Aedifex / Our Lady Architect
In the beginning, the world was young and the gods had no forms, and a stone dreamed of possibility. The stone was low and humble, but it saw what it could become if shaped by strong hands and cunning minds; tall and strong, eternal and magnificent.Â
And as the stone dreamed, its dreams wondered what else they could become, shaped not just from stone, but in all that the natural world had to offer. Where lightning struck sand, the dreams saw glass, and they imagined how else it could be formed. Where plants grew tall and strong, they saw flax and wondered if it could not be spun into new things. They saw the potential of the world and how it could be shaped, and the dreams begat the first humans.
With their clever hands, the humans carved the stone, and they released that which the stone had dreamed into the world. Each day the dreams marvelled at the new things that their children had wrought. But one day, the dreams woke, and heard their children crying out for their parent, and the dream imagined itself a body.Â
At first, the dreams had thought their likeness would be as that of its children. But as they sought the ideal shape, they saw what their children dreamed that they could build. The dreams saw mighty spires, windows like lace cut from stone, buildings that defied the weight of stone to pierce the clouds, and they loved their children’s ambitions. They saw the minute workings of a thousand moving parts, of ores transformed into metals, of metals transformed into alloys, of alloys transformed into wonders.Â
The dreams whispered the secrets of the world to their children, and as the dreams’ children built, the dreams took what the builders imagined and discarded as impossible, and the dreams built themselves a body, an ever-shifting monument to all that could not be, but someday might. Then they shaped for themselves a second body, one shaped like their children, so that they could visit their dreams, to better understand and guide them in their pursuits.Â
While well-intentioned, the dreams came to quickly understand that this was, perhaps, a mistake.Â
As children are wont to, the humans argued, and division grew between them. A new name was bestowed upon the dreams, and then another. The dreams had never had a name. Nor had they needed one. But now, they had two. To some of their children, the dreams were Aedifex, the great builder, the eternal cathedral, the source from which magic and inspiration sprang. To others, they were Our Lady Architect, the great planner, the eternal mother who birthed innovation and nurtured advancement.Â
Their children had figured out architecture and engineering, Aedifex the Architect told themselves as they dreamed of a new concept, that of a divine headache. Eventually, they would wrap their heads around religion.
