Tomorrow

Tomorrow

By Parras Dumlao

He is like all wizards: old and feeble but with clever eyes. Today he wears a cloak of red—the deep red of a dusking sun rather than the dark red of blood or the wild red of fire. He is human, terribly human, his body covered in wrinkles and wrapped in time. If he were an elf, not  a blemish of eras and epochs would bear on his skin. If he were a dwarf, his beard would be longer than most waterfalls. If he were an orc, his children’s children’s children would remember his name with pride. But he is human, which is to say foolishly perseverant, and he wouldn’t have made it so far in life if he weren’t that floundering race of ape.

The wizard has finally completed his simple task: a diverse bouquet composed of kind daisies and tulips. His flower-picking took him a while, as he quietly studied each and every petal and stem of every plant he came across. He wanted to pick only the most respectful of flora. The types of flowers that sing so happily in the silent language that all plants speak. His slow, methodical work became especially hard, as he ensured that no roses were separated from their partners or that any sunflowers were taken from the sun. In the time it took for him to collect this modest bouquet, the horizon smoke of a simple campfire had turned into the blacker smog of industrial flame.

He now meanders slowly through the forest, bearing a once-great staff of rotting cedar wood, as the complex maze of douglas fir and mighty oak fall into a single narrow pathway that closes behind the aging magician. He walks slowly. His breaths are haggard. Sometimes he stops at a log or a tree stump and watches as the world passes by. Satyrs and nymphs repeat their same old games and tricks upon hunters and wanderlusting nomads. Will o’ wisps playfully dance along the forest floor as fledgling heroes step closer to destiny. Stories and myths play out in the blink of his eye, as he carefully clutches his small bouquet of enchanted flowers. After a couple more of his routine rest stops, he finally makes it to the center of the forest, deeper than any man has been in so many eras of time, to the small stone tower that he calls home.

As he approaches the bottom stem of his tower an entrance appears where there was only a wall. A spiral staircase beholds itself in the tower’s innards, and a small table next to the entrance bears an empty vase filled with water waiting to be filled with the cheery songs of meadow plants. He sets the bouquet inside and watches with a simple smile at what his venture to the outside world has done for him. He then turns to the spiral staircase and begins to climb, as the tower’s entrance once more turns to old mossy cobblestone. 

As the old wizard walks, he takes no notice of the great tapestries that hang on the wall, memories of a bygone era. The bottommost fabric is of a simple wizard’s tower, a legend in the adventures of many old knights—it is said a great old sorcerer lives there. The second bears the visage of an old hermit wizard who helps the adventures of the epic chosen one, Brothmere the Brave, who must slay the violent dragon Garlagon and marry the young princess Rosemary. The third, fourth, fifth, and sixth tapestries bear a similar story: the third is all about how Jakor the Lively, assisted by a great mage, helped defeat the dastardly Troll of Windlan and marry the young prince Marian. The fourth tells how Vicora the Wise was able to kill her own shadow-self, with the help of a curious magician, and live her life alone in happy solitude. The story stays the same nearly every time: just different names, different foes, and different endings—the tapestries only growing older and older as the red-cloaked wizard wanders up the stairwell. 

Soon enough the tapestries change to the epic tales of some young, wandering magic-user who had changed the world with miracles beyond comprehension:; someone who had inspired those once great mages and royals. Near the end of the red wizard’s journey to the top of his tower, a tapestry, unrefined and sewned unevenly, bears the story of a young cobbler’s boy who discovered how to perform simple magic and his slow journey into the becoming a kingdom’s own personal sorcerer. It is only in this tapestry where the wizard bows his head in simple respect before opening the door to the tower’s study.
The study is a simple place. Once a great observatory now turned into a personal library of sorts, it is lighted and heated by a fireplace directly opposite of the study’s entrance. By said fireplace are two chairs and an old mahogany coffee table. The window that stands to the East is at a permanent nighttime, overlooking a world that is far from mortal. The wizard takes off unfurls his cloak and sets his staff aside. He chooses a book from one of the many shelves that cover this circular beauty. He sets the book down at the coffee table, and wanders over to a cabinet that hides in the west of the room, and he takes out a silver tea set. He comes back to the coffee table, sets down the tea, and begins to read his book. Time passes and an abnormal gust of wind appears at the other seat. The wizard smiles and continues to read. The only sound is the crackling of fire.

Are you ready?

“Not quite. Maybe we can do it tomorrow,” the wizard says with a pleasant smirk, turning the page.

Tomorrow? You said tomorrow twelve yesteryears ago!

The wizard looks up from his reading, a curious visage about his face, as he begins to take his cup of tea. 

“Oh! Well that’s my mistake then isn’t it!” 

The voice stayed silent for a while. The wizard looked back at his book, periodically drinking his cup of tea whenever he grew thirsty.

Why?

“Why what?”

Why are you stalling?

The wizard stopped drinking. He didn’t expect that question. It wasn’t a cynical question, for Death was never cynical, but it felt like that. 

“I don’t think I understand?”

You always put it off until tomorrow, but yet, tomorrow never comes. You say that you’ll take your step through the veil any day now, but yet, you wander the meadows picking daisies and tulips and lilacs and roses…

The wizard grew uncomfortable and looked towards the window, where he saw the distorted air that called itself Death. He didn’t speak and yet Death heard his voice.

You have done your destinies. You have done your stories. People are living without you. You are nothing but a ghost to them.

The wizard nodded. Death, as he had always done, spoke the truth.

All men die twice: first their bodies then their name. You are the first to ever have that second come first. No one knows you. So why?

“I….” The wizard felt faint and tired, the room growing dimmer, the fire’s crackle growing quieter.

I am not unkind. I am merely practical. Your story has ended and I am obliged to close your book.

The distorted air begins to approach, and with every inch it gains a clearer image. First robes of midnight black, then bones of ancient starlight, and soon enough a face born of mortal dream—ever changing, ever abstract. The wizard nodded and for the first time he felt his soul tremble beyond his body. He is old. He was forgotten. He was… he is… the world felt odd. He had both lived in it and also spectates it. He feels himself floatinged and yet still. 

Death, fast approaching, began to speak in its divine tongue—chills of air and petrifying sound—but yet the wizard could not hear Death over the cheery melody of the flowers below.

“We’ll leave tomorrow. Yes… tomorrow…”