The Tales of Tarya, Books 1-3

Chapter 2 - Delays and Distractions-3

Mina shook her head, mute. She remembered her uncle’s stuttering, nonsensical speech, his lost, aimless existence, the scorn of the villagers for his madness. How could she shape that into anything other than what she had seen her whole life, a life damaged and tainted beyond repair?

Sofia looked at the younger woman searchingly, but Mina did not speak again.

‘Perhaps with time you will find meaning in your uncle’s story. Sometimes a story needs to be placed deep in your heart until it can find its form. You can always return to it later.’

They sat together in silence for a while, the cracking of the wheels below and the calls of birds soaring overhead the only sounds. Eventually Sofia began again, instructing Mina on the use of silence in storytelling; how pauses could draw the audience in deeper, making them sit on the edge of their seat and hold their breath.

This concept was a strange one to Mina, for silence was almost a deadly poison to playing. Any pauses onstage were the length of a heartbeat, or two at most, and served only to make the next words punchier. As Narratrice, Mina had been the straight foil for the others’ cavortings, but she had been aware of how the briefest of pauses made all the difference to whether an audience laughed at a joke or not. She had picked up on the unspoken maxim that there had to be something happening all the time, or the audience would wander, and with them their coin.

Storytelling was different though. As the afternoon passed Sofia wove story after story, showing Mina the way silence could enhance the words, prolong the wonder, allow space for the story to breathe. Each story was short, but the more Sofia spoke, the more Mina came to understand how a story could be shaped, and how spaces between the words could be as important as the words themselves.

So caught up in Sofia’s telling was she, at first she did not notice the village they approached late in the afternoon, just as the air was starting to cool a little. It was larger than many the players had passed through, but after Aurea it seemed tiny. The streets were clean, and some of the houses sported tiled mosaics. Mina guessed the people here must travel the few hours to Aurea with reasonable frequency, learning to emulate its decorative aspects and bring some of the grandeur of the city to their own tidy homes.

At first the travellers went unnoticed, just another cart among many passing through. But as they neared the heart of the village, which boasted a square and fountain much like Andon’s, Sofia stood up, drawing her story teller cloak around her shoulders. Suddenly, everything changed. Face after face turned their way as people began to follow them, calling out for tales.

For Mina it was like the greeting the players always received during their travels, but different as well. For every face turned their way was lit by a smile, every spoken welcome was warm. Mina had learned previously players were not always welcome, though she had never understood why some might look upon them with suspicion and distrust until she had learned at the heart of playing was theft. A bitter deception: players offered villagers their own dreams, stolen in Tarya and returned to them in exchange for coin.

Here though, there was not one angry word or dark expression. Children almost danced with excitement and elders stood still, faces alight with happiness, then bowed, their hands clasped together before opening out, the blessing of the Creator.

Balto found he could move no further as they reached the village fountain, a large piece of stonework with a dancing girl at its centre. Water flowed from the dancer’s outstretched hands like the scarves of the dancer at the festival in Aurea. Tiles encircled the fountain in a pattern of elaborate silver knot work, but at one point the knot work curled into beautiful script that read ‘Allegra’.

As the village folk clamoured for Sofia to bless them with stories, she whispered quickly to Balto.

‘We will stay here for the night and experience the hospitality on offer. Mina, tonight you need only listen and learn. An apprentice would normally undertake a year of observation. If your first story is any indication, I don’t think you will need anywhere near that time.’

Before any more words could be spoken, Sofia was drawn away by the eagerness of the crowd, with Mina and Balto following behind, forgotten.

After the grandeur of the royal divina in Aurea, with its massive carved Creator’s chair and elaborate stained-glass window, the village divina looked poor and tiny, but Mina experienced a strange tingling as she entered through its arched doorway. In Andon, she had loved more than anything when a story teller visited and told Tales of the Creator, or the history of Litonya, but now, for the first time, she had a strange sense of coming home. If she learned all Sofia could teach her, the divina would become a place to offer her own gifts to the Creator. Passing through the door, which was beautifully carved in the shape of two trees reaching out to entwine their branches together, she sensed something was beginning today, in this village whose name she did not even know.

Inside, the divina was much like the one in Andon, with the story teller’s chair at the centre, and rows of curved benches radiating out from it. The circular walls were carved with crude but lively images of people dancing, telling stories, even playing. Mina thought she recognised the Inamorata in one of the figures, hands clasped together, head tilted to the side, the typical pose of a young woman in love. She realised all the figures were female. There was not a male amongst them. Strangely, there was not even a depiction of the Creator. Though his face was always obscured, there was usually some representation of Him in each divina.

Sofia too scanned the moving figures on the wall, nodding her head. She gestured for the villagers to sit. Silence descended, a blanket of reverence stilling the excitement stirred by the story teller’s arrival. For the length of several heartbeats Sofia waited. Mina counted, aware, after Sofia’s lesson on silence, that this allowed the audience to bring themselves fully into this place, and created a moment in which the story could be born.

Sofia sat in the story teller’s chair, the Creator’s chair, and met the eyes of as many of the audience as she could, one after the other, drawing them into the circle.

‘Fair folk of Malo, thank you for welcoming us to your beautiful home,’ she began, her deep voice ringing out strong and true. She composed her face to a look of stern wisdom, and began the story.

Long ago, when the stars still sang and Tarya was but a breath away, seven maidens lived with their father, a mighty king, in a palace filled with music and sunlight. Wise and noble, handsome and just, the king was nevertheless deeply sad, for his love, the queen, was dying of a wasting sickness, and his wisest advisers and most skilled physicians could find no way to cure her.

The queen had appeared, many years before, from the woods near the palace, a slender sylph with a voice like a nightingale, eyes like the stars and a heart true and open. It was said when she sang, or told a tale, or painted, time stood still for all near her, so great were her talents. Over the years she had borne the king seven beautiful daughters, each as lovely as their mother, and each gifted with a talent that blossomed as they grew older, until the court was filled with their singing, and dancing, their sculptures, paintings and music, their stories and poetry, their tumbling and tricks.

But now the daughters fell silent, their faces shadowed as the queen faded, day by day. The palace became dark and sadness seeped through the hallways. Then came the darkest of days, when the queen’s spirit departed from its earthly abode. The princesses wept from great sorrow, the king shut himself within his chambers, and the courtiers mourned the loss of the bright wondrous days before the queen fell ill.

A year and a day after the queen’s death, a minstrel came to the palace. At first the guards would have turned him away, so deep was the despair that had come upon the kingdom, but he strutted and tricked at the gates of the palace, and the guards found themselves laughing despite themselves. One, bolder than the rest, decided this was exactly what the kingdom needed to restore the palace to its former joy, and he let the minstrel enter the gates of the palace.

The courtiers, tired of dull mourning, which kept the king locked away and the princesses silent and still, delighted in the playacting and ditties of the minstrel. The king, uncaring, waved his advisers away when they came and begged him to stop the minstrel, for they were wary of the power this commoner seemed to be gaining over the wealthy of the kingdom with his oily words. But though the king permitted the minstrel to perform for the court, he did not partake of the entertainments, remaining cloistered and grieving.

The princesses, however, heard the laughter and music that once again rang out from within the palace. They came from their chambers to see the minstrel. In time even they were drawn into his spell, for he was handsome and full of charm, and smiles reappeared on their faces. Soon enough they began sharing their own talents with the court again, singing and dancing and making works of art. Life was restored to the joyous celebration it had been before the queen’s death—for all except the king, who shut tight the curtains of his room and had the door doubled in thickness so he could no longer hear the laughter and music that seemed to him such a travesty.

Everyone was grateful to the minstrel for restoring joy to the kingdom. They showered him with gifts and honours. But the minstrel was not content to garner wealth and prestige alone. He had travelled a long way with a dark secret in his heart. One black night, when the moon was a broken sliver, he called the eldest princess to him and asked her to teach him her gift. This princess could play such music on a silver flute or a wooden harp, or any instrument she chose, that those who heard would weep. Gladly she shared her knowledge with the charming minstrel.

Once she taught him what she knew, he offered her a kiss in thanks. But with that kiss he stole the heart of her gift. Songs no longer sang in her head and weakness overcame her. To stop her revealing what had happened, he carried her to a secret cave and sealed her inside.

The next day the minstrel let it be known the princess had fallen in love with a commoner—a merchant who had visited the palace with fine silks—and ran away with him. The court was scandalised at first, but the minstrel took up the silver flute the princess had left behind and played it to accompany his japes, and soon the princess with her gift of music was forgotten.

Before long the minstrel did the same thing with the next oldest princess, stealing her gift of dancing, then walling her up in the hidden cave with her sister. He began to perform lively jigs with his skits. The audience became more and more enraptured with him, forgetting the princess who had once danced for them.

And so it went, with each princess disappearing in turn, until the minstrel had stolen all their gifts but one. His performances for the court became a mix of singing and dancing and poetry and playing lively music on instruments. He wore elaborate masks he had sculpted, and performed before beautiful painted backgrounds. As his gifts grew, so did his influence over the courtiers. Soon he was king in all but name.