Welcome to the teachings of Sir Swithin Swift.
My words are the words of an enlightened man. I gained my liberation after leaving my native Albion to follow in the footsteps of my maternal Uncle to India. Many years later, once the true, divine nature of us all had been realised, the Blessed Powers guided me back to the land of my birth. My awakened spirit was now sensitive to the ancient Gods of this land and these deities communed with me, as they communed with my uncle before me. They revealed a path to enlightenment that can be trod on these shores. In these teachings I set forth this path to spiritual awakening as revealed to me by the Gods of ancient Britain.
Mr Adam Yardley floundered, half-willing each muddy wave that flooded his eyes and swamped his nose, to suck him under, into the untroubled depths. As each wave broke around his face, a fleeting, gasped glimpse of the sky and the fragile trees was allowed before the watery circumference closed over once again.
Gulping air and water, Yardley was torn between a desire for the slop and slap of the buffeting waves and a yearning to rise into the clear heavens beyond the sighing breeze; that is until a shadow fell over him and the waters were plunged aside under the prow of a rowing boat. What appeared a dishevelled apparition sat within that craft, formed into an old man, gazing down upon him with eyes that exuded a pity for and an understanding of the human condition; this vision was fleeting and the waters closed, eager for Mr Yardley’s company.
Or so I imagine Mr Yardley’s experiences to be.
I have immersed myself in numerous rivers, most recently the Dee within sight of the shrine to the Goddess. As public nakedness is not encouraged in Chester or its environs I waited until the hour was late before I slipped through the willows and immersed myself under the watching moon. Of course all such immersions attune me to the alma mater of rivers, the Ganges. I cautiously paddled into those fast-flowing waters and lowered myself into waves that bare sacred offerings and ashes of the dead and once emerged, I found a figure stood among the crowds on the ghat, looking upon me...
So I appeared to Mr Yardley. My account of his final moments on the water is not just constructed from memory or empathy; I forged a mental union with the man, entering into his awareness even as he sought to take his own life.
I had been enjoying a leisurely morning on the banks of the Dee after defeating, or deflecting, a demonic assault, (see previous posts, ed. / acolyte) when I was interrupted by the appearance of a semi-ruined boat drifting atop the waves.
I had observed this craft bedded in the mud at a lopsided angle just below the wall of the field where I had spent such as eventful night. I did not realise however that the wrench and grinding noises that had arisen from the riverbank were the ancient timbers freeing themselves from the sodden earth. I thought that a large animal, possibly a deer, were tearing at the sycamores below the wall but as I stood to look, I witnessed the boat lurch free and in defiance of the river, pitch and judder before me.
One should never ignore such a call from the Otherworld and after sweeping my effects into the my pack and paying a final respect to the shrine of the Goddess, I cautiously lowered myself down the wall and found my way through the undergrowth to the muddy shore. The Gods accommodated me, sending the boat into the shallows and I was able to pick my way across the mud and lower myself into the wooden shell. I sat uneasily, clinging onto the slimed sides as the craft slipped easily away and turning began to drift upstream. The murky waters slipped an inch away from my right foot, forcing me to lean back into the boat as it passed under the bridge and then swept swiftly and evenly up the weir. I have no idea whether any saw me as I sailed against the flow of the Dee, away from the city and out toward the fields. The prow forged a crest that briefly cupped the sun before cascading golden snakes around us; insects flitted before our passage rising wisps that were swallowed in the rising light. Whispering trees reached overhead, their reflections shivering through the waves and I felt the immanence of the Goddess, shining through the water, the light, the fragrance and the earth’s subtle song.
The peace of the journey was ended when we rounded a bend and the figure of a middle-aged man, floundering in the middle of the river came into view. The boat glided still, indicating the end of my journey and I looked for the first time upon Mr Yardley. I saw too, that which had ensnared him. He did not see it, but I knew that he felt it, burrowed within him, clamped throughout him, driving him into the waves, dragging him into the gulping depths, down through the yearning reeds, toward the touch of the eager mud...
I was thrown by the sight.
It was not just the man balanced precariously between life and self-willed death. The past was peeled back and I saw another who floated flaccid, lifeless ...I was again that youth who could not act. I might have drifted by and allowed Mr Yardley to drown whilst wallowing in memory, had not the power which held him, reasserted itself and I looked again upon the demon which had attacked hours previously...
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