North of Eden

Seth Mullins began his book as a short story about a dwarfish like man who has a mirror - a mirror that shows the truth when looked into.

The story blossomed into an entire world, like that of Narnia, like that of Middle Earth.

In Song of the Twice Born, characters of a community talk about their experiences of looking into the magic mirror and what they learned about themselves. And it tells the story of the community committed to following the way of truth.

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From the first chapter:

From the journal of Patrick O’Delan:

Sirrus has advised us to record our experiences as we follow his path to spiritual discernment. So, I have decided to comply – and I shall begin with my account of the bizarre incidents surrounding my first encounter with our dwarfen mentor.

I recall the night covering the prairie in faint ivory: the half-moon’s light on the snow. Only the tips of the hardiest shrubs could pierce the white crust. Not for the first time, I wondered what madness it was that spurred me on at that ungodly hour. ‘Too late to return now before sundown,’ I’d thought; but that had been hours ago, and the problem was that I’d not turned around yet, not even begun to consider the trek home. And I was running, like a man in flight.

A darkening of the ground warned me before I stumbled upon the body crumpled there, huddled and still. His body, though I had no clue as to the import at the time. I would’ve thought Sirrus a child if not for his white beard and tufts of snowy hair. Certainly he was (and is) no bigger than a child.

I noted the trail he’d made; footprints led north and out of sight. He’d been out wandering alone and then simply collapsed? I felt for breath, then for pulse. There was still life in the dwarf.

I felt like no hero – but I did, strangely enough, feel clearer than I had at any time since embarking on this mad venture. Surely I was adequate to this small task? Besides, I reasoned, it would distract me from my sufferings at home. Flight would not enable me to elude the visages of the dead, but here…ah! Here was life that I could save. Fortunately, the little man was no heavier than a knapsack full of rations. There was but one thing for it: to follow the trail and hope that this stranger had a home or shelter nearby. Warmth, dry clothes, and then food and drink were all imperative.

Some time later, I came upon a small house shrouded by snow-laden firs. Its logs merged with the shadows. It looked, altogether, like a dwelling not intended to be found. Now that I know Sirrus, I understand.

But I was anxious to aid the old man or be rid of the burden of him (I wasn’t sure which – and oh! Don’t I still struggle with this!) I pounded on the door’s knocker. Then I jumped at hearing his voice, hale as the light of dawn. It came from the dead weight in my arms; and I understood, to my consternation, the confounded dwarf’s ruse.

“No use making a disturbance,” he said. “My own home this is, and I can’t rightly answer whilst I’m on the same side of the door as you!”

***

Dawn nudged me awake to gape at my surroundings, not remembering. There was a vague echo of outrage in my mind and I couldn’t clarify its source. (Sirrus would later tell me that he’d needed to “test my heart” with that dying man’s ploy of his). The air smelled of damp earth and I sensed that the chambers here were much more spacious than a typical cabin and also that I was probably in a basement room. Stone pillars the width of my waist held the low ceiling, and a spiral staircase rose nearby. Movement caught my eye; then the rotund, bearded figure emerged overhead, bearing a lantern, and recollection leapt up in me with all its attendant confusion.

This strange dwarf hung his lantern on a peg on a nearby pillar. Its light met hard and smooth stone everywhere except upon the thick rug of white fur that had cushioned my slumber. I blinked at the wee man’s garish clothing: yellow breeches, bright red vest with black buttons the size of his fists. He didn’t hail from these parts of Brinstead, certainly. It took me a moment to focus on what he was saying (and now I must conjure it to memory, as best I can):

“Sorry I had to test you in such a - well, morbid - manner, but time is pressing and the Draymes number so few. By time I mean my own; I’m getting on in years, you see, even for a dwarf. And the Draymes, well, nowadays they number only myself. So, given such scanty resources we require crude measures and unseemly haste. Name’s Sirrus, by the way: Sirrus, last of the Draymes and keeper of the Mirror.”

Certainly, I was questioning my host’s sanity and (by extension) my own safety. Dwarf? Draymes? All I knew was that Marguerite (Ah! I feel the pang, even now, as I write of her) was probably worried sick, and I’d have to find some way to convince her that I hadn’t spent the previous night with some tavern wench.

My discomfiture made me gruff. “Where do you get the arrogance, old man,” I grumbled, pushing myself to my feet, “to put me to a test? Played on my sympathies and made me look the fool is what you did.”

Then Sirrus asked me who it was that made me look the fool whilst I’d been running blindly in the dead of night. At least this way a bed and warm hearth had found me, he offered. I acknowledged his comment with a sour smile. I said (very condescendingly, I will admit) that the important thing was that he was well. And seeing’s how he was, I would be off.

“Before you go,” Sirrus said – and I remember now how he feigned nonchalance – “I mean, assuming that you’ll have naught to eat, how’s about a wash in the basin? I’ve a fine blade if you’re wanting a shave.”

“My face,” I pronounced, “is plenty fine for the walk home.”
Here my host bowed solemnly and said a curious thing. “I think you’ll find that your face is a good deal different from what you remember.” He pointed to a tall standing mirror (the Mirror!) against the far wall, which was held to its bowed wooden supports by a thick revolving peg.

“Come have a look see.”

I cannot now recall what made his suggestion so compelling, nor why it filled me with trepidation even as I obeyed. The mirror shimmered like a small pool of water hung upright. Then I was before it, transfixed by a face that I thought could not be myself and yet could be no one else. Sirrus would later explain that I’d caught a glimpse of what is real in me beneath all the illusions and conditioning of the world – my true face. Lifetimes seemed to parade before me, resplendent with every detail save for a sign or a friendly voice to say, “this is real”, or, “this is not real”.
And Sirrus was speaking. “Why the scowl? Is it not a relief to know that you are more wondrous and unfathomable than ever you thought?

“I apologize for this bit of trickery. Sometimes it’s my last recourse, and I couldn’t help but think that it would be tragic, should this knowledge die with me.”

There seemed to be no word for what I was feeling, but “fear” was as close as I could come. Intimations of danger roiled in my stomach. I fought them down. I’d seen my reflection in the mirror often enough, surely! Inside my mind, I protested: ‘I am as God and the Goddess made me, and I have no cause for shame.’

Sirrus rambled on. “There’s a word escapes me now. Ahh – netherworld. Your people have tales of a purgatory that awaits the unfaithful after death. But isn’t purgatory really the life you’ve always known?”

The cursed dwarf (so I considered him then) was circling me.
”Respect for Truth makes the whole world of lies an ill fit. A man thinks he knows where he’s going; he needs to believe it, and convince all others. What will become of him if certainty if thrown into doubt?”

I seemed to know spring’s thaw in my limbs. My mind caught fire like the cry of creation. ‘Twas as if a piece of the sun had been captured and shaped in my likeness, then made its home in the Mirror.

“Man does not like to question the story that he is living,” Sirrus said.

Then the vision was over.

***

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About the Author:

Seth Mullins' first novel, Song of an Untamed Land, was published in 2005. Seth has lived in Maine, Connecticut, Oregon, and New Mexico, and currently resides in Vermont.