Xantheashat's Song
I stir.
Listening to the sounds around me, I know that Life continues as it has since The Beginning. Seasons continue to change, that which is young still matures, reproduces, ages, then steps aside for the new generation. The chattering of the minds and tongues of the young and short-lived are as a background feeling-tone that is both comforting and a perpetual nuisance – as it has been since the Beginning and will continue until Time Stops. All is as it is supposed to be. I slowly allow my senses to expand as this time of Awakening gets underway, beginning the first strains of the Ancient Songs which are my returning gift to the world.
This last time of Sleeping has been a long one. As I Sing, I can feel the effects of far more ages than normal passed in the shelter of utter quietude deep within my bones and very being, and I wonder if the rest are feeling similarly disquieted by an extended Sleeping. The refrain of the Song falters when my mind stretches out to touch the Others who also would be Awakening and raising their voices in harmony to mine to find… only silence. Disquiet even more distressing than that of overcoming the turpitude within begins to well. I reach out my mind even further in an attempt to touch minds still sheltering within the Sleep to find... a void of utter silence, not even a whisper left behind to tell me of their passing.
They are gone? Ancient and Immortal as I am, given to protect and serve the processes of Life on this little world as I have been – where have they all gone?
It matters not. They are gone, and I alone am left to Sing the
It is dark outside my haven, as it should be when I first Awaken; and I emerge from my ancient home in the side of the mountain… to find the mountain exists no longer. The floor of the valley has risen to meet the peak of the mountain – and I emerge into a tight knot of trees growing so close together that I can barely move. Indeed, this last Sleeping was over-long for Life to so close me in. Mindful and regretful of the crying of the trees as their branches snap to let me pass, I Sing softly to ease the burden the pain I bring has caused. I eventually work my way to a small clearing where I can finally stretch my limbs and wings to climb into the air to survey the world I have been left in.
Indeed the world is different. The air is no longer sweet, and the songs sung by the young and short-lived below me are bitter or frantic or resigned. No hint of the Ancient melodies remains to remind and comfort. In the distance the trees thin and then disappear, and in their stead rises something I’ve never seen before. It glows from within and without with a strange, dead light that mutes and silences the sparkles of the stars above. It seems as if dropped in odd geometric patterns on the ground, yet does not tell any Ancient story in its design. And it hums – an angry, desperate, arrogant hum that even mutes the songs of the young and short-lived winged ones who flit in and out.
Now I understand. I see that which Life has newly placed in ascendancy in the world has created this scene of desolation and disregard for
I turn my flight to the upper air. I shall search out a new mountain haven into which I can retire and, like the Others before me, resign the guardianship of this world to the care of that Life which at the moment poisons and demolishes it.
But my long Sleep has affected my stamina, and my sadness for all that has been and is no more has sapped my strength. I allow myself to descend slowly, avoiding the places where the dead light glows brightest and mindful of any openings in the ground into which I can easily slip and shelter for a cycle or two until such time as I have the strength to resume a search for a final resting place. The place I find reeks of the anger and bitterness of that New Life; but it is an old stench that is slowly fading away, and it is the best alternative I have the strength to find. I back into its depths carefully, for it only barely accommodates my bulk while easily handling my length. It is a deep opening, leading to many deeper levels. I choose the deepest, where the Life above would be least likely to find me
*0*0*0*0*0*0*
I stir.
No, the first whiff of the air tells me that my memories were not mere nightmare. I still am prisoner in a world to which I do not belong. But the air tells me more – there is no more air flow from the outside world to freshen or sustain that which dwells within. It was not that way when I entered here. I am imprisoned in this place, even more firmly than I had been by the trees outside my former haven only a short time ago.
I listen.
There it is again – it is the voice of a single young and short-lived Life sounding in tones of confusion, fear, pain and desperation. What a sad place this world has become, where an Ancient cannot even retreat into the depths of the world without being followed by such disquieting voices.
I listen further.
It is a voice of one who is very young, very fearful, and very much in pain. I reach out carefully and brush very slightly against that mind, knowing the minds of the young and short-lived to be fragile and easily broken. Even that little contact is almost too much for that tiny mind to bear, and I sense it closing down consciousness in terrified self-defense.
But that contact is all I need to see within.
Such fragile Life it is which rules this world in this Age of Decline! And yet this Child of the New Life holds within it the place where the Ancient Songs and Ways used to sit – vacant and ignored by the
I have a choice to make. I can remain silent and undetected in the depths of this shelter while that Child of the New Life expires for lack of fresh air, or loses its fragile grip on the reality of the life it knows as a response to the debilitating isolation. Or I can, in some way, make my presence known in a manner that won’t frighten this Child of New Life literally unto Death – and sustain this Child until a means of freeing it could be found.
Never have I had to make such a trivial choice, in all the Ages of this World I had overseen. Life is – and Death is part of Life. The ending of a single short-lived voice has never before been an issue for me. I withdraw my mind and contemplate.
The answer is obvious -- how can I miss it?
I had been withdrawing and resigning my place in this world – why? Because I too had found myself alone and isolated from my kind; unable to conceive of my continued existence in a world in whose processes I could find no place for myself and the
I stretch forth my mind again, and touch the mind of the Child of New Life – still subtly active in its unconscious state – and investigate how and/or where the Voice of the Unknown might be acceptable to it without giving harm. These
There. The Child awakens.
Pain! The sound is wordless and yet communicates well. The body of the Child is badly damaged – movement is excruciating. I pause, reflecting on the proper way to respond, the proper tones to use, the proper volume. It is difficult; getting a body the size of mine to mimic a voice so tiny.
“You are damaged.”
Fear! The mind of the Child instinctively broadcasts the terror in all direction. “Who’s there?” the tiny voice whispers into the overwhelming darkness.
“I am here,” I whisper back – the closest I can get to this Child’s voice must seem a roar. More fear oozes from the mind of the Child – fear I must allay. “I cannot harm you. Fear not.”
Too late. The broadcast of terror peaks, and consciousness blinks out again. There is little I can do after all, and I resign myself to silence again. I have been witness to Death’s approach many times, and I know it often to be a merciful release. Perhaps it is better this way – to allow this one Child of New Life to slip away as it would have had it not found its prison to be mine as well. Perhaps we could slip into that Next World together…
*0*0*0*0*0*0*
I hear the Child awaken once again, but refrain from trying to communicate with it. The awakened mind still oozes terror – adding to that terror is not the
“Are you still there?” The tiny voice is hesitant, fearful, yet… what? Hopeful?
I refrain from answering. I do not want to destroy that thread of Hope which has come into existence apparantly from nowhere.
“Please…” the tiny voice sounds desperate after its vain wait for response. “Are you there?”
I sigh. The sound is much bigger than I intended it, and the Child’s fear wells up in response. Still, to give no answer would only compound.
“I am here still,” I whisper in reply.
The Child sighs in return – communicating first a brief flash of fear, and then a sense of relief. I understand. By speaking, I have removed much of the sense of isolation that would have destroyed it quickly – even though the thought of the Unknown being given voice is terrifying in and of itself.
Time passes. I refrain from touching the mind, but I can well imagine what is going on. The tiny mind is fragile, but it is neither unintelligent nor inflexible to what seems new or inexplicable. The Child had its own decisions to make.
“Are you going to eat me?” The question arises without warning, a question of survival.
“No,” I whisper back – and I feel the fear level drop drastically. Trust in the Unknown? Strange are the Ways of this New Life!
“Who are you?” Again, the question arises from nowhere, and yet I understand.
“I am Xantheashat.” I give voice to the Ancient name bestowed on my at Time’s Beginning, filled with Ancient sounds holding meaning for another Age but not this one.
“Are you a monster? For real?”
“‘Monster’?” I repeat this word of the
I hear the Child move again and whimper in Pain before answering. “A monster is something that is big and scary and destroys everything. Like Godzilla – you know? It kills and stomps and…”
“Enough.” I make the whisper loud enough to communicate my disgust. “Is everything that is big and frightening a ‘monster’?”
“No,” the voice had gotten tiny again, and held a new hint of fear. “Just the mean ones.”
I made my voice quiet again. “Then I am no monster.”
There was a pause – the Child was thinking and processing what it had learned. I too was processing the idea of ‘monster’.
“But you’re big?”
“Yes,” I whisper. “Much bigger than you.”
“And strong?”
“I am as strong as I am,” I defer. Strength is relative – to a tiny Child such as this one, I would indeed be very strong-appearing; yet I am well-aware of how depleted I am compared to my potential.
Another pause for reflection passes. “And you’re stuck in here too?”
“Perhaps. I have not tried to leave as yet.”
“What were you doing here?”
I feel amusement at the sensation of suddenly being the object of curiosity or having to explain myself or my actions to another. Indeed the
“Resting.”
“From what?”
This question I do not wish to answer – not even for myself yet. I fall silent, hoping that will communicate my unwillingness properly. The moment of silence stretches into the next, and then into the next. I hear the Child move again, and with a mind now attuned to the nuances of a much smaller mentality feel the lance of agony wash over the tiny consciousness and snuff it out again. Deep within, I feel a twinge of sadness at the slow approach Death was taking with this little being.
*0*0*0*0*0*0*
“Xantheashat?”
I rouse at the sound of the attempt to reproduce sounds never meant to come from the lips of New Life. Such effort deserves recognition. “I am still here,” I whisper back.
“Am I going to die?” The tiny mind was again broadcasting fear, but that Fear was of an Unknown even more impenetrable than I was.
“All that Lives Dies eventually,” I whisper back. “Such is the Way of Life.”
“I’m scared.” It wasn’t a question, and the voice was weaker.
“I know, Little One.” There is little I could say that would give comfort. Without knowing
“I don’t want to die.”
Time enough or not, I cannot sit by oblivious to the suffering of this one Life. Since Time Began I have lifted the veils of the Unknown to Life on this world and taught that which ends suffering – I cannot stop myself from doing as I and the rest of my kind were created at the Beginning to do. I begin the refrain that I had stopped singing earlier, and then modulate the Song to one which speaks of Life and its grand Cycle. I Sing, pouring all the Ancient Wisdom I have ever known into the Singing – and I feel the Child’s fear and longing slowly dissipate into understanding and acceptance.
Even as I again begin the refrain that will modulate into one which speaks of the Unity of Life, I hear it: the sound of earth being moved forcefully and with little regard to the Lives it might contain. These others search for the Child who is lost – and soon will find what they seek. I fall silent and spend a moment in indecision. I am torn between the desire to stand guard in the darkness over this tiny flicker of New Life which had taught me so much and the need to protect myself by pushing back into the depths of the tunnel before I could be discovered by these other New Life-forms. Self-protection is my choice – the Child will be safe among its own kind – and I choose to once more retreat back down into the furthest depths.
“Xantheashat!” The Child’s cry carries above even the din of the laborers above us as the sounds of my movement reach its ears. “Don’t leave me!”
“I don’t belong to this world,” I reply in soft mental tones, rippling the surface of the tiny consciousness just enough to give a vague hint of who and what I am, “And neither does my Song. It belongs to Ages long gone – yours is a
“Please.” The sorrow tugs at me, envelopes me in the perception of betrayal.
“If you would honor me, say nothing of me to the others. Their fear would be the end of me and the Song.” I resume my retreat.
“Xantheashat!”
“Farewell, Little One.”
*0*0*0*0*0*0*
“Xantheashat?”
I rouse. The voice which calls out the approximation of my name is unfamiliar, yet I know I’ve touched the mind behind the voice before. Still, I am comfortable in the deep labyrinth as I wait patiently for my own Passing, or for the Sleeping to begin again so that I can remove myself from this poisoned and embittered world. So I remain silent, knowing that in doing so, I am letting all living memory of my existence Pass as well.
But now a new sound reaches me, a sound that rouses me completely from my apathy. It is fragmented, many of the phrases broken or missing vital pieces as if but only half-remembered, but the refrain of the Ancient Songs wafts down the tunnel at me. It ceases, as if cut off in mid-utterance, then starts anew. Twice repeated, the echoes of the melody then dies, and I hear again the unfamiliar voice call my name.
I move carefully through the tunnels. Over the time I’ve resided in them, several in very deepest levels have collapsed – and I would rather not be trapped right now. A moment earlier and I wouldn't have cared, but now I allow curiosity and purpose to carry me forward.
I see, in the distance, the flicker of a small light. “I am here,” I whisper in a voice again harsh from disuse.
“Xantheashat?” This new voice is breathless with excitement. “Is it really you? You’re not just a dream?” The flickering light moves forward.
“Enough” I state more firmly, in a bigger voice that accomplishes its purpose when the light comes no closer. “Why do you call me?”
“Don’t you remember me?” the voice sounded disappointed.
“I remember,” I whisper gently.
“For years they told me I was hallucinating – when I was trapped in here, I mean. They said it was lack of oxygen made me believe that there was a monster in this old mine.”
“I told you I was no monster.” I remind that which was the Child of New Life with something that approached amusement.
“I know. And I also know they told me that the mine had been searched, and nothing found.”
“We of the
“The Song you Sang to me – do you remember?”
“Oh yes, Little One. I remember the Song – it is my very reason for existing. What about it?”
“I’ve tried to remember it as best I could…” That which had been the Child sounds hesitant.
“You have done well, having only listened one time and then to only one voice Singing. But yet you call me. Again I ask: why?”
I hear the sounds of fidgeting. “There was more to it, wasn’t there?”
I cannot restrain a quick chuckle, the rumble from which brings sprays of pebbles tumbling from the walls. I carefully modulate my whisper so as not to repeat the disturbance. “Of course there is more to it! It is the Song of Life Itself, of the
“I thought so. Teach me the rest?”
“Why?” I am so amazed, the question slips out almost without my knowing it.
“Because everyone I’ve ever Sung to tells me something changed inside somehow – that like me, their lives started to make sense. I Sang the song to my son when he was born, and he has grown up so well. If a small piece of the Song can do that, then how much more help could learning more of it give.”
“The Song will never be whole again,” I state sadly. “It was meant to be Sung in the harmony of many Ancient voices. The rest are gone now – only I remain.”
“Teach me the Song, then teach me how to harmonize,” the voice urged. “There is too much good in the Song to let it vanish from the world.”
“You?” Even my whisper can’t communicate my astonishment. “Harmonize?”
That which had been the Child thought for a moment. “Was it more important who did the Singing – or that the Song be sung?”
There it was again, Life itself showing me that the
“I don’t know if you will live long enough,” I defer. The New Life was short-lived – already this Child had matured and reproduced itself, and soon it too would be stepping aside to make room for the next generations. “I gave you but a single verse and refrain. The Song in its entirety is complex, with verses and refrains to last several lifetimes.”
“Then what you teach me, I’ll teach to others – and teach them to return here to learn more. Eventually, and together, we will learn to Sing properly.”
It is an audacious idea – and yet the thought of having the
I decide.
*0*0*0*0*0*0*
“Xantheashat?”
“I am here.”
“I am dying.”
“I know.” I could hear Death’s tones beginning their harmony in the voice, and I knew that the moment when this Child of New Life would cross that threshold drew nigh.
“I want….”
“What do you want, Little One?”
“I want to see you – just once – and maybe Sing with you one more time before…”
“I do not belong in this world.” I ruffle the surface of the Child’s mind, refreshing the memory of the hint as to who and what I am that I had placed there before. “Remember?”
But this time, the surface of that so-fragile mind stays placid and calm despite my mental touch, unafraid. “I am soon to leave this world,” the Child responds. “I only barely belong here myself.”
“I know, Little One, but I would not fill your last moments of Life with Fear rather than Song.”
“Then Sing with me, and let me harmonize with you, so that when I see you I will Fear neither you nor Death.”
I am silent, and I consider.
Since Time Began, I have Sung for just this purpose, to lift the veil of the Unknown for those who stand at Death’s threshold — and yet, never have I felt such reluctance to begin the Song for another being. I know that with the passing of this New Life, what little harmony the Song has now will be forever silent, and I am not certain that I will want to remain behind to tutor yet another fragile New voice.
The truth stands, unadorned, in front of me. For Good or Ill, my Time, like that of all the other Ancients and now this Child of New Life, has run its course. The days when the Song of Ancient Ways and Wisdom echoed from valley and mountaintop, whether in harmony as of Old or simple melody and descant of Recent Days, are concluded. In a way, I am strangely relieved that I should have as my companion, as I remove myself from this strange and tormented land of desiccated hopes and unending pain, New Life Singing the Ancient Song — for having such a companion is nothing less than Life affirming itself.
The New Song has begun; I can hear the faintest whisper of it issuing even from that poisoned place of dead lights and meaningless geometry. Buried in that whisper lie the seeds of Hope. My Guardianship is concluded; the Task now falls to those that Child of the New Voice has trained, and brought to me for teaching from time to time.
It would only be right and fitting to honor the final request of the One who served the Will of Life to unburden me. I will not learn Regret of Things Left Undone, such is not fitting for an Ancient who knows the comfort and power of the Song of Life. That is
“Tell me, Little One, does the sun shine outside this cave?”
“Yes. The sun shines brightly today, but will be setting soon.”
“Is there still a meadow, with hills just between the mouth of this cave?”
“Yes. The city grows in this direction, but it’s still over the crest of the hill.”
“Then you shall see me, Little One. Return to the meadow. I will join you there.”
I hear the sound of movement in the tunnel above me, and then… pain! My mind reaches out for the fragile mind of the Child who Visits, only to find it filled with the desperation of being unable to draw in Life-giving Breath without intense and overpowering pain. Even now, I can hear Death’s solemn refrain beginning to build.
I move, for the first time in a very long time, and I work my way through the labyrinthine twists and turns of the old tunnel toward where a single torch burns fitfully on the dusty floor. There, next to the guttering torch, lies the frail body of one of that which had at one time been a Child of New Life, the soft aura of Life with which it had once glowed brightly now flickers and struggles against inexorable Death even as the torch is.
Being careful not to dislodge any of the walls of the tunnel, I move to the side of this Child. I take It up to my chest, very mindful not to damage its oh-so-fragile shell in the process, and carry it with me — and with every step towards the mouth of the cave and the fading daylight beyond, I Sing softly the Song of Life Fulfilled. I can feel the Child relax in my grasp and, in Its own way, begin the simple descanting harmony suited to the capabilities of Its throat.
The day is indeed drawing to a close, but the sun still shines brightly over the top of the far mountains. I carry the Child through the complaining underbrush into the sunlight and find a place where the meadow grasses grow long and lush and soft to put It down to rest. The eyes of the Child fall open as It feels the solid ground beneath its back, and I know the moment they land on me — for they grow wide with awe and wonder. I know what the Child sees. The late afternoon sun is sparkling on my crystal scales as if from a million diamonds, and my wings lay against my back like iridescent gossamer veils folded back carefully out of the way. My eyes, which can shine like small suns in the darkest of nights, now merely catch the sunlight and toss it back into the air with all the colors of the rainbow.
The Child’s descant to the Song falters for an instant, and in the back of my mind I hear the mental voice of the Child exclaim, “But… You are beautiful!!” The Child reaches out her frail arm to touch my face as I bend toward her, and my whisker catches a tear as it escapes her eye. I see her take in one long, final gulp of Life-Giving Breath, and then the descant of the Song fades into Silence.
I unfold my wings and stretch in the Ancient Way, honoring the passing of this short-lived but Powerful Being and inviting the grasses upon which the discarded shell now lays to whisper the final refrains needed to guide the spark of that Life on its Newest journey. Then I turn and make my way back through the underbrush, Singing a final encore of comfort to ease my passage, and back into the mouth of the tunnels. In the darkness of the deepest of the deep tunnels I shall curl and Sleep the Unending Sleep.
In the moments before Sleep claims me, I shall be truly alone except for my memory of that frail New descant. I do not know Regret, but all Beings can know Grief when the End of Life arrives.
And alone, a dragon can cry.