BUTTERFLY

GREEN AND YELLOW

Impostors run amok among children who lack dreams. Order is a weapon, always firing bullets in the hands of the oppressor.

I couldn't understand the old woman's words. 'God is omniscient,' Mistress Seli always said. But how could he be omniscient when he didn't even know who came in and out of his world?

And was God a man? So the same thing that created us is the same thing that created us?

"I don't understand." I said in confusion.

My eyes shifted to my hands with dried blood on them. I wasn't sure where it had gotten on me, but I knew it wasn't mine. I hadn't bled enough to dip my palm into it. Whoever it belonged to must have been in very bad shape.

Were they killing someone for a sacrifice!

"Is God like us?" I asked the old woman, but my eyes were still on my hands. I felt like if I remembered the owner of this blood, I would remember everything.

"What did you expect, a bear with wings?" the old woman said grumpily and took a few steps towards me, supported by her cane.

"But then he can't help me." I said, looking up at her. I closed my palms tightly, as if I was squeezing something. My muscles were tense, I felt like I was going to lose control.

They had sacrificed my whole life for me to come here, I had gone through hell for God to cure the disease, and for what? For women to gather and kill me because I was going to approach a human!

What was the point of calling a human a god!

"Even if he can help, you can't reach him." She said and took a few logs from the wood lying by the door and threw them into the iron box whose fire was dying out.

So the butterflies that had been sent here for centuries had all died, before they could tell God their troubles!

But what difference would it have made even if they had told their troubles to a human being?

God wasn't real, it would have been absurd. A god who created us and then disappeared?

"I want to go back home." I said, as if I was tired of the truth. I could feel my breath getting short.

I wanted to go home to my flowers, to my brother and sister, I wanted to go back to Mistress Seli, and even to the king and queen. For the first time in my life I was so far away from home, and that was enough for me.

"Are you sure you have a home to go back to?" The old woman's words made me even more tired, I took a few steps back and barely sat on the bed, my stomach in my mouth.

This woman had fired me, I should have left, but I didn't want to leave without information, and I was sure I would faint if I stood up.

"Yes, they sent me away, but they had to. Everyone thinks this is the solution." I said and took a few deep breaths, trying to get rid of my nausea. "But I have to go ma'am, I have to tell them the truth. Dozens of butterflies have come here and more will come. I have to tell them that coming here won't do any good." I continued.

The old woman shook her head and walked slowly to the door. I was waiting for her to kick me out again, but she had closed the door.

"You'll get me killed at my age." She grumbled and sat down in a small chair. She exhaled a tired breath, her eyes looking at me thoughtfully.

"As far as I know, there is no going back, but God only knows if there is a way. Don't be fooled by his resemblance to us, there is nothing he can't solve if there is a way to reach him." She said, I think she felt sorry for me.

My shoulders slumped, I couldn't go home, I couldn't reach God, I couldn't even live. So what was I going to do?

And I didn't really believe that God could help me when he didn't even know about his own country.

I listened to the sound of the fire coming from the iron box for a while, even though the sun was near the zenith, it was very cold outside. Whereas in my country spring used to be warm. Although the climate here now seemed more like autumn than spring.

"Are you handy?" the woman asked after a short silence. I took my eyes off the iron box and turned them to the woman.

"I know about gardening, ma'am." I said, of course I understood what she meant. She wasn't going to fire me, but she was trying to see if I could help her. Maybe whether she fired me or not depended on that. After all, no one would want to take someone who would be a burden, especially at her age.

We listened to the fire in the iron box in silence for a while longer. I think we were both thinking about what we should do. As the feeling of tiredness and nausea slowly passed over me, I wanted to wipe the sweat that had accumulated on my forehead, but I couldn't put my dirty hands on my face. I had already retreated to ask the woman for a handkerchief.

"What did you do where you came from?" she asked, breaking the silence and taking her cane in both hands.

Apparently she had decided to help me during the silence. I guess I had to stay with her until I found a solution to all this. I was having a hard time navigating my way through all that was happening so fast, and I didn't think I was thinking straight.

"I am a princess, ma'am, but I do the gardening for the palace." Maybe she would have kicked me out of the house, thinking I was useless, but even if I lied, she would have found out anyway. After all, I knew nothing about anything except gardening.

The woman shook her head and got up from her seat. "Princess." She said, heading for another door in the house.

"Come and see how much you know about gardening, princess." She said, emphasizing the last word.

Excited, I got up from my seat and followed her. We went up to a small kitchen and then through another door into a small garden.

I glanced around the garden; a little further away was a forest of small trees, and to the right was an area where a few vegetables and fruits were growing. Judging by the dormancy of the plants, it is definitely the season of autumn.. But the plants had not yet turned yellow at all.

I approached the tiny cherry tree in the center of the garden. I was surprised to see a tree bearing fruit for the first time in my life, even though it was so small.

I guess this was the maximum growth of the trees here. Because it was a very old tree.

"Did you grow up and bear fruit?" I said, dumbfounded. Then I touched its leaves and smiled. The tree immediately reacted to me and shook its leaves and became upright. I couldn't help laughing, I think it was trying to say 'I'm already big'.

"Are you talking to the tree?" the woman said and came to me. There was surprise in her voice.

This woman cured me with a book, didn't she! She even mended my broken bones in a few hours.

It wasn't strange that she healed me in a few hours, but was it strange that I talked to the tree?

"Flower butterflies can talk to plants, ma'am, I don't think there is such a thing in this world?" I asked.

"Stop calling me ma'am, my name is Alua. And don't call me by my first name, just call me grandma. At least people will think I am your grandmother." She said and handed me a cherry she plucked from the tree. I nodded and took the cherry she handed me.

"Taste it, does the tree say why it tastes like this?" she said right after.

When I bit into the cherry in my hand, I suddenly coughed with the field like poison that filled my mouth. It wasn't bitter, it was horrible.

When the tree dropped its leaves because of my reaction, I immediately tried to fix my disgusted expression and smile.

"It's probably the soil, we'll fix that." I said to the tree. Its fallen leaves lifted a little, but I could feel the sadness on it.

"Okay, the gardening is yours then, you can stay here and help me until we find a solution." I smile when she said that. It was good that she was thinking the same thing as me.

*******

A sparrow was flapping its wings to get the message on its thin wrist as fast as possible. In addition to the bad weather, it had encountered a flock of crows and managed to escape with a few scratches. But the fast falling snow and the wind had frozen his wound, creating a risk of gangrene.

He kept flying without giving up. Despite his tiny body, he kept flapping his wings to deliver the message thanks to his great determination.

Even with his little mind, he understood how important the message on his wrist was from the panic and fear he felt when it was given to him. There was pure fear in the man who gave this message.

There was trouble in the demon cliffs, perhaps they were nearing the end of the world.

When he saw the great fortress built at the foot of the high mountains by its lights, he narrowed his eyes, folded his wings and turned towards the fortress. He knew which window to land on, thanks to the instincts he had been told to do his job well.

His eyes involuntarily closed as a warm light hit his face through the embroidered window.

He had already realized that it was his last mission when he was wounded in the crow attack, and accepting this, he let himself crash into the window. Because no matter how hard he tried, he would not be able to land properly, he would die. He would rather die in his sleep.

Just as the sparrow's tiny body was about to hit the embroidered window, the window opened and a beautiful woman's hand reached out and caught him.

"Look at this one." The woman said with a smile. She gently took the sparrow inside and closed the window. She took the tiny animal between her palms and slowly increased the heat in her hands. After a while, the sparrow opened his eyes, albeit squinting, and looked into the red eyes of the woman who had saved him.

"Hello." The woman said with a loving smile on her face and looked at the sparrow's wounds on my body with wet consumption. Then the message on his wrist caught her eye. She picked it up, opened and glanced at it. Even though her eyebrows were furrowed, the smile on her face had not faded.

"You have come a long way, little bird." She said and the note burned between her fingers. "It seems a demon has invaded God's lair." She continued. The red color in her eyes exploded like a flame.

*******

I put the bottom of the bucket in my hand on top of the snow and drew a smiley face inside the circle I had created and continued on my way.

The fountains were frozen because of the winter cold and Grandma was trying to open the fountain with hot water. In the meantime, she had sent me to get water from the stream near the house so that we wouldn't run out of water.

I grabbed the handles of the bag on my back, the bucket bouncing noisily against my leg with every step I took. I knew the way as I had done this several times since winter had arrived.

It had been three months since I had been here, I think, and I think the only thing that had changed since then was that things had gotten better between me and Grandma .

Even though she was grumpy, I could feel that she was warming up to me and that she liked me. In fact, her similarities to Mistress Seli made it much easier for me to get along with her.

Getting closer to God was something we were still thinking about. Grandma was secretly trying to gather information from people she knew, but we still hadn't found a solution.

In the meantime, to avoid suspicion if I was spotted, I had learned about the world of the gods. The city I was in now was called Matsuri, for example. The god Beruka was extremely generous and benevolent, so the people lived in prosperity. Children didn't starve to death like in my world. I liked this detail very much and I envied it.

Also, anyone from the people could appear before the god whenever they wanted. When I heard that, the first thing that came to my mind was to go and ask to appear before him as a commoner. But Grandma told me that the women of the god examined everyone who came before entering. Of course, we were tempted Grandma to go and talk to god, but one of her friend told us that there was a rumor among the people that the women entered the minds of those who came and examined why they had come. Although there was no clear information, it was not a situation that could be risked.

So we were still pretty much where we were.

And I had been to the city a couple of times! We went shopping, it was the most beautiful and stressful experience of my life. At first, the people shouting to sell their wares and the huge crowd of shoppers made my heart sink. But then the riot of the stalls blew my mind.

Grandma told me that soon I would be able to go shopping on my own. I didn't know if I could do it, but I liked the fact that she didn't treat me like a toy that could break at any moment. For example, how many times had she sent me alone to buy water? Even though there was a chance I might get caught in a storm. But she knew I could take care of myself.

Especially when she found out that my resistance to the cold was higher than that of the people here, she gave me more work.

Apart from all this, the biggest shock was to learn that the beast that roamed next to your grandmother was a donkey. When I thought about the donkeys in my world, there was almost no resemblance between them.

As far as I understood, the people here had not yet evolved like us. Animals were still animals, people were still people. Even though I had more or less learned the names of the animals thanks to a handbook, it seemed to take me a long time to get used to the original form, especially the butterflies.

Some of them were scary, especially the cockroaches!

As I trudged through the snow in the forest, I drew another smiley face. I liked working for Grandma . When she gave me a task, the bad feelings that had settled in me since I came here disappeared.

When I reached the creek in the middle of the forest, which was frozen in some places, I looked for a place to fill the bucket with water. When I saw a place on the bank that was not yet frozen, I went there. I did not forget to draw a smiling face.

I was humming to myself the melody of the song Mistress Seli used to sing to me as a child.

Taking care not to step on the ice, I squatted on the edge of the stream and dipped the bucket into the water. Grandma always shivered from the cold while doing this, and remembering this made me smile. She was an incredibly strong woman, even though she was old, but she was very much affected by the cold.

It crossed my mind a few times to ask her why she lived alone, but I didn't bring it up for fear of breaking her heart. Not a single person had come to visit her since I arrived.

I stared at my reflection in the flowing water for a while, the setting sun hiding behind the clouds, so I could see my smile even though it was slightly dark.

I let out a deep sigh and the melody swirling in my mouth slowly faded away. Those horrible feelings had returned and sent shivers down my spine. I shook my head from side to side, I didn't know the source of these feelings, but it was as if I didn't want to know.

I took the water filled bucket out of the water and stood up. The song I had just sung had faded away, I didn't want to continue.

When I turned around, taking care not to slip on the ice, I saw someone a few meters ahead of me. I hadn't noticed him before, and when I suddenly startled in fear, the bucket in my hand threw me off balance.

Although I tried to keep my balance, I slipped on the ice and had to take a few steps backwards.

I involuntarily let out an involuntary high pitched scream as I fell knee deep into the stream. The bucket still in my hand shook and most of the water spilled on me.

I staggered a few times in the stream, but when I managed to regain my balance without falling, I looked up at the person. A man was sitting on the ledge of a tree with his eyes closed.

Was he asleep? In the middle of this snow?

I looked down at myself and was angry that I was soaked. I had a mission and I couldn't mess it up. Grandma would never send me shopping, I couldn't even manage to take water.

I dipped the bucket in the water again, filled it up and left the creek and put the bucket on the ground in anger. At the same time I was checking to see if the man had moved.

I picked up the soaked corner of my coat and squeezed the water out of it, but it was impossible to dry. Grandma was definitely going to scold me!

With a deep sigh, I picked up the bucket and looked at the man again. He was still standing still. I couldn't help but frown. Was he really sleeping here in this weather!

I took a few steps closer to the man to see if he was breathing, but I kept my distance in case he moved towards me.

"Excuse me, sir." I called out, even though I was hesitant about it. But when there was no response from the man, I took a step closer and looked at his chest. He didn't seem to be breathing, his chest hadn't moved at all.

"Are you all right?" I asked, alarmed.

What was I supposed to do if he was dead, how could I help him? What if he wasn't dead and was waiting for me to get closer to him?

As I was thinking this, the man suddenly opened his eyes and I couldn't help being startled. He looked at my eyes, then at my clothes and the bucket in my hand. He raised his eyes and looked at my hair and then back at my eyes. I took a step back involuntarily, the lack of emotion in his gaze and his yellow eye color scared me.

"I'm fine, but will you be fine, ma'am?" He said and got up from the tree. I realized he had a sword when he sheathed it at his waist. His yellow eyes seemed to glow, maybe I was scared and made it up. But I think this man was threatening me.