Young
Nahtura lay beside her, clinging onto her mother’s still swollen belly, begging
Death not to steal her away. She wept at the sight of her beloved mother. Her
eyes no longer twinkled as they had been only moments ago. Her body was
weakening from the intense labor from her daughter’s early birth. Even her
luminescent smile had begun to dim. Nahtura tighten her grip on her mother, her
willingness for her to survive grew ever stronger.
“Mother,
you can’t leave me!” she cried. Her mother’s labored breaths she said calmly “Shhh
my child” caressing her seven-year-old daughter’s cheek, trying to calm her.
Nahtura held her mother’s hand to her face.
“Listen to
me Nahtura.” She strained, “I need you to promise me something” Nahtura urged
“anything, I promise, just don’t go away” but her mother grew weaker. “Promise
me” she began “promise me that you will watch out for your sister” “yes I
promise” she told her mother, tears drowning her eyes. “You’re a good girl Nahtura, I’m so proud of
you,” “no” she pleaded, her mother’s hand fell gracefully onto her stomach,
Nahtura’s eyes widen as she watched her mother’s spirit began to separate
itself from its fleshy prison. Nahtura reached for her mother’s hand with her
tiny hands. She held her hand to her cheek.
“Please,
please don’t die. I need you!” she cried. Her mother’s body grew frigid, her
father watched as his beloved wife transformed into her heavenly body. Then the
healer came in with distressing news for her father.
“She’s a
month early, her lungs are small and her heart is weak. I’m afraid she won’t
make it through the night.” “Isn’t there something you can do” her father
begged, “I’m sorry Robin, I truly am.” They whispered outside the door so
Nahtura wouldn’t hear. But through there mumbles Nahtura could piece together
what they were saying. She fell to the bed side of her stiff mother,
“Please,”
she begged Death. “You have already taken my mother, must you take the child.
Surly your hunger for human sorrow has been satisfied. But if my mother’s life
is not enough, then take from me as well. Take with you my ears, so I cannot
hear. Take my sight, so I cannot see. Take away my heart, so I cannot love.
Take whatever you’d like, just spare the life of my young sister whose life has
not yet begun.” She spoke in such determination, that Death was pleased with
her offer.
The sun
arose the next morning; her father still mourned the loss of his most trusted
companion. Nahtura woke to see that her world had gone dark, she remembered her
bargain with Death. “Take whatever you’d like, just spare the life of my young
sister” she remembered, sitting on her bed, her bare feet cascading towards the
cold wooden floor below. She sank to the
ground, feeling her way with her small hands. She crawled her way to the crib
where her sister lay. She held onto the side, pulling herself up to stand, she
stood over her baby sister; she took her hand and floated over her sister’s
face. She moved her hand down to the child’s small chest to feel the beat of
the girl’s tiny heart. It beat strongly and her breaths were long and soft. The
child jerked when Nahtura’s hand caressed her cheek, as her mother had done the
day before. The baby began to whimper like a lost fox searching for its mother.
“Shhh
little one, you don’t have to cry. Even though my sight has vanished and I will
never see your face, Death has accepted my offer and let you live. Before she
passed on mother made me promise to watch over you, and true to my word I
shall. But to you I promise to tell you of our mother and what a kind and
loving and soft-hearted women she was.” She felt the baby shiver; she felt
around for the in completed blanket that her mother has started for her. She
brought it up to her tiny chin. Nahtura leaned over the crib and kissed the forehead
of her unseen sister. Then she whispered,
“Ember”
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