled means 'child of' so Muddled becomes 'child of the mud'. Not particularly clever but appropriate.

"Because I was tall for my age, the elder woman lied about my age and put me into the Apprentice Choosing that spring even though I was 2 years too young. There are two Apprentice Choosings in every year. The first is in the spring so that farmers can get help in the fields. The second is in the fall for help in harvesting the fields. Since most of the jobs in a small town like ours revolve around farming most of the apprentices go to farmers.

"I was fortunate. I was chosen by Berek the Ironmonger to be an apprentice at his forge. This mostly meant that I was to work the bellows until I passed out from the heat. He would carry me out and throw me in the river and to revive me and then we would go back to the forge.

Muddled paused in his reveries and looked over at the frog. Surprisingly the frog was still there and was staring at Muddled like he was really interested.

Chuckling, Muddled looked over at the oak tree and in the soft moonlight saw the silhouette of the dryad leaning against her tree listening.

"She must be lonely," Muddled thought. "All by herself," and he resolved to make good on his promise to plant those acorns for her in the morning.

"Where were we my froggy friend?" Muddled addressed the amphibian. "I know. Berek had just thrown me in the river.

"Some people might think that he was cruel or harsh for throwing me in, but he knew that I needed to cool off quickly or I might die or suffer some harm from being overheated. The quickest way to cool someone off is to throw water on them or throw them in water. He chose the latter.

"It was not too long before I could stand the heat of the forges the way he did. And the work made me stronger. It helped that his wife was a good cook and she knew what it took to keep a growing boy strong. They were both a little older then my parents would have been and their five children were grown and left to seek their fortunes in the world. So I lived in one of the bedrooms in their house and life was good.

"With my help, Berek was able to make many more horseshoes for the farrier and plow blades and tools for the farmers. This brought in more money and we began to live better.

"Berek taught me how to melt the iron and what to put into it to make it stronger or harder or more flexible. He also taught me how to beat a piece of iron into a plowshare or a scythe or a sickle or a knife. He would not make swords or armor or any weapon of war. He had been an iron monger for the king and had made these things and saw what they were used for. He vowed to never make weapons again.

"But he also taught me to make small things. He taught me how to make nails in different sizes for carpenters, book corners to protect the precious books. He even taught me how to smelt gold and silver and how to create beautiful pieces of jewelry.

Muddle paused to look into the fire for a minute. He shook himself and took a long drink from his water skin.

"That was a good time," Muddle finally said still looking at the fire. "And like all good things, it ended far too soon.

"We had been working nonstop for a week filling a big order to one of the large landowners. He wanted new plows and rakes and hoes and other tools and lots of horseshoes.

At the end of day, we went down to the river to wash up and Berek looked out over the water and said, "Muddled, I don't know why I went to the Choosing that day and I for sure don't know why I picked a scrawny underage mudborn like you. But it has worked out. Your body grew strong, your mind is sharp and you learned and your hands are nimble and strong. We are much better off than we were when you joined us. Next week, I will go down to the guild hall and submit your name as a first degree journeyman iron monger."

My heart jumped in my chest. As a journeyman, even a first degree journeyman I would get a real name. A real name that didn't have mud in it.

"Come on. Let's go see what Mama has cooked up for us tonight," he said, slapping me on the back.

Muddled continued in a soft voice, "As I said, it ended all too soon. The next morning, I was awakened by the screams of Berek's wife. As I ran to their room, I saw Berek on the bed, his eyes closed and a smile on his face. I knew in my heart that he was dead and so with him died my dream of a carreer.

"I was now twelve and on the streets again. Berek's widow made me take the load of tools and things we had made for the landowner to him. He paid me and expressed his deep regrets in Berek's passing. I nodded acknowledgement and turned to leave. When I returned back to what had been Berek's shop a man was standing there counting coins into her hand.

"I handed her the bag of coins from the landowner and she whisked them into a pocket in her skirt. She looked over at the wagon and the horse, said something to the man. He shrugged and put 3 more coins in her hand.

"I stood by dumbly as the widow turned to me and said, 'I am going to live with my sister. I have sold the house and the shop so you will need to fend for yourself. Good luck to you.'

"And like that, I was an un-apprenticed orphan again."

Muddle yawned and addressed the frog politely, "Well Mr. Frog, I am getting tired and I will be going to bed now. If you are interested in more of the story, please find me tomorrow night. I am headed west down the road."

The frog blinked slowly and let out a noise that sounded like, "Re-Deep!" before slipping off into the night.

Muddle shook his head and extended his hand into the fire. A moment later the fire was out and a single flickering flame stood in the palm of his hand.

"I thank you Master Flame for your warmth and light. Until we meet again," Muddle intoned in the old language.

The flame danced on his palm for moment, bowed and was gone.

Muddle poured some water on the embers out of cautiousness and crawled into his bed roll. As he was falling asleep, he thought he smelled the fresh scent of oak and a pair of lips that gently kissed his forehead.

So ends the first part of A Journey Never Begun.