I was seven,
and I vividly remember this parable again that Beatrix delivered.
She's an unreliable narrator,
but she's certainly a narrator...
To recall it:
"Thales, have a seat. Get your butt comfortable,"
my apparently-not-half-sister Beatrix declared.
I heard creepy laughter—children giggling, and screaming like people were being burned—
flickering in and out of reality.
Or rather... my auditory processing.
Shit like this had been happening ever since I ate the fruit.
But it's gotten much better.
It's been two years since then.
But I haven't gotten too much experience with it—
I'm very limited, since I don't have permission to go into the wider land known as Historia.
Only when I turn ten and complete my last trial am I granted permission, apparently.
Beatrix beckoned me toward the cushion laid across the old wooden chair.
"Good boy," she said, ruffling my hair.
"Okay, what do you have to yammer about now?"
"Hey! That's a crude descriptor of my eloquent communication," she pouted.
"It's not my fault you're an idiot with poor attention to detail."
I curled my mouth into a mischievous smirk.
"You have a cute freckle."
She looked stunned.
Immediately, she cried out in defiance, shouting that she had no freckles and I must be mistaken.
So I told her its exact measurements.
See, my vision makes a hawk look blind.
It makes old cameras look like cave paintings in comparison.
"Anyway," she huffed, "whether or not I have a freckle—which was petty, by the way—
My story today is called The Idiot Prince."
"Sounds... how do I say this... lame?"
"You really are insufferable.
But that's your charm—simultaneously an old fart and a complete child.
That's you, Thales."
"Yeah, yeah. Continue with your story, woman."
"Okay," she said, clearing her throat.
"It was a kingdom—a hive in a lush green forest..."
This kingdom was a perfect caste.
Everyone knew their role, and everything moved in harmony.
Suddenly, a homeless wanderer entered the forest.
The wanderer had been walking forever.
Even the Sabbath day offered no rest.
The wanderer became a bee.
A fox, it seemed, the bee knew it would have to be.
But now, he was just a nameless bee.
The bee did not want to become merely one of the hive,
but an individual.
But only the Queen was an individual.
So, the bee believed it had to become part of the royal family.
The bee whispered sweet honey into the worker bees' ears.
They planned a coup d'état against the Queen's throne.
Together, they did.
In the aftermath, the bee finally obtained a name.
Kether.
The Crown.
But he was surrounded by a withered forest and a kingdom of grey.
The workers he had conspired with were executed.
He consolidated his rulership,
claiming heritage as part of a puppet Queen Bee's bloodline.
He ruled the crown from the shadows.
But from the shadows,
he was still barred by his sins.
Even becoming the Prince left the Prince Bee without a real name.
"Nice," I said. "Is that an allegory for some experience you had, or just a story?"
"Oh, Thales, you misunderstand," Beatrix smiled.
"Myth is a manifestation of expression for what is truly there.
When you swim through the mist and wake up from the dream, you realize—
we no longer tell stories...
We live them.
Reality is a metaphor for the truth.
And the truth is an unstoppable hyper-story."
I wonder who, and when, they will wear the crown...
and still be left bereft of meaning.
"Are there more?" I asked.
"Of course," she replied.
"For stories are intersecting lines that we all move on—
train tracks of existence, with a train that stops at all platforms.
The little Prince Bee still wishes to fly,
still wishes for a name...
...Although Kether was a wonderful name."