Chapter Eleven
The Viking and the Princess
The holes that the Chameleon’s zombie army had drilled into Princess Moiety’s chest would have killed her if the Viking and the glowworms had not intervened. The princess -in tune with her character- demonstrated her gratitude to the Viking for his sacrifice by stealing his boat and fleeing the island. She would have sailed home quite happy with herself if she had not had so much trouble with the holes. The holes exposed the world around Moiety to the negative pressure inside her chest. Quite a few random objects and an ocean giant were sucked inside of her to establish equilibrium.
On top of that, the mermaids were attacking. The only thing the princess could think to do was to light Odin’s scroll of poetry on fire to fight them off. This caused a tsunami. Moiety also discovered that in the light of the poetry scroll, things -such as mermaids- could be seen for their true nature.
When the tsunami from the burning scroll covered the island, Moiety was sure she was going to drown. Job’s Leviathan came along at the last moment and saved her from drowning. The Leviathan carried her down to the deepest part of the ocean to the base of the island. There they meet the Nidhogg, the organism infecting the roots of the World Tree. The Nidhogg attacked Moiety and Leviathan, and while the Leviathan was reeling from the blow, the Nidhogg looked for a way to enter into the princess’ chest cavity.
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“With each book I write, I become more and more convinced that the books have a life of their own, quite apart from me.”
“A book, too, can be a star, explosive material, capable of stirring up fresh life endlessly, a living fire to lighten the darkness, leading out into the expanding universe.”
-Madeleine L’Engle
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Moiety called out to the Leviathan again. “How do I fight this?”
Her mustard seed of resistance to the darkness was enough to pierce through the current and find the dragon’s mind. Hope sliced through his despairing thoughts. The child was finally fighting. God does not give us meaningless dreams. “Tell a story,” Leviathan commanded and began to muscle himself, tiredly, toward her.
The Nidhogg had disengaged his considerable length from the root system and was hovering above the current rushing into Moiety’s chest cavity.
“Tell a story.” Moiety balked. Why? What story could she tell when all the world was rushing into her black hole heart? “What do you mean?”
“The word is near you, in your mouth and in your heart.” The dragon’s words crackled into her head like a flurry of sparks jumping from a smoldering log.
Maybe the Leviathan was right, and the only way to fight against the depression of consumption was through the joy of production. Perhaps the best way to fight pain was to use it to her advantage, to harness the power of the chaos around her, and use it to produce something of value. Moiety inhaled and listened. She exhaled and repeated the rhythm that she heard around her:
“The ladybug is done.
It splits its ruddy mold,
Splaying tiny fly wings
Unfurling from their fold.”
The current flowing into her chest cavity slowed ever so slightly, imperceptible to anyone but Moiety. Moiety again opened her mouth to translate the universal vibration that she heard in the ocean around her.
“A still small voice
Is only loud to quiet ears,
Tiny drips dropping
Flood a city after years.”
The current slowed even more. Moiety closed her eyes, a redundancy in the stygian darkness, but somehow necessary to creation. The poem continued to reveal itself.
“Marching ants move
Like a military fleet
Tiny blades of grass
Are splitting concrete.
Quiet, gentle zephyrs
Turn the clouds into rain.
The beach expands by sand:
Grain by grain.”
The current in Moiety’s chest stopped, and the water in the trench returned to its regular flow. The Nidhogg, fearing a Support this podcast
