A while ago, while going through some of my old school stuff at my mum’s place, I came across something I had written for a school assignment in the tenth grade when I was about fifteen.
It was a writing prompt assignment where we had to pick between three or four paintings and write a story based on it. I, of course, pick the one that had three robed figures in front of an altar.
In a way, you could say that this was my first piece of fantasy fiction I ever wrote and thought it would interesting to translate it and share it.
Keep in mind that I’ve tried to translate it as close to the original as I could.
I may do a rewrite of this in my current “style” of writing but with the same basic story as a bit of an experiment.
Enjoy!
Chapter 1: “A beautiful girl”
It was a beautiful and sunny day, like every other this time of year. Cerdian sat outside his family’s homestead, it wasn’t a particularly large homestead, it lay a few days travel from the nearest village, but Cerdian had it pretty well regardless.
He got up and walked towards the forest that lay close to the homestead. He often went for walks in the forest, but if he had known what this walk would lead to, he would probably have stayed home.
He walked slowly towards the forest, today he thought to go for a long walk. He had walked for about half an hour, when he heard the most beautiful song, coming not far from there.
He walked quietly towards the sound. He came to a clearing that had a large rock in the middle upon which sat a beautiful young girl, who sang with the most beautiful voice he had ever heard.
She must have seen him because she started getting up and leave. He waited a bit and went quietly after her. He walked for a while, hiding behind trees and bushes to not be seen.
He made it to a small temple. He had never been in this part of the forest before, so he didn’t know that there was a temple here.
The strangest thing was that it wasn’t dedicated to any of the gods he knew and what’s a temple doing in the middle of the forest?
He didn’t know if he should go in or not, so he walked back to the homestead.
He couldn’t stop thinking about the beautiful girl he had seen in the forest and he decided to go back to the temple the next day.
Chapter 2: “Varok, the all seeing”
When he woke up the next day he got dressed in a hurry and hurried into the forest. After a while, he made it to the temple, it wasn’t especially big.
He walked to the entrance and saw that something was written above the door: “Varok, the all seeing.” He had never heard of this god before, but it sounded like a good god. He walked slowly inside.
When he walked inside he got himself a big surprise, the temple looked even bigger on the inside. The floor was laid with marble tiles, which were black and white, it was pretty, but also a bit scary.
Suddenly he heard someone, he hid himself quickly behind a pillar. He could see three people in robes, one in yellow, one in purple and one in green. Two of them carried a stick and the third one had a red cylinder with a gold bracket at the end.
There was someone between them, it was the girl he had seen the day before. She was dressed in a long white silk dress.
They walked to a small staircase and knelt.
The person in the yellow robe, who carried the cylinder shaped object, raised it above his head and said: “Varok, we beg you, plant your seed in this maiden.”
This he said two times and after the last word, a big flame grew from the floor.
The girl walked slowly over to the flame and laid herself on it. It was very strange because she didn’t seem to get burned.
Kapitel 3: “The power of Varok”
She lay on the flame for half an hour. At the end Cerdian jumped out of his hiding behind the pillar, the monk looking people turned around towards him, and he was chocked, they had no eyes, it looked like they had been cut out.
He was as if frozen in place, he couldn’t move at all.
Now the girl had seen him, she walked quietly towards him, her eyes began glowing white, he could feel he was getting more and more cold. He started shaking and suddenly everything became black.
When he opened his eyes again, he lay on the floor of the forest. Thwaswere no temple to be seen.
He got up, his head felt strange, he didn’t know how, but he didn’t feel normal.
Then he started walking home.
Writer At The Threshold 