The Storyteller - Chapter 22

The Storyteller

A Novel

By Paul McCann

Chapter 22

The Mermaids Crown

In the silent refection on the hill by Edensgrove he thought about his life and the calling to be a storyteller . He didn’t mind the cold so much as he was well used to walking around the countryside rain , hail or shine . His connection to the land aand its people was an inheritance he was born with . Unrehearsed and unique were the stories that came to him with a constant flow . For him , it was easy to catch stories that came frequently . He would explain the process like a fisherman who would cast in a line and pull out a fish . The river came from heaven it was filled with the stories of life . On the banks of the river , wild flowers grew with the seeds  of wisdom and knowledge as butterflies danced in the sunlight from flower to flower , waiting to seize a moment in time to bring some colour to the world .

The storyteller had many gifts and spoke with the authority of a mighty commander and his voice could conjure up the sounds of life using noises of animals and birds

howling winds and pouring pain . His stories were as old as the hills and came from a time when fairies dwelled all over the land . He spoke of  legends that would never grow old in a land where standing stones talked around magic fairy rings in green pastures of peace . The innocence of the people was the magic ingredient / For them the stories were and they saw his dreams like colourful pictures in their minds .

.It was almost time to begin as the half light fell down around . It was that time of the year when the long twilight was happening . The people of Edensgrove had been informed that the storyteller would be there that night . Then and there he heard the laugher of children approaching followed by adult voices . They all arrived together and someone in the crowd shouted out .

“Hello storyteller . You’re very welcome here “

All of the children sat around the storyteller in a circle with their parents sitting around them in an outer circle . The children screamed ,.

“Tell us the story about oceans. ”

Said one of the children .

The storyteller closed his eyes and thought for a moment then he took a deep breath and with a soft whisper he said  .   

“Well  then let me see , ah yes, that’s right “

The little children moved a little bit closer so they could hear . They all listened intently.as he began to speak

“The waters of life had tumbled out of the sky and filled all the rivers and streams , that rushed out to the  great oceans that rose and fell back to the shore to claim the valleys and plains only to be found again at a later time by those who had survived the flood over the earth .,  Villages and farms that once been there had sunk down into the bogs . At a later time a hand crafted jeweller by the name of Desiman had come searching for something that been either lost and or washed away during the flood . The story unfolded about an ancient crown that belonged to a mermaid creature who was Queen of the sea . She lived on the island of dreams and when the flood came it was said her crown was lost and ended up somewhere on our land,

Her crown hols the key to her magical powers and until it is returned to her head she remains a prisoner of time unable to swim the oceans around the earth . So the Desiman the jeweller has been searching for her crown for many years for two reasons . To make a replica of the crown as well as to return it to her so she can once be empowered to use her magical powers to control the oceans of the earth and to keep safe all the lands from further flood and harm. “

“How long has Desiman been searching for the mermaids crown ?”

One of the children asked ,.

“He has been just biding time for 40 years now in search for the crown . He lives in a small house in Glengarrath just along by Lord Bantry's walls , in the woods itself .

I myself spent some time with him there watching him drawing and identifying wild flowers and examining  their extraordinary wealth of biological material . He often goes wandering round looking at the standing stones and other ancient sites .  . Here in this place he discovered one of the oldest copper mines known to man . All through West Cork the quartz rock is shot through with this beautiful green copper and he believes that somewhere nearby lies the mermaids  crown .  He has been digging the hillsides for the past thirty years and the people who live there have become aware of his work and the significance of the find if he should find the mermaids crown . The landscape around West Cork and Kerry is desolate and you'd often find yourself walking into bogs . In his digging there he has found lumps of trees and bark and pine and stuff . Then he realised that at one time that place had been deforested for manufacturing bronze and copper, as it takes many tons of wood to produce a couple of kilos of copper ore . Desiman has an understanding of the bogs . Recently he found some treasures that were unearthed with his digging  around the Boglands . He found some designs and patterns on some of these treasures that he was able to use making his hand made Celtic jewellery . “

“Where did these treasures come from ?

Someone in the audience asked

“As we all know a lot of our fields fell into a bog about five thousand years ago when the neolithic farmers also lost enormous tracks of land due to floods and as I dug down six or seven feet I found entire farms had been buried beneath the bog .
Some of the buildings had been impacted but not the metal work and in particular the treasures that I'm after were kept intact . They are masterpieces of the Celtic church as well as some secular pieces made from the forming of the metal or what's called the chip faceting that early metal smiths used at the fall of the Roman Empire in 540 AD . It was called kirptsnit wood carving that the was incorporated into wax because one of the greatest food sources was of course honey and a by-product of honey was wax and that’s when Desiman’s found a carving in wax that told the story of the lost mermaids crown and from that day he has spent all his life in search for that crown “

“So what will happen if he finds the crown “

“Well that's the gift , you see as he will inherit all of the treasures of the oceans . That’s is what was written and you can just imagine the great wealth that would be his . The oceans have held captive unseen treasures for thousands of years and it would all belong to the one who would find and return the mermaids crown. “

“How will he give it the crown to the mermaid if he finds it ?“

Asked another child .

“ There is a scroll that he found in an underground cave with a map that’s shows a passage within a mountain nearby that goes to the island of dreams . The map is in the hands of the jeweller and he alone has the directions of where to go to return the lost crown “

“Can he return from the island of dreams ?”

Another child asked .

“ As far as I know there is a bridge between the island of dreams and this land where we live . Only the one who has returned the crown is allowed to walk across that bridge . “

The storyteller stopped talking and looked around at all the little children who were starting to get sleepy .Then he gently raised his arms in the air and said,

“If you see the stars align and form the shape of a crown in the sky then you will know that the Queen of the sea has her crown back ”

The parents and children all applauded .and one by one they made their way back into the village . The storyteller was offered a room with a bed to spend the night . He followed the crown into the village and was shown the home where to go . He went there through the open door and closed it after he entered then he got ready for bed .He looked out the window of the cottage at the stars in the sky that seemed to be forming a pattern of shinning spirals like an artwork of silent expressions in the universe  for all the earth to see.

He went to the bed and lay down whispering ,

“Creation is the art work of a great jeweller in the sky who makes everything shine for all time .  Indeed it really is masterpiece of perfection “

End Of Chapter 22

The Storyteller

link to chapter 23

https://www.abctales.com/story/mcscraic/storyteller-chapter-23

by Paul McCann