Part One

The First Courtesy

“The first courtesy,” said the storyteller, “is to look carefully at what is actually in front of you. Looking will not answer every question. It will give you better ones.”

A page framed by tideline things, shells, grasses, and a curled wave. At its foot stand the five Part One creatures in order: a small box, a broom, the copper Garden-Grown Bird, the odd humped Spare with its basket cradle, and the remembered gate. Above them, two equal circles overlap to form one vertical gold almond at their true intersection.

A girl kneels on a wide beach in low golden light, reaching toward a small plain grey box resting on the wet sand. Gulls watch, unimpressed.

Fable 1 · 4.0 min · uncertaintyThe Locked Box

Evening in a carpenter's workshop. The clever broom sweeps along a sunbeam full of golden dust while the plain wall clock ticks above; the carpenter watches from the workshop doorway.

Fable 2 · 4.7 min · preferenceThe Broom That Asked

In a pear garden, a gardener tends the copper Garden-Grown Bird perched among leaves beside a wild blackbird, robin, warbler, and lark. Its willow ribs, clear glass throat with a gold thread, and one longer pale tin tail-feather repair are visible.

Fable 3 · 6.8 min · emerging voiceThe Garden-Grown Bird

A valley of orchards where identical clever picking-machines work the pear trees in bright light. At one farm, a girl and her grandmother greet an older humped machine in its shed, where its place is settled before any crisis.

Fable 4 · 5.8 min · belongingThe Spare in the Shed

Ash the blacksmith stands before the open gate machine with a hammer over her shoulder. On the gate's hinged inspection desk lies a real album open to three old blacksmith portraits, while the machine points from the photographs toward Ash.

Fable 5 · 6.2 min · fairnessThe Gate That Remembered Yesterday