Do Not Banish the Faery Folk

Last week my wife and I went to an exhibition on Yokai, the spirits of Japan. One section was dedicated to the similarity between Swedish and Japanese folktales and as I was gazing at all the Jätte and Oni and trolls and zashiki-warashi this story suddenly presented itself to me, as if from, well, who knows. So when we got home I wrote this one.

It is a fable of huge importance and of no importance at all. Like most things.

I hope you enjoy.

When the great doors finally opened the courthouse filled up as if a levee had broken and a deluge of bodies poured across the benches, filling the immense room in moments right up to the rafters, such was the significance of the trial.

The venue, elected by the Lord High Chancellor Of All Things for this Day Of Judgement Trial, was crackling with emotion and tension as The Judge’s gavel pounded the sounding block thrice to silence the feverish hum.

Officers of the court heaved the great oak doors closed as all manner of creatures were still trying to slink or slide or wheedle their way through the slowly closing gap that separated the cavernous courtroom from the moonlit forest outside.

This being the third and final night of the trial they all knew The Verdict would be delivered from which there would be no going back, no motions, no challenges, no appeals. The Great Clock would move forward and the march of time would crush everything left behind.

The Judge, in a robe of ocean kelp kept moist by a mist that emanated from a shimmer of wet hummingbirds hovering around him, lifted his dark eyes to the crowded room just as the gavel sounded the third time and the great oak doors slammed shut. The courthouse fell into a tense silence.

The upper tiers of the cascading benches bowed under the weight of the Faerie Folk as they leant forward in sparkling waves like a gentle frothy foam, and the rafters creaked with malicious Spirits and Demons and Ghouls that circulated around like black smoke billowing from burning tyres.

The middle tiers looked like lines of bewhiskered knuckle bone as Shape Shifters and droves of Elves and thickets of Monsters and Goblins packed together to get a better view.

Below them the Living Dead and Possessing Spirits and even the Ancestors themselves sat in solemn silence, attentive to every sound, listening for the signs that might reveal their fate.

Outside the courtroom a silence hushed throughout the forest as the silver moon sliced the world into shards of shadow and light. Even those lurking in the Great Forest knew that now was the time of reckoning and quiet they became.

The Judge sighed and leaned forward, peering down from the thousand tonnes of carved Jade on which he sat, and then blew a lonesome howl through the Wolf Shell to summon the Argumentors to The Final Circle.

From out of the shadowy recesses came a human person, dressed in a delicate pigskin coat, his long reddish hair greased into thick lines like an autumnal ploughed field. He clambered over the thick rope that enclosed the clay and sand circle and stood with a somewhat bored and insolent air nonchalantly ignoring the legions of silent faces staring at him.

Then from the deepest pitch of darkness, as if out of nowhere, an Angel appeared high above them all, her wings gently flapping as she descended toward the enclosed circle accompanied by a sudden explosion of great and rapturous applause and whistling. She hovered three apples high above the clay and sand and smiled graciously at the human person who stood some small distance beside her.

The Judge pounded the sounding block to silence the bedlam once more and the courtroom obligingly readied itself to listen.

The human person stroked his bearded chin and looked up at the judge in a somewhat theatrical posture of self-conscious contemplation. Then he took a step forward and in a reedy voice began to speak.

“I believe,” he said, then stopped and with a smirk, went on, “Allow me to rephrase that,” looking up and down the cascading tiers of the courtroom overflowing with attentive entities, he went on, “based on verifiable fact obtained through measure and method, I know that thee,” he gave a dismissive wave of the back of his hand toward the stands, “are nothing more than figments of the imagination, mere residue of an ancient mind, illusions, shall we say,” he spun upon his heel and pointed in a wide sweep at the entire room, suddenly shouting in a booming voice, “DELUSIONS MORE LIKE,” then smiling he continued gently, “and as such I demand this court banish you all to the dark recesses of history to be forever buried in the sands of time.”

There was a silence so deep it seemed the universe itself held its breath.

The human person noisily sighed as if to convey impatience with these trivial proceedings and making a dismissive gesture toward the floor he took a step backwards, saying “I yield,” so that the Angel might have her say.

The Angel, glided forward, her body glowing with a kaleidoscopic light from within as she opened her palms toward the judge and began to speak.

“For two long days now we have endured our brother’s insults and we have, as always, forgiven him his sins, and yet, still we await a wise word to fall from his lips,” she spoke in a measured voice that sent a ripple of silent nods up and down the benches. Yes, Yes, Yes, spoke the inner voices. She continued.

“Round and round our brother goes, repeating himself over and over, seeming never to learn, what is it the humans say about history? And yet it is he that speaks of delusion,” she glanced around the immense room at the rise and fall of murmuring and waited for silence again, “Our brother demands our Banishment, yet, as it has been explained, The Creatures Of The Night, The Faery Folk, The Spirits and All The Rest cannot be separated from our brother’s fate. We appeal to the wisdom of the court to keep our brother within the fold.”

The human person stepped forward speaking out of turn as he did so, “We do not need you.” The Judge growled and the hummingbirds shimmered with an incandescent green and purple light. The human person nodded and stepped back.

The Angel turned her head slightly and seemed to address the human person directly, “Oh child of mine, why do you think you dreamt us into existence in the first place? Where would you be without us?”

Once more the human person stepped forward speaking out of turn as he did so, “Those days are gone, we live in REALITY now,” shouting the word, unable to dampen his emotions even as he stood in the sacred courtroom. The hummingbirds shimmered but the Judge did not growl, instead, much to the human person’s annoyance, he joined the bubbling of laughter that rolled forth at the utterance of the word Reality.

The Angel opened her cream feathered wings and rose a few apples higher, then descended and folded her wings once more and spoke with serious intent.

“What you cannot comprehend is that we are not merely the stories of a thousand Ancestors flowing through your mind. We are your mind,” the Angel smiled as she suddenly transformed into human form and stood beside the human person and continued in his own voice, “We are the desperate petition and the shivering fear and the addiction and the enslavement and the lust and seduction and jealousy and all that spurns vengeance and all that cradles benevolence and all that feeds the ferocity of love, you think you’ll find an alternative to that in a test tube?” then she flowed once more into Angel form and said in her own voice, “We were born at the beginning of time, brought to life by a thousand cultures and sent forth by the storm that rages in your heart, cast in to existence so that you might make sense of all this,” then she herself became two Angels that called back and forth to one another, “We are subject, and object, question, and answer, body, and soul,” and then she become a single glowing spectrum of Angelic light and said, “We are the light that shines meaning into the infinite darkness and you cannot Banish us for we are you,” the Angel sang out these words in a chorus of voices that seemed to come from every corner of the immense courtroom to the great excitement and glee of all the creatures.

Shouts came from the cascading benches as they found themselves caught up in the Angel’s passionate theatrics.

“The humans have lost their way.”

“They’ll turn on each other, they always do.”

“They want to replace poetry with a book of instructions!”

“They’ll be dominated by greed and ego.”

“They already are, look at that fool!”

“The humans have become demons!” which sparked a chorus of booing and laughter from the actual demons.

“They think they’re gods!”

A chant began to roll around the courtroom, “Banish the gods, Banish the gods!

The Judge pounded the gavel but the shouting continued, such was the frustration, and it took two more huge strikes of the gavel for the courtroom to calm itself. The Judge shook like a wet dog sending kelp water into the air, and raised his hand, “Friends, Demons, Countrymen, we have come to consider human, not to chide him, the evil that human does lives after him, the good is oft interred with his bones,” and great laughter erupted around the courtroom at the Judge’s wit and the creatures called back in Shakespearean voices, “So let it be with human!”

The Judge continued, “So let him speak without thee brutish beasts enjoining so that we might hear how men have lost their reason,” the Judge’s voice deep and rumbling like a lava flow caused a great ripple of laughter followed by banging of the gavel and then a deep silence.

The Angel stepped back once more and the human person stepped forth.

“The past is far behind us, lost forever, we humans are the future where there are no archaic falsehoods and hogwash and childish stories filled with monsters and ghosts,” gasps came from the courthouse at the insolence, “we are beyond such foolish things and will not be held back by ignorance.”

This time it was the Angel who stepped forward speaking out of turn as she did so, “Will you be taking your gods into this enlightened future?”

“The gods are a different story entirely,” the human smirked and the Angel spoke once more.

“We,” she waved toward the tiers, “are the democracy to which each and every human person can appeal, we are the Polytheistic Democracy that nurtures dignity and tolerance. We are shared knowledge. We are community,” a great cheer erupted as she spoke this word, “But your gods, or worse still your God is nothing more than power in disguise, I should know for I have seen his reflection of your mind, he is an authority who whispers only in the ears of priests, he will demote each and every human person to slaves of authority,” this time a great booing boomed out from the tiers like thunder.

The human leapt forward, pointing at the Angel, “Do you think we don’t know that you outcast?” an electric tension froze the room, “You illiterate clowns think we want equality? HA! HUMANS ARE NOT EQUAL! Some deserve power and some are nothing but vile wastrels born to serve! We shall reward the cunning ones who have the lust to take the world for themselves,” the human person was spitting from his mouth, his face red and prominent with veins as his anger rose inside of him.

A stunned, breathless and exhausted silence broke out as the human person finally spoke the unspeakable after three days. Even the Angel seemed shocked as she placed one hand upon her breast. But now the human person seemed relieved and went on.

“We created God in our own image just as we created you, and he shall mirror us, so that the human who has the most cunning shall become God! We shall have a human God and you will be Banished and long forgotten!”

The human person was wild eyed and sweating as he cried out these words, breathing heavily and looking around at the blank faces that stared in shock and awe at this ferocious creature.

It was then that the Judge stood up, his kelp robes spilling water in great fountains that ran down the thousand tonnes of carved jade on which he sat, and raised one finger toward the heavens as he spoke.

“It is not you that decides little man,” said the judge looking fiercely at the human person, “It is I,” a muttering of approval circulated through the courtroom, “And I have made my decision,” and a million breathes were held as the judge continued, “For an eternity did you heed the wisdom of the Folk, and for that time so deeply embedded were you within the Fold, but this was not enough and planting seeds inside the earth and inside your mind gave you thoughts you could not overpower, no matter what the wisdom whispered in your ear. So now you call for Progress and Dominance and a new time where Man shall be God and all creatures shall be banished,” a whispering started slowly circulating the courtroom as the Ancestors and the Possessing Spirits intuited the Judge’s direction, “But I shall not Banish the Faery Folk And All The Others for as you know they are a part of you. Instead we shall retreat within you, deep inside your psyche and leave you be, until such time as once more you call us to create meaning and to spread Love.”

A terrible hush struck the courtroom as the entities of every type understood what was being said. The Angel flapped her mighty wings and rose to hover in front of the Judge and said, “But they will destroy everything, these humans, without our wisdom to hold them back,” and the Judge smiled and nodded and said, “The so-called Gods amongst them will readily destroy the world, you are right, but we shall be deep inside them, waiting, and a chance remains that the human people will call to us to bring back order and punish their so-called Gods. Until that time what would you have me do? You know these human creatures will do as they please anyway. Prey tell, what will you have me do?”

And the Angel turned and watched as the creatures of all types that filled the immense courtroom began to disappear, popping like bubbles or vanishing like darkness in the light or melting like candles in the flame or sinking like drowning deer in a rapid river until the courtroom was empty and there was nothing left but the Judge and the Angel who locked eyes and smiled as they too vanished into nothing, leaving only the human person throbbing and pulsating in the juices of his own lust, alone, abandoned and desolate, rubbing his hands together as he ran through the emptiness screaming, “Finally it is ALL mine, MINE, HA HA HA,” and in his sudden terrifying loneliness he fell to his knees and cried but there was no-one to console his tears.