Rachel Starr Thomson

by Rachel Starr Thomson

Little One was born in the Golden Fields, in a little thatched house amidst the sunlit wheat. It was a happy home, and she delighted in the blessings of the land—sun warm on her face, wheat dancing in the light and mysterious under the moon, companions as happy and innocent as she was, and space—wide open space, great circles in the wheatfields where she threw off her shoes and danced until she felt that the sun had no more beauty or energy or light than she.

The houses scattered throughout the fields made something of a town, and in the center of the land was a place they called the Town Square. There was a market there, and a tree to climb, and a box to stand and preach or sing on.

It was there that Little One first saw him. A young man with mysterious, laughing eyes. When first she saw him he was playing with the children, and all their innocent joy was dancing in every movement he made. She could not take her eyes away from him.

That night she sat by the fire in her little home and watched the flames jump and settle again in orange tongues. After a little while she looked up and saw her father watching her. He was waiting. He could sense the question in the air.

“The young man in the marketplace,” she said to her father, “—who is he?”

Her father looked gravely on her. “He is the Living One,” he said.

“I think I should like to know him,” said Little One.

“Then you will,” her father answered. “But oh, my daughter, be careful what you wish for.”

Little One met the young man more and more frequently as the days went by. Sometimes they talked; sometimes she simply watched him as he worked, played, and spoke with others. Every time she saw him she felt her heart slipping away from her control… before long it would be his.

The wheat fields were harvested in late October, and November brought grey skies and light snow with it. Early in the morning on a day cold enough to gather her breath and make it visible, Little One met the young man in a field. They stood face to face, and she knew that her life was about to change forever–that in some way, it already had.

“I want to be yours,” she said.

“I know,” he answered.

“How can I enter into your life?”

The young man’s face grew sad for a moment, and he looked away at the horizon where dark mountains loomed. “I am going away,” he said. “If you would be a part of my life, you must follow.”

“Can I not go with you?” she asked.

“No,” the Living One answered. “No. Instead you must follow my footprints, trusting that you will find me in the end.”

She bowed her head. A cold wind was blowing over the barren fields, and it stung her face. “I will follow you,” she said. “You will not–will not forget me?”

“No,” he said, “for I will take something of yours with me. Give me your heart, Little One, and I will hold it in my hand throughout my journey.”

She looked into his face, but there was no hint of humour there. His eyes were serious. She held out her hand and closed her eyes, summoning her soul to rise to her fingertips. She felt her heart form there, in the palm of her hand, and then she opened her eyes. She gasped. In her hand was a small, dark, cold thing.

“I thought…” she said, and tried to laugh at herself. “I thought my heart would be a greater gift than this.”

The young man smiled then. “You do not imagine how great a gift,” he said. “Give it to me, and trust me to treasure it no matter how insignificant you now see it to be.”

The young man left the Golden Fields on the following day, taking Little One’s heart with him. She felt its absence as soon as he had gone, or perhaps it was his absence she felt… whatever it was, it ached inside her.

In the marketplace she heard an old man say that he had seen the Living One heading toward the mountains, and the people sighed and said they wished he would stay with them longer. They did not suspect that a part of Little One had gone with him, or that she was about to follow.

She said goodbye to her father and mother that night. They kissed her and blessed her, and sent her away wrapped in a warm shawl that had been in the family since her great-great-grandmother’s time. She left in the wee hours of the morning, while the sun was just beginning to cast its pale rays over the world.

By late morning, the sun had risen over the Golden Fields. It melted the night’s snow, leaving patches here and there, and running little rivulets through the dark earth. Little One let the sun’s warmth comfort her. She could almost imagine that her heart was in them, but now and again a pang would strike her, and she knew she had to keep going.

She reached the foothills late in the morning, and immediately the shadow of the mountains loomed over her and blocked out the sun. It was cold. Little One drew the shawl around her shoulders and looked to the road ahead. A winding, rocky path disappeared into the hills; the mountains stood beyond, brooding and black. She shivered with more than cold. She was afraid… afraid for the first time in her life. But when she looked down, she saw footprints in the earth. His footprints. She would go on, then. She had to follow him.

The foothills soon gave way to a mountain pass. It closed in around her like iron walls. The path was narrow and difficult; shale slipped under her feet. The footprints were almost nonexistant. Still she went on. There was little wind in the pass; and the quiet seemed as much a prison as the mountain walls. In the quiet her thoughts spoke to her, and she was appalled to hear the things they said. They went from being merely unquieted to being nearly blasphemous; from complaining to accusing the Living One of stealing from her. They were awful thoughts, and she nearly screamed because of them, but then she lifted her face and forced her mind to quiet itself. The thoughts were still there, broiling beneath the forced calm, but she thought she knew what to do with them. Softly, deliberately, she began to sing. She marched in tune with the song, ignoring the slippery, rocky way, keeping her eyes on the road ahead of her. She sang of every lovely thing she could think of, and thanked God for them; and she sang of the Living One playing with children and smiling at her.

When the song was over, she found herself at the foot of a steep embankment, and the footsteps went straight up. She followed them. The climb took hours. When at last she reached the top, she collapsed with exhaustion and fell asleep.

Her sleep that night was fitful. Her doubting thoughts, previously quieted with a song, gathered themselves and whirled, whispering, through her head. She curled up tightly on the stony ground and shivered in the night air. The power to wake was beyond her, as was the power to sleep well. She was plagued by a nagging sense of something missing. She had lost her heart, and couldn’t sleep without it… couldn’t rest… couldn’t be whole.

Little One awoke in the wee hours of the morning to the sound of singing so beautiful it pierced her loneliness and exhaustion and drew her to her feet. She stood now at the top of a small mountain, and the sky was clear and wide above her. Across its black, starlit depths the Northern Lights painted their song in the sky. The song swelled and leapt as voices joined it: the stars singing, and with them all of creation in its night-worship. The song swept Little One up and filled her until she thought she would burst with the painful beauty of it. The song encompassed all things lovely, and at the heart of them all was the Living One, who she saw now as a Great and Wild Being, Alive in a way she could not comprehend; and she was filled all at once with an overwhelming sense of his presence and an aching longing to see him more, to know him more, to follow and find and catch him.

In the glory of the song she worshipped and danced on top of the mountains, and she was not sure that her feet stayed on the ground… more than once it seemed that she had risen into the glorious whiteness of the Milky Way, into the shimmering coldness of the Lights, and danced down sky-paths no mortal had ever before seen.

When the morning came, the sun rose like a great golden king in the sky, and the snow-covered mountaintops welcomed it with the dazzling brilliance of reflected light. The sun’s rays cut through Little One and laid her still-rejoicing soul bare; she thought there was nothing in her but light and worship now. She hardly missed her heart–little, black thing that it was. She had been filled with something greater; something eternal. The sun’s rays were warm and they came unhindered through cold, clear air.

Little One caught her breath and looked to the path again: there were footprints, still going on through the snow. It suddenly occured to her to wonder how far ahead the Living One actually was… had he not been there in the song the night before? She realized with a quickening pulse that she had danced with him and not even known it. He could not be far ahead! She wrapped her shawl around her and fairly ran down the snow-laced path.

The track from the mountaintop led down to the top of a low ridge. Here, on a path neither terrible nor sweet to her feet, Little One followed the footsteps of He who was Alive for days. The days dragged into weeks. Little One’s shoes began to wear through, and she tore strips from her shawl and bound them around her feet. The track descended still further, and she found herself on a relatively busy road, where travelers and market-folk from the mountains regularly traversed. Some of these were kind to her, others were preoccupied with their own business, most were willing to stop and talk. She spent hours with them as she followed, and enjoyed their company. The beginning of the journey had been lonely! But after a while she started to notice a deeper loneliness creeping up on her. For all the people’s cheerful, everyday talk, there was something missing in them. The more time she spent with them, the less real the magical night on the mountaintop seemed to her. She tried to tell some of them, but they never understood; and gradually she began to wonder if she had not simply invented the details of it and festooned her soul with a false vision of beauty.

The days went by; full of idle chatter. The footprints were still there, but they seemed old and faded. The sense that the Living One was just ahead had left her, and much of her excitement had gone with it. Now and again she found herself resenting him. The mountain track really was a pleasant place, with some beautiful views and a great deal of unhindered sunlight, and the people were delightful in their own way–yet she couldn’t rejoice in them, couldn’t fully enjoy any of it. Not with her heart missing. She wondered why, after all, he had taken it. Could she not have better followed him whole?

The feeling of discontent and doubt grew on her until one day she realized, as she rose from her roadside bed and began again to follow the footsteps, that it would not take much to turn her aside for good. The people on the road might ask her to tarry with them–she would do it, she would stay. She might never take up the journey again. The realization frightened her. It showed up her own weakness, and she did not know how to combat it. She spent the day in a half-terror, half-apathy; she might give in, she might not, perhaps the longing would pierce her again, perhaps it had all been a fancy.

They came to an end, terror and apathy; and neither won over the other. It happened this way: Little One saw a small caravan coming toward her, and was immediately drawn to its occupants. They were a small, rowdy group: mothers and fathers and children who she would have counted had they held still long enough to berecognized as individuals and not as one ever-moving flock. It was late evening and Little One was alone in the road with her shawl pulled around her against the growing cold. The strangers were drawn to her as she was to them; they hailed her and urged her to stop and take supper with them. She agreed. They drew their caravan to the side of the road and made camp.

Among the strangers Little One noticed a girl about her own age. She was quiet in manner, unlike the others, moving behind the scenes in a graceful, ghostly way. Once the girl stooped to pull a pot of boiling water off the fire, and the flames lit up her face: she was pretty, pale, with a long scar on one cheek. Her eyes met Little One’s, and she smiled just before she turned away.

Little One saw something in those eyes that woke desperation in her. She ate her supper without tasting it; made conversation and didn’t really hear a word. At last the people of the caravan began to settle down for the night, and Little One was momentarily ignored. She searched the shadows until she found the scarred girl… sitting on the other side of one of the wagons, looking at the stars.

The girl turned and smiled at Little One. She didn’t seem at all surprised by her approach. Little One, on the other hand, was quite discomfited. She wanted to say everything but she wasn’t sure what “everything” was. She opened her mouth to stammer a greeting, and was tremendously relieved when the girl spoke first.

“Look at them,” she said. “So high, the stars. They can see the end of the road where we can only see the little bit we’re on.” She looked at Little One, and there were tears glistening in her smiling eyes. “They shine so peacefully, so steadily, that the end of the road cannot be anything but peace and wholeness at last.”

The girls stood for a moment, looking at each other, partaking of silent fellowship. Then Little One said, “How long have you followed the footsteps?”

“Six years,” the other said. “Since I was a child.”

Little One swallowed a lump in her throat. “And you have not yet reached the end?”

The girl smiled. “I have learned to wait. But your path will not be mine. Do not think of the time, or of the hardships–think of the Living One, and go on.”

“But you’re going the wrong way,” Little One said. “The footsteps lead across the mountains…”

“My path and yours are not the same,” the girl said. She looked back at the stars, and absent-mindedly fingered the scar on her face. “We will reach the same end some day. Stay strong, stay faithful.”

The girl reached out her hand, and Little One took it. They stood together for a long moment, and then the girl leaned over and kissed Little One’s cheek. “Don’t give up,” she whispered.

The conversation ended there, and when Little One woke in the morning to the sound of the caravan moving away, all the old longing and hunger and pain of her empty soul was awake and raging more strongly than ever. The footsteps seemed clearer on the track, and as she followed Little One heard a whisper of thought–”You talked with him last night, and you didn’t know it.”

Bolstered by her encounter with the strange girl, Little One threw herself into the task of following as never before. She took care never to lose sight of the footprints, and began to keep close watch on everything she did or said among the road people. She was intensely desirous of another night like the one she’d spent on the mountaintop, so she began to take every opportunity to stay awake and wait for it. Somehow, she thought that she could make things change if only she’d be a better follower. She determined to take the journey very seriously, and somehow the joy began to go out of it. She rarely ever danced on her way anymore.

One night, as she toiled down the road long past nightfall, it began to rain. It was only a slight rain, born on a slight wind, but it was cold and stung her skin like ice. She called to mind the old song she’d sung at the beginning of the journey, and singing she marched on. The storm dissipated after a short time. The next night, she determined to walk all through the night again. This time the storm returned with far more force, and she found herself cowed by it. She gritted her teeth and went on, as the cold water nearly obscured the tracks in the road.

The storm became a regular companion. It seemed to dog Little One’s footsteps: freezing rain, snow, stinging wind, mud and fog… she could not get away from them. The storm grew progressively worse. The worse it got, the more she determined that she must try harder to overcome it. One night a panic gripped her: she could hardly see the footprints. From that night on, fear began to drive her, and the storm lashed her and mocked her and weighed her down.

The night came when she could not bear the storm any longer. She collapsed in the mud and hugged her knees to her chest, pulling her shawl up to shield her face from the stinging wind. “I can’t…” she gasped. “I can’t go on any longer! Why do you punish me so? Why send a storm when I seek for victory? You know I can’t bear it! You know!”

There in the midst of the storm Little One felt a warmth, and felt rather than saw a strange light. She felt gentle hands on hers and heard a voice: she knew it was his, though it was distant and more unreal than she wanted it to be. “You carry the storm with you,” he said. “You have taken too much on yourself and forgotten to trust me. Release your fear. Desire nothing but me, and know that I will lead you to myself. Cast this burden away, child, and you will find rest again.”

His voice was so reassuring, yet Little One felt as though her fingers were clutching the burden with all her strength. It was her protection from the storm, wasn’t it? Her knowledge that she was doing everything she could was all that kept her from being swallowed by it. Slowly, she let go. As she did, the wind began to ease.

A week passed before the storm disappeared completely, and Little One resolutely reminded herself that she had cast the burden off and that the Living One would see her through to the end of the journey. She remembered what a pathetic thing her heart had been when she handed it to him… had she imagined that her will, her strength, was so much greater? Ashamed, she realized how often his Life had intervened to keep her going when there was nothing in her to do it… the Night Dance, the girl with the scarred face, the longing. Even the longing was a gift. For the first time Little One realized that her heart had not been lost. It was in the keeping of the Living One. He had taken it and given her hunger so that she would continue to follow no matter the difficulties. When her longing had reached its end and she had found him at last, somehow she knew her heart would be returned to her.

For a time the mountain path led up into open spaces again, where the air was cold and clear and sweet, and Little One rested in the peace within and let her eyes rejoice in the blueness of sky. She felt strangely close to the Living One. Not that she felt the excitement of his being just ahead; she didn’t know where he was on the path, and for all she knew he might have left the world altogether… but she felt as though he were close to her in a quiet, unstated way; as though he were inside, in the place where her dark, cold heart had once been. One night she lay awake by the side of the road, looking up at the stars, and memories of her life in the Golden Fields came to her. They were pleasant memories, and sweet; but she realized suddenly that she had not been alive then–that she had not really known what life was. Did the realization mean that she was living now? She didn’t know, but she was content to trust. The Living One held her heart in the palm of his hand. Nothing would touch her that he did not ordain.

Her confidence was nearly shaken when she saw blood in the snowy tracks. She looked at the road ahead… it stretched over the ridge and down into a valley. There were clouds over the valley, as though it would not stand to be seen by the sun, and sense of heavy foreboding came over her. There was pain in the way of the Living One. There was blood in his footsteps. For a moment her soul quailed, but she took a step forward. She trembled as she went. It was not her courage that held her up now; only the knowledge that the Living One had her heart. She would not shy away from the path he had willingly taken. She would go on.

She descended into the valley with the supernatural calm of a martyr, face set like flint. A stink assailed her as she reached the floor; a swamp lay on every side. The swamp had begun to encroach on the path and it sucked at her feet as she walked. The air was dark and dirty somehow; it seemed as though things were swarming in it–living thoughts, taunts, evil things. She shivered, aware that something beyond herself kept them from touching her. She looked down, and the sight of the footprints wrenched her soul: they were twisted. Broken. Bloody.

She looked up and felt horror strike her deep inside. She was looking at the end of the road. It came to a sudden stop there in the swamp… but no, no, it was not the end of the path that loomed before her, but a living thing, a dark shape coiled on the ground that obscured the road. She took a step closer and then stopped as the thing began to uncoil itself, and a great serpent’s head rose from the road before her.

“I know you,” she whispered. “Why…”

“Why didn’t they warn you?” the serpent echoed. “Why let you come so far and never tell you what waits at the end?”

His voice was hypnotic, irresistable. Her defenses were falling and the swarming things in the air began to get at her, stinging her soul. With fear. With doubt. With condemnation and hate. She was horrified to learn how quickly all of her peace could abandon her. Devastated to know how little she really believed.

The serpent coiled around her and whispered in her ear, “You were wrong about him. See? This is the end he brings you to. He destroys you. The Living One has led you to death.”

She had never known a lie could have such devastating pain in its words. She fell to her knees and wept in the path as the serpent tightened his hold and the stinging things ate away at her. She felt the serpent’s cold scales brush against her feet and tighten… he was crushing her feet.

The dance was over. The journey was over. She fell as one dead and darkness rushed in on her from every side, and then… the faintest of lights. An image. Bloodied footprints in the road. She pushed against the darkness. It could not have her. Her heart was not here, not here to die with her body, not here to be mangled with her feet. He had her heart, and he was faithful.

In the throes of death, in the grip of hell, Little One smiled.

As if in a dream, she heard a cry of tortured hate and defeat. She drew in a choking breath and tried to push herself up on her hands and knees. Her feet hurt so badly. Her eyes filled with tears and she lay in the road again, free of the serpent but still wounded. Wounded forever, she thought. She began to cry softly. It was not the fearful wailing of one in terror, nor the weeping of one without hope. She cried tears of hurt, a child’s tears.

A mist passed before her eyes and she found herself laying in the road on a grassy hilltop, with someone’s arms around her. The girl with the scarred face. She smiled up at the girl and closed her eyes again, and the vision passed.

He was there when she awoke. She didn’t know where “there” was: she couldn’t focus on anything but him. The Living One, before her in his old beauty and friendliness, and yet with a new splendor and terrible majesty. She tried to smile.

“Have I come to the end?” she asked.

“Yes,” he said.

She blinked back tears. “I do not remember the end of the road. The serpent stopped me…”

“You did not walk the end of the road,” he answered. “My angels carried you.”

“I am broken,” she said. “My feet… my soul. I have nothing to give you now.”

He smiled and held out his hand. His fingers were closed around something in his palm. “But I have something for you,” he said.

“My heart?” she asked, managing a smile through her tears.

Slowly, he opened his fingers. A dazzling brightness escaped from between them, and when his hand was open Little One found herself looking into a light brighter and deeper and purer than any that belongs to the stars. In the very center she thought she could see something like a small gem: the diamond that her coal-like heart had become.

“The path and its treacheries have served my purposes well,” he told her. “Come, and receive your inheritance.”

She reached out her hand and the light pierced her. Her soul was on fire; her soul was in love. The light lifted her and she laughed, clear and bright and strong. Enough of her broken past remained in her to make her feel the miracle of the change. To hear herself laugh was to enter a dream she had almost ceased to believe in. She looked to the Living One and saw that he had become a Living Light. She reached out her hand and he took it, and their hearts became One.

The light flowed into her feet and healed every trace of the serpent’s work, and Little One danced in the heavenlies with her lord.

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