Category: Fantasy

Read Shaman Story Chapter X – Borrowing.

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Buppa and I stand on the porch. He holds me, his strong, tanned arms making a seat for me to sit on. A man comes to us. He and Buppa talk quickly, quietly. Buppa shakes his head, no.

The man reaches out, pulls his hand back before touching Buppa. Holds his hands out, palms up. His voice strains.

Buppa tells him to go away, come back later. He shakes his head as the man goes down the steps, out the gate, to his car, drives away.

He takes me inside. “What did he want, Buppa?”

“To cause pain.”

“Will you do what he wants, Buppa?”

“I will do what he asked, not what he wants.”

“You going to hurt someone?”

“Someone will be hurt, yes.”

“You told me not to hurt people, Buppa.”

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Read Shaman Story Chapter X – Hide-and-Seek.

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Sometimes Grandpa’s friends ask “May I share how I do it?” to help me learn how they do something Grandpa does, something he is teaching me. They let me piggyback down their path. Sometimes we have to travel far and they become a ladder and I climb up their rungs and the ladder flies and you learn how to be a ladder and fly.

I piggyback and climb their rungs so I can borrow from them to learn how to do it, to understand my way, my path would be different from theirs and different is okay, it is the outcome that matters.

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“Where am I, Gio? Come find me!”

He starts with things easy, asks me questions to make me explore. “Am I in the garden?”

“I don’t know, Buppa.”

“Can you feel me in the garden?”

The garden is tough. He puts so much of his energy into his roses, his vegetables, his Brothers the Bees.

“You’ve been in the garden, Buppa. I can tell you’ve been there.”

I feel a kiss in the air around my head. “Oh, come on, Gio. You and I worked in the garden yesterday. Am I there now?”

The air tickles my feet. I laugh, realizing. “No! But your some place we walk to.”

“Oh, you’re so smart, Gio. Where am I now that is someplace we walk? Feel where I am. I left a trail. You can follow.”

“Like Hansel and Gretel, Buppa!”

“Yes, like Hansel and Gretel but I won’t put you in my oven when you find me.”

I start crying.

“What is it, Gio? What’s wrong?”

“What if I can’t find you, Buppa? What if I get lost?”

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[I mentioned in Shaman Story Chapter 5 – Lessons that chapter numbering would get wonky as Shaman Story is a work in progress.
At this point, I’m adding chapters to the beginning to foreshadow events happening in later chapters, this one being a case in point.
I’ve learned to live with such things. Hope you do, too.]

Read Shaman Story Chapter 7 – Sensing.

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Buppa stops, turns, let’s me see him in another place. Somewhere beyond the moon, under the sea, through his garden, into the earth.

A big wooden door, made from trees and branches all woven together, leaves grow out of limbs making eaves and lintels. There’s a little window but it’s too high for me to see in. A light flickers through the glass. A candle.

“What’s that, Buppa?”

“It’s a door, a very special door. But only for you, Gio, not for anybody else.”

“It’s my door?”

“Yes, but only if you want to learn more. If you want to learn more you have to go in.”

The door has no handle. I step closer, onto a mat of tightly woven hay and flax.

The mat opens eyes. It lifts and spins like it’s caught in a whirlwind. It pushes me back, grows four legs, a spiky tail and a giant head. The woven flax and hay become golden fur. It stops spinning and lands on its feet, larger than me, larger than Buppa, larger than the door.

It looks down at me. “Are you afraid, Gio?”

“Yes.”

“Good answer, truthful answer. Do you want to go in?”

“Yes.”

“Why?”

I don’t know what’s expected. “To learn more?”

The creature smiles. It has many, many teeth, like needles. It drools. Its drool splashes and steams like acid on ground that isn’t there. “Are you asking or telling?”

I want my Buppa. He’s not here. He’s always with me. Where’s my Buppa?

“Anything else?”

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