The Universal Migrator

“Briefly rests the dew upon fragile blades of grass,
Even now it scatters on the breath of existence.
In haste this world of dew is left for calmer winds,
Each passing somehow more beautiful than the last.”

Solar arc near its end, the relentless grip of shadow steadily mounts in its wake. Lunar dominance is as yet a pale, mysterious orb suspended in the failing daylight sky. Such is that known as twilight time—when tides reflect the shifting of celestial dominion, and in the firmament is manifest the cadence of creation. Birds—those with brilliance of color who serenade the Morning Star with their joyous melodies, as they who soar the uppermost thermals with their fierce, farseeing gazes ever questing for weakness and confusion upon which to prey—make to roost ere the emergence of their tenebrous cousins, perched along gnarled boughs extending proudly from ancient forest columns that reach out to cradle the heavens, patiently awaiting the folly of their nocturnal woodland brethren, upon which they would feed. Nearby, in his isolated madness, the lone wolf pains a cry of woe toward his rising master in the eastern sky, hoping with his suffering to call forth the voice of comfort from his fallen brothers and sisters. The wolf knew that one day he too would be called to join the star hunt, where he would abide for an inestimable duration of time, until once again the call of life would grow strong and he would return to join a new pack. In this wisdom he found much peace. The bringer of death is also harvester of life—continually reaping life’s vitality so that it may be sown into the fields of incarnation yet again.

It was not the wolf’s brothers and sisters who echoed his cry, however. It was the insoluble Breath of Creation, sometimes known to man as the “World-Breath,” flowing through existence, resonating with all that is, ever was, and is yet to be. Though to Creation the Ten Thousand Things are but one and simply is. The embrace of the evening’s breath brought great comfort to the lone wolf, consoling his grief and reminding him of the True Path, whose vibrations constantly give origin to all direction and the power therein to discern the way. The Breath of Creation encompasses all and is ever seeking to forge a balance between that which exists and that which does not exist. Creation, being not only master of life, but also that of death, initiates all beginnings yet also requires constant demise in order to sustain the delicately balanced Circle.

Mankind is now all but blind of the True Path. Their untrusting senses too often focused inward on petty wants and desires. There once was a pure time for mankind, when they ran with the wolf and saw the world through the eagle’s eye. But then mankind grew clever and decided they no longer needed the companionship of the wolf to hunt, nor that of the eagle to touch the sky. Yet perhaps most tragic was the fading of their desire to echo the warm, yet at times necessarily harsh love and nurturing spirit of their celestial Mother. Instead they sought only to perceive how the land and its progeny could benefit their immediate needs, while giving no heed to the long lasting effects brought forth by their actions. Slowly they descended from the True Path, the ancient lore of Creation forgotten in the passage of time. Now all that most hear of this elemental music is the whispering of the wind, the roaring of the ocean, and the rumbling of the earth, and yet do not recognize it for what it truly is; they can no longer harmonize with the ancient melody with which their hearts beat still. No longer do they hear the voice of their Mother in those sounds, but rather seek to give them explanations which are within the scope of human understanding. Man says, “I think, therefore I am,” where the wolf is, and therefore feels.
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As the living earth breathed around him, Areli forgot the purpose of his outing, aware only of the pulsing heartbeat of the forest and of the barely discernable rustle as his swift footfalls briefly made contact with the leafy covering of the forest floor, reflecting soft hues of golden yellow and brown in the fading evening sun, making evident the onset of autumn and the eventual rule of winter. With the passing of autumn would come also the unrelenting frost of the ice god Stribog’s breath, bathing the Northern Territories in a deathly blue cold, all life seeming to lay dormant until the warmth of Hagar, the southern desert goddess, is exhaled over the land as she rises from her seasonal slumber, bringing with it the spring thaw. As he ran in communion with the World-Breath, he found that he could no longer recall his name, nor the path that he was sent to follow. He began to feel a deep resonance within himself, manifested in a voice at once familiar, and yet unheard until now. Or had he heard it before . . . long ago? He could bring no remembrance forth, his memories clouded by years of isolation.

The time has come to break away.

The World-Breath. So calming were its whispered tones, creating a symphony of life. There was calmness in it, yes, though there was an underlining hardness to it as well, a hardness that spoke of an all-knowing and unchallenged wisdom and authority stretching far back into the time of the birth of the elementals—the progenitors of all life. It carried a tone that at once demanded obedience as well as conveyed a strong sense of care and protection.

Windstalker . . .

Windstalker. Was this someone’s name? His name? Yes, Windstalker was a name he had been known by once. Though how long had it been since anyone had called him by that name, given while still wrapped in the fading warmth of his mother’s bosom? Surely it had been before the urging, when he had finally succumbed to the call of the wind after years of fierce struggle within himself? His birth vigil was one to be remembered. Most of what he knew of that night was what others had told him. Though some memories remained his own. Occasionally he was haunted by dreams of the awesome storms that had torn across the land as he began his journey from deep within his mother’s womb.

The time has come for your return, Windstalker.

His return? Where was he to return to? He had no home, not ever since he had left his mother’s village all those years ago. For as long as he could remember his home had been wherever the wind had urged him. How ironic, that his childhood name was the opposite of what he now was, what his relationship with the wind has been for so long. Irony? Or was it fate? He was no longer sure. He no longer cared. When his mother had gone into labor, a fierce tempest had raged over the land, causing great nervousness and raising old superstitions within his mother’s people. She was in labor for a dangerously long time, stretching over several days. It seemed that the storm’s wrath rose and fell with her birthing pains, reaching a crescendo toward the end. As he came into this world the harsh winds had suddenly settled, instilling an ethereal silence in the air. It was as though the very wind itself had been wary of him. Windstalker he had been named. Stalker of the Wind, feared by the elemental Breath of Creation . . . or so they had said. He had never believed in such farce, though. After all, how could a powerful elemental force such as the World-Breath be afraid of one such as he? Of course now he knew the truth. He knew that it was the wind that commanded him, and not he who stalked the wind. The only consequence of his birth that he was sure of was that it had brought the death of his mother. Ashriel—Harvester of Souls—had taken the life of Areli’s mother in exchange for the emergence of his into the world. As surely and suddenly as the fierce winds had fled the night sky, so too had his mother’s sweet breath fled her body, leaving her newly born son weeping, feeling the ebb of strength from her now cold embrace as she began her sojourn to the Realm of Abeyance, where she would sit in judgment before Da’shen, the great Judge of Souls.

He never even knew his mother’s name. It was believed that if a woman died from childbirth that through the corruption of her sorrow by Sutekh—the Lord of Chaos who dwells deep within the Pillars of the Desert—she could return in demon form and search for the child she had left behind in order to bring it back with her to the Realm of Lost Souls. Because of this it was forbidden for such children to know the name of their mother. So that if she came in search of the child it would not respond to the demon’s whispers by calling out her name in its sleep, and in so doing reveal where the babe slept. So he had grown up without the protection of a mother, and had belonged to no family within the tribe because his father was a mysterious traveler from a far away land who had been banished by the village when it was found that he had taken one its girls to his tent. Areli was shunned by his mother’s family as a babe and forced to labor for the other families before he had seen the passage of his fifth summer. These were deeply troubling memories.

No! What was he doing? Why was he remembering these things? All this had happened long ago, long before he had been summoned. He was different now; nothing from his past mattered any longer.