The Water Bearer

A girl stands at the bottom of a colossal elevation, her legs half-buried in snow. Her village is just around the corner of this eternal winter mountain, but she doesn’t harbour the nostalgia to visit them. She faces the terrifying, yet enticing clouds that coat the mountain, where the beyond the unclimbable storm is the boundary to the human world. It does not frighten her as it should- somehow she senses that the storm will part if she decides to enter. Entranced, she muses on the possibility of ascending it. Instead, a stern voice calls from behind her.

“Marbles!”

 She yelps in singsong apology and resumes her earlier struggle of threading through deep snow. Stumbling awkwardly in a heavy, fur coat, she reaches Invel with a sheepish smile. 

“Don’t lag behind,” he glances soberly over his shoulder, “You’ll get lost.”

She nods several times and jostles her satchel determinedly. Beneath a turbulent snowstorm, they walk across the frozen valley blindly. It takes her three, laborious strides to match his one, despite all the armour he’s wearing from the town’s treasury. Flakes swell around her, whisking her ashen braids loose. The snow seems to bury her faster than she can free her skinny legs. 

To gather some motivation, she focuses on Invel’s broad, silver back, where an ethereal sword shines luminously. Legend has it that the Sword of the Realm was forged from the sun itself. For centuries, many have charred vying to wield it, until this ordinary young man somehow crosses the boundary from his world into theirs. 

Marbles was the first to witness his calling. He had arrived several years before the Sword came to him, wandering along the mountain’s foot. He and Marbles accidentally found one another when he was starving beneath her window, listening to the radio. 

They would listen intently to voices from other kingdoms, even to voices from his realm. Soon Invel had gathered the courage to tell her of houses so tall they reached the sky, of miniature objects that glowed upon a touch of their flat surface, and of candles that never burned out. Marbles liked to bend his descriptions, so in her mind, the tall houses were for giants, the touch-surface a portal, and the never-ending candles were used by farmers to attract faeries. Sometimes she mistakes her fabrication of his stories as their childhood memories. When her mother would approach the room, she would only smile when she sees them crouched together, dreamily wrapped in sheets. No noise could penetrate the blankets of curiosity. 

Marbles stares wondrously at both the sword and its champion, drawn to their gentle flame. Though she is powerless and talentless, she alone accompanies him simply for the excitement of it. As they draw closer to the final enemy, a giddy thrill powers through her. 

Her footsteps become lighter as she steps onto hard snow. After a breath of strong wind, the blizzard dissipates, leaving glitter in its wake. Her ears ring in the sudden stillness, hearing only her breaths as she welcomes a panoramic view of the mountainous valley. Along the skyline, the blue silhouette of leafless trees appears like stifled ghosts. 

Crystals fall on her lashes as she stares at a massive doorway. It’s broad daylight, yet starlit darkness gapes before them in the shape of a keyhole. Invel draws his sword.

Marbles tightens her grip on the satchel to keep steady. Whenever they would slay monsters, she was always the first to barge in while blowing her trumpet hands, playing both the scout and the bait. But something feels amiss with this door. She turns mute. Perhaps because of the eerie silence or the fear of reaching the end of their journey. As they gingerly approach the doorway, she tries to hide her trembling hands, but Invel notices without needing to look. He gives her a reassuring, half-frightened smile, then together they waltz through the rift. There’s a blinding clash the instant they walk in. She opens her eyes to Invel holding her hand in one and his sword the other, upholding a dome of sunlight against the galaxy. 

The night sky churns, metamorphosing into a dragonish creature with thousands of wings. Its sword-like feathers thunder over the shield, sounding as though a whole kingdom collapses. The substanceless ground quakes and the shield shatters. Invel swings his sword mightily, charging at the darkness with a beam of light. 

Marbles steps back, watching apprehensively from a distance as she studies the monster to decide what to take out of the satchel. Their echoes resound in the shadows. The darkness thickens until she only knows that Invel is there when a luminous slash appears. 

The various strings of dancing light remind her of Invel’s sunrise. She had saved it from the time she kissed his cheek along a rocky path, and the Gradient oddly poured out from his sword. 

She opens the bag and raises it high, releasing its blue, mauve and rosy Gradient over the darkness. The creature squirms and to her curiosity, it doesn’t come after her. Invel swiftly positions himself over the Beast with a hungry grin. Just as he raises his gleaming sword, the monster spreads out its wings to the invisible ceiling. Sharp feathers enter his side, crimson splatters across the darkness, and a soundless scream escapes Marbles' lips. 

Before she knew it, Marbles stood before the creature, boiling with sorrow. The dragon’s eyes unwillingly burst into inky tears too, along with the chamber around them. The darkness rips apart as her fury wills it, until it no longer exists. She doesn’t understand what she’s doing. She doesn't even think she’s doing anything- she is simply enraged, and the world seems to bend itself to appease the weeping girl. Finally, the doorway implodes into thin air, returning them outside.

She stands halfway in the snow again, breathing frost. The searing, morning light makes her eyes sting. Still trembling with wonder, she messily trudges through the snow to pour water over Invel’s wounds. He strikes her hands, catching her off balance. She falls in an eddy of snow. 

“What did you do?!” He scowls with sudden rage, clutching his bleeding ribs, “I was supposed to kill it! Me! The one with the Sword of the Realm!”

His sword burns purple, blue, then transparent. Hatred blackens his terrifying glow, and for a moment she wonders who the Beast really is. 

She stares down at her hands still clutching the water canteen. Her face twitches in pain, guilty as though she’s just broken a law. How could she, the mere water bearer of the Sword’s champion, defeat his quest? She had solely desired to cheer from a distance. There was no need for another ‘chosen one’; she’s a digression from the central journey- from his journey. As she kneels beneath him, buried in snow, all their years together seem to blur. Absently, she asks herself aloud,

“Am I on the wrong one?”