Once upon a time, there lived a man, down on his luck, travelling the roads of the world looking to increase his fortunes. He had worked for many years as a farmer, but his land had dried up. So, cast out of his simple life, he had begun his search for a new manner in which to make his way in the world.

One day, on a particular road, leading to an unfamiliar town, he passed a sign on the side of the road. He stopped, and read its message : “I PAY GOLD COINS FOR COPPER PENNIES”. Well, though quite skeptical, he nevertheless thought to himself “I better at least hear this person out. If true, I increase my fortune, if false, I continue on none the worse for wear.”

So, seeing a faint path beside the sign, he followed it into the forest.

Soon, he came to a cliff. A narrow bridge six inches wide crossed a wide chasm and ended at the other side. There he could see a small elf, dressed in green, resting on a bed made of many bags of gold. “Hoy there!”, said the man to the elf, “Hoy!”

The elf jumped up immediately. Squinting at the man, he shouted back, “You’ve come for the gold? Wonderful! You see I collect copper pennies, and as an elf I have plenty of gold. However, nobody seems to believe the offer, and I get so few takers! Why, I haven’t given a bag of gold away in months!”

“I wish to hear more about the deal,” said the man, “it sounds good, but what’s the catch?”

“No catch!” exclaimed the elf, “Just one small logistical matter. I will pay you one gold coin for each of your copper pennies, but you have to meet me half way on the bridge. I will not cross to your side.”

The man rubbed his stubbled chin and said, “You won’t, eh? Why should I have to cross all that way to meet you!”

The elf made a grimace. “Look, either you see value in what I have or not. I very much want to add your wonderful pennies to my collection, and in former times, I would cross all the way over to that side, but I’ve had more than one person take advantage, using force to take my gold and keep their pennies, and leaving me to make the long walk back over the chasm!” he huffed. “So I came up with this system where we both have equal risk, and neither of us has to endure crossing the bridge twice.”

The man paused in thought. Looking at the precarious nature of the bridge, noticing a slight wind blowing across it, he began to question this deal. “I can see plain enough that the gold looks real. But what if it isn’t?” He began to finger his purse of pennies. “And, I could just as well lose what I have by dropping it into the chasm!”

The man looked up. “Okay, you little imp, I will get onto the bridge with you.” At this the elf smiled happily, picked a bag of gold and began to cross. His smile faded however once he reached the middle of the narrow, windy bridge, and realized the man had done no more than (with one foot still on land, and the other snaked out on the bridge) stretch out his hand with the purse of pennies to somehow reach the elf far out in the middle.

“This does not equal meeting me halfway,” frowned the elf, “you must leave your side and meet me in the middle in order that we both get what we want.”

The man stepped back off the bridge, and his face went red. “Listen you little demon, you want me to risk everything I have for this gold! I have met you as far as I will, and in fact, I demand you come all the way over and prove to ME that you even HAVE real gold!”

The elf sighed, and turning his back, sadly returned to the other side, laying back down on the bags of gold.

This angered the man, and shaking his fist at the little person, he returned to the road, smugly thinking to himself, “What a blowhard! Asking ridiculous things of me, and wouldn’t even prove to me that he had REAL gold for my lousy copper pennies. Fortunately I kept my wits about me, instead of playing the sucker to whatever scam he had going.”

And with that, the man reached the road, resuming his dusty journey to the next town.

Once upon a time, there lived a boy named Num, who had stopped feeling.

As a child, Num had a cruel stepmother, who would often tickle him until his eyes bugged out and tears streamed down his cheeks. He would beg for mercy, but received none. This treatment commonly occured in his land, where the government saw the merciless tickling of children as a brutal necessity to keep them aware of their lowly place in the order of things.

Most simply accepted this peculiar brand of torture, but Num impetuously decided to do something about it: he constructed a special protective suit, that covered every inch of his body, making him almost impervious to the sensations of the outside world (and most specifically to the savage tickling of his stepmother). Now of course, like a snug-fitting pair of boots, he could still feel things somewhat, but it all felt dull and remote, and thus easier to ignore.

In this way, he endured the cruel attacks of his stepmother for many years, until the day arrived when he came of age and left his home to find his own fortunes in the world. He had become so used to his protective clothing, that he had forgotten that he even wore it. He bathed in it, he ate in it, he worked in it. And so when he left the cruel domain of his stepmother, he continued to wear his protective suit, although he no longer needed it. Travelling through his muffled world, he got by, and experienced success in the trade of beekeeping. And though his clothing prevented him from ever sharing any real feeling with another, he did manage to find a bit of dulled happiness through all the layers that protected him.

One day, a time of revolution came to Num’s land. The populus had begun to criticize the governments many harsh habits, its pollution of the sky and sea, its policies of death and domination. They wanted to live in a new way. And then a most terrible secret came out: the government at last admitted to its aggressive extermination of the Tutch, the people who had once dwelled in this land, before it became annexed for the growing population of Num’s people. They had easily wiped out this former culture, for every last member of the Tutch had no eyes. This ancient people simply felt their way through the world, and became easy targets for weapons that could kill from a distance.

Soon after this startling revelation came another one: the government had long hidden a fantastic tome written by the Tutch, called “The Book of Life”, a book that revealed an ancient and wonderful way to live, a way that excluded the abusive tickling of children, a way that supported happiness of the people. Some magic property of the book prevented anyone who read it from explaining it to anyone else; it became clear, to learn the teachings of the book of life, one had to read it for oneself.

And so Num heard of the book, and excitedly traveled to the museum where the government, after much public outcry, had finally conceded to put it on display, under guard. There he joined the bustling queue of hopeful readers. At last, after long days of waiting, the person in front of him stepped aside, revealing the magical book of life. Greedily Num opened its heavy cover, and looked at the first page. Confused, he flipped frantically through the book, until he got to the end.

“My god,” he said, “It’s BLANK!”

Moments passed. Impatient noises drifted over from the line behind him. Looking up at the scholar who sat nearby, he said angrily “No wonder no one can adequately explain this book…it has nothing in it!”

The scholar looked at him carefully. “Citizen, a book with blind authors will of course have no letters which you can see. You must FEEL the surface of the pages with your hand…only by feeling the the message of the book can you learn it.”

Num felt the page of the book with his thick gloved hand. “Poppycock! I feel nothing!” he said.

The scholar grimaced, saying “Take off your glove. You can’t feel the subtle bumps on the page through all that.”

Num grimaced back, and replied “Perhaps you’ve gone as blind as the Tutch. I don’t wear gloves. And any teaching worth knowing would lie in plain sight, for only with the power of sight can we adequately evaluate such a teaching from an objective distance. I see now that the government has simply masked one conspiracy with another…you can keep your silly blank book!” Annoyed, offended, and thoroughly disappointed, Num turned around and marched off.

The shocked scholar sat for a few moments, deep in thought. Then, recovering, he turned to the head of the line and spoke.

“Next, please.”

“They’ve stolen the Sleeping King! The King has disappeared!” called out the Captain of the Royal Guard, as bells clanged and the sound of scattered stamping boots filled the air. Panic consumed the castle grounds, shouts and alarm swirled and rang. At the door to the King’s Bedroom, the Captain had found the bodies there, both night guards slain, blood staining the flagstones, the sound of babies crying and lullabyes seeped from one of the dead men, as all his futures that might-have-come slowly drained with his spirit. The other man’s corpse oozed a distant chorus of bittersweet unwritten songs, rising to circle about the Captain’s head as he swatted and waved the disorienting, departing spirits away, trying to stay focused on the matter at hand.

Beyond the wide open doors, the royal bed lay empty, blankets tossed aside.

After sealing the front gates and securing all the entrances and exits (that he knew of), the Captain called the various Ministers to the Throne Room.

“Disaster has struck,” he growled, looking around at the assortment of Very Important Persons: the Minister of Grounds (looking very collected and alert), the Minister of Intelligence (managing a sinister glint through a half-awake haze), the Prime Minister himself (eyelids sagging, moustache drooping), and the rest of the overabundant band of administrators. “Someone has slain the King’s guards, and he himself no longer sleeps in the Royal Bed.”

“Good god man, what will we do? What if he wakes?” choked one of the crowd.

“Then he’ll damn us all, damn us all to oblivion of course,” retorted the Minister of Intelligence, “But of course he hasn’t woken yet. And we may yet retrieve our precious King before that happens. I assume our Captain has sent out a hunting party…?”

“Not only have I sent out a hunting party, but every tracker, dog, and messenger too.”

“Excellent!” barked the Prime Minister out of his quickly departing haze of sleep. “Then we have as good of a chance as any. Whyever would someone want to kidnap the poor chap anyhow?”

“If you’ll remember, Prime Minister, we have discussed this very scenario before,” said the Minister of Intelligence, “Regardless of the danger, someone else may feel they have better things to whisper in the King’s ear while he slumbers.”

The wind moaned around them, pulling at their ears, throwing up their coats, as the small dark group of figures crossed the short space between the castle wall and the hilly, broken landscape that stretched to the horizon. Hooded and cloaked, they trotted at a fair pace, flowing with the lay of the land, staying down, scanning the sky, ears perked for danger. One of the figures carried a large blanket-wrapped bundle against its chest. The sound of baying hounds, carried on the wind, caused more than one head in the band to whip back towards the castle.

“Onward, onward, you rogues! Let the hounds eat our wind-scoured tracks! Onward!” shouted the shortest of the kidnappers.