Freaks

By Tam H. Athot

“Syranda and magic are an interconnected tree with the same root, with many branches, and beautiful fruits in many shapes and colours.”

 Syranda is a hidden country whose peaceful, democratic system drifting almost unnoticed into dictatorship. An integral part of the people of Syranda are individuals with special skills who have been a great asset to the country's prosperous development throughout history. But in the last decade something has changed, and democracy has slowly eroded, slipping into dictatorship, led by Angelus, the Minister of Defence. The main pillar of the dictatorship's construction was the production of an enemy image. Anyone with ability began to be excluded and eventually persecuted.

 Angelus' daughter Vitu was also born with a special gift, which her father tried to hide from the world. When Vitu became a teenager, she had to face the fact that her father was more concerned with serving the regime and his own ambition than her life, and she too was forced to flee. In her search for a way out, she learned a lot about her abilities, her fellow human beings and herself.

 “Many people think that dictatorship will come suddenly, spectacularly, with a great blare of trumpets and horns, and that everyone will notice it, that one sacred moment when the trumpets blare and the drums beat, and a loudspeaker shouts, "Attention, attention, the dictatorship has arrived, the dictatorship is here, everyone should lock themselves in their houses, because the oppression has arrived, from now on it's what I, the dictator with the big hat and the red nose, dictate.”

 “The prey within us dies tonight and at dawn the predator will awake along with the sun!”

 

• Language: English
• Publisher: Publishdrive
• Release date: Feb 14, 2024

Book preview

FREAKS

Published by Tam H. Athot

© 2024 Hungary

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or modified in any form, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.

SWEET CHILD OF MINE

They say, there is a waterfall somewhere on the edge of the country. Allegedly you must walk over a long mountain, which takes about five days, and it only shows itself if you are fasting, you can’t eat or drink anything. Every hour one must prostrate himself, facing the Sun during the day and the Moon at night, and recite the secret mantra 33 times.

Along the way are traps, ghosts, and monsters are waiting for you who will swallow up anyone whose heart wavers, even for a moment. No one has returned from there so far, but it is said that whoever is allowed to enter by the rainbow may he finds eternal quiet, peace and bliss.

Vitu has been dreaming about this for a long time. She sees the pilgrimage, as she walks the long, difficult journey, and then at the end she finds the wonderful sparkling waterfall, which opens and receives her, and then all the injustice, doubt and violence that surrounds her will be replaced by peace and gentleness.

She looked around her room. Huge, she thought, bigger than those underground bunkers where people huddle together and hide, fleeing the regime the shootings and bombings.

The walls were cyclamen and turquoise. She picked these colours when she was 12 years old, and somehow, they have stuck with her ever since. Although their luxurious palace was expanded, renewed, and changed, his father always painted her rooms in the same two shades. Maybe it was the last summer when they were still a happy family. When she still believed that her father was the most wonderful man in the world, and her mother was the most understanding sensitive flower, whose only task was to shower kindness on those around her.

However, everything changed at once. Her whole world did not fell apart in a single day, but the moment when the decline began is still vivid in her memory. She played outside in the enormous palace garden. She clearly remembers the soft snoring of her nanny, the way the gentle breeze caressed her face, the way she rolled with her dog in the turquoise green grass, the trill of her mother's thin voice, as she entertained the female members of his father's guests in the rose garden pavilion.

She noticed the sound of a helicopter. It circled a few meters above their house. She lay down on the ground to better observe the events. She was used to all kinds of visitors, her father was a high-ranking officer in the army, so they had a lot of comings and goings.

Suddenly a grasshopper pecked at her dress. He loved animals from the moment she was born, she thought of them as an extension of her own soul. She held it in her palm because she wanted to see where he has been to. She loved the animals’ memories. She usually saw lakes, fresh pastures, long blades of grass, or heard the inviting coos of the opposite sex, which always made her laugh wryly. In such cases, the nanny usually sat up quickly from her slumber, then, after summarizing with a wide smile that the animal world is still alive in the intoxication of love, sank back into the soft rocking of the garden chair.

There was now, however, the usual pictures did not come. The sky bled, she heard loud bangs and saw strange lightning. Uniformed figures were pacing up and down nervously. Her father's heavily bald head was beading with sweat, he was gripping a piece of paper, gripping it with such force that the veins on his hand bulged. Smoke and some alien stench filled her nose. Suddenly the memory became suffocating, she started gasping, felt like she couldn't breathe, wanted to scream, but no sound came out of her throat. She wanted to put down the grasshopper to stop the stream of images, but her body wouldn't obey. She saw her mother's torn hair; her eyes were shining with madness from the attic window. Fighter jets were whistling in the greying sky and living creatures cried out in mourning. She wanted it to stop so badly, but she was helpless, just another victim of the series of events, till the grasshopper, perhaps sensing Vitu's pain, jumped away from her hand.

She kept lying on the ground silently, only tears were falling from her eyes.

The nanny was rocking quietly on the garden chair, her mother was warbling merrily in the distance, the sky was orange, and the sun was shining happily. The grasshopper was unabashedly jumping from grass to grass. Everything was so beautiful… except for the future what Vitu saw.

Finally, she fell into a dreamless sleep. Dark blackness surrounded her. She was floating in an empty dark sphere. Space, time, and feelings stopped around her. She was in an empty existence free space, from where the voice of the nanny extricated her:

‘Miss, miss, wake up! Wake up for heaven's sake! You can't sleep out here! Hurry up, your mother will see us!!! My lady will have us both in trouble.’

She tried to bring her back to the world with sentence like these, but she did not want to come back at all. She just wanted to stay there, where she didn't have to think about the future, his father, the world, where she didn't have to feel the deep sorrow, or be afraid of anything or anyone.

After a while the nanny changed her tune from hissing and prodding to screaming and howling over her motionless body. Apparently, the old woman became quite distressed. With her spiritual eyes she saw huge shadows and terrors around the head of her little girl. At her loud cry, the whole house rushed to them, including Vitu's mother, who instantly joined into the drama, and hysteria took over her. Only the doctor's medicine could calm her down. Doctor Honore had been serving the family for a long time, he knew all their quirks, any mood swings, which he treated with a variety of miracle herbs. He gave birth to Vitu, and he helped the other two times as well when the mother had to give birth to a stillborn child.

He examined Vitu, checked her pulse, breathing, and tongue, and after not finding any symptoms, he ordered the servants to take her to bed and called the nardu. The local nardu, Koshan had been his good friend for a long time, and over the years he had proven to him more than once that his craft was at least as precise and scientific as his medical degree.

Koshan's age couldn’t be established. According to his own testimony, he must have been around five hundred years old, although he hadn't counted it for a while. Koshan belonged to the moodi race, whose height never made it past the 140 cm, their skin was pale purple, and their dark blue veins appeared in exciting lines through the silky layers. Their eyes were huge, the most attractive part of the face, their irises shone in a hundred colours, reflecting their current mental state. Basically, the moodis were a quiet, self-contained people. Their reason and intelligence were like humans, except that their brains memorized everything. They stored all stimuli, energy, and knowledge that befell them like a huge memory card. To live with this amount of information, their brains were rewired completely differently. They were able to detach or even add emotions to their memories, thus making their own lives easier.

Of course, the correct practice of this ability required many years of training, which is why special training for the moodis was essential. If they did attend mixed schools, they had to attend to special afternoon school where they learnt the skills essential for their survival.

It was late at night when Koshan arrived. Leaning on his frail-looking legs and his cane of birch, he trudged up to the upstairs room. He had been here a couple of times, although he knew very well that he was not welcome. The father hated his race, and the mother was terrified of the truth, or more precisely, of the truth coming to light. Therefor he was only called in as a last resort.

The moments when he first entered house are so bright in her mind, like they have been frozen in time.... His old friend, Honore, called him to say that there is a little girl who has been having strange dreams and has been crying instead of sleeping for days. On the way, he thought, another worldseer. He has known many children who can see through worlds. There must be a ghost or two in his room, he chases it away, and then the parents ask him to shut down his ability. According to the Special Ability Law (SAL) of Syranda, the parent exercises the right over his child special ability, so he is entitled to terminate it temporarily or for good.

Before the new law in practice the nardu could only suspend the ability, and the magical handcuff would naturally fall of at the age of 21, when individuals were able to decide their further destiny. But eleven years ago, the transformation of the magical world began and among the first steps was the SAL.

As he entered the room the past flashed through his memories, and suddenly two huge black eyes locked on him. The child, who had been loudly sobbing, fell suddenly silent and sniffed at this strange, kindly-looking, exciting-faced old creature.

Koshan approached him, sat down on her bed, and took her hand. He sensed that she was clairvoyant, so he quickly rearranged his memory shelves and brought forward many happy, pleasant memories, and used a special barricade to hide anything he didn't want the child to see. The child laughed curly and fell asleep on his lap. In this way he was able to peek into her dream, world, whatever haunted her. Not long ago she had slept in a baby crib, but her parents thought she outgrew it, so her grandparents brought his father's kid’s bed over with great pride, boasting that they had kept it, polished, and cleaned it, and that it had been his grandfather's and his father's childhood bed, so that was a precious family heirloom.

They did not add that the bed had always been passed on to the male members of the family, but now, hence the father was an only child and the mother had already had two miscarriages, and the doctor said that another unsuccessful pregnancy would be life-threatening, they were no longer waiting for another heir to the throne, so they were passing it on to the only grandchild, even if it happened to be a girl.

Koshan saw through the little girl's eyes how her grandfather would come to her father's bed at night, and then again and again, wearing different clothes, also different pyjamas on the little boy, always shouting about something, but each time with a strap in his hand. As time went on, the pattern of the strap was the most vivid memory, the aching body, and the wet pyjamas which he didn't dare to take off because he was so terribly afraid of getting more if he would find out that he pissed his pants. Instead, he stayed in it, he was cold and hurt and made him feel penniless and humiliated, and with every beating the snap of the strap tore a piece of his father's childish heart. He simply could not understand how it was possible that the person whom he shares blood, who was supposed to love him unconditionally, wholeheartedly could be so mean to him.

As he continued to watch the dreams, he saw that not only the pyjamas but also the children's faces were changing, and he understood that this bed held the secret of a generational curse that had haunted the Kovasek family for centuries. He cast a dream spell on a child and then went out to consult with the parents.

The scenario is always similar. By the time he is called, the parents already suspect that the child has some special ability. In the state of Syranda, there was a thousand-year-old tradition of special abilities. The first surviving writings about special abilities correspond to the first historical writings. Syranda and magic are an interconnected tree with the same root, with many branches, and beautiful fruits in many shapes and colours.

On average, if we can say so, one in a hundred children is born with some special gift. Some spoke the language of animals, some had super-hearing, some could see through worlds, others spoke and understood all kinds of languages, some could light fires with their minds, some could make leaves dance. In general, parents asked for etheric handcuffs until the child was mature enough to understand and handle this gift of nature.

Society has always invested a lot of energy in integrating these creatures into the community, teaching them how to use their special abilities. Usually by the time they reached adulthood, the government offered them a position to serve the welfare of Syranda. Many accepted, and there were those who chose a quiet life of their own, and the few who, although outside the system, dedicated their entire lives to serving others. Such as Koshan.

Mom was sitting on the couch with a large glass of strong liquor in her hand. Dad stood beside her with an air of military pride, pumping thick clouds of smoke from his fig-flavoured cigar.

He knew that there is no easy way to communicate this delicately, and he is here only for the girl, not to for her father. He could only hope that the military officer will not retaliate for the sensitive information he has come into possession. He decided to tell it only if it was absolutely necessary.

‘S’il vous plait, your daughter is clairvoyant. By touching objects, things, living creatures, a dimensional door opens for her, and she gains insight into another world. It could be the past, the future, or a possible future, a parallel dimension gate. Here I need to explain the rights, perhaps you’re aware of the SAL, Special Ability Law. As parents you can ask me to shackle the ability, which will be recorded in the central office database, then they will contact you one the day Vitu turn 21-year-old. They will formally explain her the ability, its implications, and possibilities, after which, within a week to be precise, your daughter must decide if she wants to remove this shackle. On my part, I will prepare a certificate, by burning it makes her ability return to her. In the case she should renounce it, this certificate will be placed in a secret data vault, which identity is protected by 7 seal’s magic.’

Two huge sighs followed the news. As Dad puffed out clouds of thickening smoke, Mum poured herself another drink, hurriedly chugged it up, and then burst into nervous laughter. Koshan had seen much more absurd reactions, so he just sat patiently and let things flow in their natural rhythm, not intending to participate in the conversation until a decision had been made. He cast an 'unobtrusive' spell on himself, whereby he effectively made the parents speak freely, oblivious to his presence. This always helped the parents to make better decisions, and before him, there were no secrets anyway, but somehow it always put people at ease. It made their little family dirty laundry seem inviolable to them.

After a good half-hour of hysterical giggling, she managed to calm down enough to squeeze a meaningful sentence out of her lips using way too much garish purple lipstick:

‘Angelus, it is out of question, we must bond the child.’

The tall, dark eye man did not speak. He stared out into the gloomy night. He could not share his thoughts with his wife, as much as he wanted to. Clairvoyant as his great-great-great-grandmother of many hundreds of years ago, the one who had been the subject of family legends, the one who caused the family curse. Then, slowly, the puzzle began to fall into place, and he remembered Koshan, whom he had completely forgotten about until now. He was searching his face for a long time. How much did he know? Everything? And if so, would he tell anyone? Could he be dangerous to the family?

Koshan tried to calm the man's brain waves with every nerve fibre in his body. In his mind, he quickly sent a message for his friend Honore, feeling that his presence could be crucial. The doctor soon appeared. As a family confidant, she immediately involved him in the situation. Honore nodded approvingly to the woman's plan to bind the gift now, and then as an adult she would surely get wonderful special jobs from the government, being such a good, sensitive, obedient little girl.

Angelus cleared his throat, then said quietly but firmly:

‘We are not going to bind her. We are intelligent, highly educated citizens who can afford the best private tutors, so Vitu will be raised safely and properly within the palace walls.’

‘You can't do this; don't you see her suffering!!! She can't sleep so she's going to die! -she was screaming as she yanked her husband's military uniform.’

‘Hold on Etel, it's the right thing to do, it's the right decision for the whole family! A new bed will solve the sleeping problem. Isn’t it Koshan?’

Koshan slowly nodded, all the while his heart was filled with an infinite sadness, a feeling he could not fully surrender to, for he had to continue his magic to protect his own life and practice. Honore's presence, as he had suspected, helped, Angelus was calmer, his nascent paranoia did not develop further.

The wife could see that her husband was adamant, she knew him well enough to know he would not change his mind. She clung to her last resort like a flimsy straw:

‘Then at least promise me that when she turns six, she'll be able to go to the school of abilities!’

The School of Abilities was a gathering place for all kinds of beings whose parents chose not to tie their children's hands and opted for a special needs school rather than co-education. The school was located on the outskirts of the country, next to a quiet village, full of excellent, free-thinking teachers and enthusiastic, wonder-seeking students. Exciting, colourful articles about it appeared from time to time in a variety of media outlets. These had one thing in common, whoever read them felt that they wanted to study there or send their children there, and wondered how wonderful it would be if their offspring had a special talent.

It was not only for creature with abilities. Half of the students were from the non-magical world, where was a significant over applying every year, parents were fighting for places. The prestigious school had an outstanding educational program, some says the best in the country, and its values and ethos that permeated the walls of the building were also impressive to parents and their offspring. Most of its students went on to study at the best universities in the country, and in later life many doors were open to them for the finest jobs.

‘No. There are things I can't talk about! Everything is changing! Koshan, Honore, you are bound by secrecy, you cannot tell anyone that our daughter is a... Etel, we are educating her here, we are going to have hired boarding teachers and we will never say a word to anyone about this. Honore, you issue an official certificate of a special autoimmune disease which doesn’t let her be around other people, only those who have been vaccinated with some designed expensive vaccine. That's it. That's what we're telling everybody. Koshan, your license will be revoked the moment even a suspicion of this is aired! And please recommend a teacher of your kind who would also move here to help our daughter. I'll have the palace and gardens remodelled so it's going to be safe for us.’

He put down his glass and went to his study room to take the necessary steps immediately. On his way he didn’t look into his wife’s eyes, whose tears had revealed the glimmering lights of madness. Finally, she collapsed, Honore and Koshan gently helped her to the couch. The Doctor made her a calming potion, Koshan gave her a pleasant sleep. At least her night would be peaceful even if the rest of her life was not.

The next day, architects attended at the house, teachers for interviews, new furniture arrived straight from the factory, making sure as few people as possible would have touched it. Angelus had built his own garden, staffed by members of a large family who had signed a contract to spend the rest of their lives in the palace, without using any media outlet. The most professional consultants drew up the plans, which virtually ensured that 99% of the ingredients for the little girl's meals were produced within the walls, taking great care to ensure that as little outside information as possible reached Vitu. This was the easy part of the task. There, he didn't have to explain, lie or hide the truth.

It was more difficult to find teachers. First, he spoke to the nanny, who had been with her since birth and loved her as her own. She came to the house in her early 50s, by which time her own children were grown and had moved to far-flung corners of the country, starting families. She stayed with her ailing husband, who only occasionally took work. Kathy always had her long grey hair pinned up on top of her head, she was a simple, short, straight woman. She liked her, but would not have hired her, believing that her husband's on-and-off illnesses would prevent her from working steadily. However, Etel fell in love with her. From the first moment, she doted on her as if she were her own mother. Not the actual mother, but the mother she had imagined in her childhood. The kind she'd always dreamed of. He saw his wife, who had suffered from mood disorders, happy at last, and that made everything worthwhile. Kathy moved in with them in the last third of her pregnancy. Angelus insisted that she live in the palace, and to achieve this he even agreed to her husband staying with her, to whom he gave some minor domestic duties as work and unlimited access to Honoré, with whom he soon became friends. Their chess games must have had a special effect on the old man, who became less and less ill. Little Vitu also liked to visit Uncle Omre. Most of the time she just held out her little hands, gesturing for him to take her on his lap, and just listened to his seemingly endless stories of strange landscapes, colourful, exciting creatures.

The first two years of the little girl's life were full of happiness, interrupted only by the occasional squeal or cry from nowhere, which her parents attributed to the fact that she must have inherited her mother's sensitive mental condition. Now that the picture is complete, it all makes sense. She must have touched something or someone whose memories upset her. He needed a plan to keep the memories away. As much as he hated even the thought of seeing Koshan again, and his whole childhood in his giant freaky eyes, he was the only one who was able to help with that.

It was a dark, starless night, the waning moon's faint light was obscured by clouds. The dark armoured car drove without a sound along the dirt road. He used his phone GPS to find the way, shared his journey with no one, even left his driver at home. He had disconnected the car's GPS at home, not wanting anyone to know of his little night-time detour from the wheel. He used one of the phones he'd been given for undercover operations. Untraceable, undetectable. Totally secure. It can be used for 24 hours after switching on, then self-destructs itself. It has a special self-destruct virus program that runs from the moment it comes to life, poisoning itself and any external server that tries to scan it. If it detects external attacks, the virus's replication accelerates, and its outward killing tentacles grow at a much faster rate than the self-destruct program.

The machine indicated that he has reached his destination. He stopped. He looked around suspiciously, then lifted up the phone to examine it closely making sure it was working properly, that he had indeed brought him to the right address. The display clearly showed that the coordinate he had entered was the one he was at. Wherever he looked, he only saw empty wasteland. Worn earth, here and there a withered, dried-up clump of grass. No sign of life. He would have thought that a nardu was living in some kind of paradise, where everything was full of lush trees, colourful flowers, greenish grass, even in the middle of the desert, but here it was as if he had chosen a site for a new military bunker. A perfect hiding place.

The coordinates were given to him by Honore, who knew well enough that with Angelus there was no such thing as refusing a request, if he wanted something he would get it at any cost, and it was better not to cross paths. Everyone in Syranda knew that loyalty to the system was the greatest value of the high-ranking officers of the military, and they would deny no means to the end, and never question any order. He received the information a good week ago, he did not say directly when he would arrive because he insisted on knowing Koshan's real home address. This information was not in any database, and this worried him. Their family secret could be compromised at any time by him, and he hated uncertainty. He liked to control and direct events, and he refused to make exceptions for anyone. He stepped out of the car. A trapdoor rose from the ground, and he could see a low shadow outline, rising out of nowhere. Got it, this must be where he lives, his hidden hideout. The knowledge that he could now find it at any time filled him with pleasure and peace of mind.

‘What do you want from me?’ he got straight to the point. He did not find it necessary to sugarcoat it or to strike any kindly note.

‘I need your help. It's about my daughter. She can't see the information, the images I carry. Can you help me with that?’

‘I have a special potion. It requires materials that are hard to come by.’

‘No problem, I'll get it!’ Angelus interrupted the nardu.

‘This is perhaps the smaller difficulty. The bigger one is that it contains substances that are difficult for the human body to break down, taking about 70-80 days. If you were to take the next substance before it decomposes, the body would engage in a defence mechanism, producing an antibody that would slowly destroy the host.’

‘All right. Send me the list of what you need, and then we work from there.’

The gears in his brain were grinding. He can't move from his palace, because it's not just a palace, it's a fully equipped military base, which is not only super-safe in terms of its materials, but thanks to years of magical work, it's an almost impregnable target, and espionage is impossible within its walls.

He cannot relocate his daughter, no matter how much he likes this solution. What a wonderful and simple solution to all his problems, if his wife and daughter could move to a remote and desolate place where they would not know who they were... But this was only a pleasant fantasy running through his mind, for he knew that his wife would have hysterics and would never, never agree to it. She clung to her familiar surroundings; every little change would throw her off balance.

He needs to have the palace remodelled, basically split into two separate units, and every time he can't see his daughter, he'll tell her that he must travel, and from now on he has to travel a lot because he just received a promotion at work. It is, without a doubt, a perfectly feasible plan. He needs to get things set in motion as soon as possible. He has much more important matters to deal with, which require a full man, and if he shuffles the cards cleverly, he now can get a much bigger slice of that particular pie. It's been his dream since he was a kid. His father dreamed of it, and so did his father and all the ancestors before. All of them were generals, all his lineal ascendants, and if he was sharp, persistent, and dedicated, he might become the first in the family who can sit in that certain extraordinary tall armchair with legs carved from vianti wood, with special symbols on it carved by an old shaman. It was the chair of the Minister of Defence. Just the thought of it made his forehead sweltering, his palms sweat, and his heart pound faster. I am getting a little ahead of myself! he ordered himself back to the present. There are too many steps to paradise, and more than one is very difficult to climb. And most of all, no one could ever find out what his daughter was. He confessed to the President, he had to, if he didn't and found out, the president would exterminate him along with his entire family. Even the memory of the family would disappear from the face of the earth. His estates, his valuables, would be razed to the ground, and then soil will be salted, so that not the slightest beauty could grow on the former treachery. He had the opportunity of witness first-hand this and similar retaliations. There was no mercy in them, no clemency. Then the people always went into story mode. A tale worked out to the last detail, with edited pictures, videos of what country they had moved to, what they were doing there, and of course a little magical assistance, the work of the five, so there was no suspicion that any part of the story might not be true.

The President told Angelus that he was counting on him. Radical changes were on the Horizon. A snowball was about to slide down the mountain, and once it reaches the bottom, it will swell into an avalanche., and he needed a right hand, and he considered him, what an honour! The news about his daughter was absolutely bad timing, but he assured him with all his patriotism that he could handle the situation perfectly, that no one would ever find out about it, and that if they did, he would know what to do, what his duty was. And he knows, even though he doesn't want to think about it, and there's no way that day will come, because he will keep everything under perfect control, but if that purple day does come, he will do what is necessary, because he's a soldier first, he's been trained for it, he's been raised for it from birth.

Koshan's thoughts returned to the present. His brief journey through time ended, and he focused on the here and now, though he was not accidentally rushed by these memories. Everything was connected. That those few days of his life and all the information in them were connected to this day. As if time were a three-dimensional thread, like a snake, and now it returned to itself, biting its own tail representing the eternal soul. Its extension goes beyond what we call time or space. Thinking in terms of dimensions is also pointless, because that is just trying to cram something into a matrix that is much different. It is above and beyond everything. Like a tiny black dot, when you look into it, it expands, and the deeper you go the wider and more complex it becomes, crossing dimensions, merging with everything, but in the end you and the whole world is just a tiny black dot swallowing its surroundings.

He opened the door. The duality of turquoise and cyclamen vibrated through his whole being. With all its beauty, its enchantment, the dreams that manifested from the pure heart of the little girl on the walls, there was also the terrifying presentiment that the walls reflected of the child's soul.

A lot of doubt filled his magical soul. In his vocation, he felt every moment that he was on the right path, his heart always whispered the answers, the actions he had to take, except with Vitu. Fate played tricks on him in this case. He stepped out of his role of instrument, of hand, who merely mediates the Divine will. In vain he asked, his inner voice did not answer, there was no clear guidance, no light to illuminate the right lines of destiny. He was left alone in relation to Vitu.

There are moments in life that cannot be changed, that are carved in stone, where the star-spiders weave a web so strong that no one can do anything about it. But if there is a superpower, a force that can change it, that shifts the universe out of balance for a moment. The universe reacts immediately, and a few moments later, what is written happens, and balance is going to get restored, perhaps mobilising more energy than it should have in the first place.

He remembers the moment when the father told him that he could not tie the child's hand, and he felt in his heart that something very wrong was about to happen, but at the same time the inner voice was letting him down. He asked what he should do, because although it was unprecedented, he could have tied it without parental permission and without anyone ever noticing. There had been times when parents did not want the magic handcuffs, but guided by the clear word of his soul, he convinced them of the necessity or even the opposite, but now he was at a complete loss.

He felt himself in a void, where, if there was karma, it remained unexplored. It is one of the few Akashic records which are hidden from even the highest-level initiate.

He felt he was standing before a lake around which the earth was beginning to move, and the water could no longer stand stillness, it desired to move too wanted to become a river. It wanted to race over hills, stones, rocks, wanted to transform the stone, carve out the wall, feed the hungry wild game, run free under the hot glare of the sun.

‘What is it, starflower?’ Koshan said in a husky voice sitting next to her, taking her hand in his, and just looking kindly, gently into the sparkling sea-light eyes. He said no more. He waited patiently, and in his imagination, he handed her a million delicately scented flowers, more and more colourful. Roses, their orange glowing like the sunset, and the enticing, promising scent of early summer on her nose. The purple tulips implied magical landscapes far away, while the fluttering daisies sang softly of impermanence and eternal renewal.

‘Thank you, that's better.’ Even her breathing has started to slow down. Her rapid heartbeat has also found peace and quiet. ‘Something is wrong, Koshan, just wrong I can feel it, and everything is rushing around in my head. Just something ain't right. Tell me, the flowers you showed me, are they real? I mean, I've seen daisies before, we have it in our garden, but the others, the pretty orange ones, and the purple ones, I've never seen them. Where are they? Outside the walls? Can you get me some? Do you think Dad would let me have some? Or would they make me sick and kill me?’

Yes, it was so Vitu. She saw war in her mind, the walls of her world were about to collapse, burying everything she knew and believed so far, and still she was able to focus only on beauty and see things differently. She wasn't sick, by the way, it was all part of her father's twisted plan. When she was little, maybe five years old, she began to wonder what was outside, beyond the bricks and the wonderful marble stairs. Then Angelus, in his own way, or to put it more bluntly in the military state's usual way of doing things, you do what you're told from above, you don't have much choice, because there's too much to lose for you and everyone involved, so he got Honore to convince his wife that Vitu actually had an extremely serious autoimmune disease, a special condition unknown to medicine, so it was best she didn't come into contact with anyone or anything, or she might die. He took part in this game. He saw way dirtier and shadier things which he couldn't tell anyone.

It was an interesting life. He was striving to make the world a better, more liveable place, and indeed he was helping a lot of people in trouble every day, but he could not expose the great evil, the terrible, dark secrets. It is a duality, because you feel what you are doing, but you also must live with what you are not doing. This life is getting harder. Clouds are gathering cumulus and thick over the planet. There is less and stinky air.

By not telling Vitu the truth until now was to protect Honore and many others, because he knew that the father’s revenge would be long and merciless, and his sixth sense agreed with it. However now something shifted in him. It was different from his