HistoryCharacter Story – Aditi

I. “The roar of flames and the cry of a lonely child, like a bird's night call...”

Fire. This is my first conscious childhood memory. Everything before is hazy, as if muffled. Sometimes I feel it's shrouded in the same smoke that woke me that night fifteen years ago. Sometimes, when I strain my mind, I manage to see my parents' faces, a few disconnected scenes from my childhood. Besides, none of this matters; only what's here and now matters. I don't want to be a prisoner of the past, I don't, and I never will. They didn't call me Aditi for nothing, which means freedom...

That night, so long ago, and yet I still see it so clearly. I was awakened by a scream and a terrible heat. From somewhere outside the window, faint voices drifted in. Something was happening. I sensed something was wrong even before I caught a glimpse of the glow. I was afraid. I prayed it was just a terrible dream.

The flames slowly engulfed the door. My parents were nowhere to be seen. I screamed, but my screams felt silent. The red-hot air scratched my throat, and my eyes stung with dried tears.

My movements, so slow, seemed to halt time. I felt helpless.

But someone heard me. Footsteps echoed through the flame-engulfed house. I could see less and less; gray smoke was everywhere. Everything vanished in the billowing grayness—images, colors, sounds. As if everything were shrouded in a gray, airy blanket. As if I weren't where it was happening at all, but nearby, watching magical, moving slides.

Someone opened the door. I saw the stool on which the glass vase stood topple from the impact. I followed its slow flight, the flowers, and the water spilling from it. I watched it hit the floor and shatter into a thousand pieces. All that remained on the ground were flowers in a small, pathetic puddle, about to dry.

Suddenly, time resumed its usual course.

Someone grabbed me and hugged me tightly. They covered me with a wet cloth. Everything happened so quickly. I don't know, I know nothing. Gray smoke filled my thoughts. Nothing more, just gray, gray smoke.

I was bid farewell by the deafening roar of a collapsing house and sheaves of sparks rising into the sky like a galaxy of newborn stars.

II. "How to rebuild fallen castles in the ice?"

I opened my eyes. Daylight blinded me. It was a dream, it had to be just a dream. But these walls were different, less welcoming. The faint rustle of my trees was gone, too.

"Where am I?"

A silent question, asked to myself. Fear again, slowly but surely engulfing my entire body, enclosing my heart and mind in an icy embrace. Run, run, away. Home. Home, where is my home?" Tears. No, I don't remember anything else...

III. "How to learn to laugh again?"

It took a long time before they let me see my parents' graves and the ruins of the house. They were in another room, they said, that's why they burned down. I looked at the place that had once been my entire little world. Now it was just terrifying ruins.

Erye, who had cared for me, said that soon I would have to leave. She talked a lot. I didn't want to listen. She said she was as good to me as anyone in the world.

She lied.

I knew I had nowhere to go. So cold, cold in my heart.

IV. "Where will my new home be?"

Vanee, my teacher. She had once been a friend of my mother. Once, before the fire. She hadn't been to the city; she lived in a hut in the middle of the forest. She was completely different from Erye. She took me from her home and became, at least in part, a mother to me. She loved nature, she wasn't greedy. Slowly, she taught me to trust, to laugh. She helped me understand that life goes on. She surrounded me with a delicate, almost imperceptible thread of care and tenderness. Gently but firmly, she instilled new skills and principles. She showed me how to understand the whisper of the wind and the rustle of the trees, the howl of a wolf and the cries of a falcon.

She instilled a love of nature and harmony...

I wanted to be like her, and she was a druid. However, a long time would pass before I could call myself that. With the passing of my past life, I would also receive a new name. A name that would be my guide for the rest of my life.

Slowly, day by day, I was approaching this moment...

V. "Why do you return like a boomerang, you, shackles of the past?"

But things were to be different. A white dove brought me news that reawakened that little girl within me. My parents. They told me they were dead. But no one knew... For so many years...

From now on, my name would be Aditi. What was it before? That was my secret. Why do you want to know hers? This name isn't mine; it belonged to the child I was. I thought this chapter was long closed, the fire sealing it.

But was it really? Wasn't this letter a simple lie, a provocation? Should I leave my new home to search for the ghosts of the past?

The letter said little; it was addressed to that little girl from years ago. It offered only hope that they were alive, that they were somewhere, hiding somewhere. From what? Why?

So many questions.

Vanee didn't know, and I felt I couldn't tell her either. It was my decision. I should end this once and for all. Seal it permanently.

I decided to leave.

VI. "And fate still weaves the threads of destiny..."

Finding what connects me to the past and ridding myself of the silent, silent longing is my new goal. Since then, my paths have been marked by a constant search. A pursuit of what has probably long been a simple dream...

From now on, my name would be Aditi. What was it before? That's my secret. Why do you want to know hers? That name isn't mine; it belonged to the child I was. I thought that chapter was long closed, the fire sealing it.