TCOTNK Season 3.15
The Castle Of The Naked Knights. The origins of the picture book that will change so many lives....
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back to chapter3.14 (last weeks episode)
XI
We are silent together. The night is clear and quiet. We walk next to each other. Each on a wheel track. There's a fire burning inside me. No wild flames. Quiet glowing. It's always been there. It's blue. The colour of a cutting torch. Water burning. Now I can see it. Now I know. I remember the fire..
My feet and the hem of my dress are cold and wet. My skin tingles. Carlos' white towel is wrapped around my head. I also went for a swim. Feeling like a sword that had to be cooled down with a hiss after being forged. I steamed all the way back to shore. Carlos dried me with his towel. Big gentle hands. A shivering urchin with painful hair roots. Smiling like crazy. Grinning like an idiot. Teeth chattering like a mortal.
I'll probably catch a cold. It takes hours for my hair to dry and I walk through a forest with a stranger who is ten times stronger than me, in the middle of the night. But I'm not afraid. Something has changed in me. Something has been added. Something revealed. I baptized myself. I am baptized by something that is in me. From the outside in. And now also from the inside out. That's what it feels like. The buzzing blue flame has been unveiled. Received as a gift. Unpacked it myself. It is the most beautiful gift imaginable. And it's me.
I squeeze the large hand and I look at him with eyes that are drowning in yet another flood. He smiles back sweetly. Why do I think he knows exactly what's going on inside me? Why do I believe he was there waiting for me? That he called me? That he saw me? Why do I see this circus man as my guardian, my guide, my initiator?
We let go of each other's hands just before we step into the light of a fire basket. There is a small team sitting on chairs and stools. The silhouette of a large truck as a backdrop. I settle among the quiet voices. Carlos remains standing, as if thinking of maybe retreating to his bed.
This summer's setbacks are turning into stories. From what I hear, they've had a tough time. Bad weather, theft, a serious accident, too little income, old equipment that kept breaking down, a heated argument between two trapeze workers over a young and beautiful talent. And yet they sit there happily talking about it as if they were stories. As if it were one big adventure. It must be my angle, I think, but I see a circle of deeply satisfied people. They sit on the side of the road with winter approaching on a dead end track and yet there seems to be nothing wrong to them.
'How do you do that?' I ask bluntly.
Everyone falls silent. People look at each other. Did I say something wrong? I was a bit abrupt.
“I mean, where do you guys get this power that I feel? It sounds like you've had nothing but mise and misery.”
It remains quiet. I think I violated some kind of silent agreement. Missed that there is a rule that prohibits asking about this. I asked about the secret. That's what it feels like. You can ask, but the consequences are at your own expense. On a pirate ship you don't ask out loud why the captain is so hideous. That's what it feels like. The pirates have fallen silent and the sails are creaking. And I am still shivering.
Carlos speaks. Arms folded.
“This is the-tale-of-the-one-eyed-snake-,” he says mysteriously. Another quality of his voice. It is a magnet in this timbre, making you lean in.
"Once upon a time there was a shaman with a big cock,"
The group chuckles.
“The man was a storyteller, a strange one, he painted himself when he told stories, he wore the wrong clothes, was a complete outcast. But when he told stories, everyone listened.” Carlos pauses for a moment and looks at me with glittering eyes. I am unsure what to expect.
“One day the man had come up with a very special story, in fact, he had discovered a secret, or so he thought. On the next special occasion he decided it was time to tell that tale. This, of course, included a special costume. He went naked. His entire body painted. He tried his very best to get to all the hard to reach bits, covering every inch with red ochre figures and white lines. Shapeshifting him into another creature. As he stepped into the blazing firelight, the proud man looked more than fantastic. People fell silent. Not knowing how to respond to this most unusual outfit. The storyteller was overly excited. His story was so special, so important, so deep, that he could not control his body during the wild dance that came before telling the tale. He got a hard-on.”
The circle becomes noisy and Carlos sits down, across from me, his face close to the glowing fire. His wiggling shadow big against the trucks dark canvas. He takes a sip from an offered bottle. He nods while looking around.
“Yes, just like me,” long inhale, “our shamanic indian now had the attention of the entire village. They even forgot to send away the younger children. The indian felt, despite the inconvenience, that it was time for the story. All the excited attention pushed his body even further. He really had a proud totem pole. And the narrator even thought it was appropriate for his important story. He started with the title, solemnly and loudly: this is the tale of the one-eyed serpent. And of course there was someone who pointed out the obvious one-eyed snake. The village had never laughed so much. They rolled on the ground with pleasure. They slapped each other on the thighs and screeched with infectious laughter. No one heard a single word of the story the painted dancer shared.”
Carlos sits back. That was it. He’s finished the story.
“What!” I say amazed, “that's not all, is it? What about the secret of that half blind snake?
Carlos shrugs, raises his eyebrows and folds his arms across his chest. Not planning to reveal more. The circle is silent. As if they are waiting. I believe they have heard this story before. I am the one for whom the story is intended. But I don't understand. Not really.
"Maybe," Carlos says slowly, looking at the night sky, "if you come up with a good story, I'll be willing to let out the tail of my tale." People are wowing. The big man looks very innocent and blank. All eyes are on me now. I have no story. I can't tell.
And yet I open my mouth.
“This story is called,” I say with great confidence, looking at those around me, “The Castle of the Naked Knights.” My heart beats in my throat. That must be audible in the silence of the night. An owl calls from somewhere behind me. The forest is full of sounds. The fire crackles and sparks. My head is empty.
"It's starting," I say slowly. Because if I move very slowly I have more time to pluck the next sentence out of the night air.
“...with a girl,” of course. Just stringing clichés here. Then you automatically get an ugly chain. “...searching outside the walls.” not a bad picture. I need something to draw with. I take a branch from the pile. Just to have something to hold on to. And I remain standing. “She has a quest stone.” I say that very firmly. Showing the imaginary stone between thumb and index. Having no idea what that could be at the moment. A search stone?
“This quest stone is shiny and dark. The size of a chicken egg.”
Well, at least we know that. And now what? It really only comes when I open my mouth. And wield my wand.
“It's a game. She throws the stone from the place where she finds it. Hurling the rounded pebble as hard as she can, and then setting out to find it. Sometimes it's simple. Then she finds her stone without difficulty. But more often than not, the stone flies to a hiding place, bounces under or behind something, rolls down a slope or into a hole, or worse, ends up in a place where the girl is not allowed to go.”
They do listen to me. Doesn't surprise me. I'm also curious about what will happen next.
“Likewise today. The adventure game takes her and a few friends to the abandoned castle.”
Storytelling is dreaming with your eyes open. You just mix together everything from last week and then you bake a dream omelet. Add some fire and it will solidify all by itself.
“Now, I have to say that this heroine cheats every now and then. She then says that the soul has moved from the search stone and after a long search a new soul home is found. Same size. The same color. But not the same stone. This was her solution to getting stuck. This way she could always continue her search. It took her to special places.”
All beginnings are easy, I think to myself. I stoke the fire until a shower of sparks rises. Take a big sip for the first time from the bottle that was passed around and now stands next to Carlos' chair leg. It's not alcohol. A herbal drink. Bittersweet with a hint of forest floor. Not too awful. There is sniggering. Glances are exchanged.
“One long summer day, after twenty throws, finding and seeing which way the 'point' of the egg was pointing, it brought her to an abandoned castle. At a large tree at the foot of the walls she threw her dark stone once again. This time with the blind force of frustration because it had been too easy. Each time the stone had remained obediently in a clearly visible place, pointing to the path she expected. So now she wanted to take a hard shot. She fervently wished before she threw. "Iwant a challenge," she shouted, encouraged by her friends. The stone flew south against the sun. Became invisible due to the bright light and...,”
While I enact the throw, I'm distracted by a movement in the corner of my eye.
“... it landed on the other side of the low hill. The group of children run after he, up the slope, Yelling…...”
The greenish glow to my right can no longer be ignored. It takes me out of concentration. I have to look to the side. There is a naked woman hanging between two trees. Her thin body covered only by wisps of mist that leak glowingly down her pointy breasts and hairless sexlessness. Behind her the darkness vibrates. No wings are visible but she does have them. She's not small. Not an elf. She is twice the size of a human. Her head is tilted. The way a dog does. The face has no features. Her hands gesture to me.
"Hey," says Carlos, "If you leave us hanging, you won't get a tail from me."
I look at him confused. I can hardly tear my gaze away from the creature between the trees. Its only me that sees her. No one else sees the algae glow between the oaks.
It's fortunate I think more in images than in words. I know the next part of my story because I can still see the picture in front of me. I forcefully turn my back to the appearance.
“The children have reached the top of that low hill. Overlooking a wide river valley. The entire bank is littered with similarly shaped search stones. As far as they can see. All identical shiny dark egg-shaped stones. Thousands and thousa….ouch!”
Something falls on my head. It catches half in my hair before falling to the floor. It's a half eaten young rabbit. I look up and see the dark silhouette of a large bird spreading its wings. She flies away silently. Like an owl. She has dropped her prey on my head.
I turn around and almost fall backwards into the flames. The green woman has grown and now is right behind me. I look up to the glowing substance. It moves like seaweed in unseen currents. I could touch the leaking mist around the towering legs. The entity bends over. She wants to kiss me. Or bite my head off. Opening her mouth. A dark earthy hole making me cringe and lean back. A word forms in her cold breath pouring out. It starts with a stretched ssshhhh, then a sharp T followed by an Oh that is insultingly long. The deliberate Puh lends a whole world of ending to the word.
She said stop.
XII
Carlos catches me before I set my hair on fire. I don't get anything from the comments on my unfinished story.
"When was the last time you ate something?" he asks. Don't know. Did I even touch my bowl? I was drawing. And then that lady smelled my armpits, and then I went to sleep.
I can still see the enormous wood nymph. In my mind. The memory of her. I look past Carlos' shoulder but the forest is dark again. The troupe is breaking up. It's bedtime.
My head is buzzing. I don't want to sleep for a long time. I stroll towards the bridge on the arm of the big bear. The clown car is his rolling house. He doesn't have much to eat, he claims, but in a few seconds he makes a plate of fruit, cookies and sugarcoated peanuts with a large glass of milk.
"Why are you driving this laughing car?" I ask stupidly while chewing on a mouthful of sweet.
Carlos smiles broadly. Doesn't answer because he makes his clown face.
'You!?' I ask, pointing with the glass to my mouth. Mmm, he nods. I rub my mustache.
"What just happened?" he asks seriously, "you saw something." He slides into the couch opposite me. Above him hangs a photo of him in the sawdust arena. I recognize his stature. Despite the oversized suit.
“Us circus folk do illusions.”
I could listen for hours to that soft deep voice.
“We learn early on to see past the surface. And I recognize someone with the same skill. Seeing through the outside means knowing about things that are not visible for others. It also means that you can show things that seem impossible. The circus protects its secret. We are carriers of the illusion. We temporarily invert reality. We go inside the circle for a moment to create an illusion. For that we have to know what is the most real. But our role seems almost over in this form. A long practice is ending. Who knows what comes after.”
He says the latter without sadness.
I'm just snacking.
'So, I am not asking you to share anything. But realise that as a bearer of the secret you will have a difficult journey. Finding the treasure is the easy bit. Carrying the treasure is inhumanly heavy.'
My plate is empty. And I try to put into words what goes through my head. He waits while I think. While it ferments inside me. It takes a long time. So long that Carlos starts to clear the table. Prepares his bed. Washes my plate and glass. Undresses. And then slides his naked body between the sheets. I resurface from my inner dive and vaguely smile at him. Carlos comes out again to give me a kiss.
And he’s been sleeping like a whale for a long time when a first yawn catches up with me. It's a puzzle with way too many pieces. Stop? What did that green creep mean by that? No, she was impressive, not especially scary. That's what strikes me most about today. I am no longer afraid of my additions to reality. Rather eager and curious. The strange has become more normal and the normal feels increasingly strange. The creature had difficulty pronouncing that simple word. As if it had to use all its energy to convey it.
I'm rummaging through the clown car. Carlos is orderly. Has no books. No trinkets. Everything is useful. The map still lies unfolded in the driving cabin. I take it to the table. That's where the lamp hangs.
I get why they drove wrong. The roads are barely signposted. I just don't understand what they are doing in this region. It's not a shortcut to anywhere. A few farmers live here. I study the map. The valley of the water mill is deep and the river mouth wide. In front of it are the three islands that I saw upon arrival. The largest one furthest from the coast. There are no names listed. My finger wanders over that spot. I want to go there.
I sit with my chin on my fists looking at the constellation for a long time. They are stepping stones. You can swim or paddle to the first, then to the second and from there to the third. It doesn't seem very far. I would like to live there. Picture myself standing on a rock with a stole blowing. Hair in the wind. My white house in the background. Alone but not lonely.
Carlos is awake, lying there, looking at me. The peace in his gaze ignites my desire. He sees it. Still, I'm not going to have sex with him. The intense staring contest is also enjoyable. It tickles my heart.
"You're still owed the real story." he says and sits up. Sheets wrapped as a long skirt. His arms are massive. I can't help but imagine myself lying beneath him, moving slowly with him.
"Okay," I say, "distract me." And I crawl next to him to no longer have to watch his chest move up and down. He's nice and warm. A hint of mushroom.
"No one in the village...," he begins. His voice vibrates throughout the bed,
“...heard what the dancing indian had to say because they were too busy laughing. The image of the one-eyed snake was too funny with that painted penis wiggling and waving. And it did look the part.”
He lifts the blanket. Points to his own eye. The blushing snake is staring at me. That does not help. I chuckle. He covers it again.
'The clumsy shaman, because that was what this artist was, did indeed have an important insight. He said that sex for men can go both ways. Outwards. For making children. For giving pleasure. And inside.'
Carlos crawls across and sits kneeling opposite me.
“This,” he points to his crotch, “is not the head of the snake. It's the tail. The head of my snake is here.' He places an index finger in the middle of his forehead. His third eye.
'Only the tail is visible. But the rest is just as real. You wake up the snake's body via the tail. When you learn to send the energy in the other direction. If you do that correctly, your dragon will wake up.
'Dragon?' I ask.
'Dragon. Snake. Underwater monster. It's all the same.'
I can picture it like this; the thick body that crawls up the back to that golden shining eye in the skull. I remember the snake biting my crotch. Something shifts inside me. I have also noticed that change of direction he is talking about.
“And girl dragons? How about those?'
He smiles broadly. What a beautiful face this joker has.
“The shaman didn't get a chance to get to that. No one takes a dancing clown seriously, you know.”
“Is it perhaps the other way around for women? In for the kids and out for...”
His cautious smile is dirty sexy.
"Well," he says, "finish it."
Don't know. Don't see a picture. I think my third eye is already open. But my direction is not reversed. Not yet. Then an image slides in. And an accompanying feeling of intense pleasure. My face breaks open like a cloudy day.
“Out to ride the dragons,” I say excitedly.
"So," Carlos says, impressed, "plural?"
I can't really hear him anymore. I’m up, next to the bed. This has nothing to do with sex. At least not much. Much less than we think. Sex is so much bigger than fluid exchange, I think, and then I correct myself and think about the water. The holy water. The grail. The chalice. I am the grail, I think. I am the water. I'm standing on the small floor between the kitchen and bed and my system is going crazy. I can see. I get it. I have to draw. I have to capture this somehow. But not with words alone. That is not enough. I can't just tell everyone. Not the old way. Not now. That is what the green goddess wanted to make clear to me. Stop. Not now. Not at the campfire. Not to these people at this time. In this form. I am the recipient of the arrow of time. I have to try to pass it on. I'm going to send it through time to the moment when the womb is ripe for the fire. And I know some of it. An important part. But that's not all. I have to continue on this path. Find out what the rest is. Collect. Observe. Let it grow in me. I'll have to do that alone. Carlos saw that. I am a carrier. Just like him. And then I cry. Of gratitude. Of loneliness. I'm crying about the whole long crazy day. To have to travel that long road. Because of the confused outpouring of new insights that are difficult for me. It's so much. It is so beautiful. My role is so important. And I am so small, so insignificant, so little, so alone. I really cry with all my heart and he doesn't comfort me. And I don't want him to. I want to cry. It has to come out. Now I'm here. This is what I feel. Now he is here to keep my balance. Now is good.
