MΛ'ƬIЯI | ΛVΛƬΛЯ

spirit tree

"Have you seen Te'rani?" Kiri asked.

Kuna't shook her head. "Sorry, I haven't seen her for a while. I thought she would be with your family"

"Oh, we've been looking for her actually" Kiri glanced at Neteyam, who stood behind her.

"She had just returned from the Tsahik's marui a while ago..." Kuna't informed, adjusting her grip on the basket she held against her hip.

"Oh...well, thank you" Kiri turned after Kuna't nodded. "Of course"

The two were hoping to find Te'rani to talk to her about everything. Neteyam began to walk away, but Kiri stopped.

She saw an ilu below her in the water. Ayu'te. She'd seen the ilu a lot, and she remembered her mother telling her the name of the ilu.

"That's her ilu" Kiri pointed out, caysing Neteyam to turn.

She tried to get Ayu'te's attention.

The ilu turned at the sound and whistled back, reaching its neck out of the water to get a better look of Kiri, who turned to her brother. 

"I think I know where she is"

In the exact moment she connected to the spirit tree, Te'rani was taken away from the loud thunder and cold ocean. She felt at peace as her mind shifted.
As if being with Eywa was all she needed to feel it. Because it was.

Her eyes closed, or rather, opened, to what looked like a memory.

She saw herself, as a child, sitting with her mother by the beach, helping her add a bead to her songcord.

The way it felt to remember her past was melancholic, in a way.

Te'rani was seated next to her mother in the soft sand, feeling nothing but warmth. She stared at the ocean ahead of her, and saw not a single person there.

She turned to see her mother, the most beautiful woman she'd ever seen. Her hair was left open. It was long, and light brown. Te'rani remembered thinking of it as a magical trait, something only her mother had.

Her mother saw a shell between her and Te'rani. She gasped slightly and lifted it up.

"Look Te'rani!" She smiled, showing the shell to her. It was purple and golden in color. Te'rani remembered that shell still. A broken shard of it was tied to her songcord.

Why? Because this memory was one Te'rani visited often.

She forced a smile for her mother, while her eyes began to sting.

Her mother put the shell down. "What happened Tani?"

A tears slipped through her eye at that. But she couldn't cry. She shouldn't. She almost never got to see and remember her mother so closely.

Te'rani looked down at the tear that managed to slip away. When she looked down, all she saw was the ocean. She was on the ocean. On it, but not in it.

She looked back up and  saw her mother offering her a hand.

Te'rani felt her throat close, another tear falling. Her mother's face. She missed her mother's face. Suddenly she wanted to ask herself how could she have survived all this long without her kind smile, her warm embrace, and her loving voice.

"Za'u" she called. 'Come'.

Te'rani saw the sky behind her mother turn orange, the sun or the giant moons not even visible anymore as she stood up.