"Myths are what remains once the history of an event has been forgotten or lost to time." - Shatrujeet Nath
Alachna City, Ardam 802
Faolan enters Aedan's room. He has an enormous book tucked under his arm.
"Mother asked me to read you a bedtime story."
Aedan and I sit up.
Aedan groans. "Please, don't. We're still recovering from the boring meeting notes of a decade ago."
The stories Aylissa chooses are quite unconventional, and not the kind of stories you usually read to children, but she is grooming us to be the best and only help Faolan would ever need when he becomes king. Aylissa had one core value that dictated her every action: Keep the crown in the family.
Faolan flips through the pages: "These stories are quite boring. They are reports on some meetings just after the time the Council was established. It is mostly about the Ancients bickering about what will be theirs and what the Council may have. It is tedious to read through and the tension is unbearable."
He puts the book on the edge of the bed and joins us on the bed. Aedan moves to give him space.
"Aunt Idunn told me about giants today."
"Giants?" Aedan and I say in disbelieving unison.
"Yes. Giants as tall as mountains; some even taller. The giants lived in cities of clouds."
I look at him sceptically: "Giants don't exist."
Faolan ignores me: "I'm just going to tell you the story she told me."
I roll my eyes.
"A long time ago giants used to live in cities that were higher than the mountains. They lived simple lives, but they were content and happy. Their cities were something quite remarkable.
"They were a peaceful race, but they had one weakness: their love for flesh."
I scowl in disgust.
Aedan's expression mirrors mine.
"What kind of flesh? Because flesh can refer to human flesh, or animal flesh, or even peaches have flesh," I say after giving it some thought.
"We even say that we are flesh and blood so it could mean that they were very family-oriented," Aedan says with a shrug.
"Those are all valid thoughts, but the story Idunn told me was about a young ordinary fellow named Jak, who travelled to the city of giants, and barely escaped being roasted as an entree.
"Jak was a scrawny, regular human boy who lived on a farm with his mother. His father had died years before, and Jak and his mother had difficulty in making ends meet."
"That is so different from us. We would care for the families who have lost their Names-giver."
"Aedan, keep quiet. It is a story after all, or would you rather have Faolan read us meeting notes?"
Aedan rolls his eyes at me and then stick his tongue out.
The next instant Faolan hits him with a pillow.
I break into laughter when I see Aedan's shocked face.
"Now, wise one, would you please keep your smartness for yourself and allow me to continue?"
Aedan scowls but wisely doesn't share his smartness.
Faolan continues: "During a particular bout of difficulty, after losing their last chicken to starvation and their last crop to disease, Jak's mother tasked Jak with selling the cow at the local market, and bringing her the gold. She planned to use the gold as entrance fee to the city for she had decided that they would have a better life there.
"Jak took the cow and travelled to the nearest market town.
"On his way there he met a stranger who seemed very interested in Jak's cow, but instead of gold the stranger offered him three nuts from the forest of Bullae."
"Where's that? I've never heard of it," Aedan asks - forgetting about not sharing his smartness.
"Neither have I, but Idunn was quite adamant about me remembering this detail. She repeated this on and on for six times like an irritating drop of water on your forehead when lying down under a tree for a nap after day's last rain. She only stopped when I repeated it back to her. She told me that these nuts have various magical properties, of which most have been forgotten. However, one was remembered: the ability to open portals between parts of the same world, or parts of different worlds."
I snort: "There are no other worlds."
"There might be ones we haven't discovered yet."
Aedan and I are not convinced.
"Anyway, the stranger convinced Jak that the nuts would bring him fortune and fame. Jak and the stranger exchanged goods. Jak was quite impressed with himself and sang merrily on his way back home. Jak was quite an imaginative lad and the stranger's promises had filled him with grand dreams of moving to worlds with streets of gold and bringing the gold back home to his mother to build them a castle of riches.
"When Jak arrived home, his mother greeted him warmly and asked him how much he managed to sell the cow for. The cow was indeed their most prized possession. She was a descendant of some kind of a cow that Idunn promised me really existed of which the milk was so nutritious that it prolonged life by a decade."
I frown.
"Even though a decade might not seem like a breath in our life, to a human a decade is a lifespan of some," Faolan reminds me.
"So when Jak optimistically told his mother that he managed to sell the cow for a greater treasure she was quite proud of his negotiating talent. Her mood immediately turned sour when he told her that he managed to get three nuts from the Forest of Bullae. She scolded him and cursed him for bringing damned and evil things into her home. She shrieked and even refused to look at the nuts. She kept ranting how he had no sense and exchanged their wondrous cow for darkness.
"She told him that he couldn't stay in her home until he had rid himself and her of the evil he had brought them. And thus Jak had no choice but to leave his home and his mother behind and find a way to get the cow back.
"He went back to the market town and searched high and low on every nearby road for the stranger, but to no avail. He asked everyone he encountered whether they had seen the stranger, but nobody had seen anyone fitting his description.
"After two days of no luck, Jak - completely famished and utterly hopeless - went to sit against a great tree. But as he was sitting down he cut his hand on the thorns of an unseen weed. He cursed and fumbled in his pocket to find his handkerchief to stop the bleeding. However, in his doing so, the blood from his hand came into contact with the nuts.
"Instantly Jak was transported to the capital city of the giants. Idunn called the city Ispoli and her inhabitants Ispolini.
"At that time Jak was quite astonished but had no idea that he was in the city of giants as everything was the same size he was used to.
"Jak encountered a man struggling to pull his cart loaded with barrels and approached him to offer his help. The man gladly accepted his help and in return offered him a meal as Jak's stomach was rumbling continuously.
"The man introduced himself and gave Jak his name, but I cannot for Avrir's sake remember the name Idunn told me. And thus Jak accompanied the man to his home while helping him to pull the cart.
"The city of Ispoli was indeed a city on clouds, as the mountain at her centre and her buildings grew high into the clouds. It took Jak and his new acquaintance hours to reach the man's house as he lived close to Ispoli's heart.
"Upon arrival the man's family warmly greeted them, but his wife immediately took a step back from Jak. She told her husband that Jak was not of Ispoli and that he had better return to wherever he came from immediately. He husband told her that he had known that from the moment he had first seen Jak, but that Jak had kindly offered to assist him with his cart. He also told her that Jak had no idea or means to return to his home. See, on their journey home, Jak and the man started talking and Jak had recounted how he ended up in this place whose name he did not even know.
"As Jak entered their home with them the whole family started to grow and morph until they stood meters above him. Now Idunn didn't tell me why they only grew to their true size at this moment, or why Jak only recognised them as giants now - because I know you two will immediately ask me this. But this is how Idunn told it.
"Jak could not believe what he was seeing as he had also thought, just like us, that giants were mere myths. However, that said, he immediately recalled the stories from his youth about how all giants were cannibals and feasted on flesh. He had nothing with him to defend himself with. And as his hand encircled the second infamous nut from Bullae, it morphed into a club of Bullae wood. In a frenzy of fear he swung the club and beat the giant's two children and wife to death, but he was not fast nor strong enough to overpower the giant.
"The giant roared in grief and anger and vowed that he would rip Jak apart - limb by limb, and flesh from bone.
"Jak seeing no way to kill the giant had started running down the streets of Ispoli - dashing between carts and giants and houses as fast as he could. The giant was but a breath on his heels. Jak stumbled over a crate that had tumbled from a wagon. The wood splintered into his leg, resulting in a gushing wound near his pocket where the last nut of Bullae was.
"The giant, still larger than life, picked him up by his foot and readied himself to rip Jak apart as he had promised. Fortunately for Jak, his blood had managed to soak through to the nut. The nut, fed by Jak's blood transported them back to Jak's home.
"The giant, startled by the sudden change in environment, had let jack drop to the ground. Jak stumbled to his home and grabbed the vegetable knife from the kitchen table. As the giant caught up with Jak, Jak cut the giant's throat. The land that was soaked with giant's blood became fruitful, and many abundant harvests followed. Jak and his mother became the richest farmers of the province.
"And that is all Idunn told me."
"What happened to the giants?" Aedan asks with wide eyes. "Because I'm sure that if Jak ever let his secret slip, the giants would be hunted and rivers of blood would run across Ligtland."
Faolan shrugs. "It is just a story. I don't think there really lived any giants."
"But why would Aunt Idunn tell you a story about something that never was?" I ask philosophically.
"Idunn doesn't know why she does what she does, so why would I?"
"Jak was indeed a scoundrel. How could he ever justify the giants' slaughter?" I ask with a frown.
"I think that a story has more than one person's perspective to consider. Remember Jak was convinced that the giant was going to roast him and then devour him and crunch on his bones."
"Faolan, it is a horrible story nonetheless. There are so many things that do not make sense," Aedan whines.
"Nothing Idunn ever says or does make sense, but I am sure you enjoyed the story incomparably more than you would have if I had read the meeting notes."
This time Aedan hits him with the pillow, and I can barely contain my laughter.