Work Text:
The Bandit King draws his sword under the princess’ chin meeting her eyes. “Ah princess, with nothing but your poetries as defense we will soon bend you to our will, embroil you in our plans and you will be our ransom and reward in the new age that will dawn as we overthrow your heartless father. Your bleeding heart feeds naught but your own suffering. “
The fire sage and other bandits look on expecting her to respond as the pampered princess they believe her to be.
Princess: “Oh, but young sage and perilous bandits, if my blood is spilled to feed revolution then so be it! I will not fight the sacrifice I am called to so that there may come a better era for our people. Because we are one. And father, despite my many urgings, has forgotten the wonder of the world and with it the brotherhood of man. For one that is cruel to beasts will extend that same harshness to his brother and lover and child. And when your heart becomes as hard and unchanging, as brittle and sharp as the obsidian then you stand ready to shatter with a hard enough blow. And strike we must! But please spare those in his employ as they are slaves to circumstance not servants of their own hearts.”
The Bandit King is convicted by her words and withdraws his sword and wanders away to sit by the fire.
Fire Sage scoffing and throwing a stone into the fire: “Hard, brittle, sharp! Speak plainly princess! Your father’s heart is black as obsidian and twice as sharp”
The Princess: “Do you forget Sage that obsidian can be many colors or even indecisive? It depends on the other seeds of stone that were with the obsidian in its violent birthing and that which clung to it in its temperance when plunged in the ocean. For in that way my father was like any other man: born helpless and shaped by circumstances and those that he leaned on. That he chose to use his strength and sharp edges to wound rather than heal is his choice and will become his downfall. I too will stand obsidian strong in my convictions, but let me be white! Though I may die I will die pure of heart and be renewed on the other side of the spirit boundary.”
Bandit King scowls and spits into the fire: “You rely too much on the fickle spirits. They have done nothing for me and nothing for this world. We are but sentient beasts feasting on growths on this stone in the lagoon of the universe. I will seek my own life and pleasures before that of these fanciful spirits. I with my power and mind and might will bring an iron fist of change to this world and not be forgotten when my body is joined to the earth.”
The bandit continues to stoke the fire, a haunted look on his face. The sage ponders their words and tends to their meal serving portions to the Bandit King’s men. The princess cannot keep her eyes from them as sadness pervades her soul at the hopelessness in their eyes that has caused them to abandon their homes and towns and become vigilante wanderers crying revolution but only spreading sorrow.
Princess, speaking under her breath as if in a petition with the spirits for hope in their souls:
“Dear bandits, lost Sage, stare into the eternally renewing sunrise, into the shooting stars that flicker but moments in our world. Into the magma heart of the mountains that stretch beneath the seas and say to them that you are apart; that you are better, that you influence more change; if you can! We come into this world from that of the spirits by a spark. Whether of romance, duty or violence all of us begin by the joining of two bodies briefly exchanging parts of their souls. That spark catches in our mother’s womb where she carefully nurtures the embers of life within her until we are strong enough to take our own breaths; feed our own fires. As we grow and nurture ourselves under the sun’s light, feeding from the plants that grow in the rich earth of the volcanoes and the life-spark of other’s creatures we partake of and contribute to the great cycles of this world. We have the choice, with every breath and action, to bless or to curse. So take care how you fight and who you fight.
We must therefore take care in what we feed the flames of our souls even moreso than we take care of the spirit-flame housing temple of our bodies. For that which poisons and envenomates the body kills much faster than those insidious things that poison and envenomate our souls. For as all untended wounds it will fester. Without care those soul-toxin wounds will become gangrenous and suffer us a septic life until we die from those very rages of untended toxins within us. But with tender care by feeding and stoking the fires of morality in us even the most dangerous toxins can be burned out and the wounds turned to scars.
We must not let the spark in our heart go dim from the sufferings of life! For we are not just flames of consumption in this world but we provide light and warmth, shelter and hope in the storms of life. Let your character, your presence and your impact on this world be life-giving just as much as it is life-taking. For as we consume the bounty of this world for our existence in the homes we build, the food we eat and the industries we trade we also interact and affect change. We can brighten someone’s dark day of the soul; we can offer shelter and return strength, and transform! Using our souls as forges we can purify and temper ourselves and others characters like shaping glass: take the raw and imperfect in us, like so many grains of sand and heat them till they become pure and clear and malleable. Then allow the tools and templates of our life station to shape us. Then we are put back in the fire until tempered so that the fierce heat of life cannot shatter us, only the crippling blows. And even when those come remember that not all is lost as we can sweep up the broken pieces and put them back in the forge to renew them into something different, better and stronger.
When your forges become known for refining broken things into beauty then invite others by the fire to learn the same and impart your life’s wisdom. Let them take a part of your flame and add it to their own so that they may learn the secrets of the life-giving fire; that through responsible consumption we add minerals back into the soil, bring life, heat, power and become a beacon in all the good that you do until the day life extinguishes your flame. Then let your memories be drawn from the coals and ashes and let someone shape a new flame in the cradle-hearth you have made for them by your life. In that way your name and face may be forgotten but your impact will not and you will have made the immortal mark you crave.”