Please don't read this yet. I didn't get to edit it because it's 12:30 and I need to go to bed...
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If there were silence within our hearts, then our minds would rule all and we would never know right from wrong.Those were the words that stuck with me for a very long time. When I was just a little boy, I'd never known this kind of a thing. But who would when they're so young and inexperienced? However today, those words hit home rather hard, and it left me thinking a lot.
It was just morning, and I stared out the window at the rising sun. It was the day where I'd finally choose, and so I stretched out my arms and legs as far as they'd go, then sat up with half-closed eyes. I knew there wasn't much time, so without hesitation I threw my legs off the side of my bed and stood on my feet.
The moment my feet touched the floor, I cringed and screeched as I gripped my skull with my eyes sealed shut. It felt like a fault line appeared right down the middle of it. But then a single scene played out in my mind unwillingly.
"Tomorrow you will see the truth. And when you do, there will be something gained and something lost. Whatever that may be will be up to you. But just know there is no going back, ok?" a woman in a long white dress said.
I nodded, and sighed. "But what if I make the wrong decision?" I asked. I turned away with my head facing a small village, all its people still asleep. Then I turned to look behind the woman and saw nothing of the rocky hellscape that I had grown up in.
The woman smiled, and placed a hand on my shoulder. She lifted one of her large feathery wings, and wrapped it around me to drag me into her. Suddenly, I was softly in her warming embrace like that of all the most comforting clouds themselves. "Matt, I've told you that there is no right or wrong decision. Because it's whatever your heart tells you is true."
I shook my head. "Why can't my heart just stop, and let me think? I get the two confused, and I was taught to follow my mind and not my heart. How do I know which is the one doing the talking?!"
"You never follow your mind, for it lies. Instead you feel for something else. Whatever comes to you first in a decision is your heart. When you get the idea that you should challenge your decision, and something tells you that it isn't right, THAT is your mind talking."
"So go with what I feel?" I asked.
"Yes, Matt," she replied. She unwrapped her wing, and bent down in front of me. "I won't choose for you. This is YOUR decision, and......." She poked me where my heart was softly. "You need to believe it's right."
Suddenly, the entire scene faded to white, and there was a loud ring. My eyes shot open, and there I stood once again in my room, no longer in a cringe. I sighed. "Thank you, Mistress Mara... I just........... I..........." I shook my head.
Don't bother saying anything. You won't be able to find the words... I thought to myself.
I began to sloppily make my way to the clothes that lay on the edge of my small bed. Without stopping, I scooped them into my right arm and walked to the bathroom door in steps that made a two year old child look impressive when they walked. And the moment I tore open the door, I saw nothing but a man who had slept the whole night away yet slept for not a minute.
I let the clothes fall to the floor, and turned on the cold water for the sink. I splashed my face with it, and rubbed my narrow blue eyes until I could open them completely, only to see my brown hair as though I stuck my thumb in an electrical socket. But what could I have suspected when I felt like my feathery bed was a brick, and my fluffy blanket was sandpaper.
"Happy sixteenth birthday to me..." I muttered as I pulled off my grey night shirt and black night shorts. "The day where I'll choose my side. My life... And the day where I'll be shunned by someone but loved by another." I reached for a white tee shirt, and light grey cargo pants that I had placed onto the floor, and dressed myself in them quickly. They seemed to match the light color of my skin, but I knew they'd never match the colors of the outside village.
To finish off my look, I took my hands and flattened out my hair.
No time for a shower this morning. I said to myself as I turned and walked out of the bathroom.
Slowly I made my way to the bottom of the steps which just lead to a front door with white sandals at the bottom step. I stopped half way down it, and sucked in a deep breath, then closed my eyes and walked until I felt the sandals, and shoved my feet into them as comfortably as I could, then reached for the doorknob and pulled it open.
Instantly, I heard the shouting of market people out on the streets, and bells ringing and countless voices.
"Twenty dollars for this sack of potatoes!!! Freshly grown in a farm on the grassy lands!!!" a woman called out.
I opened my eyes to see a woman right beside my house on a ground made of black rocks, and she held a sack of potatoes. They were a delicacy around here because in order to grow them, one had to cross over to the grassy side of the mountains which was too close to Elden Village, the rivals of this lonely place for millions of years to come.
Suddenly, all fell silent. I groaned, and rubbed my eyes, then looked up and beyond a spiky stalactite that grew out of the ground, only to find hundreds of eyes on me.
Word got around... I thought. It was so ominous to hear only birds flying around and tweeting in the sky.
"It's Matt!!" someone called out.
A man gasped, and covered his mouth. "Today is Choosing Day!!" he shouted, though it was muffled.
"Choosing day?" someone asked.
At that moment, all heads turned, and the hundreds of voices began to rise again in mutters and whispers that I couldn't have cared less about making out.
My eyes shifted to the sky, which was bright and blue, but it had a few thick clouds that danced across it. A flock of blackbirds flew overhead, and disappeared out of my range of sight. The sun had risen a substantial amount, and was above the trees.
"It's time to go make a decision!" someone said.
I jumped, and gasped, and my eyes shot open as wide as they possibly could go as I gripped my heart and felt it breaking through my skin and bone with each beat. "Lord Raven!" I barely managed to say. I brought my hand down to my side, and attempted to catch my breath. At least I was fully awake after that.
Suddenly, a man with thick black armor stood, so tall that he put a tree to shame. His silver hair was messier than mine was just minutes ago, and his narrow blue eyes with slits for pupils peered down into my mind, which was blank in panic. And, like everyone else but me, his slightly darkened skin stood out against the rising sun.
Lord Raven held a hand out to me. "You are to follow me into the valley where the rock and the grassland meet, and where your sacrifice will be placed upon the altar of your destiny. Take my hand for either the first ride of many, or possibly the final one you shall ever have alongside me as a friend."
I looked up at him hesitantly. "But can't I--"
"There is not a moment you may misuse. The decision must be made before the sun reaches its peak in the sky for the day. So follow me into the valley, dear Matt."
With a heavy sigh, I lifted my hand up and placed it into his. Suddenly, a swirling black vortex appeared behind Lord Raven. And from it, a horse let out a strange sound, and galloped out onto the bumpy rock grounds behind him. The portal closed.
Lord Raven turned, and placed a foot in the stirrup on the saddle, and pulled himself up onto the horse. With his brute strength, he yanked me up onto the back of the horse itself, and let go of my hand and grabbed a brown reins with it.
I gulped, and my heart still beat hard, but not fast. My eyes had narrowed yet again a little, but the fear was still there.
Lord Raven pulled the reins on the horse, and turned it down a long narrowed pathway with occasional stalactites on it, and it was all surrounded by a valley of dead trees and plants. He kicked the horse softly, and let it storm off.
"H..... have I seen this place before?" I asked. "On my travels to Elden?"
Lord Raven shook his head. "Never. For this place is one seen only by those of age, and the location is untold, only shown," he replied.
I nodded. "And both you and Mistress Mara will be there, correct?"
"Well the ceremony is to see which kind you heart resides with. So what would be the point in it if she were not there?"
I stopped talking there. I said and did nothing at all, except for look at the tall valley that stretched on and on and on with nothing but dirt and stumps and withered plants everywhere I looked. My ears drew in to the sound of tapping and clanging hoofs on the hardened ground.
Suddenly, we took a turn in to the dead valley itself, and began to kick up dust and dirt. And it seemed like we rode on for forever and ever. So long that I lost track of the time.
After many many minutes, I began to see a few plants that lived within all the death and destruction of where I was from. Flowers and small green weeds that stuck between branches and twigs. And in another minute, I saw grass that began to grow. I raised an eyebrow, and as another minute passed by, I turned my head and saw a full field not too far ahead, where two strangely shaped pillars stood with a sword in the ground.
"Do you have a choice in mind?" Lord Raven asked. "I have been bound by ancient traditions to convince you to stay, however if you leave, then it is your life and it is under your control."
I shook my head. "I haven't been able to make up my mind yet..." I said quietly.
"Be strong. My sister chose to join the Elden Village and their kind, and she was born with the heritage of the first Blackbird descendants like me," Lord Raven said.
I sucked in a breath, and sighed. "I'm just scared that I'll make the wrong decision..."
"Mind or heart. Whichever you believe speaks the truth, then follow it. Whichever you believe whispers lies you must deny. That is the only way to success."
We came to a stop, and the horse let out a sound again and bucked. When it stopped and landed on both feet, Lord Raven hopped off, and helped me down onto the ground where deadlands and grasslands met in an intersection.
Suddenly, I looked over to the deadlands side where a tall, narrow black stone stood with the symbol for the Blackbird Village. Then on the side where there was pure grass, ever so fresh and bright, a white stone of the same kind stood with the symbol for the Elden Village engraved on it. And between the two, the sword stood in the ground.
"I'm here!" someone called out.
I looked up, only to see a woman with a white dress, long curly blond hair, and narrow silver eyes, and large feathery white wings. She looked exasperated. "Lord Rave, is he prepared?" She stood up straight, and looked down at me.
"Yes he is, Mistress Mara," he replied. "Matt, you must now choose a side. Walk to the sword, and drive it through the altar of your choice, then leave the print of your hand on the top of it. But choose wisely as this will never be able to be changed."
I gulped, and my eyes widened. I held back the urge to pant, and everything began to tremble. But slowly, I made my way to the sword and gripped it with both hands and dragged its short blade out of the ground.
Suddenly, I stood and looked at the two altars, the place to jam the sword into them both tempting me. And once again, my heart began to race faster than my mind.
"If you stay then you can live life without punishment. All thoughts can rule you, and you may remain fearless with simplicity," Lord Raven tempted me.
"But if you join the Elden Village, you will finally belong, and you will be loved," Mistress Mara stated. "You will finally fit in, and you can live life with a heart of purity and happiness in the light with good people who are just like you. You can help them and they will help you, and everything will fall into place."
Out of nowhere, I began to sweat. My world began to spin, and I gritted my teeth and continued to look back and forth between the two altars. The sword became sweaty in my hand, and began to slip slowly.
I looked over at Lord Raven, and then the black altar. Then I looked over at Mistress Mara and the white altar. Then something hit me. And it was a strange feeling. Something that balled up in my chest, but in a good way. Sort of like a pain but one that didn't hurt. And instantly everything froze and I stared straight ahead at the white altar. Slowly, I lifted my sword and walked forward toward the land of grass and light, and lifted it up high. Then, with my focus placed on the hole, I closed my eyes tightly and rushed it through there. Everything began to glow, and I raised one hand up to reach the top of the altar and placed my free hand on it.
Suddenly everything began to change. I felt something heavy on my back, but something light in my heart. Something light in my soul. And then I felt myself land in two hands.
"You made the right choice," they said. "You followed your heart, Matt. You got my message."
I cracked a smile. "You were right. My heart WASN'T silenced, but instead awakened. And now I see what's right, and what's wrong. There is no longer a silence in my heart..."
And that was how I learned that the heart was always right. And to ignore it was to deny truth and purity. For no right and wrong can exist without both the heart and mind. So silence the one that whispers the lies, and let the one that whispers truths sing to your soul.
If there were silence within our hearts, then our minds would rule all and we would never know right from wrong.
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