The Proverbial Sword
by John Didday
part 1
Saturday morning he was greeted by ten new work emails, each one finding its own way to add to his stress. Admonishing himself for looking at his phone so early in the morning, he went to his office to read from a book instead.
It was a favored book from childhood, one he’d read and re-read dozens of times. The title was A Hero Despite It All, although he’d read it so many times now he simply thought of it as “the Book.” After the first two pages, he was already feeling the same thrill he’d had while reading the Book in his youth. He recalled the story: powerful forces worked on courageous characters as they battled villains who were easy to hate. But when he turned to the next page, he noticed a break in continuity.
He flipped back and confirmed, yes, there was a gap in the page numbers. Looking closer, he found a tear along the binding near the stitching and flaky glue.
He turned the old book over and shook it. Nothing fell out. He looked out the window to his office, saw the mild winter morning, and sighed.
He couldn’t just skip the third page of the Book. He was reading in parallel with his niece across the country, and he’d need to be able to discuss details at their first book club meeting.
Ah, his poor niece. Her family had moved away in the fall, and he worried about her at her new school. He’d thought she’d like the Book, that it might encourage her to discover the power and the agency she had in making her own decisions, even if it seemed that her parents made all of the ones that mattered. The last time he’d spoken with his niece, though, when he’d suggested they read the Book, she’d sounded distant and uninterested. Maybe she was becoming a teenager.
He sighed again. What was he becoming himself? It was only Saturday, and already he was afraid of the coming work week. Monday. Hanging over his head like the proverbial sword. He’d wanted to remind his niece of her power and agency; did he have these in his own life? It felt like his to-do list made every decision for him, invisible forces controlling his life just as his niece’s parents were controlling hers. And he lacked the energy to do anything to change it.
But he could worry later. Right now, he needed to find that missing page. He stood up and fumbled around his empty apartment until, in the bedroom, he found it on the floor. Yes, page 3.
Bringing the page up to his eyes, he noticed a stain had highlighted a particular sentence:
The three great tables that ran the length of the hall were laid already, the silver and the glass catching what little light there was, and the long benches were pulled out ready for the guests.
A pang drummed in his chest as he read the words again. It was as though he’d imagined this place before, some time long ago. Perhaps a childhood memory of reading the Book. No. This was a different sort of memory, older.
He stood perfectly still, letting the feeling deepen. The... tables.
Three great tables. A feast in winter. The doors to the hall were heavy and sturdy, keeping out the wind and snow...
How had that page fallen out of the Book? He looked down at the stained, cream-colored page in his hand.
You’re avoiding a deeper question, he chastened himself. What was that — where was that — you were a moment ago? In a flash, he was back.
He was in the court of a king. A king in the wild, old times when courtesies and laws didn’t matter; all that mattered was the king was the leader and the monster outside the hall needed to be vanquished. The castle walls were rough, made of heavy gray stone, and the only light came from simple wooden torches.
Someone was close by, talking to him, but he ignored the voice and scanned the tables before him. Grizzled men, women, and youths; crafty-looking folk in heavy rags, lifting sloshing steins of ale, tearing at hunks of roasted meat. He was standing at the head of the table. Part of him was trying to understand what and where he was, but another part of him felt anger growing, hot in his stomach.
A hand grabbed his shoulder and shook him. “Your speech, Rickard. It’s time for your speech.”
Rickard pushed the man aside and slammed a fist heavy on the table, sending the cutlery clattering all the way down the long table. Did I do that? The man watching the scene wondered. Am I Rickard?
“Why are we in here, drinking beer, when a monster is out there?” Rickard shouted, his voice surprisingly loud and guttural. Rickard pointed a thick finger to the heavily-built door.
The grizzled guests stared back, grumbling and skeptical. The men wore thick beards and the women had coarsely braided hair.
“Rickard, we, we are awaiting the arrival of the allies,” the person beside him whispered in a nervous pitch. But Rickard disregarded the fellow, his squire, for a second time.
“I am not afraid!” Rickard shouted and stared down the onlookers with a burning intensity.
One by one, the gathered warriors, hill people, and wardens rose from their seats and stood with him.
Wait, am I standing right now? Rickard had been there, standing amongst the guests, just a moment ago. The man looked down; he was standing near the edge of his bed, back in the apartment, holding the missing page. “What’s happening?” he mumbled, looking back to his bed and his ruffled satin sheets.
He wasn’t asleep. It seemed he’d simply been standing here for the last few minutes. He had the house to himself this weekend; Jennifer was traveling for work. Shaking his head, he moved to set the page aside and, doing so, looked down again at his thin, pale fingers holding the stained page. He recalled the hands, the fingers, of the man in the vision — Rickard — Rickard’s hands had been powerful and calloused.
Glancing up again, he was suddenly outside, the air cold and clean. A light wind was sending gusts of snow into the air as he trudged forward, surrounded by the rough folk from inside the hall. They were in a picturesque, wide-open valley at the edge of a great forest. Their party approached a group of large horses gathered under snow-laden trees. No, not horses.
Centaurs. Their proportions made logical sense, but at the same time, were hard to comprehend. Their human torsos looked right emerging from the horse-like trunk, but compared to any human, they were enormous, their arms long and thickly muscled. He could feel that even Rickard was intimidated by the sight of the creatures.
“They will test you,” the squire whispered.
Rickard took a breath and strode toward the largest centaur, who was positioned at the edge of the forest.
“Where do you go, Centaur?” Rickard inquired, more a demand than a question. Unlike the others, this chestnut-colored centaur wore a polished wooden necklace.
The centaur leader shifted and paced in front of Rickard, glared at him and snorted. “We are leaving the mountains, human. If you are wise, you will follow us, but I warn you to keep your distance.”
“No, centaur. We intend to find and kill the giant.” Rickard kept his gaze steady as he added, “and we would do it with your aid.”
The centaur laughed aloud, its breath blowing back Rickard’s hair and forming a cloud of steam in the cold air. Trotting back and forth as it spoke, it kept its eyes on Rickard, who, though taller than most, stood even with its stomach.
“We have no interest in the dealings of man,” the centaur said curtly. It stomped the ground, stepped away, and then turned its torso to glance back. “But before you run to your death, tell me. What is your plan?” The great horse turned to smirk at its fellow centaurs.
Rickard looked to his squire, to the gathered humans behind him in the snow. They lifted their axes, smoothed the fletching on their arrows. Meanwhile, the witness watching internally squirmed, hoping Rickard knew the answer to the centaur’s question. The plan — yes, what is Rickard’s plan? It can’t just be to rattle our swords and look tough.
“We haven’t a plan,” Rickard responded, confident and honest. He looked up at the fantastic beast’s equine eye, which narrowed and stared into his soul. The eye was yellow, like...
Like his cat’s eye. Yes, yes. Here he was. Back home. Looking into the face of his brown cat, where it sat indifferently on the kitchen table. “Get off the...” he started to say.
Wait. What in God’s name was going on this morning? The man backed away from the table, now suspicious of his cat and his entire apartment. Spotting the Book on the floor in the kitchen, he snatched it up and jogged on weak knees back to the bedroom, where he found the missing page again. Squinting his eyes blurry to avoid seeing the page or his weak, puny hands or the book or the cat, he guided the missing page into its proper place. He shut the Book, dropped it on his bed, and let out a deep sigh.
Copyright © 2021 by John Didday
