The Protector

Miko awoke and tried to open his eyes, but he had none to open.

Great, he thought, another heartless lifetime.

This would only be Miko’s fourth heartless life, but the first three had been blessedly short. Nothing topped the brevity of being brought to life by the careful hands of a master potter, only to have that life cut short by a careless kiln worker. With any luck, this form would prove similarly fragile.

Tentatively, knowing that his usual life senses wouldn’t work, Miko began to reach outward with his mind, seeking to understand his new form. He could sense himself being made of something organic, something… strong. He also had breadth, which was very odd, as it was typically very hard for one of his kind to bond with a large object.

Whatever this new form was, whatever he now was, he knew it had been crafted with the utmost care and passion. Only the call of a true artisan crafting from their heart could summon a soul to inhabit their work. He could sense that craftsmanship in the symmetrical alignment of his form, in the strength of his foundation, in the detailed carving on his rafters that would likely never be seen by…

Rafters? Foundation?

Miko panicked, letting out a long groan, the sound emitting in the form of wooden beams settling into place.

His soul had bonded… to a building.

“Hear that, Ian?” a gruff voiced said, echoing softly within his walls and beneath his sturdy roof, “She’s waking up.”

Miko couldn’t see the man, but he - she, as her maker had indicted - could sense him. He stood a few inches from her, letting his strong, lightly wrinkled hand rest thoughtfully against her doorframe. It was his touch that had summed her to consciousness, she realized, as was always part of the ritual. Of course, she knew, this man had called her unwittingly.

And now she was stuck.

She had no idea how long buildings like this lasted, let alone what kind of building she even was. She could now sense the many posts lifting her rafters and roof high above the ground. She could feel her large doors, weighing down the firmly attached hinges holding them into place. She could sense the latticework of wooden beams and posts and several dozen smaller gates inside her walls, creating stalls and pens for the animals that would be housed inside her…

How did she know that?

“Does she have a name?” another person said from the same general area as the first voice. She wasn’t sure how, but even without physical ears she could hear the small voice. Very small, Miko noted, trying to place its speaker’s age against that of her maker’s calloused, experienced hand. A son, perhaps a grandson.

“Yes… but I don’t know it yet.” the older man replied, lifting his hand away after a gentle pat. “I suppose it’ll come to me in time. Or perhaps you’ll be the one to find it.”

As the boy and the man walked away, Miko frantically tried to recall how this had happened. She had been seeking a new body, that she knew, and she knew she had been close to finding one. She had found the right world, even the right land mass, but somehow this artisan’s call had pulled her from her course and into this barn.

That was it. She knew it instinctively, even though she had to adjust to this new form of sensory inputs, she knew she was a barn.

And, worryingly, she knew barns were built to last.

Perhaps, just maybe, this one won’t.

…

Miko shuddered involuntarily against the cold, bringing her back from her dreaming. She had let her mind wander to the warm summer months, when the sun had beat against her walls, fading the color from bright read to dampened maroon.

She had let the color fade willingly, finding the exposure to so much sunlight simply incredible. No other form had given her so much to experience, to sense, to take in, to enjoy. Grudgingly, she had admitted to herself that this life wasn’t all bad.

Of course, that had been then. This was now. And now was bitterly cold.

The wind whipped bitingly against her western face, causing her hinges to rattle, letting the icy chill penetrate within her interior. She hated the winters in the place, and this storm was particularly violent. Ian had mentioned something to Abigail about this one, Miko remembered.

For some reason, they had come to her now, during this storm of storms. Maybe that’s how things always were when storms were this bad, but something about this felt different. She could feel Abigail’s sobs as the usually strong-handed woman huddled against the side of an animal pen near her eastern wall. She knew Ian was there, too, calming the skittish animals with whom they now shared safety.

Something was wrong. Miko could tell that much, but she wasn’t sure what. Was it the ferocity of the storm? Why were they huddled among animals instead of their own house nearby? Why was their newborn child, who could usually be heard all the way from the house, being so unusually quiet?

Unsure what to make of the odd situation but wanting to do something to help the family of her long-absent maker, Miko collected her wandering thoughts and focused her attention on her western wall. She felt for the cracks where the wind found its way inside and fortified her wooden form. She sensed her hinges and sought to steady them against the raging storm. She concentrated on the posts and beams that gave her form, strengthening the stable defense to stand strong through the tempest.

With great effort, she held herself there, tightening herself against the storm, the roaring inside her rafters quieting to a whistle. Abigail’s crying softened, and Miko felt her shift to the ground as her breathing slowed. After a few moments worrying something even worse had happened, Miko recognized Abigail’s even breaths as the rhythm of sleep.

A hand, once delicate and small, now hardened with age, rested against her frame. Miko knew that hand and seemed to sense the wonder and gratitude its touch represented.

“Thank you,” Ian whispered, his own feelings emerging through the cracking in his voice. “Thank you.”

…

Miko sensed with rapt attention as the creature tugged against a rope tied to one of her stronger posts. Not the strongest one, that would be two spots closer to her northern wall, but Charlie had no way of knowing that.

“Whoa, whoa,” Charlie said quietly, just barely louder than a whisper, “you’re safe, girl, you’re safe now.”

Miko found herself immensely pleased at the reassuring tone. She could almost feel herself… smiling at the sound.

Strange, she thought, I’m not even sure what that means.

Slowly, the tension on her post lessened. She felt the coils of the rope go slack, and the screws in another post nearby jiggled slightly as a tool, likely a brush, was taken from its holster.

Based on the exchange, Miko guessed this was a horse. She could only imagine the strength and majesty of this new horse with its rippling muscles and flowing mane. With any luck, Charlie would add a carving of it to the collection he had started years earlier, at his grandfather’s request. She remembered that day clearly, when Ian took the boy to see the carvings left in her rafters by her unnamed maker, Ian’s own ancestor. Those original carvings, detailed images of flowers and leaves, had given Miko life.

Charlie’s carvings of these incredible animals the people called horses were done with just as much care, and Miko delighted in the process. She would willingly stand against any storm this strange world could throw at her if it meant the chance to feel the love and care of a true artisan at work, shaping her soul.

…

Miko quivered, feeling her grip weaken. She knew she should’ve died long ago, yet she clung to life even as her splintered form lay strewn across the ground, extending for miles.

The tornado should have ended her existence as soon as it struck. Indeed, it had seemed as though her entire being had been shattered into a thousand pieces, if only because that’s exactly what happened. Some parts of her, particularly those added later, faded from feeling immediately. But the core of her soul clung to the fragmented pieces of her rafter beams.

She held tight to the intricate carvings of flowers horses that Charlie and her maker had added with such delicate care and attention to detail. She held to the memories of children laughing, animals dancing, babies crying, people huddling for warmth.

The parts of her that lay farthest from her original foundation left her as her soul begin to collect anew, and with that collection came recollection. How many years had she been on this world now? 100? 200? She wasn’t quite she. And what had she been supposed to do before becoming the soul of a barn?

Suddenly, Miko remembered just how wrong her initial impression of this form had been. She had fulfilled her truest purpose in this form far better than she could have in most others. In the form of a simple barn, constructed by loving, honest hands, she had truly lived up to her title of Protector.

A quiet wind blew around her last remaining pieces as she felt her soul reform. No one saw as the last fragment of the barn with her essence began to glow, lighting the figure of one of Charlie’s horses on a broken beam stuck halfway into the muddy earth, the light growing until it flared like a star. Miko’s soul became whole once more, and as she separated from this last piece, this majestic carving by the hand of her second maker, Miko knew what form of life she would seek next.