A Steady Hand

I knew pain.  The physical pain of injury, the emotional pain of betrayal, the agonizing pain of dreams lost.  I became a shell.  No, I became a snail.  I indeed hid myself in a hard exterior, but I didn’t keep to myself.  I left a wake of ooze — of insults, shouts, and complaints everywhere I went.  

I believe that what became ooze started as a desire to teach others.  I thought it was a way to teach them to prepare for the worst so they could avoid injury and be better off than I was.  If that were the original intent, and if it did originally have a slight nobility about it, soon it became a routine, then a habit, and then the definition of who I was.  All who knew of me knew me to be despondent, depressing, disillusioned, disabled, dishonorable, discouraging, and disgusting.  It was all summed up by the name the kind people gave me of “Dee”.  The unkind gave me names much worse.  The elite called me nothing at all, for I was beneath them and unnoticed.  I was invisible. 

That is my background.  Many of you know of my story of redemption.  It is a tale of wizards, and Nightsteele, and the beautiful folk of Ravenwood and the healing ancient pool.  That story is all true, or at least the heart of it is true, but there is a part of my story that did not make it into the tavern tales.  This part was played by a man I did not even know existed, for he was beneath even me.  To me, he was invisible.  I had overlooked him times beyond counting.  He made no noise, he cast no wake of pain nor insult.  He simply was.    

Though he was blind,  this invisible man observed.  He absorbed.  He collected memories and knowledge and put reason to the rhyme of life.  All this he did without speaking.  Without drawing attention to himself.  Without making any ripple in the intricate fabric of Ravenwood.  If I was a snail, he was perhaps a sponge.  

Things began to change the day I noticed the invisible man.  My first recollection of him was when I glimpsed him out of the corner of my eye as a tall passerby who was doubtlessly in need of an insult.  Doing my duty, I turned to let him know that he was of no significance, or to call attention to his most glaring negative features — the ones of which he was most ashamed, or to share with him a word of discouragement.  Before I could speak however, before he could possibly be alerted to my intent, he turned my way as if he knew I was about to engage him.  When I saw the bandage across his eyes, my need to add to his pain dissolved away.  I saw he had his own tale of pain, and his unknown story left me speechless.  

For the first time since my life-of-death which originated out of my experiences of pain, I saw a fellow traveler. Someone even perhaps who needed no tutelage in the ways of the pain of life.  One who perhaps already knew its meaning.  One who knew that life is pain, and anyone telling otherwise was selling something.   

Acting without forethought, I put my arm around the tall sightless fellow and asked if he cared to join me on a walk. On this walk, I talked to the invisible man.  I learned of his journey through his riddles.  I learned of his suffering, and his path.  I felt a slight admiration growing as we talked, for while the specifics of our tales were different, indeed he knew the realities that I knew.  Don’t get me wrong.  There was no companionship – I had no need of any.  But it was at least a glimmer of appreciation for the fact that I was not traveling alone.  

I did not know it when it happened, but I now understand that seeing the invisible man, that walk, that conversation, forever changed the course of events of my life. 

As is oft remembered in the tavern tales, I was attacked with a Nightsteele arrow by the Falcon.  Those tales include the truth that my injury caused a wakening within me which allowed me to reveal my origins and the fact that I had once been the Raven.  What is lost in the tales is the fact that before the Nightsteele arrow, I possessed only the desire for relief from my life-of-death.  After the piercing, an unexplained transition occurred and I wanted nothing more than to live.  The piercing that I should have celebrated as the end, became the wake-up call that my life was wasted and that I needed redemption.  My desire changed at that point to wanting more than anything else the very thing I was losing – life.  

The poison of the Nightsteele has robbed my mind of a precise recollection of the events between the piercing and my redemption, but I do have glimpses of memories that I pray never leave my mind.  These glimpses are now the foundation of all that I hold dear.  These glimpses are the underpinnings that will direct my path for the remaining years I am given.  

I know at one point I was sitting on a log because I could not stand.  The world was spinning.  When my eyes closed I could see the dark abyss beneath me.  People were everywhere.  Someone, perhaps with an owl on his shoulder if such a thing be possible, droned on and on about something people felt was important, but that my mind could not track.   

Those are the fuzzy details.  The element crisply in focus though is the invisible man holding my hand.  He did not hold my hand in a weak condescending, consolatory way as you would hold the hand of a child or a grandmother.  He held my hand with strength – with purpose.  He would not let go.  He was not powerful enough to give me confidence, but he was powerful enough to give me hope.  By holding my hand, he held my spirit to the earth.  His grip claimed me for this life and he spoke words that let me know he would not surrender me to the hereafter.  

I do not recall what happened, but have been told that my next memory occurred when the fine folk of Ravenwood were searching for the ancient healing pool.  I remember a sense of dread and regret.  I remember feeling the need for redemption, but I had no power to make a plan, nor to do anything save for to sit, leaning against a tree and waiting for help from others.  There again, in this simple setting I recall the strength of my invisible friend.  Little did he say, save for this was not the end, and that he was there with me.  Little did he do, save for steadying me so my back would not slip from the tree supporting my repose.  He told not of platitudes; he made no hollow promises.  He simply steadied me, said he was there, and assured me he would continue to be so.  He kept my spirit connected to the earth. 

The rest of the story is true enough as told in the taverns and by the campfires.  I was redeemed, evil was defeated, good men and women were lost, and the oppressed were freed.  These truths are real,  but they are not the totality.  I know another element of truth. 

I know that great things are indeed great things.  But I also know that there are no great things without the little things. There is nothing of value that does not start with a kind word or a gesture of encouragement.  Great deeds are made possible by the firm and steadying hand of a friend. 

And this presents us with a conundrum that is perhaps obvious – there are no little things.  Thank you my friend,  the invisible man, Gelum Sortis

 

-Dee