The Allegory Of Triberias: The Call Of Destiny .

The First Virtue

THE VIEWPOINT,
The Eastern Winds, Triberias
2420 AA, After the Great Ascension.

That was no thunder and she knew it. Every fibre in her body was screaming it even as she moved closer to the edge and waited to verify. She watched with much anticipation and finally her patience was rewarded as a huge ball of fire razed through skies. Lighting up the clouds with the same eerily orange glow that had flashed within the cloud.
Havillah took a step back, surprised by what she had just seen.
Lightening was not orange. No, it was supposed to be a dazzling white or blue, and it formed bolts not orange balls of great fire. No,  she agreed within herself.
As she pondered hard on this, a dark shadow and then another swiftly passed beneath the cloud that was underneath her. Another loud roar thundered throughout the skies. It vibrated within the cloud and shook her, despite the fact that she was watching from another place.
Maybe, the influence of the gates here was much weaker or was this view point actually a veil? She did not get time to ponder this much as all around her, more roars echoed the first one as more orange lights filled up the night sky.
Afraid, Havillah turned back and rushed back into the city seeking the warmth of the Hope's Light. As she went through the gates, the Light of the Hope permeated through her, soothing her frayed up emotions and washing away the panic that had previously besotted her. She could now be more at ease despite having entered the lion’s den.
Still, she walked on as Great of all ages, sizes and colour milled all around her. Some were comfortable with walking while the others hovered. All wearing the same colourful robes that swished and swashed in the wind of their movements. To the tenant eye this view was extremely beautiful. The flash of different colours and the kaleidoscope of lights that resembled a rainbow.
Yes, the place was truly beautiful and glisteningly so. With graceful lights and rainbows and so much gold that spoke of the wealth of the people or so they had been made to believe. Havillah bet it was not normal to walk on crystal as she had already learnt from watching from the viewpoint, and all the gold and ivory that made up this place was probably the stuff of dreams for a human, but was it really a paradise? Probably, if the overall aesthetic effect was anything to go by and this included the huge white clouds that spotted many green plants. The occasional startling blue river that flowed down from one puffy cloud to another and at the centre of it all, the adamantine structure. A castle of diamond whose sparkly spires and turrets rose up higher, so much higher than any other structures within the city.
It was the sanctuary. The main building within this city. Or a quarter of it. The pinnacle on which the quarter Hope seemed to be resting upon. Everything else in this place seemed to revolve around it and with good reason. For it was the source of their livelihood. Their anchor to this paradise in another realm.
Havillah took a couple more steps forwards and in the direction of her home. Like all other residential structures, it was a golden mansion in the inner residential district, directly east of the outer Sanctuary. It was big even by the city's standards. Being much bigger than most of the houses in the city and only akin to three others that were scattered all around the outer residential district in a quarter circle.
Like all the other buildings, the design of this mansion resembled that of a castle. With upper glistening floors that resembled towers, complete with turrets and burnished adamantine conical roof tops that refracted the light of the hope.
Where the surfaces were not crystal, gold in all shades of yellow, white and rose gold glistened in the crystal's light, making the mansion a real sight to behold even without the little cloud gardens that were planted and scattered all around and in front of the steps to the main doorway.
As she came near the mansion, Havillah shook her head to clear her thoughts and the deep darkness that had once clouded them. She took a step forward and another all garnered at approaching the glistening double doorways with the crest of her House's emblem emblazoned upon it.
As expected, her House's insignia of a flaming touch inside a loop of vines glimmered white, then a myriad of other colours before settling down on the red. The crimson of her Triban robes. The same as that of her cohort, before sliding back to admit her inside.
"Havillah." her mother's voice rang out as soon as she approached the threshold.
"Yes, mama." she replied with a sigh and began treading the long road towards the kitchen. Full of dread and hoping to lengthen the process as much as it was in her power to do so.
"You are late!" her mother admonished without ceremony as soon as she stepped into the kitchen. 
"I am sorry mama." she frowned but replied anyway.
Despite her reservations. Havillah respected her mother.  And despite of everything, all that she could do now was stare down and pretend to be solemn. What more was there to do in the presence of such great power?
Havillah knew that it would appease her. Especially when for some reason she appeared to be in a foul mood.
It was better than staring down into depths of those accusing silver eyes. Silver eyes that were the same as hers if not sharper and brighter, surrounded by the same skin colour albeit a few shades darker than what was hers.
All in all the two should have looked similar apart from her mother's silver hair that happened to differ quite greatly from hrr own obsidian locks that she had inherited from her carnelian eyed father.
As abilities went that was where all their similarities ended and as if to proof just that, a golden fork wheezed right past her head nearly impaling her as it left the room behind her to settle into the palm of her mother's open hand.
Havillah slowly lifted her gaze and eyed her mother sceptically and yet, in all these the woman seemed unaffected and was seemingly complacent. Unshaken by what had just transpired or had almost transpired.
“Mama…”
"You were in the way and had you been here earlier, I would not have needed to multitask."
There was her response and essentially, she meant to say that it is all her fault. Havillah sighed  at her reply for which she was treated to an imperious look that reminded her of her place I'm that household.
This was a losing battle, she silently released another sigh and nodded. There was no point in arguing with this woman. Her mother would just be... Her mother. The woman who had birthed her and also, the woman with so much power and influence that had also forgotten where the boundaries between the two roles now lay.
Slowly, Havillah forced herself to move forward already dreading the tasks that she knew were now lined up for her.
"What will you have me do?" she dragged out even as she dragged her feet to the crystal topped island to seat on one of the four golden stools that were tacked in beneath it. It was all she could do not to appear too sullen. For what was ahead of her was certainly going to be a very big disaster.
"Cut up the vegetables, do the dishes and set the table." her mother replied offhandedly and with another sigh, Havillah set out to work on all those tasks albeit, unwillingly. She knew fully well the disaster that was coming and as she closed her eyes to muster her concentration, she felt the drawers begin to rattle. Shaking open as several kitchen knives flew out and scattered all over the room.
"CONCENTRATE!" her mother's voice thundered and she almost smiled at her reaction. Either way, this was unsafe. One of these days, one of them was going to get impaled. Why couldn’t they just do it in the good old fashioned human way?
She opened her eyes as the sharp blades previously suspended in the air landed on the crystal top with a loud clang of glass against metal. "I do not think you will need all those." her mother scolded. "You are not yet proficient enough with the basic things to even try that. So return all of them and focus again on the one that you actually need."
With that in mind, Havillah rose up again to gather the kitchen knives, but her mother stopped her before she could so.
"No! Use your Virtue!"
Another sigh. This was turning out to be more troublesome than she had anticipated. All shr could do though was just nod and here she had thought that her tardiness had placed them behind schedule. She could only decry the unfairness of it all only in her thoughts, and after several missed efforts, she finally managed to place all the knives back and bring out a small slim kitchen knife that she rested uphazardly upon the kitchen counter.
"Now imagine a vision of the vegetables. Align them on the counter and project the vision of the knife cutting up the vegetables. Whichever you chose to start with, that will be your choice but I do need the onions to get started on sautéing them." her mother instructed and as was the norm, Havillah nodded her head again.
Slowly, she struggled to take hold of the knife and with much difficulty and a whole lot of resistance, the kitchen knife floated up into the air and slowly began slicing up the onions. She was sure that her forehead was crinkled with frustration. As one by one she sliced up the onions and diced up the carrots. She peeled up the potatoes and shredded up the capsicum and the eggplants. Next came the coriander shoots and before she knew it all the vegetables had been done, albeit in a very uphazard manner that elicited a raised eyebrow from her ever meticulous mother.
"It is not perfect, but I guess it will do." she told her as Havillah turned away from her work with self-disgust.
Why was she this way? She thought as she turned back to stare at the mess that she had just created. Why was she so different? Why couldn't she just be like her mother? She had messed up everything and that is all she could say? She could already imagine the jibes from her younger siblings.
As it was, this was far from a loving family and for the set of twins that had been born right before the morbid decree, Havillah was sure that she would find no mercy there.
"Why are you not scolding me? They're awful! " she suddenly cried out. Uncomfortable at the understanding that was so out of place in her mother's words.
"Havillah..." her mother started  even as tears threatened to overwhelm her eyes.
"It is so hard.” she found herself spouting. “I keep trying and trying but I never get it right. Why can't I do it with my eyes open, just like you?"
"Havillah..." her mother started again. Unusually calm in such a situation. “That is not the way of the First Virtue. First, you have to master the Modus of seeing the unseen before you can begin to do what I am able do. It is all about practice and practice and before you know it, you will be as good as everyone in this Virtue."
Maybe but when was she supposed to practice. All her time was always occupied by that foul tongued, sour faced elder and her mother should have known better seeing as she was the one who had placed her under the care of that old goat.
"I do not want to be like everyone!" she suddenly burst out. "I want to be like you!"
"And that is where your problem lies in. Right there!" and just like that her mother was back to being her usual snide self. "You want to be like me instead of forging your own path! We are not the same Havillah, our purposes in this life are also quite different and unless you embrace your uniqueness, you will never know what it was that you were made for." her mother scolded.
"My uniqueness." she laughed humourlessly. "What is so special about me? Everyone looks at me and expects me to be just like you. To be as good as you, but I am not! And I have no purpose what so ever in this place! All I ever do is read scrolls and suck at the simplest things that even the twins can easily do!" she answered her while standing up. "In fact, what is the purpose of the Great? What is the reason behind our Virtue? If even you don't know that much, how am I supposed to know what is my own purpose?"
"Havillah!" her mother scolded, but she had already made up her mind not to listen.
She shook her head in exasperation and rushed out of the kitchen, not knowing where she was going and eventually, she found herself in their private winter garden which was planted despite the lack of seasons in this odd country.
It was forever summer here and that lack of variety was what had always inspired her to visit the viewpoint. The scrolls she had read had always spoken of a time of seasons, variations in weather and other things that could only be seen in that world through the view point. So, what did that mean?
Were humans really as evil as they had been taught to believe? If they had been blessed with something that even the Great could not attain, why then were they the accursed ones and not the Great?  Why then the long lifespans and no other purpose other than training? Was this then truly meant to be a paradise?
The questions flooded her mind even as she ruminated on what she had learnt and perceived from the scrolls.