The Natamyths
by Daniel Christopher June
The Natamyths
Daniel Christopher June
Copyright 2011 by Daniel Christopher June
Smashwords Edition
Contact the Author at
Perfectidius @ gmail.com
Or visit his website at
www. Perfectidius .com
The Natamyths
by Daniel Christopher June
PART 1: The early education of Wendy
The Beginning of the Universe
For eternities, the entire universe spun around like a red ribbon, dancing and singing her joys, and never tiring of the life that she was. For eternities she pondered and dreamed up millions: millions of planets, millions of stars, millions of people, millions of moons, millions of songs, millions of joys. She sang aloud:
All I am and I am all,
Everything is my name,
Life is my heart,
I always change.
I grow and learn and love,
My mind contains infinity,
My entire body is wove,
From the fabric of everything.
At last she said: I will love myself more fully by loving another. I will become two. And so she became Allmother, goddess of love, and Allfather god of power. I am two, said the universe, I am male and female: I contain myriads, everything will be born of us.
And they danced that day. Allmother became the planets and moons, Allfather became suns and stars. And their bodies were the whole universe and everything, and their life was the energy of the planets. They danced that first day, and the universe continues to dance to this day.
On the second day, Allfather said to Allmother: come, let us become a little one, and she will be a poet. She will name all the life and animals we will make. Allfather walked upon the oceans, and pulled up a large wave, with white hair and blue eyes. And with his pen, he wrote the name NATALIE, on the wave. Allmother, when she saw the wave, sang the song with joy: “You are NATALIE.” The winging words entered the written name, and then the wave became the birthday of a little child, who was red as a blush, and full of words. Natalie became the GodChild, and her parents loved her very much.
They lived together, in the palace of fountains, from where all the rivers flowed. There, they watched as the swimming things became walking things, and the walking things became flying things, and the scaly things became furry things, and the furry things became thinking things, and all the world was full of life, and the Universal Three never tired of singing, and laughing, and writing, and making new life.
Natalie Becomes the Human Wendy
After many years in the palace of fountains, Natalie grew dissatisfied.
“I cannot endure being nothing but a singer about life,” she said. “I want to be a singer of life: to live, and suffer, and love, and find love, and lose love: I want to become a woman.”
Now Allmother knew her daughter well, and this did not surprise her. “She is like me, her mother, whose body is the world. She too wants to live in the world, amidst life.”
And so she convinced Allfather to let his daughter become a woman, and be born as a human infant, and to learn the whole world, from direct experience. And Allfather kissed his daughter, and Sherry kissed her daughter, and they said, “Love is in your heart, and creativity is in your mind. Go: take on the world.”
And so Natalie's body became covered in dancing flames, until the flames consumed her, and Natalie was nothing but dancing flames that were red as a dying sun. And those flames rose in the air like a great butterfly, and flew down to earth. At last, the flame burned itself out, and Natalie became a beautiful smell of incense, a lovely breeze.
She flew over the world, looking far and wide for worthy people with which to live. She flew over Africa, where the dark-skinned Africans lived in jungles and deserts; she flew over Asia, where the yellow-skinned Asians honored family and duty; she flew over America, where the red-skinned Americans loved the land and hunted the wild Buffalo. (This was thousands of years before today.) There she saw a young woman, lovely and wise, busy sewing a tapestry of the heavens, with white-winged horses, green-skinned farmers, and maidens of the Sun.
The woman sang:
A widow, a widow am I,
Who has never birthed a child,
I will love no other man again,
So alone with my song I will be.
The widow gasped as a wind whisked around her in whirls. Natalie listened to the widow's heart, and learned that she was true to her heart, and never lied to herself. She is worthy, thought Natalie.
Then the widow breathed in the beautiful incense, and Natalie filled her up, and the maiden became pregnant.
“Today my name is Joy,” said the widow, “For my body is pregnant with a new life. My body contains a miracle and a treasure, and I shall call her 'Wendy,' for she is child of the wind.”
And so Joy gave birth to Wendy, the first incarnation of Natalie. And the entire village danced and sang new songs for the miracle of the wind.
Wendy meets the Bleeding man
When Wendy was very young, and still didn't have all her adult teeth, she said to her mother, “Why do you tell me to be good? Why not bad? If it’s so good to be good, why is that so? And what is good? You have so many rules, but wouldn't the world be better without rules?” For she wanted to stay outside after dark with her best friend the Wolf Boy, who was friends with the moon, and slept during the day.
“Isn't it good that I called you Wendy?” asked the mother. “When you don't get your way, your questions coming pouring forth like the wind.”
“Still, you haven't told me why,” said Wendy.
“Go ask the Bleeding Man. He is holy. He knows what to say to little children when they are up to no good.”
The Bleeding Man was a priest in that part of the country. He would tell the children stories about how they should respect their parents, eat their vegetables, do their chores, and all those other “good” things that Wendy couldn't care two kernels of corn about.
“I don't like the Bleeding Man,” said Wendy. “Besides, what do I care what he thinks is good when I want to know what you think is good.”
“What I think is good is asking wise people and considering what they say to decide for yourself. Now go along and ask.”
She left and went to the Bleeding Man's house. Now he didn't live with the other villagers, but only went into town when he wished to whip himself with cords, to make his body bleed.
When he came to the door, he was dressed all over with a scratchy brown mat, which was uncomfortable to even look at. His face was sunken in like he hadn't eaten in days, and his eyes were wild and unsteady.
“A child, a child, I say a child! Or are you the devil come to trick me, what? Tell me!” said the Bleeding Man.
“It's me, Wendy. Momma says you know why being good is good, and why you shouldn't be bad.”
The Bleeding Man considered. He stooped to pick Wendy up and set her in a chair, but Wendy didn't want blood on her blue dress. He pointed to a chair made out of sticks and jagged edges for her to sit on, but instead she crossed her legs, sat on the ground, and nodded that she was listening.
“Being bad is like being in a tornado of flames, where you can never touch the ground, and everything you want burns you. That is what happens to you after you die if you are bad. But if you are good you go to a place where you can sleep and relax all day, and see the beautiful face of the Goddess.”
“So you've been to these places?” asked Wendy.
“No, but we know it is true because that's what the ancient elders said, and if you doubt them, you are surely going to be fed to the tornado.”
“You are saying that I should live my life according to what dead people say?”
“Hmmph! The arrogance of youth,” said the Bleeding Man.
“Well, what does it mean to be good?”
“You must kiss the boy who is ugliest, give everything you care about to the beggar, call yourself a worthless sinner, crawl through dirt and mud, give up your youth to tending the old and sick, and never think of yourself.”
Wendy's first reaction was to laugh. But she paused, and reflected; she did want to be polite. The whole town respected the Bleeding Man, and nobody called him names, but some of the boys and girls called her names like “air-head” and they tore up her tapestries that her mother had taught her to sew.
“Well I still think that the most important person to me is me,” said Wendy, “But tell me more about the Goddess. Why should we look at her face? Where did you get that idea?”
“She is beautiful, and beauty is meant to be looked at,” said the old man. “Here, let me show you.”
They went on a walk to an old deserted mountain, with a little temple on top.
“In that temple is the perfect image of the Goddess. But I will never see it, nor will anybody, because the path keeps getting steeper until you cannot climb any more. That's what being perfect is. It is always trying harder, but never getting there. You must always try harder, but you will never be perfect.”
Hmm, thought Wendy. And she thought I will run up that path and show him that it is pointless never being perfect, because you can get to the top and see what all the fuss is about. And she ran over the pricker bushes, jumped from rock to rock, used her hands and feet, and scrabbled her way to the top. But before she could get there, the sand fell, the rocks fell, and then she fell and rolled down back to the feet of the Bleeding Man.
“And that,” he said, “is what it means to be a good person.”
“What do you do if you make it to the top?” asked Wendy.
“Then you can die,” he said.
“Hmmm...” said Wendy. “You once said something. You said a man is wise if he is humble enough to learn from a child. Did you mean that?”
“Why yes,” he said. “What of it?”
“Well I think that you would be happy if you didn't fall on your head trying to get to that perfect statue, but you would be happier if you made a new statue, and showed it so people could really see how beautiful it was.”
The Bleeding Man paused for a while. He began to talk, then stopped himself, and thought some more.
“But of course, my statue wouldn't be perfect,” he said, “But maybe it would inspire people to see the real statue someday. Well, thank you. Run along now...”
“Wait, there is something Wolf Boy always said to me. He said to give nothing away, or you will spoil people, and to never take things free, or you'll become a mooch. But you should always trade, and fair's fair. As I see it, you owe me something in return for my good advice.”
“Okay, child,” said Bleeding Man. “What do you want?”
“That!” she said, pointing to his whip.
“But you are too young to realize the importance of hurting yourself.”
“No,” she said, “I want it to protect my tapestries from the mean boys and girls who tear at things and spit on what they are jealous of.”
“I probably won't need it for a while,” he said, “but you must never use it to hurt anybody, unless you have to.”
“Agreed,” she said.
They parted ways. Wendy put the whip into her purse of carrying. Her mother was a seamstress of marvelous things. She was so talented at sewing that her creations possessed magical powers. For instance, she sewed a purse for Wendy that could carry anything and everything put into it. Wendy had filled it with rocks, and papers, and arrows, and books, and sticks, and everything else she could find. And now she put the nasty whip on top of it all.
When she got home, her mom asked her what she learned from the Bleeding Man.
“Well what I learned and what he said were two different things entirely,” said Wendy. “What he said is we should always try our best to seek perfection. What I learned is that perfection is always trying our best.”
And that night she said to herself: “I, Wendy, embody perfection. I always do my best.”
Wendy meets the Caterpillar Girl
One spring, Wendy wanted to sew something beautiful that she had never seen sewn before. Her mother showed her how to sew many beautiful things: a rainbow veil, a tapestry that moved and showed great battles, black boots that could walk on water, and a sunshirt that shown like a flame with no heat. But Wendy wanted to do something else, something she didn't even know what. She walked through the woods, looking for inspiration.
Finally, she came to a thicket. She wondered: what is behind this thicket? She was just skinny enough to climb under the thorns. She dragged her carrying-purse with her. When she got through, she came up to the side of a great hill with a cave. Along the sides of the cave were four red cats, as big as calves, and covered with wild hair. They hissed and snarled when they saw her. But beyond the snarling, she heard the most beautiful voice echoing from within the cave. It was a woman's and she was sad.
Maybe she is a prisoner, she thought, and these snarling cats are keeping her captive.
She pulled from her purse the whip she had earned from Bleeding Man. With a cry, she jumped at the cats, eyes flashing, and she smacked one right on the nose. They bounded away, arching their backs and waving their tails. But they left just enough room for Wendy to run in.
The inner walls of the cave glowed with jade green light. Everywhere: crystals, jewels, diamonds growing out of the very walls. Wendy found herself ankle-deep in cool, cool water. In the center of the pool of water sat a beautiful blond woman, naked, and shivering. She hadn't quite noticed Wendy yet, and sang to herself as she combed her long long hair.
“Hello, fair lady,” said Wendy. "I saw that you are trapped here by those mean cats, but I think I can chase them away with this whip long enough to rescue you."
“Fair child, so bold and young, my captivity has just begun. Those cats are mine to fend off the world, I am a butterfly goddess, and I must make my wings in silence. In these caves I have looked long into the limpid pool of my soul, and alas, there is so much sorrow, and alas, so much beauty. But I never want to share it with the brutal world beyond. The world is full of arrows and thorns. This is my secret place. Nobody will ever know the real me. I am fulfilled looking in the pools at my sad face, and adding to their waters with my tears.”
“But caterpillars turn into butterflies. That's the way its supposed to be.”
“If only I could make wings, if only,” sighed the caterpillar girl. “If only I had some inspiration.”
“Well where is your thread? Where is your needle? Maybe you wouldn't be so sad if you were busy making something,” for she was feeling sad herself, hearing the caterpillar girl. The drip dripping of the pool, the eerie glow of the green crystals, the soft sing-song voice of the goddess, all made Wendy want to weep.
“There are my many attempts,” said the caterpillar girl, and she pointed to a pile of orange wings. Wendy looked them over, and understood. She saw what they were trying to be, and saw that they all fell apart over the same error.
“Let me try,” she said. “Where is the thread?”
“It is my pool of tears that I thread from,” said the caterpillar woman.
“That's your first mistake!” said Wendy. “To fly, you need to make wings out of all your experiences, not just your tears, but also your sweat, your blood, your passions.”
She set to work. She used some of the pool's waters to sew the wings, and added the sweat from her forehead, and she remembered her anger at the village boys, and she breathed that into the thread, and she remember her honest mother, and she sewed her joy into the wings.
After three days of sewing, she said, “Here you go! It is a red dress. When you want to fly, you pull on the sleeves and it becomes a pair of fiery wings.”
“Oh no!” said the Caterpillar Girl. “Oh no, I don't want that. That's not what I need right now. I need to collect more waters. I need to sing more songs. I need to remain in my cave.”
And then Wendy realized that the caterpillar girl didn't want to fly or see the world or dance or enjoy life. She wanted to be alone and think and sing sad songs.
Well if that is what makes her happy, then she can enjoy her sorrows, Wendy thought, But as for me, I have found joy in being creative.
And then she said, “I, Wendy, create. My joy in life is to create at all times.”
She put on the red dress.
“For the use of your waters, I will give you this advice: Do not sew wings you do not wish to fly upon. Instead, sew poetry from the lips of your sorrow, then you will not be naked. And tell your cats to let poets in, for you have loved sharing your sad songs with me.”
“Thank you, child!” said the Caterpillar Girl.
Then Wendy pulled on the sleeves of her dress, and two shimmering wings as broad as doors unfurled, and she flew out of that cave, over the forest, and circled above the village.
Then she thought of something. “I will go to the mountain and see the temple that holds the statue of the face of the Goddess.”
So she flew down the familiar path and landed next to the temple. The columns were white as bleached bones, and green grasses and purple flowers burst from the earth.
As she stepped into the temple, a cool breeze chilled her bones.
It is so quiet here, she thought, and so calm!
She tip-toed in. In the center there was a sign that read: The Face of the Goddess. It stood above a perfectly still pool of water. She looked about for a statue or an idol, but there was none. She looked into the waters, but it contained only the soft curve of marble underneath. Then she noticed something: the pool reflected her face. She saw the red dress, and the wings as broad as doors, her bright searching eyes, and she caught a glimpse of her potential and all the things she could and would be, her adult face.
“So I am the face of the Goddess!” exclaimed Wendy. “Then let me drink this wisdom in,” and she broke the face of the water with her hands, and drank in the waters, feeling their coolness and magic run through her body.
But I will not tell the Bleeding Man! She thought. He will never see a God in his own face; let him make statues for the people to admire. It is good that this temple is here for people with wings.
And she flew away to her home, very happy with her week.
Wendy meets the Book-learned Teacher
Wendy enjoyed long walks, sometimes alone, sometimes with her mother, sometimes with Wolf Boy; and while she walked, she would talk, with others or with herself, and she would try to figure out the reasons behind things, and see what causes what, and how everything relates. She loved to discover what crawled under the rocks, what swam in the swamps, what burrowed in the dirt, what flew in the skies. Sometimes, she would fly up high, high away, but never when the village boys and girls would watch, because they envied her the dress she had sewn, and they demanded she sew them wings. But she said that you can't fly an inch on anybody's wings but your own.
With all that flying, thinking and searching, she thought, What is really important in this world? How am I to understand everything, and know why things are the way they are, and what I should do, and what I shouldn't do? I love to create, but sometimes I just don't know what to make.
"What you need," said her mother, "Is some schooling."
"What's that?" she asked.
"That's where you sit and listen to a teacher tell you the way the world works. His knowledge spills over and you soak it up like a sponge."
"What's a sponge?"
"It’s an animal that sits around and soaks things up," said her mother.
Well if I am going to meet a teacher, he's not going to have it that easy! thought Wendy.
So Joy enrolled Wendy in school. In the next village, there was a cousin of the Bleeding Man who taught a class of students. They were all studying to be wise-men, medicine-men, and village chiefs.
"And what are you studying to be?" they asked her.
"To be myself, of course," she said.
"Yes, but what do you want to do?" they asked.
"I suppose whatever I find fun to do."
"Aha!" said the teacher. "That is the first lesson which I will beat out of you. Life is not about having fun. Its about responsibilities. You have to be a part of society, and help people, and fit into a role that benefits others. What you do for a job will probably not be fun at all, but you must do it anyway."
But Wendy remembered that she was the face of the Goddess, and thought that the joy of being alive was in creativity, not with responsibility.
What's the use of hard work? she wondered to herself. I will figure that out!
The teacher began with a history lesson. "Our people came here from Asia, on a land bridge. And they spread into seven distinct groups,” he said. "And those groups each started what adds up to a total of fourteen different languages. And those languages are..." Wendy sighed. "For the year that the first language changed was the year 714, and the year the second language…" and then Wendy remembered her fiery wings, which were broad as doors and as light as clouds. And she thought of flying to Asia, and seeing the little Asian boys and girls, and wouldn't they be happy to see her, with her fiery wings, and maybe they didn't have school in Asia, and
"WENDY!" shouted the teacher. "Pay attention! You will learn nothing if you daydream. Now then, I was telling you about Asia."
Wendy looked around the class, and saw that some of the boys weren’t paying attention, a few with jaws half-opened, a few sleeping, and others were drawing pictures of bears and wolves in their notebooks. Well! she thought, It seems I'm not the only one bored with all this.
After class she flew home and told her mother about the day, about how the class bored her, and she learned everything there is to know about things she didn't care one speck of dust about.
"Wendy, I'm going to tell you this twice so you remember it. Nevermind what I said about sponges. Put your heart into your lessons and you’ll enjoy them. I will say it again: Put your heart into your lessons and you’ll enjoy them. Now I want you to think about that before you go to school tomorrow."
"You mean I have to go back tomorrow?" wondered Wendy.
"You have to go back every day."
"How long?" she gasped.
"Years. Until you know enough to educate yourself. Unlike the kids in this village, you will become a full poet. That means taking in everything and applying it in the right way."
Wendy decided to think this problem through. So she flew across the woods. As she was thinking, she saw her teacher, Mr. Jozack, toting a pile of books across a path, and dropping them again and again. She landed behind him and said, "Can I help you carry those books?"
"They are heavy," he said, "But thank you anyway."
"Well I have a carrying bag that my mother made me. No matter how much you put into it, it remains as light as air."
"Okay," he said, and handed her five big books and one little blue one.
Once they got to his house, he said, "Thank you, Wendy. I hope you learn to pay attention in class, you are such a good girl outside of class."
"What are those books?" asked Wendy, "I have never read a real book.”
"Well this one is about American history," he said, "and this one is about Geometry, and this one is about poetry, and this one is about magic, and this one is about gardening."
"What's this little blue one?" she asked.
"That one's empty. I was always going to write a book, but I never have the time. I am too busy teaching and working to write anything. I always carry it with me, just in case I conceive of something suitable to write about."
"What can you write in empty books?"
"Anything you want. Pictures, puzzles, math problems, poems, your diaries, whatever idea you ever think, you can write down."
"Why not just think them?" she asked.
"Because when you write them you can see your thoughts and organize them."
"Why do that?”
"Well you like to sew pictures of beautiful places, right? Why not just remember them and not sew them?"
And then Wendy realized that language too was like a thread, and you could weave stories and pictures with it.
"Where can I get a book like that?" she asked.
"You can have it. I have plenty. This one is an endless notebook. You can write all your ideas in it and never fill it up. Its called the Memory Book."
"Thanks!" she said, and flew off holding the notebook in her hand.
And then she went to her secret place in the woods, where not even Wolf Boy knew of. There she wrote down:
I embody perfection. I always do my best.
I create. My joy in life is creating.
I put my whole heart into the work I choose to do.
After that, she asked the teacher many questions during class, even when he didn't want her to. She didn't care. She wanted to learn. And whenever she got bored, she took this as a sign that she was missing something essential. She wrote down all her ideas, and drew pictures, and wrote down what momma said, and what Wolf Boy said, and what Jozack said, and tied them all together.
What the teacher didn't know, because he never wrote in the book of Memory, is that it had the power to make things happen in the future.
"I'm going to make the perfect book with all I learn" she vowed. She didn't know yet what her writing would do.
Wendy meets the Mirror Girl
Wendy enjoyed her quiet place in the woods, and sometimes flew there to be alone. She thought: "I've learned so much about gardening from my teacher. Why don't I make a garden? Momma said you never learn something unless you do it."
First, she built a high wall of rocks so that nobody could get through. Then she read from her memory book the magic words for making plants grow. She said: "O thorn bush do grow, do grow, do grow, I ask for your prickers to guard my garden. I say: Veevosha!" And the thorn bushes sprung up like sneezes, and surrounded the walls, so that nobody would even know it was a garden just looking at it.
She said the magic words that made other plants grow. Some died and some came up wrong. But after months of trying, she had planted various flowers and trees, and everything was beautiful: there were blue pansies, and white orchids, flush strawberries, and a black apple tree, with flesh more savory than beasts'. In the center of the garden was a reflecting pool, just like the one at the temple of the image of the Goddess. And within it she placed two goldfish and two bull-frogs.
Then she went away for a few weeks to let things grow, and to learn how to keep her garden.
One night, after mother had gone to bed and she had snuck out to talk with Wolf Boy, who said he was going away on an adventure to find silver arrows, she felt especially lonely, and went back to her garden to write down her thoughts.
Imagine her surprise when after she landed in her garden, under the moonlight she saw a black-robed girl sitting by the pool, looking away from the water.
Its the lonely Caterpillar Girl for sure! Wendy said to herself, and then, How did she get through the prickers and thorns I set up, and climb the high stone walls? But look: her clothes are tattered; she has fought hard to get here, where she doesn't belong. I should investigate.
But the girl was much younger than Caterpillar Girl. She was about Wendy's age, maybe a year more. Her hair was as dark as pitch, her skin as pale as milk. She did not seem to be looking at anything.
"Hello, who goes there?" asked Wendy.
"Oh my! Hello!" said the girl. "I must have wandered here in a dream. My dreams lead me all over. It’s the call of the reflection pools. Wherever they are, they call to me."
She must be very vain, thought Wendy, but as the girl talked to her, she didn't look at Wendy. She stood and staggered.
It’s the break of dawn, it isn't that hard to see, thought Wendy. But then she caught the girl's eyes. They were two perfect mirrors, reflecting Wendy's face back to her. She was also blind.
"I have never seen eyes like yours," said Wendy. "They are perfect reflections!"
"Yes. When they became that way, my vision left me."
"But you are beautiful, after all," said Wendy, but she was only looking at herself in those eyes.
"Thank you. Others have said just the opposite."
"And you look like you have a fire burning in your chest...I find you so familiar to me."
"Am I those things?" wondered the Mirror Girl. "I will be now."
"Don't you know what you are?" asked Wendy.
"It takes a little time for me to realize what I am," said the Mirror Girl. "I have to talk with my new friend for a while."
"Well where do you come from? What is your past? What is your goal? Who are your parents?"
"Oh, I don't care about those things. Some of them are so painful to me. I think what those around me think. That is the safest way. If I am what people want me to be, then everybody is always happy—but why am I telling you this: I don't even tell myself this!" for the Mirror Girl felt the heat from Wendy's wings, and it gave her a strange sense of boldness. "What I mean to say is that I like all sorts of people, and get along with just about everybody."
"What's so great about getting along with everybody?" asked Wendy. "Shouldn't you get along with the people who are like you, and just be polite to the rest?"
"That could be right," she said. "Yes, that is what I think. And since you and I are alike, we should get along."
"But you don't even know me yet," said Wendy.
"But I do know you," said the Mirror Girl, and her voice started to sound like Wendy's. "I can tell everything I need to know by the sound of your voice. I can hear your mind thinking, and your heart feeling. You actually have a heart just like mine."
And the Mirror Girl didn't look so strange anymore, but she reminded Wendy of her mother. And she thought, Well, isn't it lucky that if anybody should find their way in my secret garden, it should be such a bright beautiful girl? So she bid the girl farewell, and slipped back home into her bed before her mother could catch her.
During school that day, she couldn't wait to return to the secret garden and talk to the Mirror Girl. And sure enough, she was still there. She was eating some apples from Wendy's Black Apple tree, and seemed happy enough.
Some of the plants were rearranged, and a few flowers were plucked and set in a pile next to the pool, but Wendy decided to ignore that for now.
"It looks like you found some food. Wait till I tell you about my day!" She read many of her ideas and poems and secrets from her Memory book. The girl drank it all in like it was milk, and praised Wendy for every smart thing she said. And Wendy thought: nobody has praised me as well as this mirror girl. Perhaps she sees me best?
Over the weeks, Mira altered more and more things. Wendy was sad to see that the garden was dying. What should she do? But she said nothing, lest Mira never come back.
One day, Mira said, "As I am blind, I cannot very well get my friends. But I think they should come to see my garden. So go and fetch them for me."
"What did you say?" exclaimed Wendy.
"I said I have written enough poems and planted enough trees to have something to impress my friends with. Now please, if you are my friend, go fetch them."
"Poems? What? Where?"
"Here," she said. "I wrote them from pages I tore from your memory book.” Wendy inspected them, but found them to be cheap copies of her own work.
"Mira, what is all this?"
"It’s my work. Don't you like it?"
"Mira, why don't you ever look at your reflection in the water?"
"What! You know I can't see. Why would I look at my reflection if I can't see? That's ridiculous!"
"No, I think you should look," said Wendy, and advanced on the girl.
Mira backed up and had the crazy look of a cornered animal. Wendy grabbed her, and pulled her to the pool, pushed her face down, and leveled Mira's face to the water.
When Mira looked, the mirrors reflected against the surface, and she saw an infinite nothingness. She screamed with horror. "No, I can't bear to look!"
"But that's what you've become: a nothing!" said Wendy. "Do not seek your worth by getting friends. Be yourself. Don't steal your worth from others."
And with that, Mira cried two silver tears, which fell into the pool. She was no longer blind.
"I can remain your friend," said Wendy, "But you can never return to my garden. Now I will take you away blindfolded.
Later, Wendy returned and fetched the silver tears from the pool. They had formed into a perfect mirror. She put it in her purse and then flew home. That night, she wrote in her book:
I, Wendy, am true to myself.
Wendy meets the man in the Tornado
One day, Wolf Boy ran through the village by daylight, and if that wasn't strange enough, he was yelling "Tornado," which seemed to mean a whole lot to the villagers, and also to Wendy’s mother, Joy. They immediately began to pray and dance and cry, while Joy hid Wendy inside their house and told her to be still.