The snow fell in blankets around the Myrisvermian castle, and within its darkest recesses, the young prince Ratoji Kishka Ikaris was peering at ancient scriptures in the library cellar.

Scriptures old and new were stored there, but the ones that the prince sought out were the very oldest of the old, ones cast aside as no longer even relevant to the well-being of the country. He clambered up the rickety old ladder to poke and pry at every shelf, inquisitively seeking out that which he knew he should leave be. Holding the ladder for him so he did not fall, Kitaro watched his younger brother in exasperation.

"Ratoji, what is it you hope to find up there, you little pest?"

"That’s the fun of it," Ratoji called back with a jovial laugh. "You don’t know!"

"Stell above, we could be here all day," Kitaro moaned grievously and slouched against the ladder.

Ratoji giggled, then returned to his in-depth scouring of the shelves. He squinted and held his candle closer to the spines of the books and the tags of the parchments; nothing of interest. Old remedies for illnesses, a few poetry books, and even a story or two that he made note to go back and find later, but nothing that piqued his childish interest. With a sigh, he began to descend back down the ladder when something caught his eye.

It wasn’t necessarily the most flamboyant of the scriptures; in fact it was the plainest of them all, which was why it caught Ratoji’s attention. Curiously, he clambered back up the ladder a step or two, grasped the parchment in his small hand, and withdrew it from its resting place.

Dust exploded in his face and cobwebs got into his ebony hair. Coughing and sputtering, he climbed back down the ladder with the parchment in hand, gladly accepting the help that Kitaro offered. The older prince lifted his brother from the ladder and set him on the floor, then frowned. "What have you got there, Rat?"

"I’m not sure," Ratoji replied with a furrow of his brows. He untied the faded black ribbon used to hold the scripture in place and unraveled it. He blinked; the paper was taller than he was!

"I can’t read it in this light," he complained.

"Then we’ll take it to Father’s study," Kitaro said and helped Ratoji roll it back up. "Surely it must contain something of interest."

"I hope so," Ratoji replied with a perky smile. "I’d hate to have wasted my time up there, risking life and limb, just to find that this was just an old cooking recipe or some such."

~

Ramboshi was not in his study, much to Kitaro’s relief. He had not been looking forward to meekly asking permission to use the king’s desk for a bit of recreational reading. That was why Ramboshi had given them their own wing; to spend time there, not in his study.

Ratoji followed after his brother with a mischievous glitter in his eyes. He spread the parchment out on top of Ramboshi’s desk, turned up the level of intensity on the kerosene lamp that dangled from the ceiling, and grinned at his brother. "Well?"

"Well what, dummy?" Kitaro responded, bored. "Read it."

Ratoji made a face at his brother, then bent over the parchment, tracing his nimble little fingers over the print. The ink was badly smudged from centuries of being kept in that dark cellar, the paper yellowed. Ratoji had to squint in order to read what was written, but it came to him in moments.

"Beware the beautiful, yellow bird, who sings a song of lies and deceit.
Beware the snake who hither twines, toting a chest of venom.
Beware the hawk who soars above, talons of iron reared.
Beware the one who haunts you so, for in his eyes is me.

"T’will be a count of twenty after the scribing of I.
That fateful day when the heavens turn the color of none.
Swirling anger and seething hatred shall pour forth like the froth of the raging sea.
All spawned from the little yellow bird who violated the flower."

Ratoji trailed off slowly, and his eyes did not register the rest of the scripture for a moment. He turned his quieted gaze up to Kitaro, who was regarding him with some curiosity. The elder prince came around to lean over the table as well, and he too began to read.

"The wilting of a garden shall lead to the blight of an entire orchard.
From that does rise them who shall not be named.
Who shall not be named, who shall not be named.
To prance and dance, it seems, like the fire demons from hell.
Laughing joyously at their victorious takeover and destruction of beauty.
And that yellow bird, the unknowing catalyst, shall be sacrificed.
Sacrificed on an alter of black roses and white irises.
Have its wings cut off and eyes pierced through with needles.
And dance those demons shall in honor of their catalyst."

"Kitaro, don’t read anymore," Ratoji whispered and drew away from the table, horrorstruck. He regarded the paper with fear in his eyes, tears visible there. Kitaro stopped reading and went to his brother, embraced him and gently quieted his falling tears.

"Hush, Ratoji, hush," he said with a slightly trembling smile. "It’s only a scripture, nothing more. It’s centuries old, right? Surely if something like this were to have taken place, it would have occurred by now."

Ratoji didn’t answer, but continued to gaze unblinkingly at where the paper lie. Terror tore through him, bit into him for reasons he could not understand. Kitaro shivered, as if he too felt a small fraction of his brother’s fear. Taking Ratoji’s arm, he guided the boy from the study, leaving the parchment on Ramboshi’s table.

~

Exhausted, Ramboshi pushed the door to his study open and threw his coat onto a chair beside his window. He ran his fingers through his short mahogany hair and yawned loudly, stretched his arms out. His tunic pulled slightly; he would need to have a new one tailored before his "liaison" with Kyrin and Kychen Houna.

He stopped short when his saw a scripture upon his desk. The long parchment was long, dangling to even the floor. He scowled and surged over to it, snatched it up.

"How many times have I told them not to bring their little games in…" He trailed off as his eyes took in the stanzas of the scripture.

"Cut throats of all races, those demons be.
Some men, some women, some short, some tall.
Fat, thin, human, not human at all.
Bats fly with wings on fire overhead while the yellow bird screams in pain.
Begging forgiveness for bringing about the destruction of his lovely black rose…"

Ramboshi almost put the scripture into the furnace then, terrified by it for reasons that he, like his son, could not comprehend. He caught himself at the last instant and pursed his lips into a thin line.

"Upon the wings of an angel comes he.
He who has not a name to give.
No past, no present, and a future fogged from his view.
He, who has no name, mightn’t he be a savior?
Perhaps a simple man with a terrible past.

Yet he lets the bird out of its cage.
Watches it fly into the sunset.
Heals with his left hand the entire orchard.
And vanishes as quickly as he appeared.
"But remain the scars do, as a world cannot heal overnight.
The seeds of evil are still planted deep within the flower bed, to emerge in time.
It is impossible to cross a bridge far from you, dear reader.
So merely hop the bumps in the road that approach you at present.
These are the words I leave for you."

There was little else for him to do except put down the scroll. He re-rolled it and set it at the top of his desk for later examining. Ramboshi sighed and flopped back down into the comfortable leather chair beside his window and gazed outside as the snow and wind beat at his frost-covered windows.

This was supposed to be a relaxing evening, he mused, not one filled with controversial scriptures and thoughts of his son… a son he could swear was just mentioned in the poem. He glanced back at the yellowed paper and wondered over the power that words could have on a man’s mind. He chewed his lower lip.

He certainly would never look at a canary the same way again.