Asmireen
©2024 by Jonathan Scott
- - - - - - - - - -
Chapter 19 - The Good Life
- - - - - - - - - -
Box's First Letter to Cogel
16.15     A man, one night, he do the thing that he want not to do.  And then, he feel dark.
16.16     A man, every night, he do the thing that he want not to do.  And then, he feel darker.
16.17     He's friend, he say "A man feel bad, because a man believe good be too good.  Relax and you feel better."
16.18     So, the man, he relax and he feel no bad about the bad no more.  He believe the bad be ok.  And, every night, he do the bad and he do it even more.
16.19     One day, the man do so much bad that he die and as he die he hate he's friend and he hate he's life and he hate Papa Voice and he hate he's self.  He hate all and die a very dark death.

     "Fifty gold." said the short fat man at the table.
     It had taken Robert a year to save up this much money.  He had even worked two jobs for the past six months just so he could have this money ready by today.  His morning job, as a cook for a nearby hotel, simply did not pay enough to allow him to save at all.  Towards the end of last year, he took on a second early morning job as a weed trimmer for the custodial crew over in Kingsfield.  He had not had a good night's sleep in over six months.
     Robert took his small bag of gold pieces and handed them over to the man who counted them carefully.
     "Ok.  Throw them squarely into the bucket and don't bother to see what you threw.  Try and steal them, and you won't make it three paces." said the unpleasant man again.
     The audience this morning consisted of a half dozen bankers, several off duty constables, and another twenty or so nondescripts.  As the man walked from the small table the audience gave him an enthusiastic but mocking round of applause.
     The Rolling Grounds consisted mostly of dirt; almost a light gravel.  The grounds were groomed each morning before they opened.  But, despite the grooming, Robert still noticed the patches of faded blood that were here and there.  Robert was very understandably nervous.
     Robert approached a table on which there was a bucket.  At the bottom of each leg of the table there was a wheel.  There was also a good strong rope attached to the table towards the bottom of two of its legs.  At the end of this rope, there was a strong man who readied himself.  The ground between the strong man and the table was paved very smoothly with a broad asphalt surface.  It was very well maintained.
     Robert approached the table and looked into the bucket.  Within he found four dice.  He picked them up and looked at them carefully.  The audience booed the man intensely for being so slow.  "C'MON, GET ON WITH IT!" a rich ugly man screamed from one table.  Not heeding the man, Robert continued to look at the dice.  On each side of the dies were symbols that he could not understand.
     "THROW THEM IN THE BUCKET NOW OR YOU FORFEIT YOUR TURN AND YOUR PAYMENT!" shouted the short, fat and unpleasant man that he had paid his life savings to.
     Robert carefully put the dice in his right hand, rolled them back and forth momentarily and then threw them into the bucket.  The strong man, upon hearing the dice land, pulled on the rope and pulled the table towards him.  Robert did not have the time to see what he rolled, although, he would not have understood what he would have seen anyway.
     Robert looked around and saw nothing.  He heard nothing.  He wondered what had happened.  He had heard about how some people grew in size or appearance after they had rolled these dice, so he inspected his body carefully and was somewhat dismayed to see that nothing had changed.
     Robert then noticed that the audience was smiling.  He then also noticed that they were all putting their hands to their ears and were looking above him.  It was then that Robert began to feel the rain.
     Robert looked above him and saw a tiny black rain cloud.
     "Dang it!" Robert silently said to himself as he began to run away.

     It was seven thirty in the morning and Marie stood at the window in her night gown.  Jake lay in bed still asleep.
     "Hey Jake.  This guy's got that cloud thing after him." said Marie quite calmly.
     "Didn't we just see one of those yesterday?" said Jake, still half asleep.
     "Yeah, but it's still kind of fun." said Marie who casually stood at the window to their apartment.
     "Yeah.  I guess." said Jake who stood up and sleepily walked to the window where a man whose name was Robert was frantically and desperately running away from a rain cloud inside the Da Bonz rolling grounds across the street.
     "BAMMM!"
     A small bolt of lightning had exploded from the cloud and ignited a small fire on a section of ground where the man had just been standing.  The noise was tremendous.  Jake could only assume that the noise for the man who was much closer to it was overwhelming.  Jake looked carefully and it seemed that all thirty of the patrons of the Da Bonz had their hands clasped tightly about their ears, and were still reeling from the sound of the explosion.  The man had fallen to the ground holding his ears and was screaming.
     "You think he's going to make it?" asked Marie casually.
     "Hmmm.  Maybe.  He looks fast.  He's not dead yet.  That's pretty good.  Better than that last pudgeball." answered Jake.
     "BAMMM!"
     The man had climbed to his feet and had jumped just in time.  Another fire burned on the ground.
     The man began to run and jump constantly looking behind him at the cloud.
     "BAMMM!"
     There was a loud explosion of applause and the man painfully uncupped his ears and lay down on the ground desperately drinking as much of the air as he could.  The patrons from their tables continued their applause as they threw scraps of unwanted food and other waste at him.
     "There's only three 'bams', right?  After that the cloud goes away?" asked Jake.
     "Yeah." said Marie who looked even more bored than before.
     "Wow.  That guy's tough.  Fifty gold is just way too expensive to risk losing your life over." said Jake.
     "I saw a guy walk out of there with a big huge diamond yesterday.  And the day before that, I saw another guy who walked out of there with this sword.  He seemed really really happy about it." said Marie in defense of the place.
     Jake then looked out of his window and towards a clock tower that was too far away to see comfortably.  He then squinted his eyes.
     "Geez.  I'm going to be late." he said.
     Jake began to run all about the room changing his clothes and grooming himself as quickly as he could.  Later he ran from his room, grabbed several slices of bread from the kitchen table and ran downstairs.  Seconds later, he was sitting next to Quick, holding onto Gideon's reins and was beginning to leave.  It was Saturday morning and Jake was just beginning the last day of his first full work week.
     In spite of Isaac's appointment as the executor for William's Peace and Pine Mountain, Jake chose to keep his employment at the fighter's guild.  He seemed to enjoy it there.  The fighters as well had become somewhat accustomed to seeing him and many were beginning to consider him as a type of mascot.  Jake was a very likable young man.  And it seemed that even the roughest of the fighters enjoyed his hard working and innocent personality.
     Jake was beginning to get to know Old Town in some detail.  He knew several restaurants that he enjoyed frequenting.  He had found out about the Old Town Municipal Animal Gardens, where for only 12 coppers, one could see tame pseudo-dragons, a dryad or two, and even a water elemental that resided within a large fountain in the center of the park.  The water elemental, known by the residents of Old Town as Oko, would often perform tricks for those who threw coins to her.  She was of course, nothing but a water elemental, so she had very little use for money, but, always seemed to appreciate the gifts anyway.  Jake also had found out about "The Deadman's Spectacle."  The "Deckle" as many referred to it, was simply a theater where one could watch plays that usually dealt with war and ancient famous battles.  The thing that made the theater so fun though, especially since the appearance of Nahli, was that the actors, who were quite often changers now, would actually alter their appearances to fit the monster types of the battles.  The one time Jake had gone, there was a monstrous deadly fight between a throng of vampires and a dozen mages.  It was bloody and Jake was amazed at the sight of it.  He continued to think about it for days and waited impatiently for the time when he could go again.
     For some reason though, today, Jake took a left on Left Avenue rather than just passing it by to follow the Toft Out circular as he usually did.  Perhaps it was simply that he wanted to try something new in hopes that it would save him some time.  He followed Left Avenue towards Main Way.  Off in the distance, he could vaguely see the Black Horse Pub & Restaurant.  Marie was still home.  She didn't have to be there to work for another fifteen minutes.  More than likely, she was still sitting there at the window watching the action at Da Bonz.  She usually didn't leave for work until literally seconds before she needed to be there.  She was lucky in that respect.  Jake though wasn't so, he hurried down Left Avenue until he met up with the Baluft In circular and took a right.
     He looked off to his left and saw The Black Horse.  It was amazing.  The Black Horse was more than just a hotel, a pub and a restaurant all wrapped in one.  It was elegance to a degree that would satisfy a king, and very often did.  There were seven kitchens that all operated twenty four hours a day to serve its five hundred guests.  It was surprising how many were willing to pay the platinum piece required for a single night's stay.  But for those that did there were services available that would boggle any person's mind.
     On the roof of the Black Horse there was a small group of mages permanently stationed there that would instantly transport any paying customer to or from any location in the known world, even out to the rim of the Greater Mirrorball itself.
     For those who so desired, there were a collection of sirens that would magically sing you to sleep each and every night.  Unlike normal ocean nymphs though, these sirens were all well paid and therefore had no reason to strangle you in your sleep.
     Isaac explained to Jake about the two platinum pieces that the wizard had given to him.  Together, they were worth enough to pay the rent on their tiny apartment for almost a year.  Together, they were also enough to buy a good wagon and a pair of good horses to go along with it.  The man Jake had tried to help must have been quite influential.
     Jake continued following the Baluft In circular until he finally came to Bottom Avenue.  There, he began to take a right, until something happened that made him pull his wagon over and stop.
     "If Papa Voice has infinite power, then why do you starve?" read the giant banner that was stretched across the front of a wide building.
     "If Papa Voice loves you then why does He allow pain and suffering to exist here?" barked out a man who was dressed in the robes of a clergyman.
     The man walked up and down the street carrying a bell and shouted out slogans that all seemed to somehow challenge either the power, the love, or even the existence of Papa Voice.
     "Follow us and live as you never have before!" cried the man.
     "Happiness and Freedom can finally be yours" cried the man again.
     The man saw that Jake was watching him.  He lowered his voice and began to walk over to him.
     "Are you tired of your pain?" said the man.
     Jake looked at the man and had no idea how to respond to him.
     "Would you like to be happy today?" asked the man.
     "I am happy." said Jake.
     "No, you're not.  I know you're not.  Your world is filled with pain and loneliness." said the man with a sincere look of compassion.  His words were almost hypnotic.
     "I know that you've lost people near to you and think that you have gotten over it, but I also know that each and every night you cry about them in your dreams." said the man again.
     Jake wasn't sure if this was true.  He knew that he dreamed about his family often, but he didn't know if he cried about them.
     "Papa Voice, if He even exists at all, must be a Fool of very limited power or of very limited love.  How could a deity that proclaims to love you allow you to go through all that you have when it's in His power to stop it?" said the man again in full and heart breaking compassion.
     Something inside of Jake then screamed at him to get away from this man.  The thing inside of him almost sounded frantic. Jake's trance of wonder then snapped and he flicked Gideon's reins and drove away.
     Jake felt creepy.  The man looked normal enough.  His words were compassionate.  His eyes were trusting.  He seemed to understand Jake and his misery to a degree that surprised him.  Nonetheless, Jake felt creepy.  He felt as though something was grasping at his soul.
     Just then, Jake heard a barking.  He then realized that he had been hearing a barking all along, but had not noticed.  He looked behind him to see Quick in the back of the wagon standing up on the edge of it barking fiercely at the man who had just entranced him.
     Jake continued to drive on, choosing to not look back.
     It was eight ten and Jake finally arrived at the Terrain Training Building of the Old Town Fighter's Guild where he stopped his wagon and entered.
     He walked down the hallways and was surprised at what he heard.
     Silence.
     He walked from room to room looking within only to see nothing.  There were no fighters battling large bats in the Jungle room.  There were no fighters battling ancient white dragons in the Snowy Plain room.  There were no fighters battling mountain trolls in the Mountain room.  Jake looked at the schedule hanging on the wall in his custodian's room and rechecked it.
     "Snowy Plain: Ancient White D"
     "Jungle: Giant Bats"
     "Mountain: Mountain Trolls"
     So, to further double check, Jake took his schedule and walked with it out of the TTB, through the yard and into Main where he met up with Shane.
     The yard was completely deserted.  Something very odd must have happened this day.
     "Hey Shane.  What's going on?" asked Jake.
     "Oh, not much, 'cept a whole bunch of vomiting." responded Shane, with a somewhat dark smile.
     "What?" Jake asked as he looked around.  The place was absolutely vacant.
     "One of the cooks decided to use some eggs last night that apparently weren't so...y'know...fresh?" Shane said with a smile.
     Jake began to mimic Shane's somewhat dark smile.  "Is everybody ok?"
     "Well, except for the vomit and the diarrhea, yeah I guess."
     Jake started laughing.
     "I'm just happy that I'm not the one that has to clean it up." said Shane.
     "Why don't they just call in the healers?"
     "The healers can heal your body, but they can't get the bad food out of your stomach and intestines and stuff.  So, even if they do heal you, you just get sick again." said Shane, still somewhat smiling and laughing.
     "A whole school of fighters that fights dragons and monsters all day long gets taken out by a few dozen bad eggs.  It's pretty funny." said Shane.
     "So what do you want me to do?" said Jake.
     "Well, you know, same as always, clean.  If you can find anything to fix, then fix it.  And when you're done, I guess you can go."
     Jake went back to his room, picked up his supplies and started walking from room to room.  There really was nothing to do.  Jake had done such a good job the night before that doing anything today would have simply been redundant.
     So, Jake left the TTB, got into his wagon and left for home.
     Jake had time.  He was unaccustomed to not having his days filled with duties.  He wasn't sure what to do.  So, he simply began to drive around town.  He decided to explore.
     He'd not yet spent much time downtown.  He had up until now kept to the districts that lay between his own home and the fighter's guild.  So, for a change, he drove up Bottom Avenue and headed towards Main Way.
     Main Way was a small circular avenue built at the heart of Old Town.  Inside the circular were City Hall, the main police station and the Old Town Post Office.  Jake drove his wagon around this circular counterclockwise until he came to Right Avenue, where he took a right and began to head towards Kingsfield.  Something inside of him wanted to see the homes.
     As he drove, he saw men and women flying through the sky carrying large boxes and other parcels.  But, Jake had seen them so many times before that he hardly noticed them.
     Up and to the left, he saw the Mirrorball shining in the morning sun.  But, Jake had also seen it so many times that he didn't notice it either.  He found himself much more intrigued by a woman that stood next to several tables in a large yard.  As Jake drove, he had noticed the woman doing something strange out of the corner of one of his eyes.  He had then stopped to watch the woman as she poured ice from her bare hands into large blobs of it that obediently rested on the table tops.  After she was through, several others approached the blobs of ice and began to make sculptures.  A man then approached the woman and handed her several coins.  The woman, who dressed raggedly and seemed thin, took the coins and somehow seemed sad as she walked away.  Apparently she had not yet found a way to make sufficient amounts of money from her gift.  Jake drove on.
     As he drove, he began to think about the words that the Nahli preacher had told him.  In some ways, they did make sense.  He had seen a lot of pain recently.  He had been miserable and sad.  Why would Papa Voice allow it to happen to him?  Did Papa Voice not like him?  Did He not love him or his family or any of the other citizens of William's Peace?
     Then, another thought came to him.  If an observer watches a man commit murder, and the observer does nothing to prevent it or to alert the police afterwards, the law, as it is written here in Eastbrook, demands that the observer serve time in prison.  The law states that the observer is guilty of the crime of inaction.
     Doesn't this somehow apply to Papa Voice as well?  If Papa Voice is as powerful as the scriptures say, then couldn't He, if He so chose, remove the pain and suffering from this world? Couldn't He make things better?  Therefore, if He could make things better, but doesn't, then isn't all of the pain and suffering, to some degree, His fault?
     Papa Voice stands by and watches, when He could instead intervene and assist.  People suffer and die and how does Papa Voice react to it?  He does nothing but continue to demand obedience and tithes.  According to the law in Eastbrook anyway, Papa Voice is guilty of the crime of inaction and should spend time in prison.
     Jake wondered why his family died.  And the more he wondered, the less he found himself capable of understanding.
     A coldness began to creep into Jake's heart.
     Jake then noticed a sign that said "Old Town Library." He pulled his wagon to a vacant area across the street and went in.  He wanted to know more about Nahli.
     Jake walked in and looked at the rows and rows of books.  Jake was not a scholar.  He was lost here.  So, he just began walking up and down the rows looking at the old dusty books nonchalantly.
     "Can I help you?" asked a man who was standing atop a very tall ladder.
     "I want to find out more about Nahli." said Jake.
     "No, you don't." said the man.
     Jake was a bit surprised by this response.  He stood there briefly and soaked up the impertinence uncomfortably.
     "Why not?" said Jake with a puzzled look on his face.
     "Just trust me, you don't.  They're nothing that anyone needs."
     "So, you don't have a gift?"
     "Yes, I do." the man said.
     "So, you're Nahli then." Jake stated confidently.
     "No, I'm not."
     "But you said you had a gift.  How can you have a gift if you're not Nahli?"
     "I have a gift because I went out and earned it.  My gift is mine because I created it.  And because I created it, I know that I can create another.  I can have all the gifts I want.  It's just up to me to go and get them."
     This man was annoying.  Jake did not want to be lectured to right now.  He just wanted to know more about Nahli.
     "I need a book on Nahli." Jake persisted.
     "No, you don't."
     "C'mon." said Jake who was very obviously frustrated.
     The man looked at Jake briefly, looked away and said "Are you happy that you have hands?"
     "What?" said Jake.
     The man from that point on refused to answer anymore of Jake's questions.  Jake soon gave up and left angrily.
     
     "He said what?" asked Hannah.
     "He said 'Are you happy that you have hands?'" answered Jake with a slightly incredulous look on his face.
     Hannah smiled.
     Jake had come home to find Hannah cleaning the apartment.  She was quite surprised to see him and to learn about his short day.  Jake thought that she would fall down and pass out from disgust when she heard about the fighter's guild and their having been conquered by the bad eggs.  There's just something about stomach disease and hundreds of big burly hairy stinking belligerent men having it that brings up hordes of unpleasant images to one's mind.  Some people, like Shane and Jake, can laugh at them.  Others, like Hannah, can do nothing but stand there stunned for a while until the shock of it all wears off.
     "So, why do you think he said that, Jake?" asked Hannah.
     "I don't know.  It looked like he just wanted to be annoying."
     "Well, are you grateful for your hands?"
     Jake looked at his hands.  They were scuffed.  They were stained.  They were calloused.  They looked as they usually looked.  Jake could see nothing special.
     "Yeah.  I guess so." said Jake.
     "You guess so?  Think about it like this then.  Which would you rather have, one of Nahli's gifts, or your hands?"
     Jake thought about it for a second.  He had seen many amazing things since coming to Old Town.  He thought about the granny pulling the wagon down the road.  He thought about the man that had been juggling his own head.  None of it though seemed worth trading his hands for.
     "I'd rather have my hands." Jake said blankly.
     "So would I.  Your hands are a gift from Papa Voice and they are much more valuable than anything Nahli has to offer.  And that's just your hands." said Hannah.
     Jake then put a coy look on his face and continued.
     "But if I joined Nahli, I could keep my hands and also get another gift."
     Hannah began to look concerned.
     "Yes.  You're right.  Papa Voice won't take your hands away if you abandon Him.  He'll let you keep your brain, your time, and your lungs as well."
     "What do you mean?"
     "I mean that He gave you everything you need here Jake.  He gave you what you needed."
     She paused for a very short amount of time.
     "Eastbrook was fine before Nahli.  Now everything is helter skelter.  Nahli upset the balance.  I don't know if we'll ever get it back."
     Jake then looked at her seriously.
     "But think of all the garbage that Papa Voice allows here.  My whole family died and He didn't do anything to stop it."
     "So, if He had stopped it, then your family never would have died, right?"
     "Yeah."
     Hannah paused for a brief instant and looked at Jake as though he had forgotten something important.
     "Really?  Never?"
     Jake then looked at Hannah and realized what she was trying to say.
     "Everybody dies.  We're not here to have a good time or to live forever.  We're here to figure out what type of people we want to be and what type of people we want to live with for the rest of eternity." said Hannah.
     "What type of person do you want to be?" she then asked.
     Jake hadn't thought about it before.
     "Ok then, what type of people do you want to live with?  ...for the rest of eternity, Jake?" she asked again.
     Jake thought about it for a second.
     "Well, I guess ideally I'd like to live with people that I don't have to worry about.  ...people that won't hurt me." said Jake.
     "Is that it?"
     "Well, maybe it'd be nice to live with people that would help me out when I was having a hard time."
     "Anything else?" Hannah asked again.
     "Ok.  I guess I'd like to live with people that were willing to take care of themselves...y'know, if they are capable of it." said Jake.
     "You know what that means, right?"
     "What?" said Jake.
     "The scriptures say that Papa Voice, in the last sort, is going to take people and put them in places where they can live with others that are just like them." said Hannah.
     Jake turned his head as though he didn't understand.
     "So, if you want to live with people that you don't have to worry about, then you have to be the sort of person that people don't have to worry about either.  If you want to live with people that will help you out when you're having a hard time, then you have to be the sort of person that will help others out when they're having a hard time too.  If you want to live with people that don't need much help, then you have to be the sort of person that doesn't need much help as well.  Do you understand?" said Hannah.
     Jake nodded.  He was interested in what she was saying.  He was also a bit frustrated though.
     "We're not here to have a good time Jake.  We're here to choose where and with whom we want to live for the rest of eternity.  You don't need Nahli Jake.  Please stop thinking about it.  It'll only hurt you in the long run."
     "I just wanted to find out more.  What's wrong with that?  I mean who is this god Nahli?  Why won't anybody talk about him?"
     "His name's not Nahli." said Hannah as she began to walk away.
     "What do you mean?"
     "The name of the religion is Nahli.  The god's name is 'Asmireen.'"
     "'Asmireen?'" asked Jake.
     "'A' 'S' 'M' 'I' 'R' 'E' 'E' 'N'" said Hannah as she spelled it out and then left the room.
     Jake walked outside.  He went to the wagon and stood there petting Quick.
     "Asmireen" he muttered to himself.
     "Asmireen" he muttered to himself again.
     Jake felt something odd wake up within himself.


Visit the Jon's Books page to buy this book!