Akari the Wordless

“Akari,” they have called her, for she can call herself nothing.

The girl is voiceless, yet what she creates has spoken to us all. Many great talents have graced Iris, but none have been Akari. She drew as the masters drew, painted unlike any other with the brush, sculpted as though stone were clay, carved as though the tree bent to her will and made music fit for the gods. Even the greatest masters of our time, those who have thrown themselves at their gifts, cannot touch the grace of Akari. Many in our time have called her works blessed, divine, as though touched by the very forces that create us. I too believe her divine and so shall history, for all who will see her works will not believe they came from but two mortal hands. Each work a masterpiece, a magnum opus for any great master of Kilyan, yet one woman created five in her lifetime.

Her mystery speaks to her divinity. It was as though she appeared in the Ryoco streets. No father to provide for her. No mother to care. It was workmen who brought her food and soon the charitable streetgoers who came to watch the girl turn charcoal into art. It is said that Akari was never seen to trade, never seen in the markets, but always fed by the wise streets that saw her for what she was.

Her works will bless Iris forever, and there will not be a child born in the coming history who will not hear her name, know her works and dream of experiencing them. This is an absolute. Her name has spread to every edge of Iris, and with her death, the old calendar has ended. We come to a new age, one yet to be named by history, but that will hold the unknown just as all ages have done.

We of Iris forge this new calendar, for when the grandchildren of our grandchildren ask what sparked a new age, we may tell them this story, and they may tell it to their kin and their kin to come.

— Tijosa, Akaristic Bishop, NCY 1