The Bottled Spirit and the Entitled Youth

Inspired by Grimm’s tale 'The Spirit in the Glass Bottle'

The telltale rustle of movement overhead penetrated the ground and roused me from my stupor. “Let me out! Let me out!” I screamed as I always did on the rare occasions when I thought there might be a living being nearby.

A moment later a response came. “Where are you?” The voice was barely audible through the layers of my prison. But it was a voice at last!

“I am here down among the roots of the oak tree. Let me out!”

Then I began to hear the blessed sound of earth being moved. How long had I waited for a chance at freedom? The scraping grew louder, closer and then the eternal darkness parted as spears of daylight penetrated the ancient dirt crusted glass.

“What the hell,” the voice said. A human hand gripped my bottle and lifted it free of the earthen tomb. The owner of the voice possessed a pair of brown eyes that studied me from a youthful male face.

“Let me out! Let me out!” I continued to shout as I dashed about the inside of my bottle and bounced off the enchanted glass. The youth held the bottle up to the sunlight, twisted it, shook it, tipped it upside down and finally shrugged and pulled the cork from the bottle neck.

Warm forest air rushed in as I rushed out. I ascended and began to grow and grow until I towered before the youth in my largest most terrifying form. Whole villages have run from my monstrous size and horrifying visage. Kings have cowered at my feet. But this boy merely stood looking up at me with his head tilted quizzically to the side. “What are you, some kinda genie?” he asked.

“Who is this genie of which thou speaketh? I am the mighty Mercurius,” I boomed in a voice that has caused ladies to collapse in a faint.

“A genie, you know. Lives in a bottle. Grants wishes,” as he spoke, he retrieved a thin black box from a concealed pouch on his person and poked at it. When he turned the box to face me, I saw a small blue man with an enormous smile flying around inside.

In spite of myself, I took a step back with a gasp, then bent forward for a closer look. This boy must be a sorcerer with his own spirit trap. But the box appeared to contain an entire world so big that his captive did not seem to be aware that he was imprisoned. “What wizardry is this? How dost thou hold so much in a trap so small?”

“It’s just the internet, dude,” the boy said tucking his magic box away.

“What language dost thou speak?” I asked with a mix of awe and confusion.

The youth scoffed. “English, same as you. Sort of.”

I took a moment to observe the young wizard, his manner of dress was very strange. His shirt bore a kind of scrawled writing across the chest. The lettering had been drawn with ink that had dried to a smooth liquid sheen and was a vibrant shade of green I had never before seen. Upon his feet were boots that encased the foot only and provided no support above the ankles yet somehow remained securely attached with narrow ropes tied in a bow. “What type of leather dost thou use to construct thy boots?”

“Nobody makes their own shoes anymore, bro,” the boy held one foot forward to better display his unusual footwear to me. “These came from some factory in China.”

“I did not knowest oriental savages possessed such cobbling skill.”

“Oh...kay…,” the youth said. “So, what about those wishes? I released you from the bottle, I get something in return, right?”

Many of the words this unusual youth spoke were unknown to me, but I surmised that he expected my thanks in the form of payment. His expression of greed did have the effect of drawing me from my regrettable distracted state. “I will tell thee what thy wages are for having let me out. Death shall be thy reward for I must strangle thee!”

“What? Why?” My declaration of intent to end the youth’s life did not elicit the reaction I had anticipated. He seemed disappointed and genuinely confused in the face of his certain death, but not properly afraid.

“Dost thou think I was shut up in the glass prison as a favor? No, it was a punishment. I am the immortal evil spirit, scourge of nations, feared by humanity,” I boasted. “Dost thou not recognize me? Whoso ever releases me, him must I strangle!”

“Hold up,” answered the youth. “I let you out of the bottle. Killing me is hardly a reasonable response.”

“Freed from entombment but not yet free. Strangle thee I must in order to take my leave.”

“Come on, man, you can just fly away.”

Was it possible that this sorcerer who possessed a box containing a world did not know the rules of releasing a spirit? Did he truly not know that when he opened my prison, I became enslaved to him? Perhaps bound spirits had become so infrequent that the tales were no longer shared among the trade and knowledge of my kind had been lost to humanity. “Dost thou truly not know what I am?” I asked with incredulity. “I am the great...”

“Mercutio, right.”

“Mercurious!”

“Whatever. Listen, I’m not even convinced that you are the one I let out of the bottle,” the boy said.

“Surely thou art jesting,” I growled with laughter. “No other is here besides thou and me. Twas not thee who came from the bottle so it must have been I.”

“I don’t know, man,” the boy lifted my former prison above his head. “You are huge. I don’t think you can even fit in here. And if you weren’t the one shut up in this bottle then you have no claim on my life.”

“Twas I!” I shouted then rolled my eyes skyward, exasperated by the ignorance of humans. It was then that my gaze caught upon the landscape surrounding me. The oak tree under which I had been buried was huge and ancient, one in a forest of many others of similar stature. The trees resided atop a swell of a hill and beyond and below, the land was flat and void of trees. And spread across the land, to the farthest edge of my vision, stood a village of castles unlike any castles I’d ever seen before. They were shod in armor plating and sheets of glass that sparkled like jewels beneath the sun. Some of them were topped with spires as if they were jousting the clouds. Others belched columns of dragon breath into the sky.

“Then prove it,” I heard the boy say through my wonder. “If you can get back in, I’ll believe you and then you can do what you need to do.”

“Very well,” I answered tearing my eyes from the castle village. “It is a trifling feat thou asks.”

I drew myself together, shrinking as small and slender as I had been when first I encountered the lad. Back through the neck of the bottle I slid. But even before I had settled and turned to voice the triumph of my accomplishment the boy had thrust the cork back into the opening and returned the bottle to the depression among the tree roots where he had found it.

Feeling very much the fool for having been so easily and thoroughly tricked and betrayed, I began to beg. “Wait, my lord. Please, do let me back out.”

The boy huffed a laugh. “No,” he said as he crouched and pushed a handful of earth over the glass. “You said you were gonna kill me. I’m not gonna let you out again.”

The dirt blocked the light. I had been near to freedom so briefly and did not wish to be thrust back into the silent darkness. In my desperation, I offered the boy a boon. “If thou wilt set me free,” I bargained, “I will give thee gifts.”

“I know, the gift of death,” the boy said and continued to seal me in the ground.

“No, no,” I promised. “I will do thee no harm, but will reward thee richly.”

“You’re lying,” the boy said. “We have a saying that you’ve probably never heard that goes ‘fool me once, shame on you; fool me twice, shame on me’.”

“I do not understand thee,” I cried suspecting that the boy was nearly finished with his task and fearing he would soon leave me.

“It means I’m not an idiot. You were going to kill me before; no reason you won’t kill me still if I let you out again. Nothing has change except your words.”

“Yes, yes! My word! Among my kind a promise once spoken cannot be reneged.”

“And you promised to strangle me,” replied the infuriating youth. “Look, I gotta go, man. My dad’s waiting for me back at our campsite.”

Truly the lad did not understand the bond we now shared, that would be broken only by his death or his grant of my freedom. Never before had a human willingly offered a bound spirit freedom, but if this youth was unaware of his mastery over me then perhaps, I would be able to convince him to release me rather than kill him.

“I promise I will not strangle thee,” I shouted, and it became a bond.

“And my reward?” the boy asked after a moment of silence.

I thought frantically to devise a bribe that this entitled youth would value enough to exchange for my release. Clearly a great length of time had passed since last I roamed among the humans, but surely health and wealth were desirable in any era. “I shalt give to thee the means to heal all wounds and turn iron or steel into silver,” I offered.

“Only silver, huh?” was his response.

The greed and arrogance of this boy rivaled that of the mightiest tyrant I had ever bested. “The finest, purest silver,” I assured. “Thou houses are made of steel, thy must have an abundance. Thou wilt be wealthy beyond thy dreams.”

“And you won’t kill me.”

“I already promised I would not!” I shouted in frustration before recalling that I was once more trapped underground and at the mercy of this petulant youth.

“You promised not to strangle me. There are other ways to do the job. I’m pre-law, pal.” Were I not fully enraged I would likely have been impressed by the lad’s skill in the art of bargaining.

“I promise not to kill thee by any method. I will not harm thee in any way. Let me out!”

The sound of earth being scraped once again was like music. And once again daylight permeated my bottle trap. The youth picked it up and stared at the tiny version of me within. He did not move to extract the cork but merely looked at me. I presumed he was mentally reviewing the terms of our contract, looking for tricks.

“Dost thou not feel the weight of the promise I have given, the heft of the magic that will enforce the words?” I asked him. To me, the vows made felt as chains attaching me to the youth.

This seemed to tip the balance of the boy’s decision in my favor for he finally uncorked the bottle. Again, I poured from the container and grew twice the height of the human before me although now slightly smaller than I had been before. The boy would not be able to perceive the difference, but I could feel the missing bit. A necessary sacrifice to fulfill the contract and interact with the mortal world. It was only a slightly greater forfeit than would have been required to place my hands around his throat and squeeze the breath from him. In my hand now was a cloth; white on one side, gray on the other.

“Now thou shalt have thy reward,” I said offering the cloth to the youth. “If thou spreadest the white side over a wound it will heal, and if thou rubbest steel or iron with the other side it will be changed to silver.”

The boy took the cloth and eyed it with skepticism.

“Is thou satisfied with thy reward? Wilt thou release me?” I attempted.

“We’ll see,” he said, set my glass bottle prison aside and picked up the hatchet that leaned against the oak tree. With a wide mighty swing he buried the hatchet head into the trunk of the old oak. When he withdrew the ax blade, a deep gash remained. Then he covered the damage with the white side of the cloth and when again it was removed, the bark was repaired.

“Tis as agreed,” I said. My attention drifted again beyond the trees to the iron village. “How is it that thou village is not but opulent castles?” I could not resist asking.

“We call them cities and those are just big buildings; we don’t have castles in this country,” the boy replied as he settled into a seated position beneath the previously maimed oak. “How long have you been in that bottle?”

“How long indeed,” I muttered. To the youth I said, “Time has little meaning to an immortal spirit.”

“I’d guess at least a couple hundred years based on the goofy way you talk. Or are immortal spirits just incapable of change?”

The youth now rubbed the hatchet head with the gray side of the cloth. Where the material contacted, the dull steel turned to shining silver. When finished polishing the hatchet, the youth stood and again swung the tool at the tree trunk, but this time the thin cutting edge twisted and bent and barely made a mark in the tough bark.

“Silver as promised,” I said with inexplicable pride. “Thy reward for my release has been given.”

“So it has,” the boy said although his attention remained on the changed hatchet, a contented smile played about his lips.

“May thou liveth in great health and wealth, young sorcerer. Am I now free to take my leave?”

“Yeah,” he said without a glance in my direction.

“Thou must sayeth the words,” I said hesitantly for the weight of the bonds remained heavy. One prevented my departure from my master’s side; another prevented me from killing him.

The boy tilted his head back to look up at me. His youthful face bore a mischievous smirk. Had I misjudged the boy’s knowledge of spirits? Had he trapped me at his side forever granting his requests, giving away pieces of myself until so little remained that my being would disappear?

“Genie, you’re free,” he said with a laugh and the invisible chain between us was no more.

“I thank thee,” I said to the youth and turned toward the iron castles that were not castles. I walked down the hill because I had not walked anywhere in a very long time. I shrunk my body down to normal human size and donned a guise inspired by the strange clothing worn by my young master. I did not like to leave the enchanted bottle behind for in the right hands it would be a powerful artifact. But I was not certain that the right hands existed any longer. The boy would take his silver hatchet and magical cloth and forget the bottle. And while it could not be destroyed by force or time, it would lie harmless and ignored on the forest floor. And as my gaze remained fixed upon the village that was not a village before me, I contemplated the adventures to be had by the great and terrible Mercurius in this world.