[The following is the fourteenth of many posts–here is the first, here is the second, here is the third, here is the fourth, here is the fifth, here is the sixth, here is the seventh, here is the eighth, here is the ninth, here is the tenth, here is the eleventh, here is the twelfth, and here is the thirteenth–about a fictitious discovery of ancient manuscripts of a religious text of narratives and magic spells. Its purpose for my readers and me is to provide a cosmology and mythography on which I am basing much, if not most, of my fiction–short stories and novels. If anyone is interested in reading this fiction, he or she can use these blog posts as references to explain the nature of the magic and universe in my fiction.]

The Luminosians would wander in the neighbouring land for weeks without ever finding a city to settle in. The elders had advised them to stop using magic for at least the time being, fearing that an excessive use of it would lead to evil.

The elders were the only ones among them who still thought the old teachings had any worth. They insisted that the people be patient and wait for a new crest of good luck to come for them. Surely it wouldn’t be long before the weary Luminosians found a city where they’d find food and rest.

It would still be a long time, though.

While they had managed to feed themselves with a combination of food they’d taken with them from the land of Tenebros as they were carried up in the air to this new land, and food hunted for and gathered here, it would soon prove to be insufficient. As the food ran out, they traveled farther, and when the food ran out in these new areas, they continued moving.

Instead of finding a city, though, they found a desert. A few shrubs were here and there, with no animals or rain. They were beginning to starve.

“What of your teachings now, old men?” a young man shouted at the elders.

“Yes, where is that crest of good luck you keep promising us?” a young woman shouted at them.

“Patience!” one of the elders said.

“I’m fed to the teeth with your ‘patience’!” another woman, a mother of several, shouted. “I want my children fed to the teeth with food, and now!“

Shouts of agreement were heard all around.

“Enough with the teachings!” the young man said. “Let us get aid from the Crims. They helped us before, when the teachings failed us; they can help us again. We can prepare another ritual.”

More shouts of agreement were heard.

“No, no!” another of the elders said. “The crest of good luck from the magic just used can, if overused, lead to a trough of bad luck. Remember the failed rituals from before the successful one, the only successful one. There is a danger–“

“There is a danger of starvation!” the mother shouted back. “My babies need food now!“

“We need only to learn from our mistakes when using magic,” another young man said. “See that small, withering shrub over there?” He pointed at it, several yards in front of him. “Let us go over to it and do a ritual there.”

Those among them who had practiced magic went over to the shrub with him. One of the magic practitioners piled up pebbles and dirt around the shrub. Another licked her finger and raised it to the air to feel for a breeze. A third lit the withered shrub on fire. A fourth got some water from his goblet and got ready to pour it on the fire.

“Drofurb, Weleb, Nevil, and Priff have assembled,” a fifth worker of magic said. “We may begin the chant.”

All five chanted together, in the sacred language. “Crims, Crims, feed us, Crims!” They repeated it in a rhythm, to the beating of a drum.

The elders watched and shook their heads in disbelief and dismay.

When the chanting, which had reached its loudest, was finally done, the water was poured on the waving flames. The shrub, burned black, began to shake.

Moans and sighs of anticipation and excitement were everywhere.

The shrub began to grow into a large, brown tree. At the highest of its growth, it began to grow leaves. Then, ripe fruit began to grow on all of the branches. Yellow, orange, and red fruit, fresh and delicious-looking.

The famished Luminosians rushed over to the tree and ripped the fruit from the branches, then filled their faces with it. Once everyone had sated himself with the fruit, the workers of magic began a new ritual to provide other forms of food.

It involved another burning shrub with gusts of wind, nearby piles of pebbles, and water poured on the fire after chanting, “Crims, Crims, give us food!” over and over again, louder and louder, to the beat of the drum.

Instead of the shrub turning into another fruit tree, though, there was a moment of silence…then soon of shaking.

“Well?” said one of the elders. “What of your magic now, you young fools?”

“Even if we had another fruit tree, we cannot live on fruit alone,” a middle-aged man said.

Then the source of the shaking presented itself to them.

Coming from the incline of a hill the Luminosians had come up was a huge herd of deer running in their direction. Some of the people had bows and arrows they’d made in the previous weeks for hunting whatever animals could have been found. Now they were firing every last arrow in a frenzy to kill as many deer as they could.

So much deer flesh was cooked over campfires that everyone was sated by nightfall. The Luminosians slept in peace and contentment that night. Even the elders, though annoyed at having been proven wrong, were pleased to have their bellies full.

The next morning, they all continued on their way to find a city to settle in. Further encouraged by their ability to use magic to provide what they needed, they continued on their trek with little complaint.

By noontime that day, they reached the top of a cliff that looked down on a settlement. It was a beautiful city, with a nearby lake, grass, and trees all around it.

“Civilization, at last!” an old woman yelled.

“We’re saved!” a young man shouted.

“As you can see,” one of the elders said, “our patience has rewarded us. The promised crest of good luck has come, as we said it would.”

“But will the people living there take us all in?” that mother of many children asked. “There are so many of us. Hospitality has its limits.”

“We will do what we can to appeal to their mercy and generosity,” another elder said. “We can do no more than that.”

“Oh, we can do much more than that,” one of the magic workers said. “Relying on their kindness will be far less effective.”

“Please,” a third elder said. “No more magic.”

“Why not?” the young man said. “It has worked before.”

“And it has failed before,” the third elder said. “Recall the Luminosians killed when we tried to free ourselves from Tenebros.”

“But we’ve learned so much since then,” a young woman said. “And we’ll continue to learn.”

“Yes!” the young man said.

“What do you plan to do with this city, if they refuse to take so many of us in?” another elder asked.

“Quite simple,” one of the practitioners of magic said. “We’ll use our magic to take the city for ourselves.”

“No!” all of the elders shouted at once.

“Why not?” that magic worker asked, with a smug grin on his face.

“How can you ask, ‘Why not?'” one of the elders asked. “It is their city, not ours for the taking.”

“It will be ours soon enough,” the young man said.

“But we have no right to take it from those people,” the same elder said. “Do not be so wicked.”

“The world was wicked to us in making us slaves to the invading Tenebrosians,” the magic worker said. “The world owes us for how we have suffered.”

“This is Mad Thinking!” an elder shouted. “The first of the Ten Errors! You are denying the unity of all things by denying the rights of those people to live in their city in peace. How do you plan to remove them?”

“By having them killed, if necessary,” the magic worker said, with a malevolent smirk on his face.

“Murder!” that same elder shouted. “The sixth of the Ten Errors! You deny the unity of all life by trying to remove some of it! Your contempt for all of life will come back to you! The Echo Effect…”

“Oh, enough of your ridiculous teachings!” the young man said. “They’ve done us no good! I say, we use magic for what we need, from now on!”

The other people cheered in agreement. The elders stood back and watched in helplessness and horror as the magic workers prepared for yet another ritual.

Commentary

While many in the ancient world condemned witchcraft as evil (the Bible being a noteworthy example), it is impressive to see in a text so old a condemnation of the evils of settler-colonialism. As we know, there are many even in our modern world who still won’t condemn these evils, and yet there were writers back then who knew better.