20 May 1833

This morning Rowdy Bennett spotted a cottonmouth snake in a mud puddle upon our path. The company stopped, and Rowdy lifted his Hawken to dispatch the serpent. Before he could pull the trigger, the Reverend stopped him.

“We must take moments such as these to learn lessons,” the Reverend said. He proceeded to teach from the Book of the Black Verse.

Stanza XXI—Invocation to Distort Natural Creations

Ahthro’don-’u-Ruyon

The complete translation for this phrase is unknown, but the Reverend believes the final utterance to mean “twist,” a variance upon “distort.”

The stanza’s effect upon the cottonmouth was a terrible sight to behold. The snake coiled violently upon itself in the puddle, constricting into a rigid ball of brown and black. A monstrous hum warbled from the wind around us, then the reptile’s curled body thickened in unnatural, pulse-like motions. The cottonmouth magnified in dimension, growing thrice the size of a normal serpent, overshadowing its tiny perch of mud and hissing as loudly as the crack of a pistol. The scaly horror uncoiled before us and focused two glowing red eyes upon our company. Rowdy fired a shot, but the pellets did nothing to the abomination but cause it to shriek in horrid rage.

When the Reverend was confident we had seen the verse’s full potential, he shouted a minor alteration of the original stanza, Ahthro’don-’il-Yon, and the monstrous serpent returned to its normal size.

—R.J.