Wesley Britton's Blog - Posts Tagged "metaphysical-visionary"

This morning, it dawned on me that posting something fresh every day here is really overdoing it. So, as of today, I’m going to try to keep to a Tuesday, Thursday schedule unless I have special announcements I want to share in between. After all, a fifth book is coming . . .

Returning to my character descriptions from The Blind Alien, I thought it time you meet the very unusual Doret Galess, the mutant dwarf initiate “Dream Guesser” of a unique religious school.

For a little set-up, the following scene takes place after Tribe Renbourn has suffered a series of painful trials. After the catastrophe in Bergarten, the Balnakin government openly encouraged its citizens to seek out and kill the alien from Alpha-Earth. They extorted the rights to all of Malcolm Renbourn’s books as partial compensation for the horrible pit that destroyed much of Bergarten. As a result of all this, Dr. Malcolm Renbourn suffered a near fatal heart attack. Tormented for the role she feared she played in all that, Bar Tine Renbourn left the tribe.

So the extremely talkative Helprim Annijol Hod, Malcolm’s heart doctor, thought it wise to bring a spiritual healer to the tribe. Here’s that first encounter where you’ll not only meet Doret but read many insights into Tribe Renbourn as a whole.

Defining a few terms: “Hearthstone” is the name of the Renbourn home and estate. “Sojoa-sheets” are solar panels. “Togs” are clothes and “pravines” are wine-like alcoholic drinks.

While I’m thinking about it, remember The Blind Alien is currently on sale for 99 cents at Amazon. I have no idea how long that will last—

Most of this introduction is in Doret’s voice with a few observations from Alnenia and Lorei Renbourn along the way:

Doret: I met the Renbourns one wet and humid day when I accompanied Annijol Hod on one of her trips to Hearthstone. She had told me much about their situation in her usual style, trying to prepare me for the experience. "You've been seeing them on the news for years," she said, "but films are flimsy Sojoa-sheets into their tribal soul. You have been reading up on their trials? Good. I knew you would. I predict you are in for the challenge of your young career. But I know you, young as you feel, are better equipped than any senior Hollow-Bone at Appool. You are limber enough still to be creative, intuitive, adaptable. This is no test for dry skols and formulaic lists, I promise. Did I tell you, yes, I'm sure I did. Here we are. Open your six senses, Initiate Galess.
You will sense much before you see a face. This will be a true test of your dream-Guessing skills."
Annijol spoke true. But one step out of her trans, I felt the aura-cloud hovering over this place. I looked to the sky and shivered. Before that moment, All I knew of evil was what I had studied — evil comes in currents, vibrations, in parasitic funguses and pollutions that scurry like crabs in sea mud.
I had heard this and read this. But I was young. I had touched or sensed it not in my life. But there it was, unmistakable. Walking to the guest-arch of this gray house, I thought The untrained might have sensed the cloud as an invasion of resentful or angry spirits trapped in this world of matter. But even I knew this was an aura of dead ones not. It was a cloud of psychic despair.
Annijol was in full stride when we reached the door arch and a young woman answered her ring. "Ah Sari, how are things this day? You look not good. Is your face what all in the house wear? I thought so. Come Doret, you are here not a day too soon." I followed Annijol down a short hall and paused in the doorway as she went forward to a dining-table where most of the family sat. I scanned the room, focusing my aura-eye on a thin woman to my left. She was bending over very small children being herded into a room I saw not. She turned in our direction and smiled at me behind a veil of dry tears. I recognized her from the news films. This was Elsbeth. Yes, she was wife and mother and nurturer by birth.
I then looked at the table and scanned the seated group. First was Joline, the sad beauty whose spirit-womb ached. She was with child, but the child was her affliction not. Next to her sat the tight-lipped and determined Alnenia. Yes, she was solid, brash, an anchor. I could see the Husband not through Annijol blocking my vision as she stood by the other woman whose back was to me. From the long brown hair, I presumed she was Lorei. I keenly awaited sensing her presence. One was missing, the Balnakin slave. So I listened and heard Annijol talk, a strange, clear voice in the atmosphere of grief.
"What mean you, gone?" Annijol sat heavily by Lorei and I finally saw the side of the unsighted's face as she turned to speak to Annijol. Oh yes, I sensed her gifts even from this distance. Raw, untrained, unschooled, but unmistakable. A priestess by birth and inclination. I moved forward and stood by Annijol, noticing Elsbeth coming to join her clan. I heard, or rather, heard not, one remarkable occurrence. Annijol was silent.
After a long pause, Annijol collected herself and said, "I sorry. I have no words." Then, she remembered. "Perhaps the friend I told you about arrives on the very day she is most needed." She turned to me and offered me the chair next to her. "This is Doret Galess, a Hollow-Bone from the Appool Ordinum. She is not only trained in spiritual and mental understandings, she was raised in that Seminary from birth. Introduce yourself, Doret. Give these Renbourns something to hear that will distract them from their bad news. I presume you heard. One of their Sisterhood has departed. A spoke of their family wheel is broken."
I looked over the faces and saw Malcolm for the first time. I had to hold back my surprise. His aura was incredibly intense, filled with vibrating colors from the entire spectrum. But there was more. A separate unseen aura was beside him but not in him. His Alpha god? Alien chemistries? It was as if all the auras I had ever sensed had been painted by one artist. A different creator had blended the alien's colors. I sensed that, like Lorei, there was a presence inside him of unique power. But his face told me he was unaware of such presences. Rather, he looked like a man too familiar with cages. He was a mind who had to calculate every thought, each action processed through layers of questions. He was a creature who had lost all instincts. I saw Alnenia
reach over and whisper in his ear. His eyebrows rose. I laughed.
"Alnenia Renbourn," I said, you need not whisper. Immediately I will tell our unsighted company that, yes, I am remarkably short. I expect Joline's legs are taller than I stand. Against most, I stand to the breasts. Still, I am twenty-six years of age. I am short because I was birthed from two parents who participated in an unsanctioned experiment to see if certain chemicals wetted to a fertilized egg might make male offspring more certain. I was the result. A perfect female in all ways. But one who will always wear children's togs. I know not who my parents were. I was a strange creation brought by one Icealt to the school, a little thing apparently no larger than a hand."
I smiled. "Like you, Doctor Renbourn, I am product of strange science. This is one reason Annijol felt I might be of special use here. I am, like you, familiar with being unique."

Alnenia: Looking at Doret that first day, I saw the quiet, certain compassion in her. I drew her story out while the others listened, I know, with only half minds. I intrigued to meet a woman abandoned by her parents at birth to a religious school where she grew up without other children around her. To grow up in prayer-cells and pravine-yards and libraries seemed a sad beginning in life. But I saw no sadness in the short one. She looked complete in herself, a soul with quiet waters in her womb.

Lorei: I gratefulled when Annijol rose and told Malcolm it be time for him to sit in the large-chair so she could examine his chest. As they walked to the other side of the room, Annijol still offering quiet consolations, I turned to Doret and asked, "So what be the help you believe you can offer us?"

Doret: In some moments, I can feel Lorei's strength and it almost drops me to my knees. Perhaps I am too attuned to such waves. Perhaps, no, I certain, that in some moments her Olos-force is beyond anyone I have known. On that first day, I knew the source of her terrible grief and how this shaped her aura. This was a family of extraordinary shared power, tightly inter-woven auras, survivors of incredible adversity. When Annijol had promised me a challenge, she spoke half-truth. This tribe was self-aware, knowledgeable, and so unique I could share not simple consolations. I looked at the man and one list leaped to my mind — "If you can find bearings not, make no short-cuts through the trees. Any explorer knows — return to your starting place instead." But I felt unprepared, unable to reach into my toolbag of skols and phrases and techniques to grab ahold of a starting point. After all, this alien, well, his starting place was another planet. And his starting place on my world had become as cursed a site as any in history. And many placed the curse on his brow.

Beta-Earth website:

https://drwesleybritton.com/

Author contact:

spywise@verizon.net

Strange as it might sound, I can point To very few specific literary influences on anything in the Beta-Earth Chronicles. However, in The Blood of Balnakin, I had one author very much in mind when I crafted one scene. That author was Anne Rice.

In particular, in Rice’s better books, and I can’t claim to have read much more than her Vampire Chronicles, her descriptive gifts are on full display. She does an amazing job of presenting the sweep of history with such a haunting, powerful, romantic, sensuous tone. If I were to point out my favorite scene showcasing these abilities, I’d choose the chapter in Servant of the Bones where we enter a cave of jewels that’s both beautiful and richly detailed.

Now, in no way do I claim the scene below imitates or emulates Rice’s style or depth. I’m not in her league. I don’t sound like her and am not trying to do so. Instead, while writing it, I thought it was, in a sense, a tribute to Rice. That’s because I wanted to encapsulate several millennia of history in a few pages with a Rice-like sweep with a large dose of mysticism.

To set the stage, the Mother-Icealt of Beta-Earth, who is housed in the Great-Ring-of-All-Domes in the island sanctuary of Nilexdra, offers an audience to Tribe Renbourn. For most of the Renbourn wives, this summons to meet the supreme priestess and oracle of their world is the opportunity of a lifetime. They realize her purpose is most likely to give her the chance to meet and assess their husband, the Alpha-Man, Dr. Malcolm Renbourn.

The women are correct. The Mother is keenly interested in checking out the one man on the planet whose auras are veiled from her mystical powers due to his other-world origins. As an alien, Malcolm isn’t connected to any of the flows of Olos, the name for both the planet and the goddess who protects it. The Mother determines Malcolm is flawed because of his fears and uncertainties, has important roles in celestial plans for the future whether he likes it or not, and is far, far from dangerous to her people.

The Mother then offers “full oracle” to the Renbourn wives—Elsbeth, Lorei, Joline, Alnenia, and Doret. Most of them meet privately with the Mother in her oracle cell and are given surprising visions into their futures.

But when Doret walks through the curtain for her blessing, the Mother asks her to share her time with her bond-sister, Lorei. That’s because both Doret and Lorei have their own powerful spiritual gifts and the Mother knows the three of them together can open paths never possible before.

To define a few terms: “Sojoa” is the Betan term for the sun which supposedly oversees masculine attributes. The “Sea-of-the-Lost-Moon” is a giant body of water filling what would be much of lower Europe and Asia on our planet. As far as anyone knows, it was indeed a lost moon that crashed there and created the sea before there was any recorded history.

“The Plague-With-No-Name” is the most important influence on Betan culture. Killing three out of four infant boys their first year, it’s the reason for the planet’s polygamy. No one knows its origins. Until now.

In Doret’s words:

As I closed my body-eyes, I felt the flow of interconnection in my mind. I lowered my head. At first, random thoughts floated uncontrolled in my consciousness. Then a flower with the face of Olos began to form, at first vague and detailed not, then a clear image of the goddess studying her child. I knew each of us saw the same image. Then, the flower-Olos stretched out two branches like human arms, and the astounding revelations began.

In a growing flood, images filled me, not of the future, but of distant pasts. I saw, heard, smelled, and touched the guttural-sounds of many, many men in the garb of mere unworked animal-skins. I saw them in paddle-boats on rivers which were true images of times before the plague. So many men, men stronger than women. Men in seated circles around log fires. Men and women roasting the meat of giant birds on the stone cooking platforms. Men and women stuffing simple boots with dry grass as insulation in the cold of ice and snow.

Then, I felt the shaking of the ground, the wail of wounded Olos, the gray cloud in the sky that blocked out Sojoa for so, so long. I, too, felt the shaking earth and ran into the caves and tunnels and spit up waters from my womb and peered into the gray and endless cloud of the angry god that circled Olos, Olos crawling in pain, her hand clutching the rip in her side. She gasped and choked and panted for her missing consort in the sky. Looking down from above, I saw the fissures and veins of splitting land sprouting in all directions cracking the skin of Our Mother. I saw the waves and waves of hot liquid rock and dirt pouring and falling from the mountains. I saw the corpses of the winged creatures that were never to fly again. I heard the howls and growls and cries of animals as they fled into lands new and frightening. I saw water harden and humans walking across seas without need of ships and boats.

As if time moved as fast as a waver picture, I saw the cloud loose its thickness as it became part of all-breathing. Then it faded into the soil and humans returned to the soaking rays and waves of Sojoa. I saw the ice melt, and old connections between tribes were lost to a wandering humanity who continued to search for game and food.

Then, I saw the first wailings as infants died in surprising numbers. I saw the burnings of women whose seed was determined rotten. I saw wives cast out who bore only daughters and were forced inland away from tribal ports. I saw infant girls buried in the sands. I saw the fleeings from the Old Continent when all-skins felt the disasters within their own colors. I saw old worships change when even Olos was branded the demon of our earth. I, too, crouched in my hut fearing the night visits of the imagined Red-Scarfed Plague-Maiden choosing which infants to spare. I saw the beginnings of skol writings and I saw the burnings of skols which told fearful stories. I saw time pass and a gentleness of regret fill migrating tribes who moved from sorrow to resignation to living as if no plague had ever been. Such histories, I knew, were lost in the fearing times when the Plague lost its name and became the mystery with no beginning. Nor end.

I saw how the jealousies and envies of many wives gave way to hope of inclusion and child-birth in tribal alliances. I saw how cultures began to shape themselves as if disconnected from all others. I saw the growth of the Domes and the reverence for Olos return as female nurture spread from home-cribs to all aspects of life. I saw the rises and falls of Lieges on all continents. Through all, I felt the flow of Olos in the fields and skies and waters.

The most puzzling image was of Olos herself standing by a red-brook, a red-sword in her hand. It was a stone-sword she had pulled from the ground but had nowhere to place it. I read her thoughts — the sword is drawn but where is the scabbard to put it to rest?

Then the images cleared and I was again kneeling in the small room with the Mother-Of-All. Lorei was on her knees beside me in deep tears. As was I.

"Plague with no name?" the Mother wailed, her hands gripping her throne. "No, now I see it! It was no Lost Moon who fell into Olos as if in need of her warmth! No, it was a moon of angry rock from far from Olos! A moon jealous of the life on Olos it could spawn not itself! An angry moon, a jealous moon that gave us the Sea we named after a lost moon! Cursed Moon that cursed Olos! And the waters that bear this plague and spread it lap against the shores of this holy island!"

We three said nothing for a time. We now knew of the pollution that infected the wombs and milk of the children of Olos. We knew the ways of prophecy and science had new work to begin.

---
Find out more in The Blood of Balnakin—The Beta-Earth Chronicles: Book 2
https://www.amazon.com/Blood-Balnakin...

The Blind Alien is still on sale for 99 cents!
https://www.amazon.com/Blind-Alien-Be...

Coming This Fall!

The Third Earth—The Beta-Earth Chronicles: Book 5
http://bmfiction.com/science-fiction/...