Heat was too much that it was almost impossible to breathe. Sweat drops dripped one by one from Cara's neck and temples and all over her body. She could barely open her eyes. Cara saw herself in a house that was burning. Everything was falling apart from the ceiling, The doors, furnitures, chandeliers. Everything was falling down with a loud thud. In a room next to her she saw the back of a man in suit amidst of all the fire and chaos. She hurried past all the fiery ruins because she felt she must save him somehow.
"Hello, get out of there, You'll die!!!." she screamed.
The man stood there, still turned his back on her, giving her no response.
"Hey! Are you crazy??? can you hear meeeee??? Come with me or you will die!!!!" She screamed again!
The man gave her no response.
She hurried past a door that just exploded, She was terrified, But there is no time to be afraid, She had to take him out. She struggled through the scorching hot floor towards him. Her feet felt like it was on a hot burning coals. She touched the man from behind and he turned around at her.
Those emerald eyes... Aiden!
He smiled at her. It was supposed to be warm but somehow it terrified her to death.
Cara woke up from a nightmare as usual. Why the heck did she see Aiden in her dream. She'd always seen a man with emerald eyes but never in her wildest dreams could she imagine actually meeting one. Maybe she dreamt about Aiden coz she thought about him a lot before she went to sleep. She was tired. She wished if she could get a goodnight sleep withought any nightmares. She tried to sleep again, but she was too disturbed and afraid to sleep again. So she piled up some good books from her little library to read till the morning. Even when she was reading, she could feel her heightened senses which made her hard to focus. So she tossed the books around and got up annoyed. "Its 4 AM. Goddddd!!!!!"
She had always thought why she was cursing at god everytime she was annoyed, not that she believed in a god but having someone to blame for all the sleep she lost somehow made her feel better! She decided to calm herself down because that is the only thing that will work. She played her most favourite spotify playlist, with all the Taylor Swift songs to play to her heart's content!!!!
"She wear short skirts, I wear T-shirt..." she danced till sunrise with a big swiftie heart of hers.
It was morning so she decided to go out take a morning walk. She quickly wrapped a coat around her since she guessed it would be cold outside in the morning. She also plugged in her headphones with some sweet music playing... she hummed the music as she walked out of the house.
She always loved mornings given the fact that she was an early bird. As she walked through the side walks, she noticed a huge banyan tree, protected with tiled concrete walls. It seemed strange to see a huge tree standing tall after all these years and attempts to cut it down and redevelopment plans. Locals say there were paranormal forces protecting the tree and that till date nobody was able to touch it. Some says ghosts, some say spirits, and some say genies. Anyways, its all laughable to the core! Somebody might have made up a story to protect the tree, that's all!!! Still the tree gave off a strange aura that it was irresistible. So Cara decided to pay the legendary tree a visit.
As she stood there glaring at the tree, a breeze rushed in from somewhere, her hair in the air flowing, Cara felt a presence behind her back. She turned around but she found no one.
"Do you know the legend behind this tree?"
The sound sent a chill down her spine, it came from the side of the tree, she turned back and froze.
An old bearded man in his off-white cardigan like shirt and brown pants stood tall with his hands in his pockets. An aura of majesty could be felt in the way he carried himself. He had deep blue eyes. Gray hair and gray beard. Long nose and fierce eyebrows. His belly was protruded as if it was his lifetime's achievement. She looked at him puzzlingly once and the decided to say "No."
She let out a nervous smile.
The old man laughed throwing his head back as if he heard something silly or childish, except Cara didn't feel it was funny at all.
"In this town of Astra, This tree has see in all in its 10000 years of life. Legend says it that it was here way before that."
She glanced at the banyan tree for a moment. It was so tall and thick. it's prop roots hung from its as if it's the hair of an old sage. It must have survived a lot and it must have seen a lot in its thousands of years of life. It was quite amusing to think of, She could be just another moment in time for the tree, a speck of dirt.
The old man continued. "500 years before, The king Victor of Alba who lived here wanted to build his castle with this tree as it was strong and powerful. So he ordered his men to cut the tree. but none of them made it alive. They were all enchanted to kill themselves. The king was infuriated so he ordered more men to cut the tree, but in vain, he just lost more men. The news spread across the town to other cities and other states. The king of the neighbouring state of Nyx, Reagan heard about the king Victor losing men and thought it was the perfect opportunity to conquer Alba. He recruited men with arms in secret to offend Alba. The king with his obsession towards cutting the tree, neglected the state affairs, which led the ministers to get angry, and they blamed the king in secret but too scared to face the king. They have tried many times to tell the king of Reagan's plans but the king was slowly losing his mind. On the day Reagan planned to attack Alba, that day king took the axe himself to swing at the tree. But he was pushed back by a strong force that he flew back 10 meters from the tree. The voices inside him whispered to him dark thoughts which made him want to die. He felt compelled to swing the axe at himself. He resisted the voice in his head that chanted "DIE, DIE, DIE, DIE,..." with all of his might. Then the voice started whispering him things he regret the most, all of his darkest and unworthiest moments of how he was a lousy king, how was a bad husband and father, that he didn't deserve to live. At one point, when the king reached his threshold of will power, Reagan had already conquered Alba. He was rushing towards the tree with his men to slay Victor, at that point victor couldn't even control himself. He picked the axe and let it out on a full swing at himself, but before the axe pierced through this heart, He screamed so loud that it echoed throughout the town. Reagan and his men froze at the terrible sight. "My spirit and bones refuse until you are cut!" Axe punctured through his rib cage and the blood splurged throughout his kneeling bodice, but soon after his body burst into a black mist and disappeared."
"Woah!! So cool. So what happened to Alba afterwards. Is it why our state is called Nyx today?"
"Precisely!! Reagan and his men were horrified. He proclaimed the tree as holy and never to be cut to avoid such disasters. Reagan replaced Victor's court with his men. He retained some of the wise and experienced ministers to work for him. Victor's entire family was either killed, imprisoned or sent to exile."
"That's sad. What caused Victor to be obsessed about the tree?"
"The tree."
"The tree? why would the tree want someone to cut itself and kill the same person?"
"Because it wanted to die".
The conversation felt wierd. Cara felt something off. Her consciousness was shouting at her to run away but curiosity caught her off guard.
"Anyways thanks for telling me the story. It was interesting. How did you know all of it?"
"I'm an old man who lived here since I can remember. ofcourse I know all the stories of Astra. "
"What's your name, sir?"
He smiled. "I forgot my name, I suppose. what's yours?"
"Cara."
"Cara." he repeated after her.
"Then... I should go... I guess." Cara smiled awkwardly at him without knowing what to say.
"Come here sometimes, if you ever want to hear stories."
She smiled and waved but she couldn't hide her nervousness. She put the earphones back into her ears as she jogged back home. She couldn't stop thinking about the story of king victor and the tree. Some eery feeling kept crawling into her psyche but she decided to ignore.