Rain thundered into the ravine. The trees cried.
Yes! Yes! they shouted while the water ran down their arms. Their shoulders relaxed as they embraced the rain, as it soothed their aching frames. The stones of drought had fledged wings and flown elsewhere, off to torture another land.
The trees' heads rose taller. Just a little.
The rains continued for another month, and then came the stark hostility of winter. The weather was brisk and bitter. White rays pierced the glass motes of the bare branches, rebounding glares through the ravine. The trees felt the earth harden under their feet again, and fear struck deep into their roots.
It can't be happening again, they protested. Please don't let this happen again. The sun is sharp and we'll go blind. The ground is stiff and our spines will break.
They begged the sky to fill with dark, brimming gray clouds.
Soon enough the wind took pity on the poor trees and blew such clouds to the forest. They poured their givings forth again, but the trees had grown greedy. They begged the bliss to stay infinitely, they swelled with rain and gluttony, they grew so heavy with this matter that, now, their spines did break.
Nature takes its own course; the rain must be given equally. If this age-old rule proved true, then this question arose: What was so unique about these trees?
The answer, thought the dirt that harbored the forest to reality, is nothing. Nothing is different about these trees, nor about the trees in the neighboring ravine, nor about the tectonic plates that rock the ocean to sleep.
Everything was balanced on an ingeniously-crafted scale, and everything weighed the same. The scale sat perpetually at a perfect horizontal angle—or it was supposed to. If one side weighed even an ounce more than the other, the entire contraption would crack in half. Worlds would fall away.
As the rain continued, the earth couldn't absorb any more water. The ravine flooded. The trees snapped in halves themselves and were swept away in the torrent. The wind grieved for its haste, and the forest wept for its narrow skull and nearsightedness. The wind whisked the clouds away. The scale was wobbly for a long time, and eventually the ravine dried and the angle restored itself.
But it took a long time.
YOU ARE READING
Aeolia
General FictionA woman runs from everything. A songbird joins her from nowhere, singing colors and images. A whisperer finds the pair among a field of poplars and graves. A dark and vicious viper stalks them from deep in the earth. They must flee from the Viper...
