The Prophecy of Water | ✔️ 🎖 [2018 Wattys Shortlister]

CHAPTER 14-Anilan

Humans are wild animals at heart. I just made them see it with their own eyes.

LoG, 96

Nalina was trembling when she went out into the street. Everything around her seemed blurred and hazy, observed through salty teardrops. When her legs found a familiar path, Nalina hurried on, without stopping to catch her breath. She wavered through the narrow streets, passing The Market Square. She was heading towards the poorest Namases next to The Left Gate.

I am almost expecting to hear children's racket. Mom making an apple pie. Borna and Sobik kicking the improvised ball made of rags. Miglena sitting on the porch clutching that wooden doll of hers. Dad smoking thoughtfully, in silence. Nalina could envision him there. She wanted to run to him so much. To shout "father!" To lower her head into his lap and cry her soul out.

The unknown wrinkled woman was putting out the laundry to dry in the yard. She went rigid in fright when she saw Nalina.

The idyllic picture disappeared.

Namas 217 was now re-painted on the outside. It had a new, sparkling white colour instead of the familiar, soothing pastel green.

The place was here but ... Nothing is the same again.

The Light and The Dark replaced each other too many times. The days went by, and Nalina was no longer the same.

I want it so much. I want to be the same.

Her head bowed, Nalina was walking back to the castle with a slow, broken step, still squeezing the notebook.

Time for me to go back to my new life, I guess. I'll go to The Waterfort as soon as I can and then ... Then I will ask Mother to let me use The ViewWall. She'll surely allow me to do so when she finds out it's about father. I have to tell everyone about what happened.

Nalina heard laughter and whistles that were coming from the nearby alley and stopped, curiously. The three contours that appeared before her seemed like one grotesque bulky man. Nalina retreated at first, but when she recognised the young men, she smiled, relieved. They were a part of the mosaic of the images of her childhood.

Nalina was thrilled about this chance meeting. She raised her hand and waved in their direction. She couldn't be sure what their names were. Her brain was straining to recall while their kids' games in the street were passing vividly in front of her eyes.

"Hey!" Nalina joyfully exclaimed. "Do you remember me? So much time has passed ..."

The three of them first stopped dead in their tracks, cautious, trying to find out who called them. When they finally recognised her, men grinned as on cue and pulled their hands out of their pockets. "Well, well, well, would you look at that. If it isn't Her Majesty, the Princess Nalina," the closest to her, short and bulky, with a bundle of black hair embroidered in braids, muttered mockingly.

Nalina didn't hold it against him. "Yes, isn't it funny?" she greeted them with a broad smile.

"We could say it's a lucky coincidence," the scrawny, tall one murmured to himself. The central part of his pate was adorned with thick blond mane, but the rest of it was smoothly shaven.

Nalina didn't think much about this remark and continued to blab: "And yes, I fully understand why you talk like that to me. By the way, I really hate to be called a princess."

"So you're walking round the old hood, huh? Can it be that you missed us?" The third one snarled. He was also quite short, with dirty hair and a smile that lacked several front teeth.

"Miha," she said slowly as if remembering him.

Those other two boys used to harass and mistreat him because of his poor growth. Nalina often stood in his defence. She wondered whether now, as adults, they finally consolidated their friendship.