Story Seed - Leap of Faith

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At last, the journey was coming to an end. The wind whipped bitterly at his clothes, trailing the remnants of his cloak behind him. He ignored it, having long ago gained techniques to insulate himself from the perils of heat and cold. His borrowed leg twitched, pushing him forward once more, toward the edge of the rise to see how next to proceed.

Across a great chasm, carved into the hidden rocky promontories, was the lost city. He mused that it was no longer lost to him, though in ways he wondered if he was now lost to the world he had begun in. He had given up much for this pilgrimage, and the sacrifices demanded by the Way had changed him fundamentally. I am no longer what I was when I began, he thought.

The chasm was hundreds of yards wide, and dropped away to a mist enshrouded bottom. The fall's distance could not be judged, but he knew that it was far enough that even after all of the trials he would perish. He looked back to the city, to the end of his journey, searching for the next step he must take.

There was no bridge, no device to extend a draw, no cables upon which to balance or hang, there was nothing, just a half mile of open space over a drop that no man could survive. He sat and he waited. He meditated, and studied. He considered his apparent failure, and the goal that lay so close and yet so very far.

For a week he waited. He observed people in the city, lights at night, and heard the sounds of music. He even saw some of the figures watching him, studying him as he was studying this test. At last he stood once more. No man could make that jump, and no man could survive the fall that would surely follow, but he was no longer a man, he was more; transformed by the tests along the Way he was no longer what he had once been.

Without a second thought he took off running, and at the chasm's edge he flung himself into the air, hands grasping.