SO YOU SHALL, Tehlu told her, and reached out to lay his hand on her heart. When he touched her she felt like she were a great golden bell that had just rung out its first note. She opened her eyes and knew then that it had been no normal dream.
Thus it was that she was not surprised to discover she was pregnant. In three months she gave birth to a perfect dark-eyed baby boy. She named him Menda. The day after he was born, Menda could crawl. In two days he could walk. Perial was surprised, but not worried, for she knew the child was a gift from God.
Nevertheless, Perial was wise. She knew that people might not understand. So she kept Menda close by her, and when her friends and neighbors came to visit, she sent them away.
But this could only last a little while, for in a small town there are no secrets. Folk knew that Perial was not married. And while children born out of wedlock were common during this time, children who grew to manhood in less than two months were not. They were afraid that she might have lain down with a demon, and that her child was a demon’s child. Such things were not unheard of in those dark times, and the people were afraid.
So everyone gathered together on the first day of the seventh span, and made their way to the tiny house where Perial lived by herself with her son. The town smith, whose name was Rengen, led them. “Show us the boy,” he yelled. But there was no response from the house. “Bring out the boy, and show us he is nothing but a human child.”
The house remained quiet, and though there were many men among them, no one wanted to enter a house that might have a demon’s child inside. So the smith cried out again, “Perial, bring out young Menda, or we will burn your house around you.”
The door opened, and a man stepped out. None of them recognized who it was, because even though he was only seven span from the womb, Menda looked to be a young man of seventeen. He stood proud and tall, with coal-black hair and eyes. “I am the one you think is Menda,” he said in a voice both powerful and deep. “What do you want of me?”
The sound of his voice made Perial gasp inside the cottage. Not only was this the first time Menda had ever spoken, but she recognized his voice as the same one that had spoken to her in a dream, months ago.
“What do you mean, we think you are Menda?” asked the smith, gripping his hammer tightly. He knew that there were demons that looked like men, or wore their skins like costumes, the way a man might hide beneath a sheepskin.
The child who was not a child spoke again. “I am Perial’s son, but I am not Menda. And I am not a demon.”
“Touch the iron of my hammer then,” said Rengen, for he knew all demons feared two things, cold iron and clean fire. He held out his heavy forge hammer. It shook in his hands, but no one thought the less of him for it.
He who was not Menda stepped forward and lay both hands on the iron head of the hammer. Nothing happened. From the doorway of her house where she watched, Perial burst into tears, for though she trusted Tehlu, some part of her had held a mother’s worry for her son.
“I am not Menda, though that is what my mother called me. I am Tehlu, lord above all. I have come to free you from demons and the wickedness of your own hearts. I am Tehlu, son of myself. Let the wicked hear my voice and tremble.”
And they did tremble. But some of them refused to believe. They called him a demon and threatened him. They spoke hard, frightened words. Some threw stones and cursed him, and spat toward him and his mother.
Then Tehlu grew angry, and he might have slain them all, but Perial leaped forward and laid a restraining hand on his shoulder. “What more can you expect?” she asked him quietly. “From men who live with demons for their neighbors? Even the best dog will bite that has been kicked enough.”
Tehlu considered her words and saw that she was wise. So he looked over his hands at Rengen, looked deep into his heart and said, “Rengen, son of Engen, you have a mistress who you pay to lie with you. Some men come to you for work and you cheat or steal from them. And though you pray loudly, you do not believe I, Tehlu, made the world and watch over all who live here.”
When Rengen heard this, he grew pale and dropped his hammer to the ground. For what Tehlu said to him was true. Tehlu looked at all the men and women there. He looked into their hearts and spoke of what he saw. All of them were wicked, so much that Rengen was among the best of them.
Then Tehlu drew a line in the dirt of the road so that it lay between himself and all those who had come. “This road is like the meandering course of a life. There are two paths to take, side by side. Each of you are already traveling that side. You must choose. Stay on your own path, or cross to mine.”
“But the road is the same, isn’t it? It still goes to the same place,” someone asked.
“Yes.”
“Where does the road lead?”
“Death. All lives end in death, excepting one. Such is the way of things.”
“Then what does it matter which side a man is on?” It was Rengen asking these questions. He was a large man, one of the few that was taller than dark-eyed Tehlu. But he was shaken by all that he had seen and heard in the past few hours. “What is on our side of the road?”
“Pain,” Tehlu said in a voice as hard and cold as stone. “Punishment.”
“And your side?”
“Pain now,” Tehlu said in the same voice. “Punishment now, for all that you have done. It cannot be avoided. But I am here too, this is my path.”
“How do I cross?”
“Regret, repent, and cross to me.”
Rengen stepped over the line to stand beside his God. Then Tehlu bent to pick up the hammer that the smith had dropped. But instead of giving it back, he struck Rengen with it as if it were a lash. Once. Twice. Thrice. And the third blow sent Rengen to his knees sobbing and crying out in pain. But after the third blow, Tehlu laid the hammer aside and knelt to look Rengen in the face. “You were the first to cross,” he said softly so only the smith could hear. “It was a brave thing, a hard thing to do. I am proud of you. You are no longer Rengen, now you are Wereth, the forger of the path.” Then Tehlu embraced him with both arms, and his touch took much of the pain from Rengen who was now Wereth. But not all, for Tehlu spoke truly when he said that punishment cannot be avoided.
One by one they crossed, and one by one Tehlu struck them down with the hammer. But after each man or woman fell, Tehlu knelt and spoke to them, giving them new names and healing some of their hurt.
Many of the men and women had demons hiding inside them that fled screaming when the hammer touched them. These people Tehlu spoke with a while longer, but he always embraced them in the end, and they were all grateful. Some of them danced for the joy of being free of such terrible things living inside them.