Jerret of the Lake

Jerret was born to a filthy man and a strong woman. Refugees of the Third War of the Wold, they'd lurched into the wilderness in hopes of safety, and found a protected cave on the edge of a smooth, dark lake. From here, they'd foraged roots and wild onions, killed and roasted rabbits and Thornian squirrels, and heard little of the goings on in the rest of the world.

Jerret's father had a great fear of the lake. It was a strange irony in Jerret's early years that he could throw a stone from the entrance of their cave and have it land in the dark waters, yet his father would not bathe or even dip his toes into it. As Jerret grew, his father's phobia increased to such a point that the man refused to leave the cave, and all the work finding food and gathering wood for fires was left to his mother and he.

It was on a drizzly autumn day that Jerret's mother sent him around the far side of the lake to gather hen of the wood mushrooms from their most abundant mushrooming patch. When Jerret arrived, he discovered a barren forest floor and animal tracks he did not recognize.

Jerret was no fool, and even with only a dozen cycles to his name he knew to keep safe from the unknown, but he also had great confidence with his pointed spear and strengthening arms. Worried their soup pot would be left wanting without any mushrooms, he ranged further afield in hopes of discovering a new, fruitful spot.

As if called upon by an unseen deity, a vast storm rose up in the sky and rained down upon him with late season hail and thick, bone chilling drops. He took shelter in a stand of pines, his bag but half full. He waited for the air to clear, which it ultimately did.

The sun had long since clipped past the horizon, and Jerret let his eyes adjust to the dimming light. Backtracking against his trail, Jerret had spotted gaps in the trees looking out on the lake when a vast shadow slouched in front of him. It unfurled, a stag rising to two legs, but the stag's flesh had melted from its bones. It was covered by a mere mantle, and the stag’s horns glowed an eerie wisteria.

When the stag spoke, it came like a slow and distant roll of thunder.

"I've seen you, boy. Seen you on the lake. Seen you as you harvest and hunt. I've seen you outgrow the patch of earth you call a home."

Though Jerret moved his lips, no words came. A small, skeleton frog leapt from the darkness behind the stag. It sat down in front of Jerret and regarded him with flat, dead eyes.

"In one human life, you will have few chances to make life-altering decisions. I will present you one on this eve."

In his fear, Jerret had not seen the lean staff the stag held in one raised hoof. The stag tapped his staff into the earth in a rhythmic pattern, and as if called from the darkness itself, a shimmering bulb of a flower grew from the top of the staff. It billowed, blood red in the dark, then opened. As quickly, the flower wilted and collapsed, only to be resurrected, the color of orange death, emitting the scent of some ancient world.

The stag plucked the blossom and held it to the fore. "This is the blossom of Rafflesia. In the center is one seed." He removed a small, red seed from the center of the blossom and dropped it to the ground. The frog flicked a tongue, forged of sinew and tendon, to snag the seed in its maw. With one hop, the frog was beside Jerret.

"If you take this seed," the stag intoned, "you will have a choice to make, which is as follows. You may return to your life, foraging food for your unworthy father, wondering what may lay beyond the edge of the wild. All I ask is that, if you make this decision, you hurl the seed into the lake, to return it to the depths where it may belong.

"Or, you shall take a long journey, to the edge of the Veil, where you will plant the seed. If you choose this path, know one thing: a Rafflesian Poppy grows but slow. You must tend to it every day while it grows, feeding it water and whispering to its roots. You will be away from your lake for quite some time.

"Lest you think this seed only takes but does not give, the act of caring for the poppy will impart upon you the gift of unnatural longevity. With this extra time, you may do as you choose."

Much of his poise returned, Jerret squatted to the ground and held his hand out to the frog. It coughed the seed into his palm. Without pause, Jerret stuffed it into his mushrooming sack.

Before Jerret could offer response, the Elk had gone. Jerret looked through the shimmer of darkness for a moment, but saw nothing.

Upon his return to the cave, Jerret helped pull the mushrooms apart for the stew, consoled his miserable father, told his mother he'd found new fungal hunting grounds, and threw the red seed as far into the lake as he could, knowing the prevailing wind would push it way, if it floated, and some dark creature would eat it, if it sank.

Feeling somehow invigorated, Jerret took the evening to tidy his corner of the cave and tell jokes with his parents. "What makes the blue wizard blue?" he said.

"Wild blueberries?" his mother responded.

"Knowing there are termites in the world!" They laughed, because everyone knew the Bastion's footings were of wood. His father grinned from the corner, in their fire's dying light.

"I'd never heard that one," he said.

When the carcass of a frog washed up at the edge of the lake the next morning, glowing like the dying sun, Jerret broke out in a deep sweat, and sliced it open with his knife, knowing what he would find. Not an hour later, he'd told his mother he was off to find wood for the fire, intending instead to march north. Arriving near the edge of the Veil, he built himself a small daub and wattle shelter near a trickling brook. He marked the days it had been since leaving the cave: twelve. With the water an eternal source, he planted the seed mere paces from his hut.

With time, the seed peaked from the ground. With more time, it gained a bit of height. Each day, Jerret watered the roots, and each day he spoke to them.

When Jerret returned to his cave on the lake, it had been eighty-one hundred cycles of the clock. He found nothing of his mother and a pile of his father’s bones in a deep corner. On the wall was a scratched note that had long since become unintelligible.

Jerret sat down in the mouth of the cave. He laid his Rafflesian-wood staff to his side, looked out upon the dark waters, and sobbed.

Entered by: 0xB0B8…97Ad and preserved on chain (see transaction)