The Downside to Having a Power

           “Inroqua,”

The fire ring erupted into flames from dry wood. Ramses put away the book he had read the mysterious word from as it settled into a comfy campfire. He pulled up a seat across from Kira.

           “That’s really handy.”

           He dipped his head back and forth. “Yeah, it is. But before I had a favor, I could make a fire with just these two hands. So can you.”

           “Sure. I bet just speaking a fire into existence is a lot less effort than trying to build one with kindling and flint, though.”

           “True enough,” he scratched his chin, “But favor is … I don’t know, it’s helpful and harmful.”

           She peered at him quizzically. Favor came in all types and degrees from calling forth lightning to getting bread to rise without yeast. She knew of someone who could remember anything they read, another who could capture people’s conversations into bottles so they could listen to them later, and still another who talked with birds. “I always thought having a favor improved your life.”

           “It can. But sometimes it can hurt people or rip a family apart.” She dipped her eyes down to the fire at this thought. “I heard of this fella once,” he continued, “long time ago up in my town of Bergen. He had the amazing ability to copy things. Objects, I mean. He could take one coin and use his favor to turn it into two.”

           “Wow…” Kira breathed.

           “Incredible on the outside, right? But a lot of favors are limited or have a downside. Your friend, Hans, he can change the color of fire, but only fire. Not flowers or paint or food; only fire. Me, I can create fire from nothing, but only if I read from this book. And only from this book. I can’t even just say the word. I have to read the text or it doesn’t work.”

           “What if you lost the book?” Kira asked.

           “Exactly. My favor only works with this book so I might lose everything if I lose it.” He cleared his throat. “So, the multiply man, he started to become rich. People would pay him to copy things they already owned. Their best cow. A fishing boat. One girl was so crazy about two men that she asked him to copy herself so they could each have her.”

           “No way! Did it work?”

           “It did. Then they started paying him big money to copy things they couldn’t have. What if a neighbor wasn’t willing to sell a person their best hunting dog? They would just get a copy from the multiply man. Everyone was happy. People were lining up for him to use his favor. And for a time, life was good.”

           “What happened?”

           “Well, there was a downside, as there usually is. Typically, the bigger the favor the bigger the downside.” He leaned in. “All of a sudden, some things that he had copied started to disappear.”

           She breathed in, “How come?”

           “At first, they didn’t know why. People thought they were getting robbed. Some just believed that what they had was too good to be true. But eventually they went back to the multiply man. He had made their copies, so he must be the one who made them disappear.”

“I bet the villagers were mad.”

           “Really mad. But he couldn’t explain it. He said he hadn’t done anything that would have made things vanish. It wasn’t his fault. But here’s what they found out.”

           “It was his fault,” Kira guessed.

He nodded, “The richer he became the more reckless he was. If he liked a wagon or horse, he would copy it and have one for himself. Without even telling someone he’d done it. It left a lot of people confused because they thought their stuff was being stolen. He started to copy women that he liked but couldn’t have. Imagine the chaos! He was drunk all the time, he destroyed people’s property with no regard, and he would ignore the authorities when he broke the law. Whenever there was a problem, he would just throw money at it, money he had copied.”

           “But why were things disappearing?” she asked.

           “He constantly lied, about everything. He was a man who could make anything, right? What did he care about being honest? The truth didn’t matter because he could create his own truth. But that turned out to be the downside of his favor. With every lie he told, something he copied disappeared. And it started with the first things he copied and moved from there. That’s why no one noticed at first. He had started with some crops in his garden, a coin here and there. Nothing big that would attract attention. But then a sailboat he had copied for a man vanished from beneath the crew’s feet and dumped them into the sea. A person’s prized horse that they had doubled went missing. When people went to him for explanations guess what he did?”

           “He lied some more?”

           Ramses nodded, “He lied some more! And with those lies more things vanished. He was always copying money so the coins he had used to pay for things started disappearing from people’s homes. The more he lied, the poorer Bergen became. Less coin, cattle, boats. And then his own riches started disappearing. But the man couldn’t stop lying.”

           “What did they do?”

           He sighed, “It didn’t take long for the town to turn on him. They figured out what was going on and demanded he tell the truth from now on. They still wanted him to copy things, they just didn’t want it to disappear. But lying was so ingrained in his nature at that point. It was a habit; he couldn’t stop himself. Someone would ask a harmless question and he would casually lie about it. For no reason! Finally, the villagers had had enough.” Kira was on the edge of her seat. “They couldn’t have his favor around anymore wreaking havoc and they didn’t want him doing it all over again to some other town. So, did what they thought was necessary. They cut his tongue out so he couldn’t lie ever again.”

           She gasped, “His tongue?”

           He nodded. “For a little while there was peace. He tried to live a life without a voice, but he couldn’t. One day he disappeared too. No one ever saw him again. Some say he managed to tell another lie and he was the one who vanished this time.” She shook her head with wide eyes. “Bergen uses that story to teach little ones the dangers of lying. It might be a tale that someone made up, but…” He sighed, staring deep into the fire, “…stranger things have been true.”

           “So, you see,” he said, stretching and realizing it was getting late, “favor can be good, and it can be bad.”

           She shook her head, “His tongue. Wild.”