durance

"I was very small when I was taken away to Faerie. I had just turned 11 years old, and I had been spending the warm spring day outside, in the woods around the quiet neighbourhood I was born and grew up in. It was rare for me to have such freedom then, and I was sure to savor it, climbing trees and rolling rocks to find the pillbugs and spiders hiding under them. It was sunset, or close to it, when I found The Book.

The Book was an old and mouldy thing, with no writing on the cover or in fact any pictures. It had been under one of the many rocks I had been pushing around, half-hidden under a growth of moss. A strange place to find a book, but I was so curious, and opened it right away. I don't remember what it had said, but I remember there being a great and terrible power in the words. I read it from cover to cover, but when I looked up again from the pages, the sun had not descended an inch past where it had hung when I had began. Then came the wind, whistling through the birches like some great thing was hunched over the wood, breathing down between the trunks. Then, it was dark.

When the light came back again, all I remember was seeing Him. I'm not even sure if He had a name, or if He was even a he, but that is all I could think of to call the beast. He was many, many times my small size, a great, slithering black thing like an octopus, His body composed of spongy black tentacles and nothing more. His head was shaped like a great cow skull, horned and with wide, round white eyes that rolled about in the sockets when He moved. He spoke to me, and it was high and whistling, like the wind. I remember what He said then, and I think I always will.

'You have sinned greatly, child, and for that you are mine.'

The darkness came back then, sucking in all around me like a vacuum, until I could see no more, the only sensations moss under my feet and the wind at my heels, braying and cold. I remember running. I ran for a long time, I don't know how long it was, but in felt like forever. The only respite was the soft strands of webbing I would sometimes stumble upon, the silkspinners gently wrapping me in them, hiding me for a time. I remember that they whispered to me, tiny voices in my ears, speaking words I didn't understand.  But they could not hide me forever, and the wind would find me again, tearing away the silk and forcing me to run, run and never stop, until my feet are torn and bleeding and even then I must continue.

One day out of what must have been hundreds, thousands, though, it was different. He was there again, and with him came the only light I had seen in so long. He was curled around a clearing, the moonlight seeming bright enough to sear my eyes and skin. He laughed at me, and said that He wanted to play a game with me, and if I were to win, I would gain my freedom. But, He added, that I would never win. His captives never did. He extended one of his tentacles to me, and I felt nearly compelled to reach out and shake it as if I had been shaking a human's hand. It's funny to think back on it now, to remember how normal it had seemed then.

He spoke to me again, asking at what kind of game I would like to compete. I had paused, thinking, but then my voice spoke, but it was not me willing it to, or at least it seemed.

'A game of emotion,' my voice had said.

He seemed to have found this amusing, laughing a whistling laugh that made his eyes rattle.

'What kind of emotion, child?' he replied.

I looked back to Him, and spoke again.

'Emotions stirred in others,' my voice said to Him.

This drew another laugh from Him.

'And how will we do that?' the wind rattled.

I did not look away.

'With music,' I had said.

His laughter was the loudest it had ever been in my ears, roaring like a winter storm. He told me that I could use any instrument I knew how to play, He would bring it to me. But I did not know how to play an instrument. No one had ever taught me.

Then you will use your voice, He had told me.

In a flurry of movement, He summoned our judges and audience - a group of others I instantly knew were like me - human, but twisted in strange ways, fearful and weak, just as I was, had always been. They were afraid of him, and they cowered and cried when He spoke, told them the rules. He went first.

There was something nearly comical about how He played, stretching parts of His body to form a crude sort of harp, plucking each impromptu string to produce a crystal clear note. I was afraid, I had never sun before an audience before, and what sort of emotion could I possibly instil in this fearful group? What had possibly compelled me to suggest this? Soon, He had finished, and those round eyes were on me expectantly.

My body seized, then, not sure what to do. I struggled to come up with a song, any song at all, but my memories of my home, my life before the woods, before running, was hazy and shrouded in a thick mist. Seconds became minutes, dragging on into what I felt must have been hours, locked in my own head, struggling in vain to grasp even one of the slippery memories that lurked beneath the murky surface, so many silvery fish I was to slow and stupid to catch. I began to cry, then.

But those tears were what jerked me back to focus, a memory solidifying as firm and bright and clear as the day it must have been formed.

I had been very small, perhaps six or seven years old, and it had been one of the very few times I had seen my Oma, my Father's Mother. She had taken me in her warm, fat arms, and taken me to her church one Sunday morning, very early so I was still very sleepy. But I remembered very clearly when they sang the hymns, every voice joining into one. For one, Oma had even propped me up in a pew and showed me the little paper booklet that held all the beautiful words, and helped me to sing it with her. I remembered being happy.

'Our God, our help in ages past,
Our hope for years to come,
Our shelter from the stormy blast,
And our eternal home.

Under the shadow of Thy throne
Still may we dwell secure;
Sufficient is Thine arm alone,
And our defence is sure.

Before the hills in order stood,
Or earth received her frame,
From everlasting Thou art God,
To endless years the same.'

I opened my eyes then, unaware I had even closed them. Lost in my memories, I suppose I had sang that hymn again, and it must have moved our audience greatly. I don't know if any of them had been familiar with the words, or even what they meant, but the message must have been clear. It was ne of the first emotions I had seen since my time there aside from fear - sorrow.

And He saw it too, he must have. He was frozen in place, not even his eyes rattling about as they often did. There was ain unsteady silence.

And then, I ran.

I must have gotten back, since I'm here. I barely recall the hedge, or if He had chased me. All I remember is running, and weeping."