The Birth of Brambleson
A long long time ago, way further back than anyone in Palimpsest can remember, the Briarpatch was a quiet place. The berries were tended by leshy plant fairies and even the streams ran softer than they do today. Some would call it peaceful, but it was also a sad place. Because, although it was a beautiful playground, with more food than any bunbun could eat in an entire lifetime, there were no rabbits to play in it.
The garden longed for somebun to hop amongst the thorns and admire the pink and purple roses and enjoy the delicious fruit. One particular bramble plant, the smallest of them all, so wanted to have a bunny friend to play with that it wished on a star for a playmate to appear. The next cycle the wish was granted. As berries and flowers came out to bloom on all the other plants in the Briarpatch, the branches of the tiny bramble bush bore only one giant purple bramble. It was at least four times the size of an ordinary berry, and it just kept growing and slowly ripening.
Finally, one particularly cloudless night, when all the stars in the sky could be seen super clearly, the bramble peeled back its drupelets to reveal a tiny baby bunny rabbit. Unlike most baby rabbits, this one could see clearly in the starlight and as he took his first glimpses of the world around him and at the night sky above, he could see one star shone brighter than all the others.
"This star and this bramble bush brought me into existence," the tiny bunny realised, taking a bite out of the bramble cradle. "The bramble bush is my mother, for she has birthed me and given me nourishment," the bunny said. The bramble bush shook in the wind, rocking the cradle, and the star twinkled its pleasure. The bunny looked around the starlit Briarpatch. "The star is my father," the bunny continued, "for he granted my mother's request for a son and with his guidance and light, I will never be lost."
The tiny bunny's eyes came to rest on the little bramble bush that had wished so dearly for a playmate and the little bunny realised the yearning that the bramble bush had had for a friend. And so the bunny made his first divine promise.
"I promise that for all my days I will play and make merry in the Briarpatch, for I am a child of the Bramble bush who wished so hard on a star for me to appear."
The bunny named himself and the star Brambleson to honour the bramble, and from that day to this, kept his promise and played in the Briarpatch as other stars faded and died. We should live by this lesson and play, even when all seems dark.
Myriad tales are told about the heroics of Brambleson, Prince of Rabbits. Many of them, it must be admitted, have sprung almost wholesale from the mind of one little bunbun girl, who despite growing up deep in the warrens of the sinking city of Palimpsest is said to be the most faithfullest of Bramble followers [citation: Connie Furr, to whoever will listen]. But amidst the embellishments, the dramatics and the exaggeration, the true nature of Brambleson still shines through. And this is why the stories are still told, and why I am telling them to you now.