Chapter 1 - The Magic Mushroom

Long ago, when the world was still young and soon after the million year rains, lived two brothers. They were still boys and had not yet been given their true-names. In those days your true-name was not given at birth, it had to be discovered. The world was a different place in that time, greener, more mysterious and filled with smells and sounds that have been long forgotten. The brothers were coming to the age at which they would have to travel alone, find their name and return as adults.

“Arsac, can you help?” Ison was dragging cooking wood toward the house. Arsac looked at his brother, smiled, and looked back down again at what he had found. Between his feet was a peculiar mushroom with a short white stem and a red spotted cap. Arsac had seen many mushrooms while helping his mother gather food in the forest, but never one that looked like this. It looked like it had sprung freshly from the ground, needles and dirt still falling from it. As he watched, it began to move in a lazy, spiraling circle and continued to grow. When it had stopped, it was as tall as his head and the stalk was as thick as his thigh.

“Ison, come here!” he called to his brother. Ison dropped the cooking wood and ran to join his brother. “What do you think it is?” he asked with clenched teeth. He was fighting the urge to run and hide from this strange thing. It had stopped moving, though, and it seemed less threatening standing still in the morning light. He gathered his courage and reached out to touch it. At his touch, the mushroom jumped back causing both brothers to let out little involuntary yips in their surprise. The mushroom was standing in a new place now, several feet from where it had come out of the ground. If you looked closely what may have been feet seemed to poke from the bottom of the stalk. Maybe not a stalk after all, for as they watched the stalk separated into two long and spindly legs, soft and fibrous, buckling slightly as they moved. As they looked up, they could make out an abdomen, arms, a neck, a small face and the large, red, spotted cap. The mushroom, if that’s what it really was, swayed and buckled slightly under its own weight, then found its strength and stood up straight. As they watched, the limbs grew thicker and more fibrous, the face grew more distinct, and the arms began to move.

Rooted in place, almost as if they had grown from the ground themselves, they stared with mouths open at this thing taking form in front of them.