A Drop Of Silence

FOUR OF SWORDS

A full day of work, now done, training, learning; life goes on in the Court of the Crimson King. I had not been able to figure out what to call The Blades, but I suppose, The Crimson King works well enough. Blood, war, strategy. I wasn't the happiest camper being here, but I knew I still had much to learn, so I found solace in moonlight walks, seeking out the places which came as close as any to the Peaceful Kingdom.

This night, as I made my way into a wooded area, I found, what, at first, I thought might be a graveyard. Within a wooded glen, I came across an old world tomb. The top of the stone sarcophagus was sculpted, depicting the figure of a knight in repose. Hands crossed upon his chest, there was a shield, representing the realm, displaying an eagle's wing and a star. Here was the closest area to a full garden I'd found, with blooming trees - more spring than the usual. At once I think of honoring the dead - a hero's funeral. I stroll slowly around, gazing at a single star seen in the deep purple of the sky. How peaceful; how unlike the high energy of the rest of the kingdom. Examining the tomb, I draw my fingers over one sword which is affixed there. I note three others which I believe to be offerings from comrads, honoring this fallen warrior, hanging from the tree. This is akin to the tomb of the unknown soldier, though he would have been fully known by the others.

There are yellow, red, pink and white roses blooming in the foreground. Strangly it is the one place I feel most at home.

"Beautiful, isn't it?" I hear someone say. I look back to the trail, opening from the path leading in. I nod. "It's not what you're thinking," a tall, slender young woman I recognize as the Page, continues. "This is a sort of 'sanctuary,' I guess you'd call it. It's those who've been in battle, or gone through some quest, come to rest, recover from their sojourns.

"But what of the tomb?" I ask.

"Sometimes, it takes something on the level of a mallet to get the point over to take a time out." She smiles, her eyes glinting. "Hard headed people are like that."

It all made sense in a strange way. Though I wondered what they did with those who had died in battle. Before I had chance to ask, my companion had gone, allowing the peace of the moment to give me the sense of the place.

This is a quiet card. In ways it is more reminiscent of the element Earth than the element Air. But there are always two sides to a coin, or in this case, two edges of a blade. These were simply not a people who were given to solemnity, I supposed.

Song for The Four Of Swords: A Drop Of Silence by Kitaro