The Cheese and the Worm
by Harald Smith
A farmer of Storbeth (1) and his family made cheese for a living. They made good cheese and had so much that they could feed themselves, their village, and even have some to send to the cities of Sidherius and Hortugarth.
One year, though, the farmer complained to the other villagers about the Night Worm spirit (2). This spirit had long been part of the village, but it always demanded a sacrifice of cheese once a year and always demanded the best cheese, whole wheels aged two years or more. 'Well,' the farmer said, 'this is not fair to us. Cheese is the only thing that brings good things from the city to our village. With cheese we can buy good anvils and hammers, with cheese we can buy fine cloth for our rituals, with cheese we can buy spare grain for our breads. This Night Worm robs us blind and never gives us anything.'
So the farmer argued and the villagers listened. The villagers had seen
what the farmer could get for selling his cheese. They wanted these
things, too, so they agreed with the farmer. That very night, they went
to the Den of the Night Worm and tore it open. Then they filled it with
salt so that the spirit could not return. The Seeker found a new spirit
(3), that of the White Cow, and the villagers made sacrifice to the new
spirit instead. The farmer and the villagers produced more milk than
ever and made more cheese than ever. They filled the whole store room
with wheels of cheese and then set to their Darkseason tasks. Through
the next two seasons they dreamed of the great profits they would see
when Seaseason came and of the fine things they could buy.
The Night Worm, though was greatly angered by this change for it had long aided the village. So the Night Worm did something it had never done before and appeared by day upon a rock. A sunbelly bird spied it sitting there upon that rock and plucked it up in its beak. It flew off then thinking of the meal to come. But the Night Worm was not without friends and called to the Red-clawed Hawk for aid. The hawk heard the cry and came to help, swooping down upon the sunbelly bird. That little bird was so scared it just dropped the Night Worm from its beak and the worm fell from the sky. It just so happened that the bird had been right above the village storehouse when it dropped the Night Worm, though, so that the worm landed on the storehouse roof and found its way through the thatch into the storehouse. There the Night Worm proceeded to crawl around, careful to avoid the eye of any villager entering.
When Seaseason came, the farmer went into the storehouse to open the first wheel of cheese. But when he cut into it, the cheese was not firm and hard, but runny like water and it smelled like dead goats. The farmer retched in disgust and threw the cheese from the storehouse. He tried another cheese wheel, but the results were the same. Cheese after cheese he tried, but always the results were the same until there was a hill of rotten cheese outside the storehouse.
When the villagers learned of the calamity, they recalled the farmer's words. He had told them how cheese was the only thing that brought good things from the city to the village, yet now there was no cheese to bring any good things. He had told them how with cheese they could buy good anvils and hammers, fine cloth for their rituals, or spare grain for their breads. Yet there was no cheese to buy these things. They also remembered the Night Worm, the Night Worm that robbed them blind. Yet what had the White Cow given them, or the farmer?
The villagers grew so angered that they broke into the farmer's house and put out the hearth fire. They broke apart the hearth itself and filled it with salt (4). They stripped the farmer and his family bare and lashed them with scourges until they bled. Rubbing salt in the wounds the villagers then drove the farmer and his family and the White Cow from Storbeth, never to return. But in the storehouse, they piled the rotten cheese and made a shrine to the Night Worm. They sacrificed long and hard and honored that old spirit ever after.
(1) a village in the Southlands of Imther and part of the Valusi clan
territory
(2) Imtherian villages typically honor a unique local spirit each
season; the Night Worm is the Earthseason spirit of Storbeth.
(3) individual spirits are not constantly honored in the villages; the
spirits often feud with other rival spirits for the right to be honored
and propitiated; the villagers themselves often decide that an old
spirit is no longer worthy of honor and that a new one should be found
instead.
(4) filling a hearth with salt curses that domain and the family from it
with barrenness. It is considered one of the greatest curses that can
be placed upon a family and is typically done only with the consent of
the entire village.
Powered by hypermail