A curious sight indeed, a pan piping wolf ensued by a fleet of fawns in captivated hysteria.
He led them to a clearing and sat them 'round.




THE FIRST STORY

Listen.

There exists somewhere, secluded and secure in the darkest and most forgotten mountain forest, a lost cave. It gave dwelling to God's most horrifying and terrible creature. Throughout the earth there was nothing found it did not feast upon. Greatest to smallest, the blood and bones of all beasts from this world piled together, saturating the soil in the recesses of the cave that had seen neither the light of sun nor moon.
On the appointed day, God decided to kill His great creation and shook the earth, collapsing the cave upon it. With this, every life from the planet had been gathered to one place, in the darkest darkness, and the earth there consumed them all.
Ages passed before a wondering woman trampled earth over the grave, exposing a small hole through which a beam of full moon's light first pierced this place of death. From the blood and spirits of all fallen creation there arose a most fearsome and glorious flower, radiating rainbow light and, bursting forth from the ashes, it fired upwards to moon. The woman peered down curiously into the hole which had opened beneath her feet and caught a brief glimpse of this most holy and awesome flower before her soul was completely consumed by the collision of such energies. The spirits of the moon, the woman, and the flower then exploded, together and full of life, into the cosmos. Her body fell dead and vacant over the hole in the earth and, with it's light lost, the flower withered before dawn of the next morn.
The end.

Which then are you, child? The Cave? The Creature? The Food? The Earth? The Flower? The Woman? The Moon? The Light? The Darkness? Or perhaps the Morning To Come...?



THE SECOND STORY

Emilia and Andore sat close as he told them a parable.

Once there were Twin brothers. They were identical in every way except that one could see while the other was blind. The one that could see was very prideful about his site and rather than help his brother through his life he watched him struggle and glorified himself that he did not stumble as his image did.

There came a day when the two were traveling by night on a carriage, which slipped during their journey down a deep crevice. The driver was killed but the brothers survived the initial wreck. The clouds were thick that night and they had fallen well under the forest canopy, perhaps even in pure darkness!

A pack of wolves was sent by God to judge between the brothers at that time and they approached the scene ravenously. The brother who had seen all of his life was terrified! "Brother brother, help me! I cannot see! I'm lost in the darkness!"
The other, having been blind all his life, could hear every aspect of the forest around them and could make sense of his environment, replied to him,
"I have lived in this darkness all of my life and can hear even know dangers that you do not know are coming. In my home there there will be compassion for me, but this is not your home."
The wolves then descended and swiftly devoured the one who had seen but was now blind, but the other they spared, because he was not afraid.

The End.