The Temple.
It blocks the sun, the ascent of the sun child, and near its massive foot in the small collection of huts Essan wakes in the grayness of dawn. Essan one of the many, wakes. He lays still and listens. Outside his hut there is the start of bird songs, hesitant. They are working up to the song they sing when they greet the sun child. The sun child that rises and drives back the dark, drives back the mystery. He fills his lungs with the humid air of his hut, feels the fullness of his bladder, not yet. He lifts his hands and holds them above his face in the gloom. He opens and closes the hands, feeling the thick calluses, the strength there, again they will work to the glory of the sun child. He lowers his hands, and arches his back, stretching, now, he is ready.
He leaves the hut, surprised at the light, he has slept longer than usual, that is not good, for there was rain last night and today he may mark the stones, the birds should have woke him. he walks to the edge of the clearing, stands next to a tree, and urinates. He hears the sound of footsteps behind him, he turns and sees the small group of slave boys bringing up the pots with food and drink for the men. From the huts the men begin to emerge. Each glances at the sky, looking for the light, gauging the ascent of the day.
Essan moves over and drinks the bitter brew offered him from a pot quickly. He takes no food. He goes back to his hut and gathers his tools. Essan heads out and to the well worn path that leads first up to the base of the temple which rises like a mountain from the thick vegetation of the forest, and from there up the completed tiers to where he and the other masons now work. In his mind there are few words for he knows his task. He is the leader of the masons, and today he will mark stones, before the sun child burns away the wet, before the sun child remakes and claims this world, inscrutable, to all but the priests. The priests, those who speak the language, who move their hands, who look and see, who speak visions, who understand, who give the language law, who give these people purpose and plan.
From the sides of the path the growth is thick, unseen creatures scramble away, in the distance they bellow and cry out, knowing too the harsh law of the sun child, ageless. The breeze is light but it's direction gives away the presence of the near city, smoke smells let Essan know again that the beasts hidden in the forest about are not the single blood of this plain. The path is hard and worn, packed and lain by generations of masons feet. So many have traveled here. It will be generations more before this temple is completed. The one to the north, where they now worship, long since done, is a mountain in itself, though smaller. Who built that no one knows. It is unimportant. There as here the bones of men knitted together are broke apart, over and again, for the glory of the sun child, as dictated by priests, as served by these, nameless.
Essan reaches the clearing where the stones are prepared. Large blocks brought up by the slaves whose limbs shatter from the effort. The road of their arrival is wide and straight, but Essan never travels there. Long ago his thoughts might wander, as to what it might have been to be a hunter, and know the habits of creatures, or to be a farmer and work down where the canals sparkle under the sun child's fierce gaze. Had he lived amongst the people of the city he may have had a wife, he may have had children. But that was not his mark when he entered the world, and these things he wonders no more. In his body he feels a truth as he understands it. That the things of those in the city are passing. The work on the temple started before them all and will continue after them, and the temple itself will stand till the end of time, till the sun child comes down and claims the world for it's own. There is nothing here in the circle of the world, hemmed by the horizon, more important or honorable than to be working these stones. The priests, hardly human, make this understood through their attentions.
He lives with the masons at the foot of the great temple, Essan knows his craft well and practices it as such. The priests say nothing to indicate to him that what he was done is ample, their cold hard gaze passing over the work. They direct where the blocks are to be moved as they have forever, since the world was made. Yet he is still alive, after all these seasons, he has not been offered up and bled away, this means he will work seasons more, the priests allow it.
He stands now on the third tier of the temple. He lays his tools down and takes out a scribe. He moves among the blocks, sighting down edges, looking carefully over the surfaces. The rain from the night before shows the imperfections in the stones that their tools and hands were too blind to discern, thin pools of wet. He marks them, and moves on. As he finishes the other masons are coming up the path, silently moving to their stones. Essan walks about them indicating what work must be done. He sees that Pado, the most skilled of the masons will be late again, and his mood sours. It was been this way for some time. Essan saves the most difficult stone for him, a thing in his mind done as punishment, but in in reality done for need. Essan can not grasp the man, his thoughts, he is so talented, his carvings so beautiful, his sense of when the blocks are true so great yet he seems to care little for the glory to the sun child that the temple will bring, for the mercy he may show his people because of it. Essan is grateful the priests have not come here while Pado is not present, it would be dangerous, their diligence is paramount, the priests dictate it.
The arrival of the priests was never specific. They would come with the warriors and slaves. The mass of men would make way. Blocks would be laid, and raw stone brought into position. Orders for the next step would be passed along. It was best to remain silent, to look down and work.
Pado arrives emerging up from the lip to the second tier, Essan hastens over to him and shows him the stone on which he is to labor. Pado accepts this without a word, choosing his tools and beginning, he is young, and he moves easily amongst the stone. The is no questioning or uncertainty in his approach to the stone.
Essan returns to his stone and sets to work, he is older, each step more measured than that of Pado, but he still moves with assurance, his tools as extensions of himself. The work becomes a rhythm. The heat and humidity grow. Essan feels his muscles coil and uncoil as he works, he feels good to know his craft so well, to understand what needs to be done and still perform the tasks with the strength of a young man. This is his time, and his time is a river, blending with the lives of masons before him, and the lives of masons which will come after him, all laboring for the glory of the sun child, for the mercy he may show.
Later, as the day bends toward dusk, as the green of the canopy of the surrounding forest deepens, as the smoke from the cooking fires rises from the sprawling city, as the fields the by the canals empty of the men and women working there, Essan looks up form his stone and feels the unwind. He sees that Pado is gone, his tools also. He walks over and looks at the block on which Pado had been working, he draws his hands over it's surface, he sights along the edges, the work is good, perfect. He stands staring at the great block, Pado should have told him he was leaving. If the priests new of his behavior it would not be good. He looks over at Jarro the only mason who had ever dared to speak directly to one of the priests, his lips are scarred and twisted from where the warrior put the hot embers in his mouth. His teeth are exposed, and his chin is wet.
At night storm clouds are building as the masons straggle back to their huts. The slave boys who have brought them their food disappear into the forest when they see the masons come down the path. Someone has built a fire and the men gather around it as they eat. The fire sputters and smokes. One by one the masons drift off to their huts to sleep.
As Essan lays in his hut, smelling himself in the closeness he wonders when he and the others may go down to the baths. Then he hears a body enter the edge of the masons camp. He tenses. He realizes it is Pado going into the hut where he sleeps. His mind struggles with the problem but exhaustion overcomes him, and he sleeps.
Essan wakes, he hears the steady drumming of rain on his the hut. He knows that they may not see the face of the sun child on this day. There will be no work today, except perhaps for the repair of tools, the mending of clothes, the healing of wounds. He sits up. he can hear the sounds of the other masons moving in the other huts nearby, he considers drifting back off to sleep, he remembers how long it has been since he has bathed. He sits up in the gloom of the hut, pushing aside his blanket. He scratches his head feeling for insects, the hair is thick with oil. He stands and goes outside. The rain is warm and heavy. He walks carefully over the slick mud to the edge of the camp and stands on a mat of ferns turning his face up. He feels the water stream over his naked body, welcome, washing away the dirt and stone dust which has accumulated there.
The wind picks up and a tumbling roll of thunder passes over the land. Essan looks up, the mounting bulk of the temple is lost in the wash of wet and mist. Essan passes his hands over his body, he bends and shakes his head, tossing the thickness of his hair. A rushing body stumbles into him, he almost falls but he instinctively grabs the person who now stumbles with him into a near tree. The persons garment is clutched close about him. Essan sees it is Pado.
Pado mutters and apology, smiling strangely in the rain. Pado turns instantly and heads off into the darkness of the rain shrouded forest. Another roll of thunder. Essan looks back to the mason's huts, no one else has emerged to take advantage of the rain yet. Pado has headed off in the direction of the city, but not along any path that Essan knew of. In an instant, without a considered word, Essan quickly dives in through the forest, knowing that if he waits he will not be able to follow Pado through the gloom of the rain spattered forest.
Essan becomes aware immediately of a faint path. He can see Pado up ahead, he seems slowed by something and Essan knows he could catch the younger man easily if he wanted to, yet he lags behind, a hope forming that he might find out what the lone mason has been doing with his time away from the temple.
The path they follow leads onward toward the city, yet also skirts around it. Sometimes the two men come to a road that leads directly down to it, but they cross it, and continue on through the slippery undergrowth.
At last they reach the edge of the forest. Pado heads out of the growth and toward a large collection of buildings set apart from the city. Essan stays at the forest edge watching. Wishing he could go nearer, hoping to not be discovered, knowing that it isn't his place to be seen in the city. Still he knows the buildings where Pado is headed. He is shocked and confused. The buildings are the priests quarters, a place where common humans are not allowed, a place almost as holy as the temples.
He sits under the shelter of a large tree. The rain is but an intermittent shower of large drops there shaken free of the canopy whenever the wind blows. He watches the the buildings where Pado has gone. Waiting. He wonders how long he will wait. It isn't right for a mason to be sitting naked beneath a tree in the rain. Although there are few about to see him it isn't something he should be doing. It is a madness. When the temple to the north was built, when the generations before started the temple on which he now works, they couldn't have been preoccupied with such things. It is a wrong thing in the world.
As he wonders, looking first at the buildings, then at the sky, considering his hands, Pado leaves the buildings where he had gone. Now Pado is in the presence of a warrior. Such a thing is absurd. Essan shrinks back, he hides himself. He waits for Pado as he makes his way back to the path. He allows Pado to move past, his head down, hurrying once again as with a burden. He follows, now back toward the masons camp. The rain has lightened, although thunder is still heard, distant now, edging toward the lip of the world. Essan can see Pado ahead of him, he feels a need to know, and so quickens his pace.
Essan comes up quickly behind Pado and grabs his arm. Pado trips, turns, from beneath his garments a large disk of gold falls to the ground. Pado barely glances at Essan, he curses, and grabs the disk of gold from where it has fallen. Pado pulls it back under his garments and looks hard at Essan.
"What are you doing here?"
"That is what I want to know, Pado. What is that? What have you been doing all these days?"
"It is no business of yours."
"It is. I am the head of the masons. Tell me what you have been doing. What is that? Have you been metalsmithing? That is not your mark in this world, you are a mason, Pado. Why were you with that warrior?"
"It brings glory to the sun child."
Pado smiles. Essan feels that these words are a play to him, and he grows angry.
"How long will that last, Pado? That is nothing. A toy. I could destroy that with my bare hands. We need your help at the temple, doing work that will last. To do that, to spend your time on such things is nothing, a fart."
Essan moves close, his eyelid is twitching and he restrains himself from tearing the disk from Pado, throwing it to the ground.
"We weren't working today."
Pado turns and heads back up the path.
"I do my work at the temple. More than most. You have no contest with me. This is a special job for the priests. You don't know anything about this, Essan. It has nothing to do with you."
Essan stops. He feels something turn in his chest as he hears those words. Pado takes no notice. He moves along with the disk of gold under his garments.
Essan walks slowly back to the camp, paying no mind to how far ahead Pado was. When he returns he goes to his hut and pulls a bit of of food from a pot that hung from the ceiling. He stands chewing, his eyes staring, his thoughts a swirl. He reaches down and takes a branch he brought with him from the outside thick with fragrant leaves. He swats the moisture from his body. He puts on his garment and stands listening. In the other huts he can hear the voices of the other masons, their murmur comforts him. How many ages has it been so. The river, the river of their lives flowing on uninterrupted.
He thinks of going over to Jarro's hut, of sitting and speaking. What it means to be a mason. Jarro understands their struggles. His poor twisted face. Now Pado comes and goes with the priests, and honorable Jarro sits his tongue loose, his teeth bared. He thinks of the great temple to the north. He wonders if the people who built it ever faced questions. He can't doubt the priests, they alone can speak to the sun child, but why would they allow this? Is there a new law? It was unthinkable. He walked out of his hut.
Instead of going to Jarro's he walks straight to the hut where Pado stays. He enters. There are other masons there. They stop speaking when Essan answers. He looks at them and they rise and leave. Essan looks at Pado, scattered near him are strange tools that he doesn't recognize. In his lap lays the disk Essan had seen earlier. Pado looks at him steady.
"So the priests, they know you are doing this?"
Pado laughs.
"Of course, you saw me there."
"How long have you been doing this?"
"A season. There is much gold coming up the river now. The priests find this work worthy. Very worthy. This work honors them, it honors the sun child, Essan"
Essan can see now that Pado's remarks back on the trail were in earnest. He did believe that this work brought honor to the sun child.
"The temple, Pado, is..."
"Yes, the temple, the temple. Tell me, Essan, couldn't the slaves do most of the work there? And if not, what about the temple to the north, that serves us well."
"Blasphemy, Pado. It is what our lives are for."
"That isn't for you to decide, that is for the priests to decide."
"I see. I see now. Pado, with you it is all me, me, me. You feel special because if the attentions of the priests. You do! But what about the priests who came before them, and those yet before them. They all believed in the work of the temple. We might all try to earn the favor of this priest or that, but the temple it is something beyond any one person or priest. To be like you, we might as well be the animals in the forest, mindless, vain. The only true glory comes from things larger than ourselves, Pado, things beyond the ability of a single person. Things that will endure."
"Be careful, Essan, what I do is asked for by the priests. It is you who are being blasphemous now."
Essan looks down at the disk of gold. He seems finished with his talk. He picks up a tool and applies it to the gold. Essan looks down, a ring of faces, feathers, great cats. Essan turns to leave.
"It's not that I don't understand you, I do. This is new art, Essan. How many temples do we need? How many generations must we commit to toiling in the forest, far from their people. No wives even! This allows me to speak in my own voice. To sing to the glory of the sun child in my voice alone. Something I can do which is uniquely mine. Something in which I improve from piece to piece. How much can I grow rubbing cold blocks of stone? Carvings the same as all those which came before. It is all static, unchanging. Surely you have felt at some time that there was something you could give the world which no one else could."
"I feel my voice. It is strongest when it is mixed with the voices of others. A voice alone is weak. Mortal. You say what you do is uniquely yours. How long will it be, Pado? More and more metalsmiths. Soon your work will be indistinguishable from all the others."
"The work we do on the temple is cold, sterile. It is good to have a magnificent temple at which to worship, but where do you see the lives of the masons who worked there? Where are there passions, the stories of their lives?"
"That means nothing. Our people will end with such talk."
Essan turns, done. He heads out of the hut and back toward his own. The men who were inside with Pado before have been lingering in the coming night outside. They move back toward the hut as Essan leaves.
The next day starts bright and clear. The birds of the forest are singing loud and clear. The ascent of the sun child will be quick and strong on this day. As usual the masons make their way up to the third tier. Once again Pado is late. When he does arrive he starts to work in earnest. Essan watches while he works, hoping that his fellow mason has realized the error of his ways.
The day lengthens. The masons have finished their current batch of stones. Essan realizes that it has been some time since the priests have come to the site. They should arrive to set the slaves to moving the finished blocks into place, to bringing up raw stone. Essan has no authority to order the slaves. He decides to have the masons work on the next lot of blocks where they lie near the foot of the temple. It will make their work more difficult, but at least they will be able to continue. The light is weakening, the sun child is readying to rest, giving way to the mustering dark. It is still early but they stop their work for the day.
They have come to the blocks at the foot of the temple, things feel strange, there is a sense of disruption, but the men set to work. Mid morning the priests arrive with several brightly dressed warriors, Essan is relieved. They look about at the group of masons, their faces cold and inscrutable. One of them sees Pado, he motions for Pado to join them and they start to head away from the group of masons. Essan is shocked. He has never seen anything like this. How was it possible for the priests to ignore the needs of the masons. He looks at Jarro who is bent over a stone. He overcomes his fear and approaches the group as they start to head away from the site. A priest takes notice of his approach and Essan falls to his knees and bows his head to the ground before addressing the priests. The priest listens impatiently and then motions for one of the warriors to bring the slaves up. Essan keeps his gaze low but looks up spouting thanks. He sees the disk of gold on which Pado was working, the priest now wears it on his chest. The procession continues on it's way. Essan slowly rises to his feet and watches them go. He looks back at the other masons, they too watch the priests, warriors, and Pado, disappear down the road.
The priests have not returned in days. Essan believes he has seen slaves escaping into the forest, but there is nothing he can do. Pado no longer comes to work the blocks, two other masons also have quit coming. Essan works harder than ever, he tries to keep the spirits of the masons up.
It is the end of another day at the camp. Essan sees Pado again, he is speaking with some of the masons at the edge of the clearing. He simply watches, and the men ignore him.
The morning. Only a handful of masons have appeared. The slaves boys neglected to bring them their food in the morning. Jarro, too is gone. The hum of the group is gone. Only a few sounds of tools on stone, a grunt, a small spoken word. The day is long. The sun child seems to not have noticed, or perhaps it is waiting.
Essan sits on a great block of stone, alone. He watches for the sun child to climb over the temple. He watches the people of the city, they move to the canals, they build fires, they move amongst their buildings. If there has been a change in the law why have they not told him? It is not right to ask. It is his to simply do as is his mark. He slides of his stone and starts to work. The sounds of the creatures of the forest seems nearer. The murmerous undertone of the city fading into their song.
Essan has worked long. Beneath the sun child's unforgiving face. He no longer hopes the masons will return. He is thin from gathering food out of the forest. Some of the things he eats make him ill. He goes to leave, but the path to the camp has become overgrown. It will be best for him to sleep amongst the stones now. He walks near the edge of the third tier. The city seems smaller, it's near edge hidden by a rising wave of growth.
He chases the animals away, but they always return. They sit on the great blocks of stone and watch him and he pushes the vines away the stone. They scratch themselves, and swat at flies. The vines grow faster than his hands can work. Essan looks about bewildered. The sun child is hidden by the leaves that hang motionless in the heat. The blocks of stone are humid mounds of green, things have come to live there, snakes and lizards appear and disappear in the tangle. Essan desires to see his people once again. He turns left and right but there is no path to see, the temple itself, it's great rise is hidden in the hummocks and spills of hungry growth.
There are tools, and bones, beneath the forest floor. There are blocks of stone. Now a holy man stands before his people. He glitters and shines like the sun, burning bright and fearsome. His limbs tinkle as he moves. He is thinking something far from the forest. He is feeling the fear and adulation of a multitude. He will be remembered as a great man. His name will of the lips of everyone forever.