There was a time when the Ice King walked through the forests. In those days, it was not uncommon to see archetypal forces manifest and show their faces, and the Ice King was among them. He was the strongest of the forces, and he carried a great and heavy axe with him. Wherever he wielded his axe, a wall of ice would appear and crush all life beneath it. The other forces were afraid of him, although they would never have admitted to it. And to make matters worse, he was egotistical as well, knowing his tremendous power and strength and using it to rule harshly over the forests and his harem.
This was how the world was, and if you wanted to be in the
world, you needed permission from the Ice King.
You needed to embrace the frozen kingdom with its weak sun, and you
needed to pay a very heavy toll each year.
How long it went on is anyone’s guess, but they say that
something happened which changed everything.
A great willing was building in the Earth and it finally manifested and
spoke its name. It was during the weak
summer then, if you can call it a summer at all because it was not like the
warmth we have today. When the name was
spoken, a tiny plant came out of the soil.
Unlike the other tiny plants that came and were usually blasted away by
the advancing ice, this little plant stayed firmly where it grew.
 |
| The first pine tree. |
No one had ever seen such a plant before. It was bristly and thin with sharp needles
all over it, no doubt reflecting its sharp and harsh environment. Of course, new life had come before, only to
fail quickly when the Ice King returned to the forests and demanded a greater
toll than the life could pay, so no one thought much of this particular
plant. But it grew and it grew in the
short summer, and it quietly awaited the coming of the king, knowing its secret
task.
He did not disappoint.
He came through the forests harsh and sinister and horrible, seeking out
both plants and animals, crushing whatever he could with ice, demanding a
terrible toll. He wanted the entire
forest to know that he and he alone was king.
As he was about to move on to the next forest, he found the tiny bristly
plant. He blew his magic frozen breath
upon it, but the little plant stayed put.
He brought snow down from the heavens and then rain and then snow again,
but the little plant said nothing. Its
tiny green needles were each coated in a sheath of ice, and yet they remained
green and did not fall. Then the Ice
King blanketed the entire ground of the forest in a thick sheet of ice, but the
little plant stayed put, now protected by the strength of the ice itself.
The Ice King sat back and watched it. A plant that could withstand his icy embrace
and not be destroyed must be magic, indeed, he thought. Again and again, he hurled ice and snow at
the little plant, but again and again it withstood the onslaught, using the Ice
King’s very weapon--ice--as a defense against further attacks. Here at last was a plant that could not be
destroyed and would not pay a toll.
The other archetypal forces watched intently, and in
unison they spoke the name of the plant.
At the very top of its bristly needles, tiny brown spuds appeared. The Ice King looked at them in fear, knowing
that they would eventually form seeds, knowing that more of this plant of steel
would appear in the crippled forests, knowing that he could not stop it. He tried to boast and bluff, but it was too
late. The chink in his armor had been
found.
The following summer was the warmest summer ever, and the
tiny seeds on the bristly plant did form, just as the Ice King had feared. They were encased in little scaly wooden
objects so that they could not be shredded by the king’s frozen fingers. They grew and they fell to the Earth, and new
bristly plants came. They were harsh
plants. There was nothing soft or sweet
or gentle about them as there was with other fleeting plants. They kept their own ice-like and rigid
nature, the one so like the very king they had defeated.
Every year the Ice King came to the forests to wield his
axe, and every year there were many tall and bristly plants that used his very
nature to withstand his attacks.
Eventually, he stopped coming as often, blowing only his magic frozen
breath now and then to temporarily encase the land in ice. But everyone knew that the best force in the
world had been bested, and whenever they forgot this due to the exhaustion the
winters would cause, they would look at the bristly plants and see the little
brown spuds at the top. And then they
would know that there was a new force in the world.
