Tale of Two (Part X)

Dark clouds were gathering outside the castle. The wind howled through the castle's windows. Nothing seem to be a missed in the eye of a passer-by. It just seemed to be an ordinary storm brewing.

" Are you sure you want to do this Tarika?" asked the king. The princess looked up. It had been a long time since someone called her that name. Even the king himself called her Princess Aaratrika, an ancient sanskrit name that the king had named his daughter in favour of his best friend who sacrificed his life to save him in a battle once. It was that day that the princess was born.

"Yes father, we have to take them down if not they will launch another attack and we will lose even more of our people. I am not losing anyone anymore" replied the princess. She walked to the window, the clouds continued to gather.

"We don't have to do this you know. I mean if we could just give them what they wanted they would not bug us anymore"

"WHAT? GIVE THEM WHAT THEY WANT AFTER WHAT THEY DID?" bellowed the princess. She turned to face her dad, her rage was seizing through her. She was fuming. "How dare you say that?"

"No dear, what I meant was..." The princess held out her hand.

I am not giving anyone anything. You were not there when it happened. I am not as merciful as you are father." She bellowed.

"But my dear..." The princess stopped him again. She quickly faced the window before the tears start tearing down.

"Please leave. I want to be alone" she whispered. The King hesitated. He wanted to hug his daughter and comfort her but he knew it was no point. She needed her time alone. He quietly left slowly shutting the door. The princess felt the door shut and collapsed and cried. she was devastated. She remembered the incident as if it happened yesterday.

She was kneeling at the willow tree when she heard a loud cry. Suddenly the carnival had turned into a death arena. It was chaotic and people were running and screaming. Arrows were being shot at people and for the first time she came face to face with death. She was confused when suddenly she felt a huge arm around her lifting her. It was uncle Mar on his horse. "We need to get out of here" he cried

"What's going on? Why are we being attacked?" the princess asked as she adjust herself up on the horse.

"It's the highlanders. They have launched a sudden attack. Apparently they knew that we were coming to settle the deed and have instead choosen to deal with us with brutal force."

" But it makes no sense. We have not even told them about our proposal" shrieked the princess.

"They are highlanders, barbarians. They would never listen to us" scrowled Uncle Mar. The princess kept quiet. Something did not make sense. When she was asked to settle the matter with the highlanders, it seemed their representative was more than happy to settle the matter over an agreement. Why the sudden change?

Uncle Mar rode on into the forest. It seemed very quiet. The clouds were gathering above. Uncle mar stopped suddenly and got off his horse. He brought the princess down and dragged her into a small cave. "Stay here until you see one of our men. Whatever happens don't come out. Keep mum" The princess opened her mouth but Uncle Mar bent and kissed her forehead. There was a certain sadness in his eyes, The Princess felt queasy. Uncle Mar walked to where the horse was. Suddenly, the princess saw horses and men appearing out of no where. They were dressed unusually with what seemed like rags and the men were wearing shorts and skirts. The princess chuckled. It was funny to see men in shorts and skirts. But stopped. Something seemed wrong.

"Where is she?" asked the tall roughed looking man in a funny ascent.

"I don't have to tell you anything" Uncle Mar replied.The men stepped closer to him.

"Look, spare us your patriotism to the King. You were once a highlander, you traitor. Now you cleaning the king's butt?" they laughed. The princess was shocked. Uncle Mar was a highlander?

"Better than betraying my own clan" replied Uncle Mar spitefully. The laughter stopped.

"Whatcha talking about?" growled the man again. Uncle Mar sneered.

"You dame well know what I am talking about. I am not the one that killed my own brother so that I can take over the clan. I am not the one that banished my own family from the clan so that I can have my own rule. Who you talking about as a traitor? Have not seen the mirror lately, have you?"

The man who spoke when forth and slapped Uncle Mar and there was blood running from his nose. The Princess blood boiled. she was so tempted to come out of hiding and give the man a good trashing. But Uncle Mar looked at her while turning to face the man again. From his quick glance she knew he wanted her to stay where she was.

The man laughed. "They are all gone. I am the true clan and no one can ever defeat me"

"I won't be that sure. Adlus' clan is growing and one day you would be defeated" Uncle Mar replied.

"I will kill them all before your best friend can defeat me. Now tell me where is the girl?" he asked again.

"Over my dead body!" he spat at the man's face.

"Then die!" he screamed. The princess watched in slow motion as the man took a sliver dagger and stabbed Uncle Mar. Uncle Mar spit out blood and slowly cumbered to the ground while the man whose name was Bart was laughing out a cruel laugh. The Princess cried silently as she watched her beloved family member died alone. She wanted to run and hug him but his words rang in her ears. She sat there watching him, slowly dying. It was nightfall before one of her soldiers came, by then the princess had no more tears to cry. The princess later understood that there was a change in the leadership of the highlanders and that Bart their leader was a violent man who wanted to conquer more lands for his own interest. His new target was the Princess and her family.

It has been a year since Uncle Mar's murder. The war against Bart and highlanders have been an on going battle. BUt the only difference was now, the princess was in charge. Uncle Mar's death made her change. She wanted revenge. She cancelled her own wedding, trained harder and went to battle. She was more violent than she ever was. She was still the happy normal person that she had been but when it came to war she transformed to Joan of Arc and there was no stopping her. Over a year, she became more focus and daring and buried herself to being a warrior rather than a princess. Her parents had given up hope talking about marriage and she told them if they did anything against her wish she would leave the castle and disappear.

The clouds grew darker and it started to drizzle. A knock on the door

"Princess Aaratrika, may I come in?" The Princess wiped her tears. It was her general.

"Please do" and turned to face her general

Tale of Two (Part IX)

I wrote this on the 3rd of dec last year, forgot to post it up

"It's nearly dinner princess. Wakie Wake"

The princess cracked open her eyes as her blurred vision started to find its placing. Slowly the view started to find its placing. Slowly the view started to come into focus and she saw her maid picking up her clothes which, were strewn all over her tent. She slowly caught herself up. Her head felt light and empty. Now she knew what it means when they use the expression, 'feeling light headed'. She yawned indecently without covering her mouth.

"Well it seems the mixture you drank had you hooked to the Goddess of sleep. The pure ecstasy of intoxication" sighed the maid.

The princess slowly recalled what had lead to her being light headed. After receiving the letter from Taylor she had lost her footing on earth and have been drifting in cloud 9 until, Uncle Mar popped in his head into the tent. He had brought her something sweet to drink. He had referred to it as soothing for the soul. It was in fact a herbal mixture which was usually given to people who are unable to sleep. uncle Mar thought the princess was feeling uneasy about the situation she was caught in and thought that the tonic would help ease her. The princess smiled. Uncle Mar was being the watchful and protective over her, just like a doting father. The princess wished that if she had another rebirth, she would be born to Mar as a daughter. She truly loved him as a father.

The princess yawned again. As she covered her mouth, she became aware of the noise surrounding her tent. She began to see shadows of people passing by her tent and heard all kinds of voices from children screaming to men laughing and women gossiping. She pulled her maid aside and inquired what was happening outside.

"Well princess, its a festival out there. It seems that everyone is joining in the mass feast that the village had prepared. A whole lot of food, dance, drinking happening out there. You better get dressed before you miss out the fun. with that the princess got up and tided herself.

As she stepped out of the tent, what greeted was no short of a parade. There seemed to be carriages and wagons and tents parked everywhere. People whom she had never seen before were strolling and moving around and greeting the princess at sight. However the main event was still at the center of the village and the princess made her way to the central. The music grew louder as she approached the central. It seems that the village's population had tripled and there were so many people all of a sudden. The princess felt as if she was in the mist of a great tidal wave and was having trouble breathing. Suddenly she felt something pull her from behind. She felt back only to find herself facing a huge manly chest. '

"You alright dear?" It was Uncle Mar and the princess smiled. Uncle Mar motioned her to a table nearby and passed her a dagger. He told her to keep it by her side, just in case she needed it. She knew that she would not be needing it with Uncle mar watching her like a hawk. The princess gave him a quick hug and bid farewell as she decided to explore the festival on her own.

The princess had no idea what she wanted to do but her heart seemed to know exactly what she wanted. Her eyes searched for Taylor. Apparently she seemed to be unable to locate him in the huge colourful mass. Suddenly she heard a familiar voice and turned around just in time to see her maid running towards her.

"Where in the world were you? Come on, we better hurry to the main table before all the food is taken up. I saw some really nice pudding" she screamed over the noise in the crowd, dragging the princess to the dining table.

It certainly was filled with so much food that the princess had trouble deciding what she wanted to eat. But after watching people grabbing food, she made a quick decision to just have some bread and meat. While eating at a corner, her eyes were still searching for Taylor. Then something struck her. Perhaps he was with the girl? Perhaps, they had decided to get together and patch things up. She suddenly lost her appetite and felt something burning in her belly. She had not seen the girl and Taylor. She dropped her half eaten food and continued to search for Taylor and the girl. As she searched furiously, she caught the sight of something unusual. A woman with a veil seemed to be staring at her from a distant. She was very well blended in the shadows of the caravan but her eyes shone like that of a cat on a night prowl.The princess was intrigued and she abandoned her search and walked towards where the old woman was standing.

"Princess where are you going" cried the maid. The princess did not reply and headed towards the caravan. The maid tailed behind having a strange feeling that they would be in somewhat of trouble but having faith that they could still escape if trapped.

The old lady moved into the caravan and the Princess turned and asked her maid to stand outside. The maid wanted to argue but the looks on the princess silenced her. As the princess went in, she saw various forms of crystals, glasses, lucky charms and weird exotic possessions. The lady unveiled herself. The princess realized she was in a gypsy's caravan! There seemed to be a mystic air surrounding her. She was curious. The princess had heard so much about gypsies and how they are the apprentices of the devil and that she should never associate with them. But the princess being herself have somewhat always been enticed by these people. In fact, her own nanny was a gypsy herself and she knew these people and what they did for a living. It was too bad that her nanny had to run away when the King ordered people who practised witchcraft to be burned. She never met her again. This lady however resembled her old nanny. The gypsy asked the princess to have a sit on the tool.

The Gypsy took out a pack of card. Under the deem candle lights, the princess knew they were tarot cards. The lady shuffled the cards, her eyes never leaving the princess and passed her the cards. the princess took the card and shuffled it with a particular question about Taylor. The smell of Jasmine filled the room. The old woman then placed three cards in front of her. The first card was a wolf on a hill at night, the second card was a whirlpool raising to the sky and the third was a picture of two towers. She looked at the woman

"Two tales apart
Two twines divine
Two are one
Two are divide
A choice of two
A Two of Thine"

The princess shook her head. She had no idea what the old woman was saying. She looked at the woman and she smiled.

" An age you are in that worries your parents. The devil's at work, a man to steal your heart. The angles at work, to restore it through a special young man. Two from your past, two spilled into your present. What you are unsure is which one is real and which one is fake. Who is who? You can't choose but have to do so. A decision of dread, a decision of death, a decision of life and only you can decide"

With that the lights went out and suddenly a make voice boomed in the caravan, "If I were you I would seek the one with the knowledge, the one that willows in nature". The princess was stunned and overcome with fear ran out of the caravan.

"Wait princess, where are you going?" screamed the maid trailing after her.

The eternal moment

I have been thinking about a lot about Aging lately. I am only turning 25 this June and yet a feeling of bizarre weirdness surrounding me. "I am 25, now what?" Time seemed to be having a conspiracy against me, not revealing anything to do with my future. Yes, I am still busy with all that is happening in my reality, yet there is the silent me that is growing within me. The one that catches the lapse of time, the same time that my consciousness had failed to see.

To put it simply, I am aging. A process not solely a physical change but also mentally. To many I may still look and behave the same but, something else is going on inside of me, my mind,my soul. Lately I have been meeting some of my friends and conversations with them have somewhat left me confused and yet, amazed and satisfied in a unexplainable manner.

Take for instance, last weekend I met up with my friends who traveled with me to Sikkim. It was a catch up session for us and to do a mass reflection on how we felt after returning 5 months from the trip. Everyone shared. However, what my team leader Siva shared had an impact on me. He chose to live a simple life. He had sold his car and now cycles to work. He is planning to go for mountaineering course during the month of October till September. He does his part to save water. At first I thought, "What a crazy chap! So young and still wants to live a simple life?" I always assumed that people like my leader Siva would conquer more in terms of material asserts as he grows older but I was clearly wrong. I thought it was absurd consciously but something else in me was giving me an unease feeling. Whatever he had said somewhat haunted me. I then recalled the moments of eternal pleasure I had when I was climbing. Alone in that forest trek. The wind as my blanket, not a sound, just me and me alone walking in the forest. I felt my heart beat in harmony with the movement of mother nature. I felt a huge amount of relieve and excitement that I have never felt. It felt good. The eternal moment.

This thought extended when I went dragon boating on Sunday. I saw how my team mates who were in their forties were rowing with so much passion. The key idea according to my friend Jason who leads the active aging program is, focus. As you age, you become more focus. You know what you want and you tend to enjoy a lot more. That explains how men and women in their sixties are still able to be competitive in that age. I suppose Aging is a beautiful process, it just depends on how you see it.

I am currently reading this article in a magazine about aging gracefully. There is this story of a little girl who was shelling peas with her grandma. Suddenly she asked her grandma what she would do if she knew she was going to die in the next fifteen minutes. The grandma replied, "I would still be shelling peas with you". A powerful message. Living in the present, a beautiful way of eternalizing moments.

I am still thinking about Aging. I somewhat wonder if this thought is a result of my stagnation of time in my life or it is really a product of my fear of aging. I am yet to find out. But one thing is for sure, no matter how old I get, my life would still be as exciting as watching a Korean Soap Opera. Even if it is not, I am sure to screw up something so I have something to look forward to.