Telling Tales

by James Washburn

Chapter Four - Juan and the Carrot

Chapter Four

Juan and the Carrot

This story is about a donkey, way down in the country of Burro, where the sun bakes the ground red and the trees brown, and there’s places that haven’t seen rain for hundreds of years. Now, this donkey, he was called Juan, and he was a poor donkey. He was a campesino, you see, which is a kind of farmer. The only problem was that he didn’t get to keep what he grew. He had to give half his crops away to the lord who owned the land for the privilege of being able to farm the land.

(Tales saw a good many ponies shaking their heads and muttering darkly. It was, as he’d guessed, an agricultural audience)

This meant he barely had enough to feed his family, let alone himself. So to ensure his family didn’t starve, he went hungry. Every day, he would eat little to make sure there was enough for the others. But that meant he was hungry all the time. Every day when he got up in the morning, he was hungry. When he was working in the fields, under the blazing sun, he was hungry. And when he got home, he was hungry. Always, he was hungry.

Every day when he was walked home, he passed by the lord’s gardens. Now, these gardens were astonishing. They were full of rare, mysterious and delicious flowers, full of sweet grasses, and it even had a vegetable patch with potatoes, cabbages, carrots and all sorts of things. Whenever he passed by, his nose always filled with the scent, and he got even hungrier. He’d have liked to just lean over and take a bite out of something, but there was a wall, and crossing that wall meant crossing the lord, and that would mean getting thrown off his land.

But it went on, and on, and on, and he was getting hungrier and hungrier, so one day, Juan had had enough. He was sick of starving, he was sick of working, and quite frankly, he was sick of giving everything he grew to the lord. One day, on the way home, he clambered over the lord’s wall and broke into his gardens. He ran to and fro, grabbing everything he could find, snatching bouquets of flowers, uprooting rows of potatoes and carrots and snatching bunches of grapes straight from the vine. He balanced as much as he could on his back, and what he couldn’t balance, he held in his mouth.

He was just about to take his haul home, when he was spotted. The lord’s wife saw him from the balcony and screamed, which put the wind up him like nothing else. Juan ran over to the wall and scrabbled back over, just as the lord’s bodyguards rushed out. He ran as fast as he could down the road, shedding his loot as he went.

He ran on into the hills above his town and didn’t stop until he was certain he had left the lord and his men behind. He stopped and slumped by the roadside to check his haul and catch his breath.

In his haste, he’d dropped everything on the way. All the flowers, all the grapes, potatoes, lilacs, everything. Well, everything except for one carrot. He sighed with regret and relief. Well, he thought, it was better than nothing. At least he had something he could eat.

He sat down with his carrot, and was just about to take a bite when the lord trotted up, riding on the back of one of his bodyguards. He was puffing and panting, although not as much as the poor chap he was on.

From atop his employee, he said, “You there, with the carrot! I demand that you give it to me! I’m quite exhausted, what with all this rushing about.”

Juan looked up at the lord, then at his carrot, then back at the lord.

“No,” he said, plainly. “This is my carrot, and I’m going to eat it.”

“Give it to me!”

“No. I go hungry every day because you take from me and give nothing back. You are not kind, and you don’t deserve my carrot.”

The lord harrumphed. “Well, fine then. Keep the wretched thing.”

And with that, he dug his hooves into his bodyguard’s sides and rode off, leaving Juan alone with his carrot. He held it up to the light, and savoured it. He looked it up and down, and imagined how fine it would taste, how crunchy, how wonderfully sweet and delicious it’d be.

He was just about to find out, when... when...

(Damn, thought Tales, he’d have to be artful here. In the usual story, the donkey God turned up, but that wouldn’t work now. The nuances’d be lost on this audience. Think of an alternative, think!)

...when a stranger turned up, tall and mysterious, and all dressed in white. She stood beside Juan and coughed politely.

“Donkey, will you give me your carrot?” she said, sweetly.

“No,” said Juan. “I go hungry every day, I want to know what it’s like to not be hungry. I’m going to eat all of my carrot.”

The stranger threw off her hood. “My dear donkey, I am Princess Celestia! I raise the sun every day to shine down on you. I bring light and life to the world. Don’t I deserve the carrot just as much?”

“No.”

“Donkey, I am powerful,” she said, warning. “I am more powerful than you can imagine. I can crush mountains, I can empty seas, I can level cities. Do you not think I deserve your carrot?”

“No,” said Juan. “Although you are powerful, you don’t help me. You raise the sun, but leave me to toil in the dust and heat, and you leave me to go hungry at the mercy of my lord. You’re not kind and you don’t scare me, and you definitely don’t deserve my carrot.”

Princess Celestia harrumphed and left, leaving Juan alone with his carrot again. He admired it some more, wiping the dirt from it, wishing he’d brought a cooking pot, or something to cook it with. But it would do by itself. He was just about to take a bite out of it, when another donkey, dressed in a worn black cloak, walked up beside him.

He did not ask for Juan’s carrot, but sat beside him and was silent. Juan saw that this stranger had a scythe strapped to his side, which was odd, since the wheat harvest wouldn’t be due for another few weeks.

“Hello, stranger,” said Juan.

"Hello, Juan,” said the stranger.

“You know my name, already then,” Juan replied, a little surprised. “I don’t suppose I could ask yours?”

“I am death.”

Juan was silent for a moment. He turned his carrot in his hooves thoughtfully. Then, he broke his carrot and passed half to death.

Death looked at him quizzically. “Why?”

“Because you are kind, death. You come for everyone, regardless of who they are or what they do. You’re the end of pain, the end of trial and the end of everything wrong. You, you are kind.”

So Juan sat there with death, and ate half of his carrot. And although he might have still been hungry, he was content now, because he knew death was looking out for him, wherever he was and whatever happened.

* * *

Tales waited for applause, but there was an awful silence instead. He cursed himself quietly. Juan and the Carrot was a story for impoverished places, where you had troubles and trials to be relieved of by death. Back in Badenoughstok, where winter was the norm, that story from had brought the house down. But here? Here death was something to be feared rather than respected.

He heard the mutterings of his mentors in his head. Tut tut, they said, never a good judge of audience, were you?

Wait, hang on, that wasn’t in his head. Someone was actually muttering. There was a low whispering somewhere in the vicinity of the Pink Doom.

“...and anyway, it makes no sense as to why Celestia would want a carrot in the first place, let alone go to Burro to find one...”

She was purple, and a unicorn, and really quite pretty, even now when she was scowling like no one’s business.

“Is there a problem?” said Tales, trying to break the ice forming over his audience.

“I was just saying that your story seems awfully far-fetched,” she said. “Princess Celestia’s role in it doesn’t make much sense, and it doesn't stand to reason that death would stop for a chat with a random donkey.”

“Whyever not?” said Tales, trying to smile. He knew better than to say but it’s just a story. “Do you know him?”

“Well, no, but I know Princess Celestia.”

“Hah! Well you would say that, wouldn’t you?”

“No, she actually does,” said the Pink Doom. “She studied with her and everything!”

Tales sighed internally. Sure she did, he thought. And hey, even if she did, she wasn’t the only one with connections in high places.

“Well, that’s as may be, but I knew a guy who knew a guy who knew a guy who knew King Art Quilldragon of Canterlot!”

There was further silence.

“Who?” a voice called out.

“You mean you never heard of him?”

“Well, sure,” said the unicorn, although the rest of the audience looked clueless.

“Oh well, I’d better tell you about him then,” said Tales with a smile. He had a good story about King Quilldragon. Perfect, in fact, for an audience like this.

Comments

[Themaskedferret]

*Facepalms* typical twilight.

[James Washburn]

1466573
Typical? Thank goodness. I'd worried I'd got 'em wrong.