9 October 2022
I am a fairly religious person, and as part of that, I try to follow the law of the Sabbath, in that we don’t work on Sunday if we can avoid it, and try to make sure nothing we do forces other people to work, either. I’ve been trying to figure out how to apply that to writing and I’ve decided I will generally write for a shorter block of time on Sunday, and rather than the action-packed fantasy stories I favor, I will try to focus on something with a more spiritual bent. Not religious, necessarily, but spiritual.
One of the stories in the back of my head I’d been trying to figure out was this concept of a butterfly knight, inspired by this picture by Sandara on DeviantArt (found via YouTube, actually). Butterflies can represent a lot of things, including the cycle of life and death, as well as beauty. So I concluded this butterfly knight might have ties to the idea of “beauty from ashes”, which is something I’ve been thinking about a lot lately. And thus Aislin was born.
When Aislin (pronounced Ashlynn) lost Matthias, her husband of only two months, she also lost herself. Family and friends offered their condolences; the priests of Father Death offered her what solace they could. Aislin even appreciated it; there was no guarantee she would have made it the next few months without their support.
But nothing really broke through that grayness she felt. Everything seemed meaningless. Rote. Empty. There was a hole where her heart had been, and nothing could help it heal.
One morning in spring, she visited Matthias’ grave, as she often did. This time, however, she felt a presence in the gentle breeze flowing at her back. She turned, and her eyes caught hold of a single, brilliant blue butterfly, floating along as if it hadn’t a care in the world.
Even Aislin couldn’t ever say why that butterfly was so profound to her. But something about the beauty of that moment made her heart overflow, and she laughed aloud for the first time in months. Her grief didn’t disappear, her sorrow for her lost husband hadn’t gone away, but now it was tempered with hope, with a surety even, that things would get better and beauty could rise from the ashes.
At the next opportunity, she traveled into town to thank the Eternal Rose for her gift. For if anyone could bring beauty back into her life after so long in the dark, wouldn’t it be the goddess of beauty herself?
However, what Aislin found at the Rose’s temple was not the gentle beauty that had healed her. Rather, it was a garish, opulent thing that demanded the attention of all who passed by. Many of the priests and priestesses were no different; they dressed in loud colors and hid their faces beneath powders and paints.
Aislin cringed, and her heart ached. To herself, she wondered, “What about this is beautiful?”
For better or worse, her comment was heard by several of the clergy, and a furious debate spread among all the churches of the Eternal Rose. The schism ran the risk of causing more than one war.
Still, that was of little concern to Aislin at the time. She returned home, disappointed, but still determined to move forward. When Old Harper’s crops failed, she shared her food with his family, and invited them to appreciate what they had more abundantly. When little Dory broke her leg, Aislin helped her get around, and when it healed, they rejoiced together at the wonder of being able to walk.
Aislin might have continued like that the rest of her life, quietly promoting peace and quiet in her community, had her town not been raided by a band of brigands. Despite her own lack of skill, she grabbed Matthias’ sword and rushed to defend her home.
The leader of the band was a large man. He easily struck down several of the town militia…