“You did?”
“Absolutely!”
Maren chuckled with delight at the thought. She had always been close partners with her imagination but had never considered that it was beautiful.
“However,” the old man continued, “I didn’t give it to you just for play.”
The girl didn’t fully understand what he was saying. She pushed her mouth to the side and squinted. “Then what’s it for?” she asked.
“Oh, I love play,” the man said. “I love make-believe and laughter. But to stop there is to only use a small part of the gift I gave you. With your imagination, you can create. With your imagination, you can solve problems. With your imagination, you can even bring things that are in my world into your world! It is far more than simply a means of shutting out the unpleasant business of the world around you.”
“But how do I do those things?” she asked.
The old man stared compassionately at Maren for a moment, then answered, “You’re going to have to spend more time in the world outside of make-believe,” he answered. “It is here amongst the disagreeable, troublesome day-to-day where the best opportunities lie.”
A tear began to make its way down the girl’s cheek as the man’s words sank in. “But the real world is so painful,” she protested.
The old man sniffed and a tear ran down his own cheek, mirroring Maren’s. “Yes,” he said, “but pain is the anvil on which true greatness is formed.” He then reached over and touched the girl’s hand again.
At his touch, the sense of goodness that Maren felt about the man was magnified, but it was also accompanied by unexpected sorrow. It was a heaviness so immense that, had it lasted more than a brief moment, the girl was convinced that it would have taken her life.
“Do you remember what Son told you?” the man asked.
“That I’m part of your great story,” she answered, rubbing the tears from her eyes.
“That’s right!” he said with a grin. “You were made to be free, powerful, and heroic. Not a slave to plays and pies.”
“I want to be heroic,” Maren declared. “But I’m small, and I don’t have any friends.”
“Really? No friends?” the man asked.
Embarrassed for giving another untruthful answer, the girl corrected herself. “I have friends that have been very good to me.”
“Yes, you do. They were a present from me,” he said with a wink.
Maren sat and peered at the old man’s face for a moment and thought about her friends. She remembered the way they cared for and protected her. The way they were patient with her quirkiness and loving beyond reasonableness. As she thought, an idea emerged. “I have to go back and free the other slaves from Laor,” she blurted out.
“My goodness! That IS a heroic notion!” he said.
“It is?”
“Indeed. And do you know what?”
“What?”
“I believe in you.”
“You do?”
“Absolutely!” the old man cheered, and he grinned proudly from ear to ear.
As Maren basked in the man’s applause, the smell of breakfast grew stronger. She could feel her stomach rumbling and wanted to put it to rest. Quickly, she glanced down to get a look at the fish frying. She licked her lips, then looked back up to see the old man’s face. To her bewilderment, he was no longer there. The man was gone, the food was gone, and the buzzing in her head had returned.
“I hope ye slept well, girly!” she could hear Kugun yell from inside the apartment. “’Cause as soon as I’m done eatin’, yer goin’ ta da brothel!”
For the first time, Maren noticed the filthiness of her cage. It disgusted her, and she felt compelled to escape from it before Kugun came out to sell her. She reached between the bars and yanked on the lock holding it shut. It did not budge, but neither did her desire to get out. She reached around again, with both hands this time, and pulled down with all of her weight, but it still would not open.
The girl stopped and listened for Kugun. It was quiet in the apartment, so she reckoned he was still eating. She examined the bars of the cage and wondered if she could squeeze between them. She stuffed her right arm through and managed to get most of her right leg out. Not confident in this strategy, she withdrew back into the pen.
Suddenly, she heard the sound of dishes being tossed onto the counter and she knew she had to make her move. She went back to the bars and squeezed her head through, badly scraping the back of her ear. Looking upward, she managed to get both arms and a shoulder out, and began to push hard to force her torso through. Her heart beat like a timpani drum and her hands began to shake. She wanted to groan as her belly and hips fought hard to stay in the pen.
Just then, the door opened and Kugun shouted, “Hey!!” as he jogged toward her.
Maren reached down, grabbed a handful of dirt and pebbles from the ground and flung them up at the man’s face. As he spit and wiped his eyes, she pressed with her feet from within the cage and pushed as hard as she could with her hands from without. With one final effort, she got her body through, pulled her legs out, and scrambled to her feet.
“Why, you worthless imbecile!” the man roared as he reached for her.
She ducked under his arm and ran as fast as she could. The morning fog was still thick, and she didn’t know which way to run, so she darted forward down one of the narrow winding alleys that snakes its way through the interior of Ahmcathare.
“I’ll find ye, little idiot!” Kugun fumed.
She could see his silhouetted form searching just outside the alley’s opening and did her best to make no sound.
“And when I do,” he added, “Yer goin’ ta wish ye’d never seen a blackberry pie.”
CHAPTER ELEVEN
No Easy Way
The smells of pheasant roasting and
