Shadows fell upon the city as Mordred walked through dingy streets. Unlike the inner city that shone with light, the outer city had to make do with sparsely placed street lights, of which only a handful worked on any street. Small islands of light were surrounded by a sea of darkness.
The city was as unpredictable at night as a forest. Though the streets promised the sanctuary of light, the next darkened alleyway might well hide a group of thieves, murderers, or worse. As frustrated as Mordred was, he cared little for such considerations. Solitary figures passed him by, clutching their obscuring cloaks about them.
For all the uncertainty of this city caught in shadows, it was more honest than in daytime. In day, people wandered through the streets in crowds, neither knowing nor caring who they walked with. They were one in the sense that rocks falling in a landslide or droplets raining upon an ocean were one. No matter how many faces one saw, they all blended into one form, the cosmopolitan man. Everyone in a crowd was anonymous, even as hundreds of eyes gazed upon them. It was an illusion of belonging, a grand masquerade.
Night was different. The city revealed its true face as a realm that nobody controlled. Men lit lights, trembling in fear of the darkness where predators stalked. When few men walked the streets, what greater entity could you claim to be part of? One was but a small creeping beast within a forest of stone and steel. Was there an artificial union with the cloaked strangers one passes by? No, the masquerade of civilization ended in the darkness. One walks alone in a city of isolated individuals. No one will be there when you need them.
Mordred stopped at the glass window of a shop. The reflected image was barely illuminated by the street lamp across the street, more shadow than corporeal form. He was fae and man, trapped in between. Both were united in one truth, that existence was akin to the Otherpaths, fleeting and changing in every moment. When he moved, the figure in the window made the same movement on the opposite side. If he raised his right hand, the figure in the window raised the left. The one who mimicked reality always got it backwards, misinterpreting the source of its motion. What a sad fate the man in the window had, ever bound in ignorance by laws he could not understand. Or perhaps the man in the window was convinced he was right, always taking the motion of another and doing the opposite in mockery. Malice and ignorance produced the same effect. Always the opposite.
Mordred turned away. He had no more time for the man in the window. The walk took him through a maze of houses, shops, bridges, and alleyways. As he walked over a bridge, he looked down into the canal. His reflection looked up at him, illuminated by the cool light of the Traveling Moons. Just as the works of man held his reflection, so too did nature in the controlled channels man forced it into. He dropped a stone into the water, distorting his reflection with ripples. Clouds hid the moons, casting a shadow on whatever image reformed in the water. When the sun or moons lit the world, what was visible danced before their rays, changing as the world decreed. Yet, when a black sun rose in one’s heart, the self shone, banishing the illusions of the world.
He stood absolutely still and stared at the water. When no force of change acted upon the mirror, nothing broke the illusion that reflection and reality portrayed the same thing. The moment he moved, the reflection changed to the opposite of his will. No matter how the world veiled his reflection in shadows, the mirror was always there.
His mind turned to Anatha and Aradin. Though the world around them changed and shifted, they were solid and unchanging, eternal mountains in a storm. What a contrast to his own people. Humans lived in a world of change, yet the fae were ever changing, or perhaps ever stagnating. Would he seek truth from a world of smoke and fog? Such clouds between matter and shadow would always evade his hand, no matter how tightly he grasped. What am I looking for; some future to come and define me? No, that is to grasp after a false image of being. Learn the lesson of the Grail Knight. Why wait? Know yourself.
Kotharian Lightning 