LAKE OF THE SWANS
Book 2 of 3
Chapter 41
Wholly involved, Noah and Sophie carried rocks and mud to damn a rivulet of water snaking through the grass on its way to the lake. Five children in a neighborhood construction project on a warm summer day, the liquid source of their fun, runoff from the family factory meadow, presently too soggy for human activity and only somewhat polluted with bug repellent.
Overlooking the children, the Emerson family’s longhut sat on a low rise. Under its birch bark roof and just visible through airy wicker walls, Emma and Mia prepared caribou hides for use in winter clothing. Cody sat Indian style on the front porch, trying his hand at carving a ladle from birch burl. The family’s old porridge ladle had cracked after many years of use.
Sitting beside Cody, the canoe maker's daughter, Rowena, known as Rowe for short, prepared nettles for the making of cord widely used in lashings and fishing nets. Rowe had brought the nettles for something to do while babysitting the children. To protect herself from the nettle’s sting, she had covered her hands and arms in red ocher. As a result, her long blond bangs were stained pink even as the bulk of her hair lay out of harm’s way in a pair of braids.
So it was, life was soggy but good at the Lake of the Swans. The gentle pitter-patter of raindrops on the roof, the dripping of the porch eaves, the soft sheen of rain on the surface of the lake. The fresh smell that comes after prolonged rain washes everything clean. The happy voices of children at play. And puppy love on a front porch. It may have been paradise if not for the pesky mosquitoes. But of course, there are always ‘lice’ and ‘mosquitoes’ in one form or another, and perhaps it all comes down to the art of living.
Lifting her eyes from her work, Emma listened as several big raindrops hit the roof. First one drop, then a second, a third, and so on, slowly picking up in tempo like a locomotive picks up steam, except from a source far more powerful.
On the front porch, Rowe stood to look out over the lake where the big raindrops pockmarked the water. Fishermen in a handful of canoes, being fairly warned, turned and paddled for shore.
“Noah, Sophie,” Rowe called, “Come up here, all of you!”
Sensing what was coming, Yike and Nemo leapt onto the porch.
Running for cover, Sophie screamed as liquid missiles pelted the earth. Ellie, meanwhile, stood calm and quiet, tied to a small white birch with a pile of hay on the north side of the lawn. Out back, Weya and her puppies remained safe and dry, the entrance to their den being high on an upswept cusp where meadow met forest.
Under the cover of the porch roof, Cody, Rowe, Noah, Sophie, and their three little friends stood looking out at the rain. Mia came and joined them, followed by Emma.
“Have you ever seen rain this heavy, Grandmother?”
“Not in many years.”
No more had Emma spoken than the rain intensified. No thunder rolled, no lightning flashed, no wind blew, not even a breeze. Just the drone of raindrops pummeling the earth.
“It’s so loud!” exclaimed Noah, looking up at his mother in wonderment.
Water poured in sheets from the eaves. Rivulets ran everywhere through the grass. A few tumbled over rocky ledges to make tiny waterfalls. And looking at the lake, the surface appeared to boil.
In the moments that followed, a phenomenon occurred that, although rare as a white stag, was nevertheless a natural event with a scientific explanation—
“Look!” Cody cried, pointing to the lake.
Dark clouds had cracked open to let loose an array of sunbeams even as the rain poured down without abate. And everywhere the sunbeams struck the boiling lake, fiery veils sprang up to dance across the surface. Bright as rainbows, great swaths of color moved like ghosts over the water, here, there, and everywhere, shimmering red, yellow, blue, and green. It lasted but a minute, a wildly electrifying minute!
The clouds closed. The sunbeams vanished. The rain diminished, and all across the campground, witnesses came out of their shelters to gather on the shores of the lake as though responding to a summons.
As Emma came on, the people turned to her not because she was queen of the land or even of the campground but because she was a known interpreter of signs, an elder of the once-great Emerson clan.
“What does it mean, Emma?”
Emma turned to gaze out over the water before returning her eyes to them, “We have witnessed but a glimpse of the infinite mystery that surrounds us...the depths of which lie beyond our imaginations. Today, the Great Spirit speaks to us loudly with fire and water. Tomorrow, his voice may come soft as a whisper in the summer breeze.”
“Let us bow our heads,” said a man who then offered a prayer. Calling on the Great Spirit, he asked for the fulfillment of their human needs, and gave thanks for blessings received.
Lifting their heads, the people had only begun to speak among themselves when a young man stepped forward and pointed to the lake, “A canoe approaches!”
Under the cloud blanket, the lake appeared a tranquil sea, softly shimmering in light rain, while, in its midst, a lone canoe appeared as though from a dream.
Squinting along the shore, the people could just make out a young man in the stern. Broad-chested and naked except for a loincloth, he paddled slow and strong. At the bow, a young woman bailed water with a wooden bowl while holding her long hair out of the way.
“That’s John and Laureal!” cried Cody.
Standing beside Emma, Mia thought of the whispers that had been going around camp, all of which could be traced back to John and his stories about a stairway to the sky. Now more concerned than ever with regard to what folks might be thinking, she turned to her Matriarch and whispered, “How are we to explain this?”
Cody, electrified as boys will be, waded into knee-deep water where he met the canoeist, “Did you see it?”
“Did we see it?” Laureal echoed, laughing at the question. “It was all around us!”
“Grandma says it’s a sign.”
“So does Laureal.” John smiled as though it were all too funny, albeit in a wonderful sort of way.
“We were bailing water as fast as we could, and still we thought it would sink us,” Laureal added. “That’s when the sign came, and immediately after that, the downpour stopped!”
“I know!” Cody exclaimed, in rare agreement with his sister. “I’ve never seen anything like it!”
Laureal got out of the canoe. “I have to tell Mom and Grandma,” searching the crowd with her eyes before once again turning to her brother, “Where’s Mom?”
“I’m not sure.”
“What do you mean, you’re not sure?”
“Mom’s not so easy to find these days?”
“Cody, what are you talking about?”
“Mom has a...boyfriend.”
“What?”
“Sweetheart,” said John, and, gaining Laureal’s attention, he pointed south where a man and woman came hurrying along the shoreline, not running but walking with intent, and holding hands.
Laureal turned to Cody, “Who’s that?”
“His name’s Harley, and that’s all I know,” Cody replied, suddenly on the defensive. “That, and, well…Mom really likes him. I mean like, she really-really likes him.”
Laureal spun to John, “I have to go. Will you be okay?”
Nodding, John waved Laureal on.
Still a stone’s throw down the shoreline but close enough to see her daughter looking her way while wading to shore, Jessie turned loose of Harley’s hand.
Glancing at her grandmother, Laureal changed course and beelined for the Matriarch. “Grandmother, has Mom found a replacement husband…already?”
“It’s good to see you safe and sound, dear.”
“It’s good to see you, Grandma,” turning as she spoke, craning to look down the beach.
“We were worried, what with nothing but rain and storms for three days.”
“We were hunkered down in our tent,” turning back to her grandmother.
A mixture of confusion and curiosity, Laureal again turned toward her mother, but before she could take a step, a group of women surrounded her and Emma, one of whom addressed Laureal directly: “Mrs. Emerson, did you see the fire on the lake?”
“Yes, ma’am,” Laureal replied, yet confused, and lit like a torch. “It was all around us.”
The women turned to the Matriarch, her granddaughter’s brief testimony adding all the more gravity to their wonderment—their hope being that Emma might shed light on the seemingly obvious connection between the young lover’s behavior before their departure and the seemingly divine event surrounding their return.
Seizing on her opportunity to escape, Laureal went to intercept her mom. At the same time, a crowd gathered on the shore before John, himself standing knee deep in the water beside his canoe. They had only begun to question the Seeker when a desperate-looking fellow squeezed out from between them. Thin of build, in the middle of life, and worn ragged from the trail, the man came forward with such urgency as to nearly stumble and fall face-first in the shallows—
“Mr. Summerfield,” gaining his composure even as his countenance remained severe, “my name is Robert Fischer. I come from Grandal. I learned of you there, although I could not be certain of your existence until I arrived here the day before yesterday. Back in Grandal, the word on the street tells of a horseman from the west, joined with the House of Emerson to enlist a company of men for the purpose of retrieving a treasure...not just any treasure, but a treasure the likes of which has not been known for a thousand years!”
“It is not a treasure of gold and silver,” John replied, having come to understand that men sometimes, if not oftentimes, hear only what they want to hear.
“And that is why I am here!” implored the man. “As I understand it, you have knowledge regarding a hidden storehouse of knowledge containing the secrets of the ancients!”
Seeing he had their attention, Fischer did not miss a beat, “I have seen what the ancients built, not these little niths of which you all know, but what most of you have only heard tell of…on the far side of the Five Seas, such ruins as to leave a sensible man dumbfounded. And that is why, Mr. Summerfield, when I heard that you knew of a trove containing their secrets…I tossed and turned night after night until, at last, making up my mind, I packed my meager belongings and left my station without a word.”
“You’ve been to the realm beyond the Five Seas?” asked a bright-eyed young man.
“Yes.”
“You’ve seen the great niths?” asked another.
“Yes, the biggest of them all,” referring to the ruin of Toronto, which, in fact, was not the biggest in the world.
“On the shore of the last sea,” Fischer continued, “it stands as a monument to the ancients. And any man that stands before it will forevermore wonder about the glorious race that once ruled this earth!”
“You entered a nith?”
“It’s not like you think!” turning to face his accuser. “I was a scribe, attached to an emissary representing the Council,” referring to the High Council of Elders in Grandal. “My superiors were finalizing a trade agreement with emissaries from the East. We met on the shore beside the great Nith, as it was a location that all could easily find and agree on.”
“To enter a nith is forbidden.”
“Out here it is, but not in the eastern half of the realm…you know that.” And returning his eyes to John, “Mr. Summerfield, I began my life out here on the frontier. I was not physically suited for it, so my parents sent me east to Grandal. I learned to read and write. I was a young man when I entered into the service of the Council. I believed in what I did. I thought I had a pure heart, but fortunately, I discovered that was not the case.”
“It’s never the case,” one of the older men put in, causing a round of laughter and jokes among those of like age.
Having laughed along with them, Fisher drew serious, “It’s been a long road. I have seen much in the East. And though I thought I never would, I have returned to the realm of my birth. And in the past two days, I have learned much about you, Mr. Summerfield. And while some might think you a madman, speaking for myself, I am encouraged. And if I may be of some immediate service to your cause, I bring you intelligence on the movements of a potential adversary. Rumors of a vast treasure will set the High Council in motion. They will send men to investigate. Their emissaries may come with cordial smiles and handshakes. If they do, of this you can be certain…their motives will not be pure.”
With Fischer’s last words, one could see a shift in the attitudes of those around him. Their changing expressions spoke to reconsideration, and perhaps even an inkling of kinship.
While the men spoke among themselves, Laureal came before Jessie and Harley. Her eyes, shifting back and forth between the pair, told of her confusion and uncertainty.
Jessie, reacting spontaneously, stepped forward and took Laureal into her arms, “I’m so relieved to have you home!”
“It’s good to be home,” swayed by what truly mattered, particularly after she and John had been days in a tent riding out violent storms.
“I hope the rain didn’t ruin your trip.”
“It certainly made for an ending to remember,” Harley put in.
“Indeed, sir, it made for a trip to remember,” turning to him even as she found it difficult to breathe, so foreign were the emotions swelling in her chest.
“Laureal…this is my friend, Harley.”
“Pleased to meet you, sir,” extending her hand.
“It is good to meet you, Laureal.”
No comments:
Post a Comment