The Hero Appears
"Father, I want to go home."
"Home? Yes, child, we will go home in a little while."
"But Father, I want to go home now."
"Tata, listen to me." He knelt down so he could look his child in the eyes – the eyes as brown and deep as his own. "Tata… we cannot go home, not yet. You're a hero. The people need to see you."
The child set his face in a cold frown. "I'm not the Hero! Not until I have the sword of fire!"
"But you do have the sword, my little hero," the father said, taking Tata's hands in his own.
"Stop it! Stop it! The sword's not real! I want the real sword!"
"Shh… shh." He shushed the child. "I promise I'll get you the sword, and you can be the Hero. But not yet. The people need you. They need something to believe in. Something to see, to touch, to love. The kingdom has been at war for so long we've lost all hope without you, Tata. You can save us."
"Father…"
"Shh… let's not hear any more of this. I'll take you to bed."
"No! No! No! Take me home! I'm tired of these old people following us around! I'm the Hero! I want the sword of fire!"
"Tata! Quiet!"
"The sword! You've kept it from me! You don't want me to be the Hero! You just want gold and silver and money! You're keeping me from fulfilling my destiny, you old – "
The air suddenly resounded with a slap, and Tata put a hand to his cheek.
"See there, child, honor your father! I won't have you mock me!"
"I can say what I please!" There was another smack, and Tata covered his face both to hide his watering eyes and the following two blows. "Father, please! Stop!"
"There! A child should know his place! Now be quiet and go to bed before I punish you again!"
Tata took his time responding and chose his words carefully. "Promise me we'll go home. Promise me I'll have my sword of fire."
"In time, child."
"Now, father! You always keep everything from me! You always kept… you always kept the money to yourself, and you spent it on evil things and left mother and I – "
He was expecting the next blow, but he didn't realize just how loud and painful it would be. And when he looked into his father's eyes, he was surprised to see them blurred with tears. In the next moment he felt his father's arms grasp his, as if the man were clinging to him for dear life. "Tata! Shush yourself! Please… for your dear departed mother's sake. Listen to me. If not for me, then for her. It's what she would have wanted. We… you can't fail now. For her sake, stay with me. Then we can go home, child." The last few words were slow to come. "I… I promised your mother I would take care of you, I did." Then the father took his son into a tight embrace.
"Will we ever go home again, Father?"
"Hush, child."
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Robo awoke everyone the following morning and had them down on the main road not long after the sun rose. The air was painfully crisp and fresh, the way it is the morning before everyone has started breathing it. Chrono was refreshed by the chill, and he thought the girls were equally renewed. Nadia still looked a little disturbed, but Chrono didn't want to ask too much about it. After all, she seemed to also want to forget what had happened between them the previous night. "So," Lucca began, breaking the silence in the air. It sounded profane, and she knew it. "Where has the Hero gone this morning, and how shall we keep up with him now?" Though she probably meant to be sarcastic, she came off more genuine than she had in a long while. But her words brought everyone back down to reality, and they thought again of the mission set before them. Another moment gone, Chrono mused, They seem to get shorter every day.
It wasn't long before they had found the Hero's gathering spot. They heard it long before they saw it, anyway. A crowd had already gathered at the foot of a long wooden platform, where the Hero stood. At least, they assumed the Hero stood there – only the front row could tell for sure. But they all saw the father, dressed up again in his pomp and majesty, delivering the message to the people.
Chrono only caught the last bit of it – "and everyone shall know the Hero for who he is! To all who would go with us: there is no time for preparation, for the time is now." Then the crowds erupted in cheering again, a compulsive screeching out of courtesy rather than true excitement. Then the Hero and father stepped off the platform, the crowd parting respectfully to let them pass. A few of them broke free and followed.
When the cheering died down, Chrono felt a jab in his ribs. "Come on, if we're going to get anywhere, now's the time." Lucca grabbed his arm and started dragging him away, though she didn't need to, because Chrono was perfectly willing and able to walk himself. He twisted his head around to see where the others were and caught a glimpse of Nadia and Robo by the platform, seemingly in conversation. They'd have to miss out on what happened next.
Lucca sort of led Chrono along with the crowd as they all followed the Hero to the middle of a clearing.
"People," began the father. Goodness, does the Hero ever talk? "You are those willing to follow the Hero? To give your time, your labor, maybe even your lives, to see prophecy fulfilled?" The crowd didn't say anything. "Very good, then. We have a long march back south, to Porre. Anyone who is unable or unwilling to make the journey may go, and no one is a lesser man for doing so." No one moved. "We'll begin. Don't worry about food or clothing. If the Hero can slay a sorcerer such as Magus the great, surely he can manage to find something as trivial as provisions for a small band of travelers. If all of you wish to come, we can begin our journey today, right now. This is prophecy – and it unfolds right before your very eyes!"
There was no cheer after this speech. The people just whispered to each other and waited. During their silence, Lucca nudged Chrono again. "One of us should go get the others… I didn't realize we'd leave this soon."
"You go," Chrono whispered back. "We won't get that far ahead if we're a large group."
Lucca looked like she wanted to argue, but instead she said. "All right. We'll catch up in a couple of hours probably. Good luck, or whatever it is I'm supposed to say."
"That's good enough for now."
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Chrono found the trip terribly boring. No one really talked to each other, at least not much. The crowd seemed excited, but he just didn't feel that. He lagged behind everyone else, waiting for the moment Lucca came with the others. But two days later there was still no one.
One good thing about the trip was the free service. Everywhere the crowd stopped, there was free food and free room and board. At first he thought the Hero was picking up the tab, but after the fifth stop he guessed there was something else going on. He remembered one tavern owner proclaiming the meal a blessing toward the Hero and his quest. Chrono found it suspicious, but didn't want to speak up – at least, not yet. He just ate by himself in silence, though he didn't much like the food. And all there was to drink was some kind of ale, which tasted like pure alcohol and sugar. Chrono was not much for hard drinks anyway, so he instead drank from streams along the trail.
On the third day Chrono saw someone he recognized in one of the towns. It turned out to be Marco, and so Chrono found himself invited to a real dinner with real water at a real house on a farm, with, most importantly, peace and quiet. He was introduced to the wife, Fiona, and the children, who all shared a bedroom. The house wasn't even close to high-class, but it was spacious enough for everyone and well insulated, like a sanctuary. He noticed several small trees growing in jars in the corner, and long strands of ivy climbing up each wall. The meal also contained no trace of meat. Marco read Chrono's puzzled expression and explained that meat was hard to come by in the area, due to a fierce drought. Bread was also scarce.
Not long into the evening the topic moved to the Hero. "So then, sir Chrono," Marco said. "What brought you so far from Dorino without your sisters?"
"Oh, they're not my sisters," he replied hastily, then added "and they're on the way. I just got ahead of them. We're here for the Hero."
Marco's smile fell, and his wife just looked up and stared at him. It was she was spoke next. "I saw him up in Dorino, too. I never expected him to be a boy."
"The prophecy does say he's a boy," Marco cut in.
"Yes, I know that much, but he's so young! And he looked so… foreign. Like he belonged somewhere else, and knew it, deep down, that he didn't belong. I don't think he ever took that cloak from around his head! The poor child – One day I had imagined if it were my boy up there… I would always be proud, you see. But he's not ready. Prophecy or no prophecy, a mere child doesn't expect to conquer a mad sorcerer."
"Right," Marco agreed, though Chrono thought he wanted to say more.
"Think of his family, Marco – what would you do if our son were the Hero? Would you parade him through all the kingdom? Or would you wait until he were grown?"
"Do you even have to ask?"
There was a momentary pause, which Chrono took to speak. "And what if he's not the Hero?" Neither responded, so he tried again. "What if the boy is not the real Hero like everyone believes? What then?"
Fiona responded, very tense. "The boy fulfills the prophecy, does he not?"
"Yes, he does have the medallion, but he doesn't really have the sword. That thing is not real. He must have doused it in some kind of oil and ignited it before making his appearance."
Marco answered next. "True, true. I've often thought this was a hoax – " his wife gave him a look of shock " – and rightly so, Fiona. But it's something to believe in, I suppose. That is, for the others."
"I believe him," Fiona said quickly. "Prophecy is never wrong."
"Darling, prophecy is only another word for a lucky guess. It's so vague it could mean anything."
"Listen," Chrono broke in, "how about we make a compromise. We don't think one way or the other until the prophecy is fulfilled, right? So why don't we wait? Why place so much, well, faith in the boy?"
All of them were silent for a while. The sun was almost below the horizon, and the light was fading from the room. "I'll light a candle," Fiona said, excusing herself for a moment.
When she was in the other room, Marco spoke. "It's something to believe in. After seven years of war, you start looking for things to keep your hopes up. At first it was victory, but one victory led to another battle, and so on and so on until there are so many victories and defeats that nothing is exciting anymore. And they keep sending the bodies home to be buried and rot into the earth. And all the while the people become old and the children grow up, and the desert encroaches from all sides and the trees die. Have you ever seen the forest just die?"
Marco paused as if expecting an answer, but then continued. "It used to be here. This land used to be alive. It was a forest, the pride of the south actually. We built this home ourselves. Fiona and I were newly married, no older than you, and we made our own home out of the trees that used to grow right here. And as the years went on and our soldiers died, the trees died and the grass burned and the streams dried up. These are the last days, sir Chrono, they are. We have spent every moment on the preservation of the land, hoping that we could reverse the degeneration, that we could stop the sun and move the earth back in time to how it was before. You ever wish you could go back to another day?" Marco's face went blank as he stared at the far wall.
"I used to – once." Chrono thought again of his own home, his own time, and he remembered then that in the south there was nothing but desert. Fiona and Marco hadn't changed a thing.
Just then Fiona entered again, and noticing the look on her husband's face, she started. "I'm sorry. Have I interrupted you? Chrono, I'm sorry for our behavior. We're not used to arguing yet. I do hope you'll stay for the night. I'll have Marco prepare a bed."
"Thanks," Chrono replied as Marco got up and left the room.
"Don't worry about my husband's depression. He's too worried. It's an insidious disease, depression. I always try to think of my garden at times like these, and how everything dies in the Winter. But no matter how harsh the cold and the ice, the earth is green again by Spring. Every sapling is a hopeful future to me. And someday I believe the world will be green forever, if you can picture that."
Really? I've seen the future, and it's not green. It's red.
"Don't let us dishearten you. The Hero is here and we should all be glad." She paused as if regaining composure. "I'm sorry. I am very tired. It has been a long day. Come, let me show you to your room."
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
The next morning Chrono bid farewell to his hosts and joined the group following the Hero. By then Lucca had arrived with the others, so the four of them traveled together and related the events of the past three days. Apparently Lucca had led everyone down a different trail than Chrono had walked, and so they had arrived in town the day before and had spent the night in a trashy inn to wait for the throng of people to show up. They were a little jealous that Chrono had had another good meal and plentiful rest.
Chrono was glad to see they were feeling a little better. At least, Nadia wasn't quite so irritable as before, and she smiled every now and then the way she had back when they first met. She didn't talk much, but that was understandable. What could she talk about that wouldn't bring her spirits back down again? Certainly there was something, but Nadia refused, for the moment, to see it.
They all arrived in Porre a day later. By then the following had at least tripled in size, something that obviously pleased the leader of the group and disturbed the Hero. At this point the leader spoke out and commanded the people to go throughout the town and recruit more followers. He said something more about the sword of fire, but his words of late had become more cryptic than ever and Chrono didn't bother to understand. Finally he dismissed the group and chanted the prophecy again. As the crowd thinned, heading for the various inns, Lucca mentioned how she was going to get everyone close to the Hero.
How she did it, Chrono wasn't keen on guessing. But he knew there had to have been a price, and judging by Lucca's face, it was steep. "Would you believe it? He's charging us ten times what the food is worth," she grumbled.
So that evening they all found themselves at the front door of the House of the Hero, as the townsfolk called it (or, if they were feeling poetic, the Hero's Abode). It was modestly large, as if it had used to be a hovel, but had been rebuilt recently. The walls and floors were in a terrible state of disrepair, and Chrono couldn't tell whether they had always looked like that or if they were on their way to becoming stone and gold. Some windows were fitted with glass, but some were open holes. Sometimes candles were placed in lavish stands, other times they were set on the tables. It was as if the house couldn't make up its mind which thing it wanted to be.
Strangely enough, the man who invited them in, who was also the leader of the following, was also the father of the Hero. The man had said so shortly upon their entry. If Chrono hadn't been suspicious before, he was now. And where was the boy's mother? And for that matter, where was the boy?
That question was shortly answered when the thin man bellowed "Tata! Supper!" and the boy came down, still wrapped in his robes. However, the robes were not quite as high on his face, and Chrono could make out some of the boy's features. His mouth was perpetually opened in a state of disinterest, as though it were too much work to close it. He held his chin rather high, revealing his thin cheeks and tiny neck. The boy's hair was still a mess of black, but he appeared to take a sort of pride in it, as if the mess were a part of the Heroic identity, a mess that, generations to come, would be worshipped. Chrono suddenly felt self-conscious of his own head and ran a hand through his hair, which he hadn't touched in the last week.
The boy came down rather quickly and ran to the table. He looked like he was going for the seat at the head, but he instead ran past to the seat on the right. His father got the seat at the head. After they were seated, the father invited Chrono, Lucca, and Nadia to sit. For some reason he ignored Robo. Chrono figured it was because the man couldn't figure out what to do about him. At this point no one in any town seriously believed he was wearing armor, so they just thought it one of those mysteries in life and began to ignore him.
"We are delighted for you to join us," the father said once they were all seated. "It is good to see there are devoted followers. We were under the delusion the Hero would not be recognized. After all, he is not what one would expect."
There was a pause, then Lucca spoke. "No, no, certainly not." She paused, choosing her words very carefully. "He is the least common of all heroes."
The father took a bite of meat and then continued, talking as he chewed. "Yes. It is exciting to think. Perhaps it is most exciting only for me. If any of you had children – which, I can tell, you do not – you would feel the same excitement I do that your own child is the fulfillment of prophecy. I don't know what could have made him… what he is. I am no Hero…" he paused a moment as if he had struck a nerve in himself, but he forced himself to go on. "I am no Hero, but he is. Sometimes I wonder how I had made such a child… if it were any part of mine, or if it had just been my insistence on making him finish his oatmeal in the morning. Oh, it's cheap and quick, and makes little children strong. It's a mystery, the whole prophecy. It's just luck, or "Providence," I suppose I have to say, that I was the one to have the Hero for a son."
In the following pause Chrono realized just how pointless the whole dinner was going to be. Clearly this man's interest had waned from the moment after Lucca had given him the money, and now he was trying out forms of conversation to make the night anything interesting. From the way he talked, though, it was obvious he had never conversed in his whole life.
"I do it for my wife, I suppose," the father continued. His face suddenly grew long and serious, and his voice dropped until the others could hardly hear. "She would have done better for him had she known he was a hero – nay, the Hero."
The boy spoke up. "Father," he said, pushing his plate away from him. "Father, I am not hungry."
"Eat your food, Tata. It will make you strong, so you can fight and save the kingdom. I paid a lot of money for that." The father sighed, then turned back to his guests. "I'm sorry. A Hero's a Hero, even though he's a child."
"All children are heroes to me," Chrono mused to himself, not caring that he was interrupting. "All children that survive becoming men, that is."
"Ah yes," the father chuckled, glad to see an actual conversation was beginning. "Your philosophy suits me. I suppose all men are heroes in their own right, unless they are just children wearing the suits of men. In that way I still have far to go… look at me, I am a leader of these people, yet I… yet the Hero is but a child and unequipped. He still has far to go."
"I just need the sword," the boy piped up between bites.
"You'll get the sword, Tata. The real sword too."
"No I won't. You've paraded me all over the kingdom when you could have let me be the Hero. I want the sword of fire. Then I'll be the Hero."
"I said you will get it. I'll send the finest explorers in world to go find it for you."
"See!" the boy shrieked suddenly. He jumped out of his seat and banged a tiny fist on the table. "You won't get it. You won't let me have it! I'm such a prophecy to you and yet I can't even have a sword. I'll tell you what I will do. I will find the sword myself, and then I will swim the whole ocean and slay the wizard myself, and I will come home myself and call myself the Hero!" There was another momentary silence, then the boy pulled his robes around his face again. "I'm not hungry."
As he stomped off, his father tried to smooth things over. "He's temperamental, like his mother. Forgive him. He's still a child, and is obsessed with his sword of fire. He thinks it's a real sword, the Masamune itself. Do I look like a fool of a man as to believe I could find such a sword?"
"It is a real artifact, the Masamune," Lucca replied. "But it's been missing for many, many years." She gave Chrono a pointed look and gestured as if to say "you know what to do next." Chrono just responded with his own gesture to mean "yes," though he didn't know, hadn't known, would never know, and would just have to wait for Lucca to tell him tomorrow.
"True. And that is why we must be satisfied with the sword we have now. It is the only way to fulfill prophecy."
"Actually," Robo interjected. Upon hearing his "voice," the father jerked involuntarily. "Only having the medallion and the sword does not make a man the Hero. The Hero must also slay Magus, if I am interpreting your prophecy correctly. The sword of fire must be used to repel the darkness. Otherwise prophecy is not fulfilled."
There was a long silence, and Chrono waited for the moment they would all be kicked out in a fit of rage. But it didn't come. Instead the father just stood and walked around the table. "True. True. He only fulfills so much of the prophecy because the other events have not yet occurred. But for those that have, he completes them all. I don't mean to offend, yet I find it baseless accusation to claim my son is no Hero merely because all the events have not unfolded as predicted yet. Prophecy doesn't depend on yet, as far as I was raised to believe." At this point the man picked up one of the candles from its stand and stared into the flame as if pondering. "He is a Hero. To deny that is to deny the fire before your very eyes."
As the man stared, Chrono noticed Lucca gesture almost unnoticeably with her right hand. Instantly the flame of the candle sprung up and lit the whole room a brilliant red. The father screamed curses and pitched the candle away (Lucca made sure it was out before it touched anything flammable).
He cleared his throat before continuing. "I'm sorry. I believe I have bored you with my story. I hope you enjoyed your meal – it was the best I could afford. Please, for the Hero's sake, spread the news among the people of the city. We can't fulfill the prophecy on our own."
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AUTHOR'S NOTE: I hope you're starting to understand where I'm going with this particular chain of events. Of course I won't just tell you... but if I have written well in the last few chapters you'll know. Otherwise I'll need to change a lot to make the plot a little more evident. Just let me know if this "foreshadowing" is actually foreshadowing or just filler chapters.
Also, I'll let you in on an idea, in case you're wondering why on earth the story is all of a sudden so dark. I feel that each time period has its own reigning mood. In the "Present," or 1000 A.D., the mood is peaceful, safe, secure (for the most part anyway). But in the "Middle Ages" period, it's dark and mysterious. I get that feeling just by looking at the world map (if you know the game, you will understand what I'm driving at). Hence, all the scenes take place either at early, early morning or after sundown, and those that don't are continually covered in storm clouds. Seriously, just check... any scene in that time which doesn't have those weather conditions is either an exception or a mistake. So, let me know if that sounds like a good idea. And, if you don't like how dark things are getting, just wait until the "Prehistoric" time... it's much better.