The Jeremiad of a Kiss
an excerpt

The flames licked at her body. But instead of the coarse forked tongue of a serpent, they were more like the delicate tongue of a lover. Siomha felt the flames, and the fear. She’d seen, or felt rather, what had happened. She wondered, desperately, what had happened to the other druids. What had happened to Eireen, Caitria, Ffion, and Gwendolyn? What had happened to all of their animals? Most importantly though, what had happened to Berwyn?
She knew, within her guts, the answer to the first question, and to some extent, that of the second. The other four druids were gone. They had left the plane of existence as it was and been moved. They were no longer in that time period as they had been. They were either dead – likely, as they may have been a sacrifice for her – or they were alive in other time periods. The animals, on the other hand, she knew exactly what had happened to. They were stuck in the time period they had left, doomed to become slowly less like their glorified selves. Berwyn, if she was fortunate, had come with her. The other thought was too unbearable for her. All this, she had caused. The druids, she suspected were dead. And all of this was because of her vision…she wondered if she had been too hasty in her interpretation.
Yet the fire felt so wonderful against her body, eradicating the old and instituting the new. Her past was being set behind her, as was all of time that was before the time she was aiming for. The future, one filled with purpose, was in front of her. And she felt strange tingling sensations at various points in her body – her eyes, her ears, her face, and her feet. These four points felt a vague power in them, perhaps; or maybe it was simply that the fire affected them in a particularly unique manner. It felt so wonderful – the fire.
Yet how could she come to terms with what she had done? She had failed, not only the other four high druids, but all the other druids, all the people, all the animals, and so much more. This onset of failure was deep, a tremendous burden on her soul. For the druids could not create the high druids anymore, not without at least one surviving high druid. This made her wonder, briefly, how the druids had been created in the first. The rumor was that one high druid, a woman named Siomha, her namesake, had appeared suddenly, without any prior existence, and instituted the order of the druids. This seemed to be something entirely unique; perhaps the gods bestowed upon her the gift, but regardless, after instituting another four druids, she had disappeared mysteriously again, telling the four to add another member.
No one doubted this story, but they all understood how little they actually knew about it, and sought to learn more of their origin, like an orphan with knowledge that her parents were still alive might search for them.
With that, she felt the tingling sensation fade a little bit, and she looked out, in hopes of seeing something. She noticed that she could see through the fire, and much, much further than she’d ever seen. She saw cities rising, and smog coming into existence, she could see battles raging near her and kings being crowned. She saw people suffering and starving in streets, and wishing only for a little clean water. She saw the rivers turn black and the hills torn up for their innards. She saw birds kept in cages and animals locked up in houses or slain for their coats. Some of these atrocities were vaguely familiar to her, but others were new. She saw metal learn to float in the brackish water. And she saw everything turn from the pristine world around her into something nightmarish, something that she couldn’t hardly bear to look upon.
Then it began to level off, this increase of death, disease, pollution, and atrocity. The cities slowly became more organized, more clean. The scum rolling through the gutters slid down into the rivers and washed into the sea. The rivers became a dull gray rather than a black. But before that happened, she saw a sight wondrous to her. She saw, almost as though in a vision, a black river burning. The fires leaped on the surface, scorching the waste, until the river was a dull gray instead of pitch black. She saw humans treat each other in terrible ways, but some humans fought for others.
Then, just when she thought it was finally all going well, she saw devastation. Furrows of blood manifested themselves in the Earth. Machines blasted entire forests into charred wastelands. Beautiful structures crumbled in under the concussive force of explosions. Men threw themselves at each other, partly out of desperation and partly out of habit. And more furrows of blood appeared near the old ones, and guns fired incessantly. Finally, she regained the use of her ears and could hear the ceaseless rat-a-tat of the machine guns, not even ceasing for one night. Days and nights of feuding humans tormented her senses, rending each other into pieces. She felt, more than saw or heard, unutterable despair. And she began to see gasses diffuse through entire legions of troops, sending them into terrible fits and manifesting terrible diseases upon them. The entire world bled.
But then it stopped. The world quieted and her tender ears received a chance to rest themselves. Still though, the fire licked around her, and much of the pollution persisted. But there was a frivolity to life – a reckless destructive frivolity, and a celebration of the meaningless – but a frivolity nonetheless.
This frivolity lasted nearly twice as long as the war had. But then, there came a break in this frivolity. Suddenly, the entire world fell into despair, all in a matter of moments (for time was still flickering rapidly in front of her phantasmagoric senses) the world fell into terrifying despair. It infused it to the core of its being, recognizing the loss of everything stable.
And within a few years, the world was being torn asunder again, but this time, it was worse. The new contraptions built in years of prosperity were capable or rending human bodies useless in even greater numbers than before. And now death was seen both as an end, an escape, and a means. Death was simply one less mouth to feed or one less human to kill. Death was the ultimate celebration of end. For those who’d grown up half on despair, death was the inevitability of their own lives. They lived in order to die. And they killed each other unceasingly. She saw humans tortured unto death, worked until their exhaustion overcame them, experimented on and transformed. And she heard their cries of anguish this time, so much more than the roar of engines or the gatling of guns. Their anguish threatened to overcome Sionha, but she held on, for the fire was still comforting her, though it was slowly dying further down. But in the midst of this anguish, she felt a dim hint of hope. A despairing home that humanity was something more than destruction – for all they knew was destruction. Their construction was designed to destroy; it was designed to pollute, to consume resources, to make the people lose their selves. And so many of them did. So many of them lost themselves without dying. Their conscience suffered so much that they effectively died, becoming nothing more than zombies. Half of Europe was a graveyard – part of it actual dead bodies, and the other part zombies, incapable of feeling, incapable of all that which created their human nature. Much of Europe had, inescapably it seemed, become something that ceased to be human.
Then the last hope came in and grew in strength, eventually overwhelming one of the forces of despair and re-establishing order in the world.
But within less than two years the world was torn asunder yet again. And this time Sionha strained so hard against her binding power, she couldn’t bear to think of what humanity was doing to itself! It had created a destructive force so powerful it could wipe out cities, and it had been used twice already, the distant after-effects only reaching her later. Now two superpowers sought to utterly destroy the entire world with these weapons, these abominations of humanity. They stockpiled them, in utter fear of the other, hoping to avoid destruction, feeling anxiety in its most depressive form. They felt so much fear of the other that they couldn’t help those who needed it so much within the world. Europe, once again, felt anguish. This feeling manifested itself so deeply on Sionha that she couldn’t avoid it. And chaos stole through it like night. Some semblance of organization, a supranational force, began to emerge, but it hardly succeeded in much. Fortunately, the rivers turned less gray and closer to clear, and the air became somewhat cleaner. Humanity was beginning to realize its folly.
Yet still they sought to destroy each other! Didn’t they realize that it wasn’t hate they needed? It was love. Didn’t they realize that they need not to share love, but to give it? Didn’t they realize what they were doing to themselves?
Sionha mourned for the Earth, which she heard groaning underneath her. But, after rising, the tension lessened once more, and Earth entered into a new phase of being. So much suffering though, led only to the aesthetic view of life, and so many humans were absorbed into that pattern of masochism and sadism, seeking for each other only pain. And pain was what they felt, suffering without relief. Pain manifested itself so deeply within them that the rising generation felt it more so than any emotion, and any emotion was the cause of only suffering. They lived, so consistently, in suffering, in pain, in irresistible and irrevocable agony. It affected them so deeply…
And the Earth, after centuries of being destroyed, began to strike back. It threw itself at them, overwhelming their cities in water and cottages in fire. But that was not enough, no, not at all.
Sionha finally felt the flames around her dying, and she saw the world around her slowing, focusing until it all became one image. And in that very moment, the flames erupted around her in a burst of energy. Those flames spewed forth from Stonehenge, knocking over the stones and singing the land entirely, starting rapid brush fires which extended themselves from that point, destroying the grass, and in the process, cleansing the land. For all existence needed periodic burning, in order to become clean, in order to become better. Perjury was the essence of progress.
The flames died out around Siomha and she suddenly felt a strength she had never had before. But in that very instant, she felt an insurmountable despair. Where was Berwyn? She slumped onto the altar, for Berwyn had been more of an influence on her, more a part of her life, than anything else in existence. And he was gone, and with him a huge part of her. The ground shook under her briefly. Was it an Earthquake? No, it was only really a vibration, not a tremor. But then it occurred again, and again, until the wolf bounded up to her. It must have been at least twice the size it had been, perhaps even three times, and underneath the wolf’s fur was a gleaming coat of something which looked strong.
Her Berwyn had come through time with her, and now it was time to invoke the Earth’s retribution.