A novel written by Sophie Nougué / Part 1

-Tomorrow, I bring you to the source

-Tomorrow?

The little man’s gaze carries the World and its stories. Those that have been written for thousands of years in the roots of trees and the water of rivers. He has knowledge of the invisible, the earth, the wind and the stars. His spirit intrudes into my cells. For several days now, I have known that he has been preparing to welcome the source that springs from the volcano, the source of fire, that which is born at the heart of the earth and crosses the rocks. The mother of all sources. It sinks to the ocean and offers it the memory of creation.

-You are in the eighth stanza of your eighth life, you are an old soul, you have enough strength and wisdom to transmit the secret of Water now. It’s not me who decides, it’s she who chose you.

I put my steps in his footprints. He sneaks up with an animal-like dexterity. Before leaving, he said “we will walk for days and nights, we will eat what the forest has to offer, there is everything everywhere.” You just have to reach out. You will not sleep. You will be like flowing water without ever stopping. Two days and two nights and then we’ll get to the source. ”

I listened to it without flinching. I don’t care about the tiredness, the hills to climb from those to hurtle down. I want to bathe in the spring. Nothing is more important than immersing my body in the water of the origins.

For hours and hours, the forest transmits its energy to me and inhibits my fatigue. The man is walking or running through the leaves that lacerate my arms and face. I hear the rustling of the grass in its path, I can no longer see it, I can never catch it. He spins, he runs, he steals his body is carried by invisible forces. I drink, I sweat, I fill my canteen, plunge my head into the river, I leave, I run to catch it, my temples beat. I slip, I slip, I fall, get up, I leave, I don’t want to lose it. It has been going on for hours. Descend the valleys, survey the hills, dive into the rivers, set off again. Find the source. The forest is more and more dense, more and more high.

The intense pace of the race is right about my reason. I haven’t been thinking for a long time. I’m in the breath and only the breath lives in me. My guide speaks. I say yes. Yes, I don’t know. Yes, I am fine. Yes, continue, advance, walk, run! I dream of water. Bathing, plunging my head into the womb.

It has been dark for a long time. Litle man says that we are going towards the light. I take his word for it. I go forward, guided by invisible, irresistible, powerful forces. I am carried by the energy which, as the hours go by, transforms into a trance. I don’t feel tired. I’m so happy to be there. It has been a long time since I have received such a gift, such harmony with the power of the forest, of the earth. The night birds sing everywhere around us, it is piercing, sweet, it coos, it flies away, it flaps its wings, from time to time when I look up, I see the light of the stars in the hole in the treetops. The guide speaks to me.

– This tree, you see this tree?

I touch the deeply rooted trunk, I imagine its height, sweat runs in my eyes, my times beat. I have not seen for a long time, I feel the sap circulating under my fingers. I read the height and the age in the ribs of the bark, yes I see this tree, yes, I hear what it tells me.

– this tree when it turns its leaves, it’s going to rain. He turns his leaves to collect water and drink it. The tree, he knows before everyone else that the rain is coming.

The race begins again. I hear his body squeezing through the leaves, that’s all I know about him. He’s there somewhere. He wears a yellow t-shirt and curiously when I think I have lost his track, a lightning bolt puts me back on his track.

I run to catch him, he guides me with his voice. He knows exactly where I am.

– snakes? Are there snakes? Should I step on a snake?

– I’m the snake, you can’t step on me. I hear her laughter in the leaves.

(Following next episode … soon)