XIX.

​

It was the Festival of First Light—the day each year when lamps were floated down the canal to honor the changing season and the river that made the village possible.

​

For as long as anyone could remember, it had been a celebration of certainty:
that rains would come and go,
that fields would rise and fall,
that gods would keep their part of the bargain—
so long as lamps were lit and songs were sung.

​

This year, the sky didn’t look right.

​

It wasn’t cloudy—not exactly.
It was smooth. Featureless.
Like the inside of a bowl.

​

Light came through it dimly,
as though the sun had forgotten its name.

​

Still, the preparations went on.

​

Children plucked marigolds from the temple wall.
Women twisted them into garlands with thread and hope.
The boys practiced drumming near the canal,
beating old rhythms with new arrogance.

​

Meera didn’t braid her hair that day.

​

When I asked why, she said,
“There are better things to do when the wind holds still.”

​

But no one else seemed to notice.
Or if they did, they pretended not to.

​

By sunset, the whole village had gathered—
some in their finest,
some barefoot,
all expectant.

​

Clay lamps were handed out, one by one.
A new boy had been chosen to lead the procession.
He trembled with pride.

​

The priest smeared ash across his brow
and whispered a blessing into his ear—
a blessing the wind carried away
before anyone could hear.

​

The crowd formed lines as if choreographed.
The women adjusted their saris in unison.
The men raised their lamps on cue.
It looked—briefly—like a scene rehearsed a hundred times.

​

The procession moved toward the canal,
a line of flickering flame and loose song.
Old women swayed.
Young girls giggled.
Men shouted across the rows,
joking about whose lamp would go the farthest,
whose would sink,
whose might win a wife.

​

The river shimmered.

​

The lamps were released, one by one, onto its back.
Dozens at first. Then hundreds.
They bobbed and turned,
forming temporary constellations in the murky black.

​

Then—a drop.

​

Small. Sharp.
It struck a drumhead
with the sound of a snapped thread.

​

The drummer paused.

​

Then another drop.
And another.

​

The rain thickened.

​

A man near the bank lifted his face to the sky and let out a great cheer.

​

“It’s blessing rain!” he called.

​

Others laughed,
relieved to have been given something to name.

​

“Blessing rain!” they echoed.

​

And then—they danced.

​

They stomped their feet into the mud,
flung water into the air like holy dust,
sang louder to outpace the thunder
that hadn’t come yet.

​

The children screamed and spun in circles.
Two boys grabbed a half-filled sack
and dragged each other through the shallows.
The drummer began again,
water now running down his arms.

​

Someone slipped,
fell into the canal,
and came up spitting and grinning.

​

“It’s the gods!” someone shouted. “They’ve come to dance with us!”

​

And so—they danced harder.

​

Even as the rain thickened.
Even as the garlands collapsed into wet tangles.
Even as the flame of every lamp hissed out,
one by one,
until only the river
shone with the dull reflection of a dying sky.

​

Meera didn’t move.

​

She stood at the edge of the trees,
arms crossed,
eyes on the water.

​

I approached. She didn’t turn.

​

“Not yet,” she said. “The river hasn’t woken.”

​

Aru stood nearby,
arms limp at his sides.
His lamp floated already down the canal.

​

He watched it until it disappeared.

​

Then turned,
and walked home—
alone.

​

And somewhere,
in a hut no one visited,
a brass bell hanging from a boat’s bow gave a single chime—
though no wind had stirred it.

​

​

XX.

​

That night, the rain did not stop.

 

It did not soften. It did not rest.

 

It fell like something old—like the gods had remembered a debt and meant to collect it all at once. The roof groaned under it. The clay walls wept. The ground, which had once welcomed every drop, now began to repel it—no more, no more.

 

We had seen rain before. Loud rain. Cold rain. Rains that lasted days and left the fields singing.

 

This was different.

 

This was heavier.

 

By the second hour, the water reached the courtyard. The lanterns flickered, shadows twitching like animals caught in a snare. We moved what we could—cloth, grain, tools—lifting them higher, wedging them on rafters, tying them with rope already beginning to fray.

 

Meera’s hands worked fast. Too fast. Her breath came short. Her hair clung to her neck, soaked already, though the rain was still outside.

 

“Where’s Aru?” I asked.

 

She pointed—he was dragging the low stool to the door, peering out with eyes that no longer belonged to a child.

 

“Get away from there,” I said.

 

He didn’t move.

 

Then—a scream.

 

Not ours.

 

From the house next door.

Something crashing.

A woman’s voice calling her son’s name.

Then another—closer—shouting, “The goats! The goats are gone!”

 

I opened the shutters.

 

The canal was gone.

 

Or rather, it was everywhere.

 

A wide, moving sheet of black water, pulling trees at the root, lifting walls, sweeping baskets, animals, mats—anything not nailed to the earth.

 

A cart floated past, upside down.

 

Then the first wave hit.

 

It didn’t knock. It entered—low at first, through the back wall, like a thief.

Then fast.

Fierce.

Angry.

 

We screamed.

 

I pulled Aru to me. Meera grabbed the rice sack and slung it over her shoulder without thinking. The potter—bless him—tried to save the clay gods from the hearth. They fell. Broke. One rolled under the cot and was never seen again.

 

The second wave shattered the front door.

 

We ran.

 

The water came with us.

 

Outside, someone shouted, “To the neem tree! To the neem tree!”

 

Another voice—older, rasping: “It’s too late!”

 

We climbed—stumbling, barefoot, soaked. The mud sucked at our feet like it meant to keep us. A board struck the side of the kiln and splintered. Pots tumbled into the water, bobbed once, then broke like they’d never been made.

 

Aru slipped.

 

I caught him.

 

Meera turned to help—then cried out. A plank had hit her leg. She limped, teeth gritted. Still ahead of me.

 

We reached the foot of the hill near the temple. That was the plan—always the temple. Highest ground. Strongest stone.

 

We passed a broken wall near the edge of the potter’s yard. Something metal glinted beneath it.

 

A bent mask.

 

I picked it up without thinking. It was painted like a lion’s face—one used in village dramas. Splintered. Damp. The strap broken. A stage prop.

 

I turned it over. Frowned.

 

Then dropped it and ran.

 

The third wave didn’t come with water.

It came with noise.

 

A sound like the sky collapsing.

 

We turned.

 

The kiln exploded—fire meeting flood, the hiss louder than thunder.

The roof of the potter’s shed lifted and twisted, spinning once in the air before slamming into the neighbor’s house.

 

Screaming. Screaming.

Too many voices.

Some in prayer.

Some in nonsense.

Some already gurgling.

 

Meera reached the first stone step.

 

Then the ground beneath her shifted.

 

She gasped—tried to grab the tree trunk beside her—

but the bark was slick.

 

I shouted her name.

 

She looked back at me.

 

And she was gone.

 

No splash.

No cry.

Just… gone.

 

Swept sideways into the dark like a thread pulled from a garment that doesn’t even notice it’s unraveling.

 

I lunged after her—

but the water caught my legs.

 

I nearly dropped Aru.

 

He was screaming now—fists clenched in my hair, eyes wide with the terror of something too big to be real.

 

I held him to my chest and ran—limping, sliding, half-crawling.

 

I don’t remember reaching the steps.

 

Only climbing.

 

Only the temple’s stone beneath my knees.

 

Only Aru in my arms.

 

Only the weight of one name screaming in my head like it might bring her back.

​

​

Epilogue

​

I woke with the sun on my face.

 

No room. No walls. Just sky—soft, unassuming. The earth stretched around me, vast and rinsed clean, as if nothing had ever lived here.

 

I sat up slowly.

 

My clothes were torn. My hands caked in mud. There was no kiln. No temple. No neem tree. No Aru. No Meera.

 

Only silence. And something missing I didn’t know how to name.

 

I walked.

 

The path back wasn’t marked, but my feet knew it. The wind had erased my steps, but the silence remembered. I moved without hunger, without purpose, without anything tugging at me from behind or ahead.

 

Then I heard it.

 

“Ah, Narada,” said a voice. Cheerful. Familiar. “There you are. I’ve been looking for you.”

 

I turned.

 

Lord Vishnu was stepping lightly across the ruins—smiling, unhurried, as if the broken walls and scattered bodies were just props from a forgotten play.

 

He looked me over—mud-streaked, shaking, still stunned.

 

“You look awful,” he said kindly. “Rough scene, was it?”

 

I couldn’t speak. My throat was thick with grief, with loss, with something deeper than either.

 

He strolled past me, pausing to study the husk of a roof beam jutting from the mud. Then he turned back with a mischievous glint in his eye.

 

“All that,” he said, gesturing wide, “and still no glass of water?”

 

I stared at him.

 

He shrugged. “Ah well. Easy to forget, isn’t it?”

 

He stepped closer, his voice softening.

 

“You’re suffering,” he said. “I see that.”

 

I lowered my head. “They were real. I held them. I loved them. They—”

 

“They were beautiful,” he said gently. “But they were never yours to keep.”

 

I sank to my knees. “Why does it hurt so much?”

 

He crouched beside me.

 

“Where does this pain come from, Narada?” he asked. “You knew about Māyā. You knew all the teachings. You could explain them better than most.”

 

I shook my head.

 

“And yet,” he continued, “as soon as you stepped into the world—just to fetch a glass of water—you fell under the spell.”

 

He looked out over the wreckage with a kind of affection.

 

“Pleasure, pain, family, fear, joy, grief… You knew it was illusion. But you forgot.”

 

He smiled—not unkindly, but with something deeper.

 

“That is the power of Māyā. Not just to trick the ignorant—but to enchant even the wise.”

 

I buried my face in my hands. “I forgot who I was.”

 

He stood.

 

“That’s why we do these little rehearsals,” he said. “To remind you.”

 

He extended a hand.

 

“Come. Let’s try the scene again.”

 

I hesitated.

 

Then looked down.

 

At my feet lay a brass cup.

 

Dusty. Empty. Unchanged.

​

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