The Cauldron
Often, my dreams feed me stories. Most of the time, I let them slip away unused, but this one was oddly compelling, and so I had to write it down. Copyright © 2010.
I do not recall how or when I came to be standing there, but I found that I was standing in the ruins of a grove…a small ring of freshly felled trees. The sky was dark, nearly dawn or nearly dusk, I could not tell or remember which. I looked all about me, and I saw that I was in only the most recently cleared section of a great old forest. For a great distance in several directions lay only the stumps of trees, but elsewhere, thick dark forest blotted out the landscape. The rich, peat-like scent of old rotted undergrowth billowed up from my first cautious steps, surrounding me in a nimbus of scents, conjuring thoughts of attraction and repulsion, simultaneously.
As I slowly tiptoed across the newly opened space, I passed another fresh stump. A heavy, worn, woodsman’s axe had been driven into it, apparently by a hand of great strength, as the axe-head was buried halfway into the green stump. Its iron was aged, turned a dull gray with tiny flecks of rust in shallow pits, and the handle was worn and polished as smooth and white as ivory, except for the last hand or so of the haft, which had been dipped in black tar and rolled in ash. I presumed that was to keep the axe from sliding completely free of the cutter’s grip during what must be mighty swings indeed. A closer look at this stump showed only three or four distinct cuts in a tree as thick as my own torso. I was in awe of the axe wielder, although I had not seen a single axe blow in person. Though the axe did not appear wicked or evil in any way, I shuddered, as if from the cold of a sudden gust of wind. I looked about, feeling momentarily exposed on the newly cut expanse.
From somewhere nearby came to me a loud, sharp crack! and then a hiss of burning greenwood, and the pitchy, dark smoke of a green-wood fire rushed skyward, carrying fat embers. Surprised by suddenly noticing this, I was drawn to the sounds and smells. Turning towards the edge of the forest, I approached the unpleasant fire, only to find an equally miserable-looking tender. A wretched old hag was slowly stirring an immense blackened cauldron atop the smoldering fire. The outside of the gigantic old pot was rough and covered with thick layers of soot, as though years of burnt greenwood had laid their pitch upon it. The top edge was the same hue of ancient iron as the old axe head, and had been polished smooth around the inside edge by the passage of many a stroke of the spoon.
The wretch herself was at one time a towering hulk, now crumpled over herself, until her humped and twisted back rose barely above my own head. Thick, gnarled hands that looked more like bark than skin jutted out at odd angles from the rags and tatters of clothing she seemed to have draped across her form haphazardly. In one thick-veined, clawed hand, she slowly rowed a thick, straight handle through the roiling, steaming surface of the cauldron’s contents. Had she been standing upright, she might have been twice my height, but as things were, I found I could look her directly in the eyes, though that turned out to be a disturbing event all to its own.
I have no recollection of how long I stood there, but I had a feeling as if an immense passage of time had occurred, and that I had to move, or somehow would remain there for a great time longer. Tearing myself from her gaze, I dared to look about her face for more clues to her role. One of her eyes was clouded over, as though from a cataract. Her face was a road map of hardship, with deep cracks and lines resembling the bark of the nearby trees more than any flesh of my own. Great greenish-white tufts of hair blew away from the fire, jutting from her tight scalp in odd directions. Thick, rambling eyebrows created a hedgerow that kept the oily sweat which dripped from her brow away from her drooping eyelids. A thin, hard line of a mouth dashed across the otherwise vertical strata of her face, and as I stared, transfixed in her gaze, she began to sing. It was a low, crooning voice, and I could not understand the words, but I found myself drawn to her further, as though I were being invited to take a closer look at the spectacle that was she. The sound mixed with the pops and gasps of steaming tree sap escaping from the fresh green wood of her cook fire, creating an eerie syncopation, that couldn’t possibly have been consciously created by the hag, and yet there it was, filling my ears with thoughts of newness and change.
“Little ones, so proud and tall,
never ready for the day you fall.”
She spoke to me as if I were dreaming. I could understand the meaning of her words, although I could not understand the words themselves. It was as if there were a tiny interpreter working fast in my ear, but when I turned to look, there were only the trees. Turning back, I felt a strange compulsion to peer into the vast cauldron, to see what the wizened old giantess was brewing.
Gazing into the pot stirred me deeply. The thick rolling bubble of the contents burped out a dizzying array of smells, and those smells invoked feelings I had only half-remembered, or perhaps had only heard about. I am not sure which. I stood, hypnotized, not realizing how close I had come to the fire. Although the heat of it began to press itself into me, I found I could not tear myself from the pot’s odd contents. I felt a strange sense of mission, and of belonging, and of unfinished work, as though I had tarried for a great length of time in a place, and now needed to find my way back to those tasks, to those…responsibilities.
As I stared into the depths of the pot, a thick red ember was ejected from the fire, as another pop of boiled sap exploded in a freshly hewn timber. It landed squarely on the old crone’s foot, and she stopped her song, but she did not even flinch. The rich scent of the fire, and the odd familiarity of the pot’s scents were momentarily interrupted by the stink of burning flesh and cooling charcoal as it gently sank into the witch’s foot. Observing this, I was taken aback, and I could see that her feet were absolutely covered with many more of these embers, now cooled, but leaving her with the appearance of wearing old, worn shoes, despite the fact that she was bare of foot. I looked from her foot, to her good eye, and she regarded me as though having done so many times before, and shrugged ever so lightly before returning to her mixing and her gentle but insistent song.
As she stirred and sang, she bent and threw another of the fresh cut logs onto her fire, and it gave a long, low groan as it began to boil away its steam in the intense heat. For a time, I looked upon the pot, when I suddenly became aware that the smoke of the fire was being drawn not skyward, but into the pot! This might explain my earlier lack of notice, as the sky grew clear rather quickly without the continuous feeding of the thick smoke. As this happened, I saw a stranger sight than any other I could imagine. I saw what I thought to be people, in the smoke, and these people had upon their faces a beatific look of peace, and understanding, and they seemed to dive into the pot headlong. They had a familiarity to me that I could not explain, although I had never seen their faces before. I rushed to stop them.
“No, don’t go!” I pleaded, but they simply smiled sad, knowing smiles, and dove into the pot away from me, before I could reach them.
“Suffer not fools, and spare not the rod.”
This time the old crone’s words struck clearly in my ears, like the blow of an axe. Just as suddenly as she had spoken them, she turned and stalked away, seeming to have a limp in one leg. Again, I stood, mesmerized, while she walked to the axe…her axe, I now realized, as she easily freed it from the tree. I could not have pulled it free had I wanted to. Spinning on her heels, she came back to me, almost menacingly, she stalked up to me, and for a moment, she straightened herself, just enough to tower over me in a frightening way.
I felt as though we had done this before, if only for a fleeting moment, but the sensation passed. She came back down from her imposing heights, and looked me again in the eye. She reared the axe, as if to cut me down. Instead of cowering before this horrible sight, I found my legs had the strength to stand firm. I discovered that I did not fear this creature, though she was a frightening thing, in all honesty. Seeing this, she checked her swing, instead, driving the great old axe into a log by the fire. She moved back to her pot, and began to stir again.
She resumed her song after a deep breath, and again I was drawn to the pot. In it, I was amazed to see now that there was no longer a thick broil of liquid in the pot. Now, there was only steam, and through the steam, I was again stunned to see that there were people! I felt a deep longing in my soul, and an uncanny attraction to these people, though I knew them not, and their clothing and mannerisms seemed unfamiliar, and everything seemed to move so fast. It was all bewildering, and yet oddly compelling. Looking around one last time, I saw the faces of others around the pot, and felt a loving warmth wash over me. I saw in their shining eyes that I was smiling back at them now.
At last, the overwhelming desire to join them all crept through my legs, and into the pot I leapt. In spite of the steam, and the fire, and the smoke, I felt only a comforting warming, and as I entered, my legs and arms were drawn to me, and I curled up and fell softly asleep. As I drifted off to sleep, the crone’s song once again came to me clearly, though again I did not understand the words themselves…
“With this axe have I hewn trees
for ten thousand years, or more.
I have done this clearing from yon mountain
down to the farthest shore.
I do this not to feed my bones,
though they grow weak and crumble.
I do this now to free your soul,
and set you to a task less humble.”
