The sun seeped through the thick canopy of intertwined branches. Down below, in a crudely formed clearing, birds of yellow and red flittered between the lower boughs of the great trees, hopped from tree stump to tree stump, chirping and singing. In the midst of the flitting, an old haggard-looking man slowly and carefully opened the door to an unkempt, battered cottage. He took a heavy saw from its resting position against the cottage wall, and moved slowly towards one of the many stumps. He dropped to the ground with a groan, and slowly, meticulously, dissected a small round disc. He laid the saw on the ground, near to the tree.
“That’ll be just about right,” he said. He stood up slowly.
Scanning the murky green scene, the man felt the crisp early spring air, and smelt the freshly grass cuttings in a large mound off to the left, around the side of the hut. He shuffled back into the confines of his small, haphazard home with his small prize.
The cottage was low, barely taller than a standing man, and had been built years before. The carefully placed branches of the walls supported an expansive thatched roof. The building obviously hadn’t been touched in several years, the walls were beginning to show cracks, and collapse was near. The old house backed on to a hastily constructed shed. Through the open door, it was obvious that tools lined the walls of the shed. The room itself was empty, but for a large, sheeted construction towering almost to the roof, in the dead centre of the workshop.
The man ambled into the shed, through the wide open door. A small thock signified the wood dropping on to a central pile. Then the man closed the small door with a bang, and a repetitive hammering noise came from the worn cottage.
Many weeks later, in the middle of the night, he made his way through relentless sleet and whipping winds, over the soft, flooding ground to the relative shade of a large oak tree. There, he knelt to the ground and scooped brown muck from the earth at the base of the oak. He then staggered back through the blinding rain to his small shed.
The inside of the cottage was bare, only two chairs, a small table and a well-used bunk occupied the interior. There was a small courtyard with a fire pit, where the man did all his cooking. The man dropped his burden in a large iron pot on the small bench in his workstation, then he ambled into the main house.
He sat down heavily on one of the two chairs. The other was occupied. The occupant of the chair wore a large coat, with a cowl stretching over his face, showing only the hooked tip of his nose.
“When will I get to see your blessed creation?” he said.
“Soon.”
“I want to see it now,” the man exploded. He lashed out at the wall of the old cottage. It splintered, and slowly buckled inwards. On its inward path, the door of the cottage opened, and sideswiped the crude shed. The whole thing came down with a clatter, the following silence broken only by the resounding whoingwhoingwhoingwhoing of a hacksaw spinning uncontrollably on the floor. Slowly, the sheet slid off the construction, piling neatly on the floor.
The rain hit the two men like knives, each blow stinging with cold.
Lightning forked onto a nearby tree, setting it ablaze, illuminating the construction in an ominous light. It loomed, taller than any man, head bowed, eyes shut. It was made of mismatched clay. It’s face was crude, rushed, it’s body ornate, and the flickering light of the flames caused the creature to glow gently.
The man looked up, and gasped.
“What the ...”
Thunder clapped loud, directly overhead.