Role

Chapter 10

'Free at last.. free at last..' the thought kept repeating as a mantra in
Admund's tired mind. He had felt the Beast release him. The price had been
paid, the bargain had been fulfilled. He could not put it in words, but it
was like a veil being lifted from his vision.. No.. Like for all his life he
had been standing under the weight of a waterfall and finally had taken a
step away from the deluge.. No.. It should have been like an instantaneous
transition from a moonless winter night into a calm spring noon. It wasn't
like that either.

Cross legged, he sat under the thick oak in Emerald Forest, rolling a large
Living Oak acorn between thumb and forefinger, looking at it and examining it
as though for the first time. He had always thought of himself and his
Brother as one acorn. He never could tell which one was the shell, and which
one was the heart. He even thought they changed places at times, which was as
things should be. 'Brother, whatever we do, we will do it together!' he
remembered himself saying to his Brother over and over again during his life.
It had been a truism, something akin to saying when we take in air we are
breathing. But life outside of the dark forest had been chaining them both.
Often it would change them both in different ways. What were once maybe two
aspects of the same whole, now were threatening to become two separates. It
unnerved him. The wind was too chilling, the twigs and grass under him were
too prickly.

Alive because of his Brother selflessness. Free, because of his selfishly
selfless Brother once again. It appeared that history, annoyingly, runs in
recurring, seemingly orderly patterns. The bargain had come not under his
terms. His freedom had also come in the same manner, without his say--not
under his terms. For the bargain for his life, he had been dead. For his
freedom.. he had been asleep. Both were done on his behalf by his Brother. A
true keeper.