Features from Further Away

The Shaman - I

Iiy-um ÿa ÿande... Iiy-um ÿa ÿande...

"Miss, you dropped something!"

"Miss!"

"Miss..."

But the figure had already faded into the curtain of shadows, as if all traces of her presence had been washed away by the evening rain. Lying half-soaked in a puddle was a tome - old, tattered and thick in volume, which she had left behind. Water was seeping into its parched yellow pages.

The shaman (Who at this point of the story is not yet a shaman but a young girl) quickly scooped up the hefty package - which to her surprise was not as heavy as she had imagined - and plopped it into her satchel. The rain was getting heavier, and started to blur her vision. She glanced once more at the direction in which the mysterious figure had disappeared to, then turned on her heels and bolted home.

It hadn't rained in Skyra for many months, and the sudden storm had caught the shaman very off guard. She groaned as she stumbled into the living room, dripping water all over the spruce flooring. A ball of black and white greeted her at her feet as she threw herself and her satchel onto the linen couch. To her dismay it bounced off and landed upside down, its contents spilling out, revealing the tome that she had carelessly forgotten about. Might be some kind of ancient artifact,she thought to herself as she reluctantly got up and picked the old book up. Shouldn't go throwing it around.

At close inspection, the tome had an auburn-like leather cover, and on it were the words The Miracle of Transcendence engraved in bold. A silver emblem of sorts was embossed in the centre, which the shaman supposed was a feather crest. The edges of the book were also decorated with a sleek silver border, which she could only describe as swirly vine-like patterns. A small keyhole was attached onto the back of the book, but nothing more suggested that it was once able to be locked. There was an antique, aesthetic feel about it.

More inquisitive than ever, the shaman flipped through the book carefully (as the pages were soggy and she did not want to ruin them). She frowned slightly. None of the writing made sense to her, smudged or otherwise, as the language exhibited was nothing she had seen before. There were also pictures, however. Magnificent illustrations of flora and fauna that hailed from various folklores, detailed sketches of skulls and bead necklaces and suns and moons, accompanied with other various confusing but intriguing symbols she yearned to understand.

So focused on her discovery was she, the shaman had been completely oblivious to the tiny ball of fur that had made its way onto her head. It pawed around awkwardly and ruffled her hair. "What do you think of this, huh?" she stopped reading and lifted the tome up above her forehead for it to inspect. The furry panda cub inched forward and took a sniff of the old book, and yawned loudly (in the cutest manner of course). She chuckled and let out a sigh. "Fine, stay there and be my hat if that's what you want."

Its yawning had reminded the shaman of how late it was. She looked up at the vintage grandfather clock poised in the corner of the living room. One thirty. Her younger sister should already be asleep at this hour, and so should she. But the book beckoned to her, its pages, as if under a spell, seem to scream read me, read me now! Captivated, her hands found their way to the first page, and she began to read aloud. Iiy-um ÿa ÿande...

˚˚˚˚˚˚˚˚˚˚˚˚˚˚˚˚˚˚˚˚˚˚˚˚˚˚˚˚˚˚˚˚˚˚˚˚˚˚˚˚˚˚˚˚˚˚˚˚˚˚

A couple of hours and a few mugs of mocha later, the exhausted shaman found herself sprawled across the floor, still pouring over the damned book. Pieces of crumpled paper lay carelessly around her, and the room was in disarray, despite the fact that the shaman highly valued order and organisation. Was I really... under a spell? She muttered to herself after realising the current state she was in. Her head ached, and her mind was exploding with revelations, half of which she still could not make sense of. A sensation in her gut told her that she had spent the past hour or so in a different plane of existence, and that something definitely happened to her, but her memory was foggy with weariness. She pushed up her spectacles and pressed a hand onto her left temple. What the hell is going on...?

"Why are you up so early...?" The shaman spun around to see none other than her little sister in mismatched pyjamas, rubbing her eyes. Something was off. Behind her sister - no, around her - were swirly patches of blue and green, that seemed to seep into and out of her figure. At once the word spirit registered in the shaman's head (but of course at this stage she had absolutely no idea what it meant nor how significant it was to her story). She squinted as a shaft of sunlight bore through the window, and the patches disappeared. No doubt there was something wrong with her now. She groaned as she stood up from her previous position on the floor, cursing at the stiffness of her legs. "I'm not up," she grumbled as she staggered to her room. "I'm going to sleep right now."

And she did.