Entwined Fate

Entwined Fates

No. I can't sleep anymore. I can't toss and turn in bed for another second. I don't care if it's the middle of the night, I am going for a run. Now. Pulling on a jumper and cap, I exit the tiny room of my homestay.

Outside, the wind is biting. The world is silent, and cold, lit only by a waxing moon high up above the jagged peaks of the snow covered mountains. The whole scene is surreal.

I start with a brisk pace along the narrow road leading to the village square only a hundred meters away. By the time I reach the main market of this tiny village I have hardly warmed up. There is no one on the streets, not even a dog. I should return, but I can't. I feel restless, in need of adrenalin to dispel the gruesome images still lingering from my nightmare.

They started four days ago, right after I got off on the railway station fifty kilometres away to hike to this remote village on the border. Along with the beauty of my surroundings, the intensity of those dreams increased until tonight when they forced me out of my cosy bed in the dead of the night.

Jogging at a medium pace, I made my way along the narrow winding roads leading away from the village, up the hills. The air is crisper here, the tall coniferous trees casting long shadows beneath my feet in the pale moonlight. I increased my pace and very soon I found myself crossing the last house of the village and into the outer edges of a dense pine forest.

A peace suffused my mind and I slowed down. Sweat mingled with the fog and my body calmed down. Espying a large rock placed haphazardly on the side of the road, I sat down.

The cold air and the exertion had tired my body and I must have spaced out for a bit until I was suddenly jerked awake by a most unexpected sound. The sound of a human voice!

I leapt on my feet. So startled I was that for a second my mind was crowded by images of vampires and werewolves, and fairies and witches! The next second though, I laughed at myself. Darkness and the fear of unknown makes the human mind imagine all sorts of nonsense. I concentrated on focusing on the voice.

It was singing. A high pitched, crooning, strange, animalistic sound drifted towards me through the pine forest in front of me. A female voice!

Was there another hiker nearby? If it's a woman singing, she must be accompanied. Maybe there is a group of them camping nearby? Of my own volition, my feet lifted and took a step inside the forest, towards the source of the strange, lulling song, the sound flowing and ebbing like a living organism, a part of the air, mingling with the nature.

As I waded deeper and deeper into the jungle, crunching pine needles with my heavy boots, I found myself humming along the tune. I've never heard this song before in my life, but I know this tune! And I know that the lyrics was written exclusively for me!

As if in a dream, I followed the voice which called for me, full of pain and longing. A longing which traversed the pine scented cold air and speared right inside me. My heart ached, my vision went blurry as the images from my nightmare flashed before my eyes. The giant ferns, the deep ravine, a tear streaked face, a blood soaked arm.

Only this time, they didn't invoke panic, but a deep, dark, desperate yearning for my other half.

My soulmate!

My lover since time immemorial!

I walked faster till I reached a clear space between two giant trees. The moonlight shone through the leaves and cast a hallow like a spotlight. And there, in that circle of light I finally saw her.

My love!

My Aadhya!

She was sitting on the forest floor, eyes closed, swaying slightly, belting out the song she sang for me the very first time I made her mine.