By: Simon Brooke :: 7 January 2026
I've had a very rough idea for a story kicking around in my brain for months. A young woman is the hereditary Wisdom Speaker of her tribe. She's inherited her rôle young, because her mother, aunt, grandmother, and great grandmother have all been killed by leading men of the tribe, for giving good advice — speaking wisdom — that they did not want to hear.
Should she accept the rôle? Would it be wise? Why should she care? Are these people worth risking her life to support? And if she does accept the rôle, how should she act, to put her tribe onto a sustainable footing and bring it into peace with its neighbouring tribes?
In the first week of 2026, I've already written the first ten thousand words of this story. None of what I've written yet is very good; it's all sketchy. But I do have a sketch of the whole arc of the story. It's provisionally entitled 'Wisdom,' and it's provisionally subtitled 'a meditation on theology, and right action.'
Here is the first draft of the first chapter. Nothing (much) happens.
The Dragon
In later years, Dzhin of the Wisdoms could not say why she woke so early that morning. There was nothing happening to wake her. The lighter, heavy with its cargo of grain, lay quiet and seemingly unmoving on the mirror surface of the great river. Four of the crew were up, sitting quietly, watching for the coming dawn, not touching the three great sweeps that extended outward from the lighter like legs of an enormous beetle.
Dzhin sat up in her blankets. Out beyond the awning that covered the passengers' sleeping area, the sky was still dark velvet blue, strewn with stars. Yawning, she got up, slipped her feet into her sandals, and pulled a rolled woollen coat from her pack to put on over her tunic, because the air was cold. She walked out onto the deck at the stern, and looked around.
Far off to the east, the sky was flushed, pinky apricot colours; the petals of the millions of flowers in the orchards that lined the west bank seemed to catch that pink and echo it faintly back. Distant birdsong rang in those orchards, without somehow seeming to break the silence. To the south, over the reed beds of the last bend before the city, the great mass of the High Place jutted upward from the flat plain like a fang of shadow, but the city walls were just a low suggestion of darkness over the reeds. To the north, the river curved away westward between its raised embankments in the last of the many sinuous curves the lighter had followed downstream through the last five days from Horsewaterfoot. In between, the river lay like a sheet of polished pewter, flat, grey, quiet, reflective, pouring soundlessly south.
Silently, a woman of the lighter crew, sitting by the hearth, with the bodies of her sleeping crew mates lying in their bundles of blankets around her, handed Dzhin a steaming beaker of ginger infusion sweetened with honey; with a silent nod of gratitude, Dzhin took it and sipped.
For a long time, nothing happened.
Very gradually, the river and the lighter turned southward, to the right, to starboard. Very gradually, the eastern sky brightened. Very gradually, the walls of the city took on definition in the south, and buildings began to emerge, behind them. Two of the lighter crew heaved on one of the great sweeps, subtly adjusting the position of the heavy vessel in the current, for no obvious reason Dzhin could perceive.
A lowing of cattle, called in to milking, came quietly over the water from the west. Ahead, another lighter became a clot of darkness on the glistening water; behind, two more gradually emerged from the gloom. Some waterbird called from the reedbeds to the east, in a deep, melancholy booming, and was echoed by an answering boom from the west. Six pelicans flew by, silently, low to the water, as if trying not to break the quiet.
Dzhin sipped from her beaker, grateful for the warmth.
Something above the northern horizon caught her eye: a line, dark against a sky starting to glow in the rosy light from the east. Quite distant, and yet... it was hard to judge distance, over the flat water of the river, over the low forest of the flat eastern bank which extended out, here, to the north of them, as they came slowly off that last great bend. No, it was not a bird. Not any sort of bird. It was much further away than that.
Much larger.
As she watched, the tips of the line curved downwards, gradually, like a nail paring. From the centre of the line hung... something... something that glinted bronze.
There was a call of greeting from the west bank. A man lead a team of eight oxen that plodded slowly upriver along the towpath on the top of the berm, dragging an empty lighter that floated high in the water, through the shallows close to the shore. One of the crew returned the greeting.
Dzhin watched the oxen for a moment. They walked slowly, their barge moved slowly; and yet the lighter on which she stood, apparently unmoving in the central flow of the silent river, passed them surprisingly swiftly. A flow of air — hardly a wind, it raised no ripple on the water — ran downstream, taking the grey cloud of Dzhin's breath away behind her, while far to the north, riding on that flow, was that... line...
It was now as wide as four fingers of Dzhin's hand, held at arm's length, and the bulge below it was taking on form. The first sliver of sun peaked above the eastern mountains, and red light flashed from the bronze body a moment before washing across the whole landscape. Dzhin turned and ducked under the awning, shaking urgently at one of the bundles of blankets that still lay on the mats.
"Kiara!" she whispered, urgently, "Kiara, there is a dragon!"
The bundle stirred.
"Don't be silly," it said, muzzily. "Dragons don't fly at this time of day."
"Come and see!"
The bundle rolled over and sat up, a red-haired head emerging from one end.
"You've seen dragons before, Dzhin. I've seen dragons before..."
"I think this one is very big."
"You think?"
"It's hard to tell size... I don't know how far away it is, yet."
When she ducked out again, the dragon was nearer, wider than the full span of her hand at arms length, low across the forest directly behind them, and growing wider as she looked. Two thousand man-heights away? One? Behind her, the woman by the hearth was beginning to stir a pot of porridge; her sleeping colleagues were beginning to stir. Kiara, a blanket draped around her shoulders as a cloak, accepted a beaker of ginger from her, and joined Dzhin at the stern.
The dragon was wider than the span of both Dzhin's hands at arm's length, now, nearer than the forest, low over the water, still coming directly for them, straight as an aimed arrow, its down-curved wings unmoving.
"It's huge," said Kiara, quietly.
It was clearly, now, coming fast.
There was a startled shout from one of the lightermen. Two of them joined Dzhin and Kiara at the stern, looking back, astonished.
Through the silent air a soft sound of thrumming reached them, like the softest of brushes on the biggest of drums, from those huge, stretched wings. There was vapour trailing back from the dragon's nostrils. About a hundred manheights behind the lighter, the tips of those downward curving wings just touched the surface of the water, creating the first disturbance in its glassy surface. The lightermen scrambled towards the great sweeps.
Now it was over them. The long jaw was longer than Dzhin was tall, the long neck, the great shoulders and those huge, inky wings with their bronze-scaled limbs stretching them...
The lightermen need not have run to bring in their sweeps. Those wingtips, kissing the water so gently, raising those long, sharp, hissing wakes, passed the craft on either side far wider than the sweeps extended. The arch of the wings, which had seemed to gentle, still lifted the huge bronze-scaled body — surely larger than all eight of the oxen from that towing team put together — a clear two manheights above the deck.
The dragon's knees tucked in tight under its belly, Dzhin saw. Its long shins and clawed feet lay tight against its tail.
Dzhin felt the thrumming with the whole of her body, now, her lungs and stomach reverberating in sympathy. As the great beast swept overhead, the note of the thrumming fell. The shadow of the wings passed over with a soft whistle. The long, long, long tail passed... Everyone on the deck of the lighter turned around, to watch the dragon glide down river past the city, its wings straightening again, the tips lifting from the water surface to form a flat line, and then the great beast rolling slightly to the right and turning in a broad curve westward, far away, over the Craft Market and the Hospital. For a while it was lost from sight, hidden by the walls and towers of the riverbank houses.
The lighter was passing the tower at the end of the city wall, now. The lighter crew were all at their heavy sweeps, angling the craft towards the western side. The porridge on the hearth bubbled, unattended. Far ahead, the lighter that had preceded them down river was being brought in towards the Foreign Quay. Two rowing boats came out from the Inland Quay, and headed upstream to meet them.
The shadow of the High Place fell across the lighter. Far to the west, the dragon came in sight again, still turning, high enough now to be seen clearly above the buildings, coming round in a wide circle that surely spanned the whole width of the city. The big merchant houses were sliding past on their right; the great religious houses lined the western bank ahead.
The first of the rowing boats — a light, narrow, eight-oared boat — came alongside, and a priest of the Stomach (responsible for a cargo of food), and one of the Foot (responsible for trade) climbed aboard. They waited while the crew drew in the long stern sweep. The second boat, a twenty-four oared towing boat, closed with the stern, and passed a hawser across, which the crew of the lighter made secure to the bits. The towing boat made off as if to row upriver, its oars churning, slowing the great weight of the lighter, drawing it towards the western shore. The dragon passed overhead again, much higher now, magnificent in its bronze and black. It seemed to be looking down at them, the long head lowered.
But then it swept on and round in another great gyre,
The cooking woman was back at the hearth, ladling porridge into bowls. Crew members were bringing in the side sweeps, while two of the crew, forward, pulled the canvas covers off the cargo, and spoke with the two priests inspecting it. Other passengers came on deck. The religious houses drifted past, progressively more slowly, progressively nearer, as the labour of the oarsmen in the towing boat brought their charge under control.
The dragon was over the far side of the city again, somewhere above the Gate of Justice, much higher now. Dzhin accepted her bowl gratefully, and started to eat, listening to the churning of the oars, and to the more distant sounds of the waking city coming softly across the still water. She could see that the first of the northern great ships of the year was already moored across the water at the Foreign Quay.
She glanced up at the High Place, and her eye caught.
"Kiara," she said, urgently, for the second time that morning. "Kiara, look at the steps."
On the eastern side of the river, opposite the ends of the Street of Justice and the Street of Wisdom, stands the quay known as The Doorstep, and from it, the Thousand Steps run up the cliff that forms the western face of the High Place of the God. Except that, for all the years that Dzhin had been in the city — for longer, for all the time since the Incarnation withdrew — the uppermost flights of the steps had been missing. They had not fallen, or broken, or been demolished; they had simply ceased to be there. And now, they had, just as mysteriously, unceased. They were there, as clear, as solid, as they had ever been.
Kiara prostrated herself on the deck in prayer, and then looked up again, staring, round eyed.
The dragon, now high above them, swinging round across the river for the third time, banked to the left instead of to the right, hovered for a moment above the top of the steps, its long legs dangling, and then alighted.
Kiara turned to Dzhin, the pale lines on her face where the straps of her bridle had for so many years been clear in the bright morning light. She spoke in a quiet, shocked, glad voice.
"The God is back!"
Does this sound like the beginning of a story you might like to read?
