A Little Grounding

In the terrain northwest of Montpellier, Aila was working in a little grotto. A river flowed nearby and dropped water from a little waterfall that had found its way here. At mid-day, the sun indirectly illuminated her project. Aila herself was walking around some of the natural features, touching things and feeling, pushing her hands into the dirt and the mud. Her overalls were dirty from it, and she had more than a little bit on her arms and hair, and even a spot on her face from a careless attempt to scratch an itch. Her ornery hair wanted to come out of its tie all the time and get into her work, so she finally asked another student if he could give her dreadlocks like his; she was a little anxious about what it would do to her hair, long-term, but in the short term it made it much more manageable, and she had to admit that it looked really cool.

I’m glad it’s a toe-ring, she thought, looking down at her shoes and imagining the silver ring safely inside. It still gave her a warm, fuzzy feeling every time she thought about it.

Her and a group of other Na’aulele had done a brief aerial survey of the area around Montpellier, looking for potentially good sites for a Temple. Quite a few were found, much to her surprise, but this was the one she’d inspected and approved. It had everything she needed, and it just needed a little push, exactly the way it was supposed to work.

She’d spent a month researching and consulting with Dr. Halalo, the only known living Ka’aulele who had actually built a Temple of Change. He was as inscrutable as always, but she sometimes detected a hint of pride and quirky humor at what she was trying to do and how she’d managed to get the support for it.

Aila knew the principles; she’d been at the actual work for several months now. Others would be able to come in and help later, but one person needed to pour their intention into it to get things moving. Not just squishing her hands in the mud, either: potions and rituals and other such things were involved. IAR had had to send all over France, and in some cases outside of Europe, for a couple of her reagents. When she saw the bills for them, she was doubly happy she wasn’t trying to make a go of it all on her own.

She had no illusions there, though; even given those obstacles, she would have thrown herself at it. It was like a geas, an obligation of old. Dr. Halalo’s early words came back to her: We are all on a personal quest, whether we realize it or not, whether we know what it is or not. You’ve started on a great journey, and a great life of service.

She knew the principles, she knew what she wanted to do and why. But somehow the workings seemed to elude her. Something was strange with it. She would attempt the final binding that brought everything together, and it would just fizzle around her as if something had snatched it away.

Aila sighed and cleaned up her tools, putting them all away carefully. She stowed everything in her pack and started to climb back to the top of the grotto’s edge.

“Salut, mon amie!” a voice called down to her. Aila looked up to see Kuléo’s blond hair and green eyes looking down at her, and she smiled. He held out his hand and she used it to scramble the rest of the way up.

“Why the big sigh?” he asked her, once she had done just that.

“Something just isn’t right. I’m following all the instructions and I’m doing everything I should. But the workings just keep falling apart on me.”

“Hmm. Maybe you need to consult with someone who can help you figure out what’s wrong.”

“Yes, but who?” Aila sounded near despair.

“Not who, but about what,” Kuléo replied. “Maybe you’re looking in the wrong place.” He shrugged.

Aila gave him a quizzical look. “I don’t get it.”

He hesitated for a moment. “I’m not sure I do either. Don’t take this the wrong way, all right? But maybe there’s something in you that’s sabotaging what you’re doing or holding it back. I don’t know. It was just a thought. A hunch.”

Kuléo was waiting for some sort of a rebuttal, but Aila just looked thoughtful. “Hmm. Maybe so. I’ll have to think about it.”

They flew back to town, laughing and doing spirals around each other for fun. On the way there, borne aloft on the soft palm of the wind like a wild bird, she had an inspiration. It was something to try, anyway.

Aila took a short leave of absence from her work on the new Temple and flew back out to the “shelf” near Montségur. It took her a little while to find it again, but when she saw it, it called to her like an old friend. When she landed, her little hollow was still there, though most of what she’d built up her “nest” from was now gone.

There was a lonely wind rushing around the area in circles; it made the place feel empty, not like the last time she’d been here with all the curious birds. But what she was here for didn’t require anything but solitude and will.

Aila laid down in her hollow again, and brought out the same bowl she’d used last time. She lit a charcoal briquette in it and let it burn until it was a simmering red coal. Then she tossed a bit of her homemade incense on the charcoal and waited.

She waited for quite some time, but nothing seemed to be happening; she wasn’t dozing off, she wasn’t being drawn into fuelu, or anything of the sort. Several times, the wind blew the incense away from her, and she couldn’t even smell its burning or see the little paths of smoke it traced through the suddenly-visible air.

Aila was nearly ready to forget the idea altogether, but something in her said: wait. Be patient. So she waited.

The day worked its way on, and Aila spent the time just studying the landscape, marveling at all the rock formations and plants, and thinking about how scientists had said they came about. It all seemed rather fantastic.

Night was falling, and that insistent internal pressure was still telling her: just a little longer. She sighed and watched the stars roll overhead, daydreaming about her new Temple, what it might look like some day.

A rainbow-hued flame leapt up from a rock outcropping, calling to the sky. Rock, sculptures, and paint in shades of blue, gray, and black were placed all around the space just so. Water fell from above in a little waterfall, into a pool at the bottom. The air swirled around and around in eddies and caressing flows. A tingling sensation filled the air, an expectation, a possibility.

Suddenly Aila realized she was no longer just daydreaming. She was actually standing in her Temple, as it might look when it was finished, presumably in the Dreamlands. And there, on another rock outcropping, was Jay, the biggest blue jay she had ever seen.

“Hello, little one,” he said in his curiously deep, human voice.

“Hello, Jay,” Aila said back to him. Unlike last time, her mind felt a strange kind of clarity. It was almost as if, instead of falling asleep at the rock ledge, she had been transported back to her Temple.

“It’s so good to see you again, granddaughter,” Jay said. “I enjoy your visits, and you are welcome any time you like. But I sense that you came here for a reason.”

She nodded. She could visit anytime? Well, later conversations. “I’m working on this,” she said, gesturing around. “It’s to be a Temple of Change.”

“And it’s lovely,” Jay said. “Buuuuut...?”

“Don’t you know?” Aila asked, perplexed.

“I have some idea. But I want to hear you put it in your own words. It says much more than my guessing.”

“Something just seems to... go wrong... with my working. I have everything in place, and the directions I’m following seem right. It feels like it should work. But it just fizzles.”

Jay pondered for a moment. “The first thing we have to ponder is that every Temple of Change was unique. And I don’t just mean in place or appearance.” Aila’s eyes widened; this was new information to her. “Each one is subtly different,” Jay continued. “And each one has somewhat of a will of its own, a purpose, a goal. What will yours do?” He almost seemed to wink at that last statement.

Aila looked around nervously for a moment, realizing for the first time how audacious, and perhaps strange, her goal sounded. “I want to bring joy and magic back to the world,” she replied.

“Mmmm, very ambitious,” Jay said. He had not even a hint of laughter in his voice, but she thought there was a little sparkle to his eye for just a moment. Not laughing at folly, but indulging a favorite child. “But do you know the interesting thing about magic and wonder?”

Aila could think of many, but she figured he meant something she wouldn’t have guessed, and shook her head silently.

“It’s already here, all around us. You felt it while studying the area where your body sleeps. The rocks, the trees, the plants. They are amazing, are they not? Is it not a type of magic, and is it not joyous and wondrous that simple bits of matter could come together and form them? That a little chick hatches from an egg? And as you’ve studied, at some level of thought, everything in the world is made of energy; just energy. Everything is clouds of energy and energy potentials, but it looks and feels solid, does it not? You have in your pocket a tiny device that can let you talk to anyone in the world in less than twenty seconds. The museums are filled with magnificent art. The air is filled with magnificent song. Is that not magic? Is it not wondrous?”

Aila pondered his words for a few moments, both awed and disturbed by this thought. Was there really anything for her to do?

“There’s so much sadness in the world,” she replied. “People hurt each other. Things are slowly falling apart. That’s what I want to change. What I have to change. I think the world is heading to a bad end, and I feel that that’s why I’m here. That’s why I was born with this need for wings, and why the Na’aulele came, and all of it. I guess it could’ve been someone else, but I’m the one who sees it.”

Jay did laugh then. “Oh, little one, you’re not the only one, believe me. But you do have your part to play. You’re very close, now, and it works best for you to find the last piece of the puzzle yourself. I’ll just leave you with this: You can’t bring magic to the world. The world must bring magic to itself. You can bring food to chicks and you can even chew it up for them, but it’s up to them to eat it.”

Aila nodded. “Thank you.” She walked over to him, not knowing if he’d sit still for it, or be offended, but she reached her wing out and gave him a little hug with it. He tilted his head to see her and seemed to smile.

With that, her vision went blurry, and the world seemed to tilt under her. She was back at her hollow again, staring up at the dark night sky and its multitude of stars. As she’d faded out from her Dream, she’d heard Jay leave her with a few last words on the subject.

You have been working and trying so hard, for so long... to find yourself, to find your people, to find your path. You want to do. But this thing you want to do... it isn’t really about you.

Aila decided to spend her night in the hollow again, since the weather was relatively nice and it was already late. A night flight in the clear, cold air would have been nice to clear her mind after her experience, but she was too tired for it.

In the morning, she woke to see a little jay sitting on the edge of the rock again. She smiled and reached up to it, but this one knew more caution and flew away.

“Ah well,” she sighed.

On her flight back to Montpellier, she pondered the words of Jay, and fit them together with Kuléo’s. There was something she was doing wrong, and it had to do with her apparent tendency, little as she liked to admit to it, to charge in and do. Aila knew it was right when she thought about it though; she had always been a do-er. It made her think a little about Dr. Halalo’s gold, too–this sort of work never worked out, long term, if your intentions were wrong, pure or not.

So there was joy and wonder in the world already. Why was no one else seeing it? She wanted to bring more magic to people, make them see what was right under their eyes. Give them something they couldn’t ignore.

And then she had it. What she had done wrong. She didn’t want to bring magic to people, to give them new dreams, new directions... all influenced by her. Aila could see it clearly now. The joy and wonder and magic in the world weren’t defined by wings growing, by amazing art, by amazing stories.

They were defined by dreams.

The dreams of all those people were the most precious and joyous things in the world, to those people. How could she possibly bring it all to them? Their dreams were already inside, and the sadness and that lack of wonder she wanted to cure was from people giving up their dreams. What would it be like to have one’s deepest dreams and desires fulfilled suddenly? She knew, firsthand. What would it be like to watch everyone else’s deepest dreams and desires fulfilled, easy as slicing butter with a hot knife? Everyone lining up around the block... come one, come all, make your dreams real.

Aila cried aloud at the rightness of this thought suddenly in her mind, flying free more than she ever had before. It really wasn’t about her. All this time, she had been fighting for her own lost and then found-again dreams. She had been denied the magic she needed so badly, and had had to fight for it. But that was her struggle, the magic she had needed. And now, she would simply be the catalyst.

The patterns that she had seen in everything in that wild flight, the second sight, appeared to her as a great river. But instead of struggling upstream against it, she would join the current, join the flow, and joyously guide any others who wished. Aila thought back to her conversation so long ago, at the farm, about not trying to bend nature to one’s will. It applied here as well, she as a bridge between that natural, flowing world, and tanau, speaking beings, who can speak magic to the world. She would give them the means, and when she jumped at the great waterfall and flew into the distance, all the others would have that chance, too. But it would be their flight. Their dreams. Their sorrows. She would not give them a fish, she would teach them to fish.

Now she knew what her Temple was for, and what it wanted of her.