1 The Lost Past

Finishing the Unfinished

DIMITRIJE IGNJATOVIC
A Compilation of Fantasy

The Lost Past

and

Finishing the Unfinished

2 The Lost Past
Finishing the Unfinished

To the latter generations,

and to those who do not have a smidgen of
gothic or evil in their souls,
from Dimitrije Ignjatovic
3 The Lost Past
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PREFACE TO THE FIRST COMPILATION OF

FANTASY BY DIMITRIJE IGNJATOVIC
I am an amateur writer and this is my work I advise the
curious to read, as it would expose my taste towards mat-
ters sinister and gothic, not expressing, believing or expos-
ing any religion.
This Preface I am going to devote to ridding the book of
any controversies that may arise, as in the infamous Dun-
geons and Dragons series, and every contemporary author’s
infamous rival, J. K. Rowling and her Harry Potter series,
that are called fantasy but not only do they have not a bit of
old fairy-tale tradition now called the traditional fantasy, oft
derided with the terms go-I-know-not-whither-and-fetch-I-
know-not-what, the-emperor’s-son-in-law-and-the-winged-grandmistress,
the-golden-apple-and-the-nine-peacocktails, the-birdgirl, the-dancing-water-
the-singing-apple-and-the-speaking-bird, or somesuch, but that
the new fantasy stories put satanic concepts in our chil-
dren’s minds, put satanic words I don’t want to mention in
their language, disable them from discerning reality and fantasy,
even leading to schizophrenia.
This is the exact opposite. I am a Christian writer, and
therefore I write Christian, traditional fantasy, in the ranks
of what you might call go-I-know-not-whither-and-fetch-I-know-
not-what, or perchance the-dancing-water-the-singing-apple-and-
the-speaking-bird. This is no Harry Potter, no Lord of the Rings,
no Dungeons and Dragons, and no Chronicles of Narnia. This is a
revival of old, traditional fantasy like Peter Pan, or Le Petit
Prince, or perhaps, the Tale of Tsar Saltan, of his Son the Re-
nowned and Mighty Bogatyr Prince Gvidon Saltanovich, and of the
Beautiful Princess-Swan ... old fantasy that may now be de-
rided as old-fashioned or Christian.
However, these are not parables of the Christian or any other re-
ligion. This is pure fantasy. Most modern parable authors make
parables that are show-through in some way or another: their
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parables, if they can be graced with the name parables, show

through their monkey-slow talent, and behind the stories one
can see such authors of new-line parables are religious zeal-
ots, who, for the most part, are capable of nothing, except
for inexplicable synonyms (most of which are found with a
thesaurus) and slow comparisons. I could have such a fellow
whipped for, as Shakespeare would say, o’erdoing Termagant – it
out-herods Herod.
I write for kids, and without satanic elements. I write com-
pletely religiously impartially. That doesn’t mean middle-
paradigm, atheistic, or satanic-but-not-to-offend-Christians, or
new-paradigm Christian, or anything like that. I, as I said,
am a Christian – an old-paradigm Christian – writer, and I
am not writing anything that has the slightest tinge of
Christianity or Satanism or any religion here – this is not
the kind of books that teaches counterfeit spirituality. This
doesn’t teach any religion. And, because I am a Christian
writer, I don’t think it will succeed. I think fame is Satan’s
gift, but read it anyway if you’re interested, and don’t ac-
cept suggestions good-for-granted.

Dimitrije Ignjatovic
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DIMITRIJE IGNJATOVIC

The Lost Past

6 The Lost Past
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Preface
This story is the journal of the brave girl called Helmi, as
she goes towards danger until she faces herself. Hopefully
it will expose my taste towards matters gothic, perhaps
sinister, as long as they have no expression of faith or any
kind of religion.
The anonymous author unquestionably has a wide vo-
cabulary, meaning having a wide scope of words to use, yet
in his/her words I found words not known by many, that
even transcend my own comprehension, and he or she
originally used less known or obsolete spellings such as
compleat for ‘complete’, lanthorn for ‘lantern’, and thorght for
‘through’, some of which I have elided, except when crucial
to the pronunciation or to give one the true feel of the lan-
guage he/she had used. The grammar is modern, but there
are still some words that use archaic spellings, now obso-
lete. The archaic pronoun thou is often used in songs, but
somewhere misused.
The anonymous Author can be presumed to be Helmi
herself, but that is never proven anywhere, nor is there any
hint of that anywhere in the book, however, many authors
these days write as if they were someone else, or change
names, tamper with dates, dabble in who-knows-what; but
seeing that there is not a trace of a town such as this
‘Wigeonbridge’ mentioned by ‘Helmi’ early in the book, I
presume the Author wrote sheer fancy, sheer myth, and in
a very emotional way relates Helmi’s adventures through
this enticing, immersive world of fantasy, full of mythical
beings and where nothing is what it seems, where Antoine
de Saint-Exupéry’s words from Le Petit Prince are a prov-
erb:
It is only with the heart that one can see rightly.
What is essential is invisible to the eye.
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In my opinion, we should all learn from this book. In old

fantasy, good always wins. Modern fantasy has lost the old
fantasy’s piety.

E.
8 The Lost Past
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My First Meeting with Tarmo

Ah, how much of my adventures and the events that
happened in my life I vividly remmember, that it would
transcend the most vivid fancy ever writ; the time has come,
that I write them down, lest they perish for ever. I have
lived a tempestuous life, without care from anyone; a life of
running away I have lived, but in the eld it all calms, even
for a wanderer with no home or family, a ‘bastard’ by eve-
ryone and everything forsaken.
When one remmembers, images pass unevenly, erratic-
ally and perchance disproportionately through their mind.
Some pass quickly, like thunderbolts during a storm, while
for others it takes much time to wither like long, pleasant
autumns.
I was born as an illegitimate daughter, or ‘bastard’ as
everyone preferred, into a rich, insolent, obviously spoilt
family from Wigeonbridge called the Carpelans. So that
one could call me Helmi Carpelan. It was them that gave
me that name, Helmi, which is the only thing I ever liked
about them, but they preferred to call me just ‘bastard’.
They adored their spoilt, insolent son, Urmas, more than
anything in the world. At lunch, as I remmember, he con-
tinuously protested that someone, which was always me,
had to cut up his toast – he seemed to never have heard of
such delicious foodstuffs as, say, a steak, which I never
could eat until age eleven.
On the other hand, they treated me worse than a slave.
They never let me even touch a toy, not to mention play
with it, so I matured very quickly. By age four, I had to
bring them everything, and serve them as a maid-servant,
and I was whipped for not bringing them breakfast at five
o’clock in the morning. By age seven, I had to cook for them
all day and night the most delicious foodstuffs, and never
get a taste, or I would be whipped.
Urmas got more and more spoilt as he grew, he was the
same age as I. He got out of control whenever he disliked
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something; he’d had hysterical attacks when the tutor was

arriving; everyone was in fear of the Carpelans. He started
pursuing easy money and started gambling early into life.
He spent 300 marks every day on drinking, and having fun
with his friends. He was permitted to go away from home
by now, but I was never before. He held his friends with
fear, not love, and he changed them often. A typical spoilt,
underdeveloped, immature boy that had everything – in-
cluding scorn for little ‘bastard girls’ that had nothing.
By the time I was eleven, I had that rebel’s instinct that
outside there is a better world, about which I was com-
pleatly right. I could no longer bear being treated as a slave
by the Carpelans, those spoilt, insolent, dreadful million-
aires who simply filled you with no other emotion, no
other feeling than scorn for themselves, no other thought
than a ghost of your mind being primed to allow any tor-
ture by them, that screams revenge. A person like me, an
illegitimate child that has never seen the light of day by age
eleven thanks to the evil Carpelans, and was whipped,
treated as a slave, tortured and primed to accept torture
and watch their easygoing life, it is so natural for them to
start trying to get revenge on their oppressors, that I also
did so. Who else would bear being tortured, treated as a
slave and primed to accept torture with apparently the
whole world advocating their oppressors, taking their side,
and with no one to care for them, than a child like me, a
child as silent as me? Such a child that is so primed to ac-
cept scorn good-for-granted, that she has to snap one day,
and try, risk being perchance killed by her oppressors, or
get revenge on the awful, spoilt Carpelans.
I kept myself awake on the floor where I usually sleep,
watched them go to their bedrooms and fall into the heavy
Carpelan sleep. I sneaked to the front door and slowly
opened it. It wasn’t locked.
How cold that night was, yet how much vivacity I had
back then! I ran, almost unaware that I was running for my
life, through the front yard and skipped the fence, then
through the road to the main part of the city. I ran off and
down the road, then into the main city. It was then that I
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ran into a boy about a year younger than I, meaning about

ten years old. He had a shock of blond hair and strikingly
vivid blue eyes. He wore a dirty white tunic. With him was
a pink, glowing faerie, no bigger than my fist, flying around.
‘Hello. Who’re you? Haven’t seen you here before. Are
you not from around here?’ he said.
‘My name is Helmi.’
‘Don’t tell me – it is you are that beast that lives in the
Carpelan house.’
‘Don’t mention that to me. So you fancy me a beast?’
‘No ... you’re kind of ... beautiful.’
‘You too,’ I giggled.
‘Helmi and Tarmo, sitting up a tree – ’ the faerie sang.
‘Pink!’ cried the boy, named Tarmo, protesting.
‘I – I – ’ At this point I started crying, both crying and
laughing at the same time. ‘Y – you – this is the f – first
time anyone’s t – told me that.’
He accompanied me while we ran through the main city.
We were heading for the city limits. Men with lanthorns
were walking by, lighting the paths of the main city.
We clutched on a horse-pulled carriage driven by a short
peasant, that arrived from our left, and arrived straight at
the city limits. We got off the carriage, and it went off
turning to the left of the city limits, and behind the corner
of an avenue in the distance.
‘Who are you?’ said the guard as he clutched the ramp.
‘Travellers,’ I replied, and the guard opened the ramp.
‘Pass through,’ he said.
‘Tarmo,’ I asked Tarmo as we ran down an unlit road out
of the city, ‘can your family give me a home?’
‘Um, sorry, no,’ he replied. ‘It’s unsafe here in Wigeon-
bridge. Plus, Mum and Dad don’t want guests. Farewell.’
He ran back to Wigeonbridge, and I ran off to the bor-
dering city.
For the next three years, I travelled across the land and
found many homes, changing them almost monthly, until I
found a scholar family from Oxendale. They educated me,
though I was not yet wont to being called ‘Miss Carpelan’.
In relation to my former lifestyle, this lifestyle was faultless.
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I stayed there for a little less than a year, and became an

educated person I am now.
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A Fateful Chance-Meeting
Is that where it all began? No ... I think it all began with
a little chance-meeting, again, with Tarmo, somewhere
near Rummerston. I was then a grown girl of fifteen, and he
was fourteen.
I was wandering across a road called the ‘Lobscouse
Road’ that led to the city’s inn part. Next to the road I saw
a soldier in a cadet uniform that consisted of a green cape
and a grey garment over a white tunic. He had a shock of
bright brown, almost blondish hair and vivid blue eyes. He
was relaxing under a tree. He has also changed during the
four years, but there was no mistaking him.
‘Tarmo?’ I recognised him.
‘Helmi?’ he recognised me, too.
‘I couldn’t wait to find you! After all those years ... it
would be almost impossible to tell it was you.’
‘Look, I now have to train for the soldiers’ bow-and-
arrow training.’
‘Aw, just a second ... ’
‘OK, you can come with me, and watch. I bet I can shove
more than fifty arrows into the bull’s-eye!’
‘Can I just – ’ Before he could answer, I kissed him.
He looked somewhat shy, he blushed, but his eyes spar-
kled. ‘Huh?’ he said confusedly, but there is no confusion in
that gesture.
‘Silly,’ I giggled, ‘I mean it!’
‘Oh. I understand.’ There was a note of sarcasm in his ‘Oh.
I understand.’
While we went to the archers’ training camp which was
across the field, we saw children dancing and singing
‘Ring-a-Ring o’ Roses’:
‘Ring-a-ring o’ roses,
Pocket full of posies,
Atishoo! Atishoo!
We all fall down.’
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I admired them for being able to play, I tried not to scorn

them for my sour grapes attitude. The sour grapes attitude
was natural if one didn’t let you play at any time in your
childhood, and you were forced to mature quickly. The
emotion vanished when I heard what they were singing.
We arrived at the training centre. It was a long straight
path with ten big bull’s-eyes. The nine soldiers for this
opening had some kind of prejudice against the game’s
rules. But my Tarmo, apparently, didn’t. I presented myself
as a watcher at the counter.
Later, it was Tarmo’s turn. He was last at the list for this
opening. He had to fire a hundred arrows, and if he scores
more than fifty in the inner circle, he’d win a qualification,
or a ‘qualley’ as he called it. The most one’s ever scored this
opening was ninety-one, scored by one Jarvi. I thought the
result was clear. But I was wrong.
‘Good luck, Tarmo,’ I said as he went to the arrow-path.
‘Er, thanks.’
‘Halvari! Step forward to the arrow-path!’
Tarmo obeyed. When he fired his first arrow, his arm
was trembling. The arrow went into the forest.
He seemed not to stand a chance of outdoing Jarvi. But
when he fired his second arrow, it went straight into the
inner circle.
At the end, he scored ninety-two. He defeated Jarvi by a
single arrow.
Later, as we went towards the inn part of the city, be-
cause Tarmo wanted to celebrate by drinking a beer, we
went past the same children that were singing ‘Ring-a-
Ring o’ Roses’.
‘Helmi Halvari!’ I gambolled around Tarmo. ‘How won-
derful!’
‘Wh—I have no idea what you are talking about,’ said
Tarmo.
‘Um, we’re getting,’ I blushed, ‘married, aren’t we?’
‘Helmi and Tarmo, sitting up a tree – ’ Pink started to sing her
four-year-old chant.
‘Silence, Pink!’ I shouted, blushing even more.
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The inn was full of barflies, bards and dorm sleepers. A

man in a fur coat was talking to the bartender, who was
probably also the innkeeper. The innkeeper was speaking
with a rhotic accent.
‘Have I no told ya,’ he told the man in fur coat, ‘aboot the
prices in here? ’Un story, ’un drink.’
‘’Afternoon, innkeep,’ Tarmo called to attention.
‘Good afternoon ta you too, ar har,’ he chuckled, ‘What’s
yer name?’
‘Tarmo. Er, Tarmo Halvari.’
‘An’ what’s your name, ar har, lassie?’
‘Helmi. Helmi Carpelan.’
‘Are ya lovers or what?’ he roared. I blushed. It seems
Tarmo blushed too. ‘I’m no callin’ ya some undisciplined
youths,’ he added quickly.
‘What, ooh, lovers!’ Pink the faerie sprang out. ‘Hey,
Tarmo, what about your girlfriend Helmi? Helmi and Tarmo,
sitting up a tree – ’
‘Pink!’ hissed Tarmo. ‘You’re embarrassing us!’
‘So, you’re a changeling, huh, Tarmo, ar har!’ chuckled
the innkeeper.
‘I’m not a changeling! That’s my faerie friend, Pink, and I
loathe her. So, er,’ he said, ‘what are the prices?’
‘Ya heard me when I was talking to this Esko guy here,’
he chuckled, ‘’un story, ’un drink.’
‘So,’ said Tarmo, ‘so be it.’
‘What stories do ya have?’
‘I’ll tell you the one I’ve been taught in the military, a par-
able called Soini the Mighty Warrior. Here goes.
‘Soini was a mighty warrior. Everything trembled ten
miles before him and ten miles behind him. One day, he
was unsatisfied with the power he had, so he threatened to
chop up everyone who disobeyed him with his mighty axe,
“like a tree”.
‘To demonstrate this, he took a cowering audience in
front of a tree. He wound up his mighty axe to destroy the
tree. Now everything was truly afraid of Soini, the mighty
warrior.
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‘But there was a butterfly on the tree. Soini couldn’t de-

stroy such a beauty, and the axe fell right out of his hands
and straight onto the ground.
‘The butterfly flew up to Soini, and told him, “You may
think they would like to obey you because you are so
strong, you hold them with fear. But if you hold them with
love, and never threaten them, they will truly love you, and
obey your every appeal, even with more pleasure than
when obeying your cruel commands.”
‘Soini spared the butterfly and the tree, cast off his law
and never threatened again, knowing that now he was
truly mighty indeed.’
‘That was ’un good story,’ said the innkeeper and gave
Tarmo a goblet’s worth of beer.
When Tarmo drank the beer, we went to the inn’s dor-
mitory and found a messy bed.
‘This is the only free bed,’ I said.
‘No matter,’ said Tarmo, ‘we’ll sleep together!’
I wasn’t wont to love. But I accepted that. Pink started
singing a song in her most melodious voice, a love song, to
Tarmo and me.
‘Withouten Faeries’ Royalm true
O Love that’s true can rare be found;
A changeling with a Faerie friend
Can love uncheck’d, his love is wound
Round any Life, round any Love
That’s been cast off discourteously,
His love is true, her love is blue,
And they’ll live in serenity.’
‘Hey!’ said Tarmo, ‘I’m not a changeling!’
‘Listen, Tarmo,’ said Pink in a soothing voice, ‘I’m trying
to sing you and Helmi into sleep.’ She continued, in a tonal-
ity somewhat lower.
‘O thirty years, love, there have passed,
Since Love O did connect our hearts;
Thirty years more will count to last,
Till our Life cracks and breaks apart.
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But my love true, and thy love blue,

Will never part, and cease their life.
It is love known by just a few
That will never come to strife.
A love eternal comes to life,
Thou canst think it will break some day,
But my love true and thy love blue,
Pleased they will steal our hearts away.
Thine amity will never die
Like all those that died for sure
And those that never will return
Off casting those whose tears still pour.’
At that point first Tarmo fell asleep, then I did. Faerie
sleep is heavy! I have never slept like that, relaxed myself
like that, in my life! When we woke up, it was already to-
morrow noon.
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Kalevi the Pickpocket

Mrs Silven greeted us at the doorstep of their house in
Oxendale. Their house was on the far end of the miles-long
Braggart Road, that was perpendicular to an end of the
Lobscouse Road in Rummerston.
The Silvens were the scholar family that educated me.
They’re of a kind sort, to say the least. Their home is quite
quaint and full of books, many of which I have read with
pleasure. I bet I have read The Playhouse over a good fifty
times, and it made my life happy for I would get immersed
into its worlds, rather than this cruel world that had no
respect for a slave like me.
‘’Morning, Mrs Silven,’ I said, unaware that it was early
afternoon.
‘But noon has since past, Helmi,’ she said in her prestige
accent.
‘Hey! What does this mean, she knows you?’ Tarmo
asked me.
Assuming he was talking to her, Mrs Silven said, ‘Yes, of
course, I raised her since she was thirteen. Enter.’
‘Well,’ said Tarmo, entering, ‘my name is Tarmo, and as
you see, I am a soldier cadet.’
‘And he’s a compleat sot,’ Pink sprang.
‘My pleasure,’ Mrs Silven shook his hand. ‘I have never
seen a changeling before,’ she added.
‘I’m not a changeling!’ Tarmo snapped. ‘This is my faerie
friend Pink.’
When we entered, we saw Mr Silven reading The Play-
house to a little boy in a dirty tunic. The boy looked about
nine years old, had a shock of blond hair and wide, vivid-
green eyes. He reminded me of Tarmo when we first met,
except Tarmo’s eyes were a vivid blue.
‘When night came black, we were asleep
Oh on the topmost hill;
How soft and cold the night air was,
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We had our thoughts’ fill.

‘When we awoke, we two, with tears
Did in sorrow part;
And all we had to say was cheers,
With sorrow in our hearts.’
Mr Silven turned his head up.
‘’Afternoon, Helmi, stranger,’ he said.
‘My name is Tarmo,’ snapped Tarmo. ‘Meet Kalevi,’ Mr
Silven told him.
‘Hello,’ Tarmo said.
‘Hi,’ said Kalevi.
‘Hello, Kalevi,’ I told Kalevi playfully. He folded his arms
angrily. ‘Oh, don’t be such an angry-face.’
‘Why you treat me like a baby!’ Kalevi said. ‘Why don’t
you be my accomplicy?’
‘That’s “accomplice”, Kalevi,’ Mrs Silven told Kalevi, and
then she turned to me. ‘I adopted Kalevi when I was at the
market in Draughtsdale, it is a dangerous trip to Draughts-
dale, unless you know the right path.
‘He got away from prison, the policemen were running
after him, then he started picking my pocket, and when
they caught him, I paid the ransom for him and promised
to raise him a better child.’
‘Well, certainly, Mrs Silven,’ said Kalevi, emotionally
hurt.
‘Ooh,’ Pink said to Kalevi, ‘what’s the last thing you stole?’
To calm Kalevi, Mr Silven continued reciting.
‘And soon, I was alone up there
Surrender’d to the clouds;
The nature all sang how thou wast
Alone, with sorrow shrouds.
‘But worry not, I won’t forget thee;
Alone now, with my mind,
Stand sentinel, prithee, like me,
Or other Husband find.’
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Around this point Kalevi got hysterical and started cry-

ing frantically, ‘I don’t want the stupid playhouse-book! I
wanna go away!’ So the Silvens were wolf-in-lamb-skin,
after all, towards Kalevi.
‘Calm down, Kalevi, it is I want to read!’ said Mr Silven.
‘Helmi, about your manners,’ said Mrs Silven, ‘I deduced
from your behaviour that you still behave scornfully, as if
you still cannot get accustomed to the fact that it is natural
that one mocks you, but one doesn’t have to mock you, for
your predicament. Take Kalevi for an example. He even
mocks those who are richer than him, and he is compleatly
accustomed to being mocked, called a pickpocket, that in
his mind the word pickpocket has lost its meaning! I advise
that you go around the land to find someone poorer than
you.’
‘Poorer than I? Is there anyone – ’
‘There certainly is, as this is a big land.’ She gave me that
penetrating look I identified her with. I could feel her con-
fidence.
‘How come you felt what I feel?’ I said quickly, to avoid
having her interrupt me. ‘I haven’t said a word since I en-
tered.’
‘One’s gestures and expressions speak volumes,’ she said.
‘You were quietly analysing Kalevi if he would mock you,
though he doesn’t know anything about you. He’s only nine,
Helmi.’
Tarmo and I then left the house and up the road ahead of
it.
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The Dark Forest

Night has since fallen in the forest we arrived at; an el-
dritch, dreadful forest was off to all directions in which we
could consider running. We were in the middle of a dark
forest, with no lanthorn to show us the way. It wasn’t
pitch-black; we could see our environs, though distorted
and a dark blue; but there was much we couldn’t see. Trees
round the paths ahead were dancing under lightning bolts
that thissen insufficiently illuminated the forest, and they
were singing a horrid song about prey.
We went under one tree, to sleep until dawn arises;
probably the forest would be brighter at day. Tarmo
climbed the tree to fetch some apples, but Kalevi fell off the
tree and right on Tarmo. Tarmo caught Kalevi, but couldn’t
hold him long – halfway down, they both safely fell onto
the path covered with grass. It seemed Kalevi ran away
from home again, following us.
‘Oh, look who we have here!’ said Tarmo sarcastically.
‘It’s the pipsqueak from that family of yours!’
‘Who you calling pipsqueak, pansy-pants!’ Kalevi shouted
back. ‘Pansy-pants!’ Pink laughed.
I couldn’t sleep any more. We moved on. The tree in
front of us cried and caught us three. As it carried us out
the opposite end of the forest, the uncaught Pink accom-
panying us, it told us, ‘We don’t want guests ’ere.
‘An’ stay ye out. We, the Walkers, are an inhospitable
race. We hold lore thousands of years old. Unlike the Faer-
ies.’
It struck the flying Pink with a really big branch, and
caught her with the same branch with which it held us.
By the time we arrived outside the forest, and on the cliff
above a very big city, it started raining. The tree dropped
us violently and left.
Pink lay limply on the ground, her pink glow fading. ‘D –
do not worry ... rain will heal me.’ She fell unconscious, her
glow still fading.
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After the first drop of rain fell on her, she began regain-
ing her eidolon’s glow, which was now an odd chartreuse,
but soon became pink and her wings jerked as more and
more raindrops fell on her. Her wings flapped faster and
faster as she regained consciousness, and her usual pink
glow was fully regained within minutes. She sprang up
into the air.
‘She’s alive!’ I said in wonder.
‘Wonderful stuff, faeries,’ said a voice behind us. ‘Rain
heals them, and they change children – ’
‘I’m not a changeling!’ shouted Tarmo, and we turned to
find a man in green that stood at the cliff. He went slowly
towards us and knelt before the rejoicing faerie.
‘By the way,’ he said, ‘my name’s Ahti.’
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Autumnsdale
‘What, er, who was that tree in that forest, that nearly got
me killed?!’ Pink asked Ahti.
‘That forest,’ Ahti told Pink and us, ‘you have just passed,
was no ordinary forest, but a forest by Sorrow cursed. I am
one of the many guardians of the city below, that is called
Autumnsdale, whose inhabitants have been rendered un-
witting by their sorrow and they’ve locked themselves in-
side their houses and one can’t extract anything useful
from their minds. One has to go past this wit plague that
will last for one hundred years that has begun for their sor-
rowful remembrance of the late hero named Ensio, that
died in fire fighting the dragon in the gorge of Hyacinthia;
they have lost their wits till the plague ends. I will guide
you up Autumnsdale.’
‘Thanks,’ I said.
As we passed down the smooth side of the cliff-cut
mountain, and through the deserted streets of Au-
tumnsdale, Ahti guiding us, the rain grew stronger and
stronger still. We heard a thunder and a rush of wind.
‘Oh great ... ’ said Tarmo.
When we approached the palace at the far end, we
couldn’t bear anymore the storm.
‘Go on, hurry,’ Ahti hurried us, ‘we have no time to
waste.’
The city’s palace was a towering, ominous-looking
building; in front of it lay the corpse of a boy, and the city’s
King, a crowned man in red, with long grey hair, seemed to
be mourning the boy.
‘He’s – he’s killed the Prince – he’s killed my son Manne
– ’ he stammered ‘ – for Sorrow!’ he screamed. ‘That foul
villain – the enemy of Autumnsdale – ’ he stammered, mad
with sorrow. ‘Finnur, the Dragon of the Gorge – he – he – ’
He broke into tears and uttered some unintelligible words,
much like ‘over Draughtsdale he abideth,’ then ‘Manne
coming after you,’ then he collapsed, then cried, ‘Revenge!’
23 The Lost Past
Finishing the Unfinished

That one word and he died. O, how can I forget this agony,
this plague?
‘There goes the King of Autumnsdale. He couldn’t handle
the wit-plague,’ Ahti told us with a strange expression I
haven’t forgotten until now, on his face about fifty years of
age. It was an ironical, yet calm expression; he seemed to
be smiling hypocritically, but he wasn’t at all.
Uneasily, we went and reached the mountain wall we
couldn’t avoid save for climbing it. We climbed the moun-
tain wall and found a cave. Then the storm stopped, and
we realised it was early morning.
The cave stretched like a corridor to the opposite of the
mountains, from whence we saw a city.
The city was, luckily, very populated. The top part of
this city was a triangle-based tower on its castle that had a
huge icosahedral roof-ornament whose one side was at-
tached to the otherwise triangular rooftop.
The castle was whole in regular shapes – the King that
founded the city was of a scholarly class.
The city was divided into five parts – the main part with
the castle, the inn part of the city, the market square, the
library and the arable fields with small forests.
24 The Lost Past
Finishing the Unfinished

The Rummer
‘This city,’ Ahti said all of a sudden, ‘is Draughtsdale.’
‘Most famous for its inns, I deduce from its name,’ Tarmo
said.
‘Tarmo!’ I squealed chidingly.
‘This city is my home,’ Ahti said, ‘and I, though guarding
another city, am familiar with it. I will get you a drink as
gratitude to you for finding me a way to get home quick.’
‘Well, not really quick,’ claimed Kalevi the pickpocket.
We descended the mountain and found ourselves in the
main part of the city. As we went through the crowded
streets we saw we were going up ‘Sawyer Avenue’, then up
‘Shelterwood Lane’, and then ‘Swingletree Street’, then we
ended up in the inn part of the city.
We entered an inn whose sign had a picture with sixty-
four eight-point stars and a sun-in-splendour with thirty-
two rays.
It was a poets’ inn – there were poets inside that recited
their poems, but also there were ordinary barflies there
that hearkened to the poets reciting.
‘What do you want, Ahti, and what do the strangers
want?’ roared the innkeeper.
‘Can you get us three beers for forty pence?’ said Ahti.
The innkeeper shook his head, ‘Nah.’ ‘Fifty?’ ‘Nah.’ ‘Sixty?’
‘Nah. Listen. Three beers cost one mark and twenty pence!’
‘Boy, how prices have risen since I’ve last been here!’ said
Ahti, paying exactly a mark coin, and two smaller coins,
each smaller coin of ten pence. The innkeeper took the
money and gave us three rummers full of beer.
‘Yuck,’ I said, ‘I’ve never drunk such a – ’
‘What do I get?’
‘Apple juice for the boy, please.’ said Ahti.
‘Er,’ said the innkeeper with the most sarcastic expres-
sion I’ve ever seen, ‘that will be twenty pence.’
Ahti paid two more coins, each of ten pence, and Kalevi
got a rummer full of apple juice. I wished I was to drink
25 The Lost Past
Finishing the Unfinished

apple juice. I slowly drank half of the rummer’s worth of

beer I got, just so I don’t get embarrassed.
I felt somewhat woozy, so I stopped and discontinued
drinking. Beer is such an intoxicating drink. The guard in
fur coat, who had apparently followed us, laughed. I felt so
humiliated. Being noble is tough work.
We exited the inn and went around the library and be-
hind the palace.
Presently we ended up at the meadow that separated
Draughtsdale from other cities. Ahti left.
‘Goodbye,’ he said.
‘Goodbye, Ahti,’ we replied.
26 The Lost Past
Finishing the Unfinished

The Dragon and the Sage

The gorge we descended into separated Draughtsdale
from Wigeonbridge, though Wigeonbridge, the city I first
remmember living in, was at a significantly higher peak.
We descended down the side, onto its dry ground, and
walked down two hundred yards or so.
Suddenly, a dragon jumped down in front of us: a horrid,
flying, fire-breathing dragon. It spewed fire at us, so we
had to retreat.
The dragon flew up. Its head had passed us: the dragon
was seventy yards long.
Tarmo jumped up into the air with his sword. He missed.
‘Tarmo,’ I cried out, ‘wait for the dragon to fly low!’
The dragon flew lower to spew more fire at us, about
sixty inches above the ground, then up, and Tarmo jumped
up, slashed the dragon with his sword, burying his sword
straight into its heart.
Presently, the dragon fell, and Tarmo jumped back just in
time, and joined us.
‘Tarmo, they sure taught you something at military school,’
I said.
‘Well,’ Tarmo blushed, ‘do you remmember that I won
the opening at the bow-and-arrow training?’
I laughed. ‘Come on.’ We proceeded down the gorge. It
was a long way, searching the gorge. We found a tunnel, an
entrance to a cave.
As we entered the cave, it was very quiet. We could hear
nothing save for cave liquids dripping.
We entered a chamber in the right side of the cave
pathway.
Inside, the chamber was equipped like a living room.
There was a man inside, a very old man with a long grey
beard. He appeared very weak. He glanced at us with his
pale blue, wise-looking eyes.
‘Glad you came,’ he said in a raspy voice. ‘It’s been seven
hundred years since anyone came into this cave,’ he con-
27 The Lost Past
Finishing the Unfinished

tinued happily, ‘and I’m not yet bored. You children may
not remmember me. My name is Pasi. I was the local sage
back then, they came to me for wise advice. Modern sages,
they are usually young and they peddle some easy rhymes
that sound wise, the word sage has lost its true meaning!’
‘So ... what would one do if he was born as an illegitimate
child, has lived with a cruel family for eleven years where
he has been treated as a slave, and still cannot stand mock-
ing by children and called a bastard?’
‘You should find someone who truly understands what
sufferings you’re in.’
‘Someone poorer than me?’
‘Yes. The one who told you that said it well. But I am still
very unhappy. People don’t come here often, as I’ve said
before. That is because of a dragon, named Finnur, that
lives here, and that no wise man would risk his life to de-
scend into this gorge because of him.’
‘Er ... ’ I said, the picture of Tarmo fighting Finnur flitting
like fire through my mind, ‘we defeated Finnur.’
‘Verily?’ he asked.
‘Verily,’ I answered. ‘We’ll tell everyone who has been
avoiding the dragon that they may freely enter the gorge for
advice from Pasi, the One and Only Sage.’
‘Thanks,’ he said.
‘Er, goodbye,’ Tarmo said.
‘Goodbye.’
We went out from the cave and down the gorge. The air
was pleasantly cold. It seemed that even our footsteps were
ecchoing through the gorge.
At length, the gorge opened up and before us there was a
city. It was more marvellous than any city I ever saw; espe-
cially the palace stood out. It was made of bricks of various
colours, the highest tower was a bit higher than the gorge
was, and each several brick was comprised of four equal
cubes, in different formations, and the market-square was
the next more impressive – it had a podium where travel-
ling actors could play – the famous Playhouse described in
The Playhouse.
‘Look,’ said Kalevi, ‘this place looks familiar!’
28 The Lost Past
Finishing the Unfinished

Where? What? Then he pointed at the playhouse. Is it –

is it not Starvelingham, the city of many monuments?
The city’s statue confirmed it. The King and a Starveling
Hound.
Until then, I only knew Starvelingham from paintings at
the Silvens’ home – the Silvens admired it. Yet it is so diffi-
cult to access by those from Wigeonbridge or Rummerston.
It was the capital city of my country, the most-admired
chief city of Fianchia, that stood while its people were
starving hungry.
But then, I saw Starvelingham first-hand, and I admire it
more than ever.
29 The Lost Past
Finishing the Unfinished

The Faeries’ Rede

We met a peasant, visibly careless, who was mowing his
part of a field next to the forest with a rather large scythe.
He stopped in the sun to talk to us.
‘What’s the story, pals?’ A polite peasant, it seemed this
instant.
‘We want guidance through the city,’ I said.
‘Ay what?’
‘How stupid can those Starvelings be?’ Tarmo told me.
‘Er ... we want you to lead us through the city,’ I repeated,
a bit angry.
‘Eh, well, you’re a bit insolent, newfangled changeling,’
said the villager.
Before he could continue, Tarmo interrupted him with a
hiss of ‘I’m not a changeling!’
But they apparently didn’t mind. ‘Tourists to Starveling-
ham, huh? I’ll be glad to guide you.’
‘How odd,’ said Pink.
We went down the market square. It was a Playhouse
Day. The actors at the podium were playing.
‘Remmember ye that eight-and-six
We oft wanted to play,
Just several costumes, acts and verse
And we can play to-day.
‘When thou dost play, it’s like a tale
Of many a dream come true,
Oh, I play Piper, thou play’st the Queen,
And our hope will be in you.
‘It is that easy, on the ground
I try, kiss thee awake,
And thou act’st as if thou sleep’st,
Thy true role, thou’lt forsake.
‘While Puck around, so playeth spright,
30 The Lost Past
Finishing the Unfinished

A mischief as he mak’th.
Such easy ways, to act in plays,
As his role he forsak’th.
‘And play, my love, the play’s alive,
O such a rite play we,
Not until the break of day,
We’ll part this company.’
I’ve loved plays since I was adopted by the Silvens, and
now I saw a play, or rather, a part of a play, with Tarmo.
‘This way to the forest,’ the peasant said, and I snapped
back to attention.
The forest was a nice lilac forest. The peasant led us half-
way through, where the path began to rise.
‘I’ll leave you here. This is the path out of Starvelingham.’
He went back to Starvelingham, leaving us there.
Halfway up and out of the gorge, we met the proverbial
Four Faeries, the Faerie Queens.
They also were very small, and had wings, and could fly,
like Pink, but these were in different colours. Unlike Pink,
they wore small crowns.
I didn’t recognise them at first, but Pink pointed out,
‘There’s my Queen!’
The first was a bright chartreuse-green; the second was a
shiny, silvery blue; the third was Pink’s shade of a pale mix
between pink and magenta; and the fourth was a shiny,
pure yellow that almost had an orange-yellow tint about it.
The yellow one said,
‘We are the four Faerie-queens, as many of you would say,
Whom many would disdain, but we will help today.
We are just spirits of no common rate,
Whom our people hath forsaken, to this date.’
‘Peaseblossom!’ said the green one.
‘Cobweb!’ said the blue one.
‘Moth!’ the pink one.
‘And Mustardseed!’
said the yellow one. The yellow faerie continued.
31 The Lost Past
Finishing the Unfinished

‘Ye must be visitors from yonder country.

The service ye want – we mark silently.’
Much I marvelled this farce of faeries to speak right now.
The Faeries continued – I wanted to mark them still. It was
Moth, the pink one, who spoke, perceiving Pink.
‘What marvel do I see? Of my Kin is she –
I’ll take’t good-for-granted – what want’st thou, faerie?’
‘I want wise advice, if thou say’st yes –
By Pink my name, thy Majesty faerie,
I was afraid while in a foreign world,
I want the faerie-land to be with me.
Thus I wish I’d ne’er break up with thee.’
‘O, thou’lt ne’er, thou wilt ne’er: I will stay as nice,
Although invisible – giving thee advice.
I’ll send a link to thee – ’tis an easy price.’
‘Gramercy, Queen Moth! Whatsoever ’tis –
That thou dost give me – I’ll take it with ease.
When thou guidest me, mysteries remain –
Will I have control o’er myself again?
O, when I hear thee with me, when thou giv’st advice –
Ay, I will take it – is there any price?’
‘As I told thee, nay – but we must now disband.
I’ll ever be there. We are hand-in-hand.’
There was a swift ray of magenta-pink light from Moth
to Pink and she shuddered, falling unconscious to the
ground.
‘Pink!’ I cried. ‘What have you done to Pink, wretch?’
‘Those are normal consequences. We are now con-
nected.’
‘What!’ I still was shocked. ‘Explain yourself!’
‘Do not be silly. She will arise.’
‘Huh?’ Pink awoke on the ground. ‘Where am I?’
She also heard the strange, flitting sound echoic of
Moth’s flying, around herself.
32 The Lost Past
Finishing the Unfinished

‘We are connected, Pink,’ said Moth, and her voice ech-
oed around Pink.
Pink flew up and we went up, out of the gorge, and end-
ing at the opposite end of Lobscouse Road in Rueingham.
33 The Lost Past
Finishing the Unfinished

Rueingham and Weedston

As far as I know, Lobscouse Road ends here in Rueing-
ham. Ahead of Rueingham’s Lobscouse Road is a road
named the ‘Spearhead Road.’ That road ends in a frontier
with Polecenia.
We went a long way down Rueingham, down an avenue
called ‘Maidenhair Avenue’. The evening has come; the sky
was already half-darkened.
‘Certainly,’ I panted, ‘there will be an inn to rest in.’
‘Hope so,’ said Tarmo. ‘I’ve never been to Rueingham.’
‘I’ll pilfer some meat, if you’re hungry,’ Kalevi chimed in.
‘Kalevi!’ I hissed.
Pink flew over the signs, shedding her glow on them, fly-
ing low to see one word – Maidenhair. She began singing.
‘O maidens and their beauty hair
Some blond, and some are brown –
Us faeries can e’en pink hair have
And maidens can thus beat us down.’
‘Pink!’ I said, offended. ‘Do not insult!’
‘Yes, right, Pink!’ said Moth’s invisible eidolon.
We proceeded down Maidenhair Avenue until we
reached the city gate guarded by a gigantic green troll. But
he was a polite one.
‘Answer me this riddle an’ you may pass!’ he said. ‘I tell of
feelings true within my letters. Use your imagination and I come to life.
What am I?’
‘A novel!’ said Pink. ‘The answer is – a novel!’
‘Correct.’ With heavy steps, he moved past.
When we went through the gate, we could hear him re-
turning, standing guard. His footsteps were heavy.
When we saw what we were standing before, we were
more than astonished. We were standing before a fountain.
I’ve seen many fountains, but there was no fountain in all of
34 The Lost Past
Finishing the Unfinished

Fianchia like this one. It resembled a lark whistling by the

springing water.
Kalevi stepped to the left and noticed a city in that direc-
tion. (‘Hey, look! A city!’) We all turned to the left and
went ahead.
About a hundred yards ahead of us we saw a city and a
guard on patrol. As we neared the guard, he stopped.
‘Good evening. Who are you?’
‘Travellers,’ I said. ‘Ordinary travellers.’
‘Well, welcome to Weedston,’ he said, ‘you have many
inns to choose from in this town, in which you can even eat.
I eat at Santeri’s when it’s not my shift.’ He let us through.
As we walked through the city, we immediately found
its inn part. Santeri’s inn was just across the road, then to
the left side of the road to the left of the entrance we found
to the inn part of the city.
Santeri’s was full of guests sitting at tables, so we found
a free table near the entrance to the dormitory on the upper
floor. At least here the guests were decent and decently
eating. A waiter approached us.
‘’Evening,’ he said, ‘what do you want?’
‘Can one get anything here for twenty pence?’ said
Tarmo.
‘Yes, well, there’s broth for five pence, beans for ten
pence, and beer for a penny. That’s all I can offer you for
less than twenty pence.’
‘Well,’ I said, ‘three dishes of broth and a beer.’
‘That’s fine with me,’ said Tarmo and paid him three
coins, five pence each, and one coin worth one penny.
Soon, our food arrived – one dish of broth for each of us
(Tarmo, Kalevi and me), and a mug of beer for Tarmo.
The broth tasted bland. It was nothing compared to the
broth at the Silvens’ home.
When we finished eating and drinking, we went to the
dorm. Pink sang to us as usual.
‘Whither faeries will live free
In a bigger faerie-land,
There never discord will be
35 The Lost Past
Finishing the Unfinished

And faeries will never disband,

But when the wolves behold the Moon
All with thirst for human blood
Be sure faeries will destroy
Their rites loving everyone’s good.’
We then fell asleep. When we woke up, it was morning.
Then we arose and headed straight out of the inn. Then
we went down to the market square down its part that is
to the right of the inn-and-house part, and up a road called
‘Mirthshunner Road’. It led us in a wiggly path up round
Rummerston and through the gate straight to a section of
Lobscouse Road.
36 The Lost Past
Finishing the Unfinished

Now There Are Two of Us

A short way up Lobscouse Road, I remmember, the wind
that struck us this time was pleasant. We were light-
heartedly going to Oxendale, to have a drink. It was about
noon. Halfway through to Oxendale, we met a girl, no older
than eight, sitting on the side of the road, alone, unguarded,
in a torn dress grey with dirt.
‘What’s your name, little girl?’
‘Kastehelmi.’
‘Strange coincidence. Mine’s Helmi. Just Helmi.’
‘There is such a name?’ She seemed not to know the
world around herself and the language much, proven still
by her lisping.
‘Tarmo,’ I chid Tarmo who was just pulling out his sword,
‘how can you show her violence when she obviously needs
parental care!’
‘What caring humans!’ said Kastehelmi.
‘Tell me your life. How do you live?’
‘I’m running away from home.’
‘How odd. Why?’
‘I was born a bastard into the rich family from Wigeon-
bridge – ’
‘Wigeonbridge! I’m from there too! Tell me more!’
‘They were called the Harjannes.’ When I heard the name
Harjanne, memories sprang into my mind. I knew those
insolent friends of Urmas, they came to the Carpelans’
home to play with him! One of those rich, insolent boys
was named Albert Harjanne. ‘They treated me like a slave,
so I had to run away.’
‘How strange. I was born as a bastard into the Carpelan
family.’
‘Really? One of the boys that came into the Harjannes’
home was named Urmas ... Urmas Carpelan. Albert always
gambled with him. How odd.’
‘They also treated me as a slave, so I ran away to a
scholar house where I grew up.’
37 The Lost Past
Finishing the Unfinished

‘What, now there are two Helmis?’ Tarmo said.

I was dumbfounded with emotion. For a long time, I
couldn’t utter a word. I have been regaining my emotions,
they were normalising into what Mrs Silven originally ex-
pected. I felt my quest was over. I so pitied Kastehelmi that
I regained my emotions. I so pitied her that she felt like an
extension of me.
‘I will care for you from now on. Come on, let’s go to the
Silvens’.’
‘Caring human!’
I took Kastehelmi up, and then we went with her up
Lobscouse Road. Then the road became a bit steeper. We
passed by that dark forest we went through. It looked as if
it was calm by daylight. We went up the road further,
through the main Oxendale, until we reached a house at
the opposite end of Lobscouse Road. We knocked. Soon,
Mrs Silven opened the door.
She glanced at us the way only she could. She inspected
all of us, and opened her mouth as if she were to say some-
thing, but having nothing to say, she closed it again. She
noticed Kastehelmi.
We’ve left her speechless.
38 The Lost Past
Finishing the Unfinished

The Monster Inside Me Defeated

We told Mrs Silven everything about Kastehelmi and
how she suffered mainly from what I have, and everything
she told us.
‘How strange!’ said Mrs Silven. ‘What a singular occa-
sion! O strange coincidence!’
‘Well, yes, it’s amain amazing. But I am not amazed. See,
my amazing quest has taught me that nothing is truly out-
standing. Kalevi,’ I commanded Kalevi, ‘will you wake Mr
Silven up?’
‘Yes’m,’ he said, and went to Mr Silven’s bed.
‘Somehow,’ said Mrs Silven, ‘somehow you have changed.
However, I need more certainty to confirm that answer.
I went to the desk, took out a scroll of parchment, a quill
and some ink, and wrote verse in seven-syllable style,
though still not perfectly exact metre, as I intended, as ex-
act metre was the playwright’s wont. At first it sounded to
me like railing at Tarmo, but then it quickly turned into
the natural love poem style.
‘Tarmo,’ I said hesitatingly, ‘er, I have writ a p—poem for
you.’
‘A poem?’
I started reading in the famous affected style well known
among today’s actors. At last, the more I read, the less
could Tarmo suppress his laughter.
‘Betwixt us twain a Scorn hath lain,
But thy Love doth quell it amain.
O hinder’d love, hinder’d by Scorne,
We’ve lain it many a Morne,
Wind up, wind down, have ventured we
Till I said my Loove for thee.
To my friends scorn-full thou wert –
Scornful, but ne’er to desert.
Now thy spaniel’s Love remaineth
But it never us disdaineth.
39 The Lost Past
Finishing the Unfinished

I love thee Tarmo, I know well,

No scorn can my Love now quell.
Leave my heart or say a lie –
Then I’ll study how to die.’
‘Ah hah ha hah ah ha!’ laughed Tarmo. ‘Did you try to
prick a soldier?’
‘Tarmo,’ said Mrs Silven, ‘calm down your obvious inso-
lence!’
‘Uh, sorry,’ I apologised, ‘I didn’t have a monosyllabic
word for insolence in my vocabulary!’
By the time I said that, Tarmo was already outside.
‘Get out of our yard!’ he shouted. I went outside to see
what was happening.
Outside, some children were dancing in a ring and sing-
ing –
‘The common cormorant or shag
Lays eggs inside a paper bag.
The reason, you will see no doubt,
It is to keep the lightning out.
But what these unobservant birds
Have never noticed is that herds
Of wandering bears may come with buns
And steal the bags to hold the crumbs.’
I marvelled that wonder of playing, without a sour grapes
attitude. The sour grapes attitude never appeared! I searched
for traces of it. There were none. I analysed what they were
singing. Every reason for a sour grapes attitude. I rushed into
the house.
‘I’m cured! Mrs Silven, I’m cured! I can feel it!’
‘Just as I knew. Well then, keep Kastehelmi, and I’ll raise
Kalevi.’
Then I heard Tarmo scream at the children, ‘Hey, go play
in Rummerston, will you?’ I was then utterly displeased.
40 The Lost Past
Finishing the Unfinished

Conclusion
Since my achievement, life started getting better for me –
I was enjoying it. I enjoyed everything round myself, even
wrote verse about idyllic vistas throughout the regions of
Fianchia that were easily accessible from Oxendale. At
those poems Tarmo would laugh, at some I would laugh,
too, for I was ill at verse.
Since then, when I got cured, my love for Tarmo became
increasingly natural, as I was more wont to it, as Tarmo
was more wont to it – even, methought, some of his scorn
disappeared. However, Mrs Silven never thought me wont
to love until the next full moon.
The full moon was also shining on that night two years
later, when I was seventeen and Tarmo was sixteen. It was
then that we got married. There was a feast at the Silvens’
house that I will never forget – Pink called faeries in to sing
and dance in the house.
Our adventures I will never forget, even though they
now seem like a distant, long, but pleasant, faerie dream;
thus I want to set them down, to have them leave a trace. It
is an instinct that one can never suppress – something
grown into everyone’s nature.
Four years after mine and Tarmo’s marriage, Kalevi was
fifteen, and he has grown into a responsible man who never
thought of a crime since I got cured. He grew into a good
soldier cadet, though his dishevelled, strikingly blond hair
showed his adventurous nature, despite his quietude.
By then, Kastehelmi has grown out of her submissive
character, and thinking she’s not human in some way, and
got well educated, but as she was younger when she ran
from home than I was when I met the Silvens, she men-
tioned nothing like my sour grapes attitude, meaning she
matured quicker than I did, and she got to know the lan-
guage and the world around herself better. Both of us
passed the Life’s course the same way.
41 The Lost Past
Finishing the Unfinished

Pink was no longer afraid of the mortal world, so she

went one day to disconnect herself from Moth. When she
returned, we no longer heard that invisible eidolon of Moth,
whom we heard as a mere voice. No-one regarded Tarmo a
changeling anymore.
Thus end our adventures, but there’s still something
missing.
What is Life? What a simply-put yet hard-to-answer
question! Our adventures would say it all, as a parable,
though no one is certain how to use that knowledge – no
one would agree: there are many sorts of people, each dif-
ferent from all the others. Know them, use them, wield
them. Be courteous toward them, don’t be one of those
tyrants; that class should be eradicated. Life is to grow and
learn and leave as much trace as you can. Yet I have not,
and I never will, compleatly gain the knowledge of the
wonder that is Life.

The End
42 The Lost Past
Finishing the Unfinished

DIMITRIJE IGNJATOVIC

Finishing the Unfin-

ished
43 The Lost Past
Finishing the Unfinished

Bonus

Finishing the Unfinished

By Dimitrije Ignjatovic

Wake up, Asky. I cannot do anything without you.

The youthful female voice rang round Asky’s head, or in-
side it, or whatever ...
Wake up.
Asky did not move an inch. The voice had no visible
source.
We used to be friends.
Asky was a young man of around twenty-seven, dark-
haired, around 6 feet tall, pretty thin, with large eyes and a
face narrower than usual.
Please wake up.
He was sleeping calmly on the rock.
Aw, wake up. Why are you like this?
‘AARGH! MUM! GOOD LORD, THE DREAM, I WAS –
where am I?’
Asky was now awake.
Asky ... ?
‘Yes ... ?’ He rubbed his weary eyes.
Asky, you are not at home.
Asky looked around. ‘Wh—who are you?’ His large blu-
ish-grey eyes were open.
Call me Nepenthe.
‘Why have you, or those that named you, chosen that
name?’
I kill pain.
‘And where are you, Nepenthe, if that is your real name?’
Wherever there is pain, I am there. I am everywhere, to be in posi-
tion to argue over everything.
Asky got up calmly. I chose to guard you, Asky. The world
didn’t look like his own. Long, vast vistas of forests, rocks
of which most were half-pellucid. I’m your friend. Green
grass completely unlike his own world. Tall green grass.
Remember me? Nepenthe is my real name. Lost in the mist, per-
44 The Lost Past
Finishing the Unfinished

haps a hundred miles away, there were high, snow-capped,

sharp-peaked mountains and very high, snow-capped me-
sas. Ahead was a long, deep valley, behind was another one.
The valley seemed to be surrounding the entire rocky
mountain Asky was standing on. We have been separated. He
was standing on the rock halfway to the top of the moun-
tain he was standing on. There was no sun in sight, but the
sky was a pure cyan. We have to finish the unfinished.
‘What do you mean, separated?’ His voice echoed
through the valley. ‘Why can’t I see you?’
Nepenthe’s voice seemed to be lost for about ten seconds,
probably until she thinks of what to say, and finds it sure it
is not a catchphrase.
We were accomplices, Asky.
You were in this world before. This is a world just outside your
world.
I am its mind.
You have been called because of the mind that lives in you, Asky.
Asky, that is its name.
This is Emoticon, the world of the Mind’s feelings.
You are to discover your sense of reasoning here.
I am the Painkiller.
You have been brought here because your mind is overcome with
sorrow, Asky.
I am the guard-mind of Emoticon.
Asky just stood there, sorrowfully looking at the land-
scape, with sad, inexplicable understanding.
Proceed. It will be of no use listening for my voice.
It’s up to us to finish the unfinished.
It was a tough descent down the mountain, especially
when one’s wearing a cape. Asky got off relatively easy ex-
cept for a cut on his right palm, and his cape was torn, as at
one point he had to hang from a tree. ‘Nepenthe?’ he called
out, to make sure she’s still with him. ‘Are you here?’
I am a mind. I travel like a ghost, unseen, undamaging, undamaged.
‘And I?’ Asky asked.
You are a body with a mind in it. Your mind part is not damaged by
bodily injuries.
45 The Lost Past
Finishing the Unfinished

To the left is the path to Sorrow.

I was written by many that do not know what they think. They were
trying to make themselves a guard mind.
In Sorrow they ended up.
Go on. Proceed. To the right.
To the right was a narrow path, cleared from grass that
was almost ten feet tall. The air was pleasantly cold and
fresh. This is the path to Joy, Asky. Down the grassy path, a
country road was opening. The road, unlike the roads of
Asky’s home world, was not asphalted. Down the road he
was walking down, with Nepenthe as his companion, feel-
ing her protecting him, there was a city. A huge city, pri-
meval or medieval, but without a castle or a moat, just be-
hind that river that, with the country road, made a right
angle. Over the river there was a bridge, guarded by a troll.
When Asky approached the troll, he stammered, ‘G—
good morning? Sir?’ That is a troll, Asky. He is very dumb.
‘Pey me an’ ya my pass!’ said the troll. ‘I’ve no patience ta
stand on this damn bridge four oors, an’ then a damn
wee ’un has nay smarter than ta poke me wi’ questions! An’
I’m no a good ’un when interrupted in me naps! Pey me five
oonces of gauld an’ ya my pass!’ His name is Pushion.
‘P—Pushion?’ Asky paused. ‘Uh, good morning, Pushion.’
‘Hoo dae ya ken me name? Ach!’ He splashed into the
water.
The city looked more like a village, with brown-haired
men and women, all in vivid-coloured tunics, scuttling
around, doing old-fashioned agriculture.
‘Oi sire!’ the young lean man in red tunic, that was
ploughing the field just past the bridge with a horse-pulled
plough, greeted Asky. ‘What are you doing, in that weird a
clothes, strutting round like some upper-class sire who
always gets mopey, that Old-sire that rules us, vexes us,
oppresses us ... damn it, be free in your strides!’
‘Why don’t you watch what you’re saying.’ Very good,
Asky. He stood for a while. ‘What’s your name, if it can be
said in proper speech?’ Asky said.
‘My name is Acanthio,’ the man said.
46 The Lost Past
Finishing the Unfinished

‘My name’s Asky,’ Asky said, with a blunt smile, and

Acanthio the villager asked, ‘And what do you want, sire?’
‘I want us, you – ’ He cannot hear me, Asky. ‘Oh, you and me,
uh, to find my shattered, scattered reason. My reason is
shattered and scattered throughout Emoticon. That’s why
I’m here.’ Yes, Asky. You have found the piece of logic.
‘Come with me,’ Asky said.
You are still scornful, Asky. Is he a villain to you? ‘D—and do
not call me sire. I am a noble man.’ Asky, you can not yet call
yourself noble. You are still talking with a great amount of disrespect.
‘Come,’ Asky said.
The pub has always smelt of beer and wine, and there
was always an ear-piercing noise from the attic. Just gam-
blers, as Bearskin the bartender told them. Do not order any-
thing for me now, Asky. They cannot see or hear me. Be calm. I am only
a mind. ‘Yes, I’d like some apple juice. And, what?’
‘Acanthio, my friend! Best beer this year, just for you, har
har! It’s on me.’
‘I can’t drink any more,’ said a man in a bronze armour
vest over a white tunic and dark green cape. There was a
long sword attached to his belt. His shiny whitish-blond
hair straggled down to the floor of the pub, but his beard
was cut relatively short. ‘I have to stay ready. Will you
drink this?’ he asked Asky. ‘I’ll tell you a story about Potent
the mighty warrior in exchange.’ Let him speak. His voice
was a pleasant tenor.
‘Uh, no, no, I have to stay sober, thank you,’ said Asky.
‘Then no story eh, heh heh,’ said the warrior. ‘By the way,
my name’s Thunderwar.’
Thunderwar drank the beer in one swallow. ‘Aargh, who
cares.’ Do not fool yourself, Asky. No beer can ease sorrow.
‘Are you sad?’ Asky asked.
‘Ar har, you still got it,’ Thunderwar laughed, ‘my wife
died a month ago. Quite a fool, you know.’
‘You aren’t sad any, I guess?’
It is quite unreasonable to drink when you’re sad.
Leave him. He is beer-crazy.
‘Uh, goodbye.’
47 The Lost Past
Finishing the Unfinished

‘Goodbye to you too, ar har, bloody thunder war.’ He col-

lapsed.
‘Acanthio,’ said Asky, ‘I can’t stand this place. There are
too many drunkards here.’
They left the pub. Acanthio got his mountaineering stick
and they proceeded. That was the piece of respect.
A reason is very big, maybe big for most to comprehend.
Yet it is small enough to stand on a mountain peak.
It must not be lonely.
Acanthio, though a lowly peasant, looked quite impres-
sive on that bridge that was perpendicular to the bridge
through which Asky entered the village, surrounded by
that river and tall grass. The bridge was long, but soon they
come to a forest, a dark forest of Sorrow. They turn right to
a path that is pitch dark, so the trees seem to be moving.
No! The trees were actually moving! Asky and Acanthio ran
in panic, and ended up at a path by that same river they
crossed when exiting the village, but opposite the trees to
the right of the bridge.
The path continued to a hill, which they climbed by a
spiral path. It was obviously inhabited.
When they arrived at the top, they found a small temple.
There was a sign nearby. Asky read it, quite amazed. ‘What
church is that?’
VISITOR, WE ARE NOT HARMFUL. WE ARE
THE SERICS, FOLLOWERS OF THE SERICINE,
THE CHURCH OF SERIOUSNESS.
Acanthio is right. Enter this temple, Asky. It will do you good.
An old man in a robe that looked similar to a robe of a
Roman Catholic monk, except it was a dark blue, came in
front of the temple. He looked at them and coughed. ‘Visi-
tors,’ he said, ‘it appears by the way you’re dressed, child.’
He shook Asky’s hand. Asky felt strange for a moment,
then he shook the monk’s hand back. ‘Greetings, child,’ he
told Acanthio. ‘You’re from Agricia, aren’t you?’
‘Yes. We have come in search of Asky’s reason, that’s, er,
shattered, and, scattered throughout the world of Emoti-
con,’ Acanthio said.
‘Um, this is Acanthio, my friend.’
48 The Lost Past
Finishing the Unfinished

‘Enter, children. It will be most enjoyable that you can

rest here for a while. We seldom get visitors here.’
They entered the temple. Inside, all the furniture was
blue. It all, except for the colours, looked like a Roman
Catholic chapel, except for a shiny blue floor, a classroom-
like structure where the sermon room should be, two cho-
rus rooms above, and an organ room.
Inside, the school children, those children in blue robes,
with their long blond hair arranged in regular curls, were
taught a school song.
‘Whither Science doth us take
We shall take our Knowledge on.
Oh, olden stories we’d forsake
And oh, bid all their trace begone.
How, and why, do we preserve
Our olden saws that hearts do hit?
Oh, this saw we can worship, serve
And write it as an endless writ.’
‘What are they doing?’ Asky asked the priest.
‘They are learning to be priests of Sericine.’ Asky’s atten-
tion trailed off. He so wanted to pull one of the children by
his or her long hair, to check if it is a wig. I can hear your
thoughts, Asky. What you want is scornful and unserious. ‘Oh, and
by the way, my name is Wormwood.’
‘Wormwood?’ said Asky.
‘Yes, Wormwood. That is my guard plant and the reason
I joined Sericine.’
Asky just listened. No need to make a smart remark, he
felt, not at all.
‘My parents sensed my Seriousness; they knew I would
be a good Seric. Mark my words, child: A priest is not os-
tentatious; woe to those periwig-pated actors who strut
across the scene, and bellow to the audience like the worst
insulters of humanity. That is unserious and ... and scorn-
ful.’
‘Scornful?’ Asky wondered why Wormwood just re-
peated Nepenthe’s words from several minutes ago. He can-
not hear me, Asky. Only you can.
49 The Lost Past
Finishing the Unfinished

‘However, respect is the key, to Seriousness, and to

Sericine evenly.’ He glanced across to Asky. ‘I bet,’ Worm-
wood said, ‘you are well known for asking?’
‘No ... I don’t change names that quickly. I mean, where
do we go if one has to find their lost Reason?’
‘You will go down the Horswood forest. It is well known
that it is full of wild horses. There you can go to a kind man
by the name of Rico, who would give you a horse when you
tell him a Seric sent you, he was a Seric himself once, he
was made a Seric around year 584 after the Serics’ first
book was written, that’s ten years ago, so you can expect
no jokes from him. He’s a plougher, just like Acanthio. He
can tame a horse so it doesn’t neigh even to laugh unless
told to. Acanthio, child, do you know how to ride a horse?’
‘A horse? I guess I can, but he has to be very tame.’
‘The horses he tames can only go if they can see, so when
you arrive at the dark part of the forest, leave the horse
there. Acanthio will take the horse back when he goes to
return to his village, won’t you, Acanthio?’
‘Yes, yes I will.’
‘So, in the dark forest, you will need a lantern. Ask Rico
for a lantern, and move carefully. There are dark-hounds in
the forest. All they fear is light. When they attack you,
flash your lantern round, and they will run away like seri-
ousness from jokes. When you arrive at Whyteton, the
town with white houses, ask them for Shillingwise; he is
not greedy, but wise about rationing. Now farewell, chil-
dren, most honoured travellers.’
You have found the piece of serious listening, Asky.
He left them. Having nothing else to do, Asky and Acan-
thio left the temple. The air was pleasant, a refreshment
from that of the temple’s air. They turned right and jumped
to a limestone below. In the limestone there was a wide
hole down to its bottom, letting through the river. They
jumped to the ground below, a clearing in an alder wood,
where a narrow, branched path was cleared in the ten-
foot-tall grass.
They went through the forest. The crickets were chirp-
ing. There was a soft breeze. The path turned left, where
50 The Lost Past
Finishing the Unfinished

the alder wood had already changed into a light lilac forest.
To the left of the path, there was a batch of nettles poking
out as undergrowth. Acanthio handled the nettle stings
pretty well, but Asky got stung on the nettles and with
some scratching and attempts to suppress panicking, he
moved out.
There was a clearing in the lilac forest in which a young
woman of about thirty, apparently a maid-servant, was
kneeling on the ground looking for something.
‘Hello, visitors,’ she said, rolling the ‘r’ sound just like
Wormwood the Seric, except her voice was a bit nasal.
‘Sure yis must be wandering from another country.’
‘Yes, well, Asky here really looks like a stranger, but one
would rarely get visitors here,’ said Acanthio. ‘So what’re
you up to?’
‘I do be collecting shrooms for Master Rico.’ She got up,
wiping her dress with her hands. ‘Will yis join me? Me
hands be all dirty.’
‘No, we’re looking for Rico.’
‘Oh, I be afraid yis do be after missing him,’ she said.
‘Master Rico’s hut bes to the right of this clearing.’
‘Thank you.’
‘Bye.’
Asky and Acanthio turned back, then left. There was
more grass in this forest. The grass was almost covering the
lilacs. They walked on for half an hour, and then the path
turned left, and within twenty yards, a huge clearing
opened in front of them. In the middle of it, there was a
house with a very big horse-stable.
There was a man of about thirty-five, with dark brown
hair, in a pale red doublet with a frilled neck, burgundy-red
knickerbockers, knee-length black boots, meaning he was
apparently an Eques.
‘Ahoy Rico!’ Acanthio bellowed. ‘Can you give me an-
other horse?’
‘Well, Acanthio,’ he said, as Asky and Acanthio ap-
proached, ‘if you’re going to have another of my horses for
nothing – ’
51 The Lost Past
Finishing the Unfinished

But Acanthio replied, ‘Nuh-uh-uh-uh-uh! We have been

sent by Wormwood your teacher, a Seric, to transport this
stranger here, named Asky, to Whyteton, so he can find his
lost Reason.’
‘Reason?’ said Rico. ‘Right, I’ll give you a horse. But mark
you, I do not want you stealing it. Pay me.’
‘Alright. A twopenny is all I’ve got.’
‘Right.’ Acanthio gave him a gold coin with a seal that
depicted something that looked like a ‘2’.
‘Right,’ said Rico. ‘I will give you a good horse.’
Soon he came back with a palomino horse. ‘Call him
Horace.’
‘Horace?’ Asky repeated.
‘Yes, Horace.’ Rico said.
‘And where can we find a lantern, a rope and two pieces
of wood?’
‘Oh, so you want to go to the dark forest? Here they are!’
He handed them a rather big lantern with a four-inch can-
dle, a longish, firm rope and two small pinewood sticks.
Acanthio enclosed the sticks in the lantern for safekeeping.
‘What are we waiting for?’ Asky said.
Acanthio shrugged and mounted the horse. ‘Come on,
Asky!’
Asky hesitatingly mounted the horse, too, but behind
Acanthio. ‘Gee up, Horace!’ shouted Acanthio. The horse
started to canter quickly, through the wide path to the left,
then through the narrow path to its right, to both sides of
which there was an oak forest.
Asky felt a pleasant breeze as he and Acanthio rode on
the horse as it cantered through the oak forest. At length,
they rode past several wild horses that were prancing
around among tallish ferns. Asky could barely hold the
unlit lantern in his hand as the horse started to gallop
through the windy forest that was getting darker and
darker. Sometime later the woods became very dark, al-
most completely dark. They were apparently in a beech
forest. They could barely recognise a narrow pathway
ahead, narrowed by four rows of beeches around it. The
horse sprang up and refused to move any further. Acanthio
52 The Lost Past
Finishing the Unfinished

made a noose of the firm rope and tied the horse to a

nearby tree. Asky took out the sticks, rubbed one of them
against another and thus lit them, then he lit the candle in
the lantern with them and put the burning sticks back in
the lantern. To prevent a forest fire, he closed the lantern.
The fire started very well.
They proceeded through the dark forest. Asky was light-
ing the way. At length, they heard a dreadful growling.
Acanthio, apparently, wasn’t scared.
Those are the dark-hounds, Asky, said Nepenthe’s voice.
They are very dangerous, but they fear the tiniest spark of light.
You have your lantern, Asky.
They won’t attack you or Acanthio.
Asky and Acanthio went on. Asky ignored the growling,
as much as it was possible ... until Acanthio stopped in fear,
taken aback. A huge monster that looked vaguely like a
cross between a large dog and a wolf with huge sharp fangs
jumped into the pathway. This is a dark-hound, Asky. Approach
him with your lantern.
Asky, though a bit frightened, approached the dark-
hound. ‘ASKY! NO!’ Acanthio screamed, but he couldn’t
discourage Asky. ‘Hi, doggy ... ’ Asky said, ‘want some of
this?’ He approached the dark-hound with his lantern. The
dark-hound gave a high-pitched yelp and ran back. ‘That
was a silly risk, Asky!’ Acanthio berated Asky. You have
found the piece of bravery.
At length, the forest opened up and they beheld a cliff,
below which there was a huge town, whose houses were
all white. ‘I reckon this is Whyteton.’
But do not just run into danger like that, Asky.
Like Acanthio said, that is a silly risk.
They descended the peak off the smooth side of the cliff.
They crossed the bridge, and found a human guard stand-
ing there. He was lean, with shoulder-length blond hair,
with a very narrow, expressionless face, in a bronze armour
vest over a white tunic, and over his armour vest there was
a dark green cape. He was wearing a green hat with a red
feather in it.
53 The Lost Past
Finishing the Unfinished

‘Hello,’ he said. ‘Who are you?’

‘What’s your name, my fellow?’ said Acanthio. ‘We’re
travellers. I’m Acanthio, this is Asky, and who are you?’
‘My name ... is Stallworth.’
‘Well ... Stallworth ... can you let us through?’
‘Why should I?’
‘A Seric sent me, Stallworth. We need to find Asky’s – ’
he pointed to Asky – ‘ shattered, scattered Reason.’
‘Yes,’ said Asky.
‘A Seric? What’s his name?’
‘Wormwood?’
‘Sounds good to me,’ said Stallworth. ‘You may pass.’
The gate guards opened the gate and Asky and Acanthio
entered.
In Whyteton, every house was white. Between the roads
that were of soil that was not covered by sand, even slate,
there were farms with tall grass growing at places, and
usually crops were grown there.
Ahead from where Asky and Acanthio entered Whyte-
ton, was a wooden-framed adobe house with a wooden
roof and un-glassed windows, but the adobe was entirely
white. A row of red rocks was apparently plastered in near
the roof with white adobe. The door was a rectangular
wooden door, surrounded by white bricks plastered in
with adobe.
They went in. Inside, everything was cheap, yet comfort-
able. There was an old man inside.
‘Hello, foreign visitors,’ he said, ‘how may I help you?’
Before Acanthio could speak, Asky replied, ‘Where is
Shillingwise?’
‘Ho ho, silly foreigner, I am Shillingwise.’
‘Any advice on saving money?’
‘If you want to save money, you better not spend every
single penny on biscuits. Be modest. I haven’t spent a half-
penny in the last ten days.’
‘How come?’
‘I just used the cheaper goods I bought earlier.’
‘Nice advice. Bye.’
‘Bye. I have a lot more experience.’
54 The Lost Past
Finishing the Unfinished

They left.
Asky had remembered.
Although he is accustomed now to such a world as this,
and delighted by its beauties, he is still from another world.
He is only in Emoticon to find his lost sense of reasoning,
some of which is shattered and scattered throughout this
world. Known as Emoticon.
As they went to the right from where they entered, to
the gate on that side, Asky said, ‘Acanthio my friend, listen;
when we reach the gate, we will part; and I will proceed up
the mountain and quest for my Reason alone.’
He proceeded somewhat in front of Acanthio. ‘Come. Al-
though we will part now, we will forever be friends.’
‘Asky?’
Asky proceeded.
Acanthio ran with him.
‘Asky!’ he cried, and followed him.
‘You can have Horace!’
‘You need me!’ he said, panting, arriving beside Asky. ‘For
one more situation.’ He pointed at two guards. The guards
had long handled spears that had curved blades projecting
at the base of the spearheads. ‘They’ve got partisans.’ It was
clear the spears were called partisans or some such.
Asky neared the guards, who said ‘Halt!’
‘Hello,’ Asky said, ‘I want to pass. We’re friends of Stall-
worth, and we want to go into the mountains.’
‘What!’
‘What, are they dangerous?’
‘No, but behind them is another realm’s territory.’
‘I won’t go there, then.’
The guard moved. ‘See, I didn’t need you!’ Asky laughed.
Asky felt Nepenthe leading him now, and a complete fear-
lessness.
Asky and Acanthio met beside a light birch wood; the
breeze was pleasantly cold and fresh. It brought Asky back
many memories.
‘You have helped me a lot, Acanthio. You can return to
Agricia now. We may now part. I am a bit reluctant, but
55 The Lost Past
Finishing the Unfinished

the events here in detail may be of much significance where

I am going. Goodbye.’
‘Farewell, Asky.’ Acanthio said. ‘I will miss you.’
‘Me too.’
With vague sorrow, Asky watched Acanthio leave. He
turned and found himself in front of a tall mountain. He
proceeded halfway to its top, when he heard a disembodied,
familiar voice.
It was Nepenthe.
The last and greatest part of your sense of reasoning, and your rea-
son itself, is in you.
You just have to grasp it now.
Asky suddenly started to put everything together. Emo-
tions, seriousness, careful listening, it all went together. He
was now a completely respectful, reasonable, noble, grown
man.
Well done, Asky.
Now, we must part.
Asky proceeded to the top of the mountain and found
some of the tall grass bent down.
There, you will sleep.
Asky did not hesitate. He lay down on the grass that felt
smoother and cleaner than any grass he’s ever lain on.
Sleep, Asky. When you wake up, you will be home again.
Home again.
With these words, Asky fell asleep and suddenly there
was a mess of senses around him.
Clarence found himself in the bed of a boarding-school of
his home world again. Electric light illuminated him as he
opened his eyes. It was all a dream, though he could re-
member everything in detail. It felt important for some
reason. He looked in the mirror. He looked much like Asky,
and he was in his university pyjamas. He got up and
donned his university’s uniform again.
He was at Cambridge University again, and oh no! He
was late.
He ran to the study room where the classes were begin-
ning; there was a student reading studies. It was Carolyn,
56 The Lost Past
Finishing the Unfinished

his long-time love! She had exactly the same voice as Ne-
penthe ... what could this mean?
‘Oh, it seems Mr Montgomery is late again.’
‘Carolyn, my nepenthe!’
‘ ... are not synonymous to – hello, Clarence. Mad as
usual?’
‘The opposite. I’m a reasonable man now.’
The rest of his classes he passed in a grown-up, reason-
able manner.

The End
57 The Lost Past
Finishing the Unfinished

A Note About the Author

Dimitrije Ignjatovic lives in Belgrade, Serbia where he
was born in 1989. He writes and translates stories for chil-
dren. By now he has translated many Serbian folklore tales,
and stories and poems by Serbian authors into English, as
well as written some stories of his own.
Dimitrije Ignjatovic’s current address is:

Dimitrije Ignjatovic
Dr Ivana Ribara 13
11077 Beograd
Republic of Serbia
mitai@eunet.yu