Chapter 4: Chapter 4: Echoes of the Past
When he awoke, he found himself lying on the ground wrapped in a warm woolen blanket. He glanced around and saw a beautiful girl with wet hair and clothes looking at him, smiling. She spoke to him in a language he didn't understand.
Soon, a man and a woman joined her, accompanied by a group of boys and girls. Animated conversations ensued, with the girl gesturing towards the sky and then pointing at him.
The woman left briefly and returned with a tray of food and drink. She sat him down and began to feed him. He was grateful, smiling and nodding in thanks, despite the language barrier
The girl who had saved him had come with her family from the nearby city of "Adnuk" to picnic on the lake shore. Her name was Nana, which was the first thing Deedy learned of her language.
They took him to their camp. Nana's grandfather was resting on a mat and woke up when the group returned with the boy wrapped in a blanket. Nana told him what had happened, explaining that Dan was mute and couldn't speak. The old man looked at him with tired eyes, nodding for him to come closer.
Dan approached shyly and knelt before him. The old man, experienced in the ways of the region, addressed him in various mountain dialects until he responded to one. Deedy rejoiced, telling the old man what had happened to him until he found himself at the bottom of the lake.
The grandfather translated for the rest of the family, who were amazed at what they heard. When he reached the topic of his grandmother, he remembered the intense despair in her eyes as they were about to throw her off the cliff, and the tender and loving looks she had always given him with those same eyes. He burst into tears, shouting and hitting his face with his fists until Nana and her father intervened to calm him down.
Nana's mother sprinkled some rosewater on the boy's face, soothing him slightly.
Suddenly, he stood up and told the old man that he was going to search for his grandmother in the same place, holding onto hope that she might still be alive. The old man tried to dissuade him, but to no avail. He had already taken off running like an arrow, disappearing into the mountain passages!
Quickly, Nana and her siblings ran after him. They circled the lake until they reached the foot of the mountain, where a dense forest lay. Deedy walked among the trees, gazing up at their tops until he reached the smooth wall of the mountain, where he saw a terrible sight... a mound of human skeletal remains, some preyed upon by animals, others still shrouded in torn blankets.
He searched among the debris for a new mat but found none. He looked at the branches to which some of the skeletons were still hanging, the trees that bore nothing but empty mats.
When he grew tired of searching, he sat on a rock and brooded, and Nana took his hand, leading him obediently back to the camp.
There, seated before him was the old man, whom everyone called "Father Reda." He began to speak to him in his language, and everyone listened, seeing the gradual change on his face from sadness and despair to hope and smiles, and even to joy and laughter! Everyone was astonished, and they asked Father Reda what had happened.
He told them, "I explained to him one of the customs of his tribe that he didn't know, which is that if someone dies or a young man is killed on the day when one of the elders of village meant to be thrown from the cliff, they annul his fate."
He explained to them that the custom of the elders and children was an ancient tradition practiced by the nomadic desert and polar tribes due to the difficulty of living, the scarcity of food, and the instability.
In the evening, they took Deedy with them to their home in the city.
Weekly Power Status
-- Power
Ranking 
-- Power
stone