Back at the clearing, Mannat followed his routine without any delays. Inside the hut, he didn’t pick a storybook that day. He chose one about mana called ‘Road to being a magician.’ He had felt something out in the fields. He was still itchy in and around his heart. He was hoping to find something in the books. However, he regretted his choice the moment he turned the first page.

Small, neat words filled the page from edge to edge. There were almost no spaces between the barely readable words. He could hardly focus on them. Written in a flowing style of writing, the first page alone had many words that not even the dictionary acknowledged. Unfortunately, he had to put the book back in its place. Next, he pulled out a book that was four fingers thick and had no title. It was old and covered in dust, and its age was exactly the thing that got Mannat’s attention.

Its brown leather cover was old and decaying. It had lost its strength and had become flexible like paper. It had thick stiff pages. There were broken edges and missing chunks all through the book. The ink had faded in places, and the characters had lost shape. Interestingly enough, there were sketches among the words. Mannat would have felt much better if the book wasn’t written in a foreign language.

He let out a sigh. Should he get another book? It wasn’t that he was lazy, but the book spoke to him; it wanted to be read. Eventually, Mannat started flipping through its pages, just to see its content. A book so old was bound to have some secrets.

The language was made of pointy glyphs; he didn’t see a single curvy letter on the pages. Most of them made no sense, but there was one reoccurring word that looked like it would mean miasma if it was written in the kingdom's language. It was probably a coincidence. He thought. Impossible,

On the next page, there was a sketch. Drawn with charcoal, the four-legged creature –there was no way it was a wild animal-- had long hair and dense fur. It had a sunken nose, big eyes, and bigger fangs jutting out from the corner of its upper lips. The end of its limbs had sharp long claws, and it was rather menacing looking.

The sketch instantly got his attention.

Mannat flipped through the pages to see if there were other such sketches and found another one a few pages ahead.

The sketch belonged to a bipedal being that had human form, but it was bigger, with a shaper jaw, fangs, and hair all over its body. There were more: a wolf that had horns and two heads, a hairless bear with large bat wings growing from its back, a skeleton horse, walking fish. Each new sketch was more horrible than the previous one until he found the sketch of a tree growing from a round seed near the book's end. He wanted to find more about the tree as it reminded him of the conjecture he had made, but there were no more sketches in the book. If there was any information it was locked behind the language he couldn’t read.

That was the end of his little adventure.

He looked at the sketches a few times, before slowly, and carefully closing the book. Its binding was coming loose. A slip-up could have easily sent the age-old pages flying all around in the hut. That would be a tragedy for both the book and him.

Carefully, he wrapped it back in the leather cover, tightened the laces and put it where he had found it.

He had a hunch that the tree in the Witch’s garden was the one in the book. He would have liked to find more, only there were too many books, and most of them were more than three fingers wide.

His only bet was the book he had previously found -- the one with small characters and unreadable words. Unfortunately, his reading ability was too low.

He told himself that he was reading to understand the language and not to gain knowledge. The acknowledgment took out some of his nervous energy and calmed his heart. Eventually, he picked up the storybook again and sat back in the chair to read.

In the evening, he got the things together, safely tucked them away in the cabinets, stood up, and stretched. Birdcalls filled the woods with a frantic calm when he came out of the hut. It sounded weird, but that was life.

For all he knew, the songs he considered sweet and relaxing could be the birds warning other small inhabitants of a lurking predator. He listened to them with his eyes closed and saw the sketches appear one by one in his mind. They kept him occupied, making reality a drone on his ears until he had enough of them. They were frightening, thought-provoking, elusive, and nothing more than faded sketches in an old rotten book.

He put this knowledge to the back of his mind and picked up the bucket. Carved from a piece of wood, the bucket was heavy when empty and provided a good workout for the legs when filled with water. He was returning from the back of the house with a filled bucket when his foot got stuck in a root. His hands were full and he couldn’t stop the fall. The bucket fell first. It bounced twice on the ground splashing water everywhere.

Mannat let out a groan getting up and noticed a colony of ants in the path of the water.

There was an anthill downstream, and countless ants were moving in and out of it. The spilled water rolled toward them. The ants felt it with their receptors and scrambled into the hill. The water crashed into the colony like a tsunami. It took away a few soldiers that couldn’t get inside in time and flooded the tunnels. Ant’s rushed out of their hole to the surface as water bubbled out the air inside the colony.

Mannat hurriedly stood up. Of course, the ants didn’t drown. They quickly sealed off the air vents to stop the water from seeping deeper into their home, but Mannat didn’t see them acting. He was long gone when it happened. In his mind, he had already found a way to get the rabbit out of the burrows.

He had an ominous feeling the Witch’s task wouldn’t be as easy as she’d let him know.

Mannat left early. He didn’t take any detours along the way and went straight to Sardar’s home. The old man didn’t live in the residential area, but had a manor slightly away from the village. His manor was in the fields. and in the fields. It made sense for him to live where he could keep an eye on the crops. Mannat went around the village, as it was the quickest and quietest way to get to the fields. The dirt road divided into two at the edge: One went straight back into the village, and long green wheat shoots had swallowed the other. He could see the manor from there. It was just fifteen minutes of distance from the village. He could have made it earlier had he continued running, but his heart was beating too fast for him to risk it. Mannat didn’t want to meet the old man covered in sweat and panting like a dog. He would have seemed desperate, and nobody pays attention to those who are desperate.

The road was wide and well treed. It connected the village to the town, which was a half-day journey on a horse-cart. One would pass four villages on the way, and river Kismet.

Mannat didn’t have to go that far. He took a quick turn ahead and followed the road straight to Sardar’s Manor. It was two stories tall one of a kind brick home, and there were great spires rising from the top. The boundary wall alone was ten feet high and the front gate formed an arch at the top. It was made of heavy wood with iron plates bolted tight into it to increase its weight, and make it more secure.

They had kept the main gate shut, but the smaller side gate was open. Mannat could hear people talking inside. He entered through the side door and the unfettered talking, screaming, and laughing bamboozled him. There were so many people already inside his arrival didn’t draw any attention. It was like a carnival in there.

There was a great veranda at the front, a mango tree growing near the door and a crowd of people --some he knew others he didn’t. They all were Sardar’s immediate family members, nieces, nephews, sons, daughters. People tend to stick to you when you have a great amount of wealth. Among this horde of strangers was Sharmilla. She was sitting in the manor’s shade on a knitted bed, massaging the head of an elderly woman. That woman was so old her sunburnt and age-darkened skin looked like a crumpled bed sheet that hadn’t been dusted for years.

The other very many females, young and old, were busy cooking, gossiping, or playing tag. There was only one man beside them. There were as many as seven kids; the oldest among them looked to be almost ten years old.

Mannat straightened his sight and saw Sharmilla staring at him. She was wearing a long blue skirt and a matching top. Her long brown hair wasn’t braided and draped over her left shoulder. She had stopped massaging the old woman’s white head. Suddenly whispers erupted among the crowd. He heard the Witch and the blacksmith’s son among other things, and then several women looked at Sharmilla. Her shocked face instantly turned bright red from the attention. She dropped her head in panic and hid behind the old woman.

In any case, Mannat had successfully attracted the attention of everyone present.

The old woman gestured to the man at the scene, who put down the boy he was playing with and approached him. His name was… Mannat didn’t remember, but the man had a sharp set of eyes and thin lips, like a fox. He stooped an arm length in front of Mannat, glared at him and asked in an authoritative tone, “What do you want?”

“I want to meet the old man.” Mannat spat out. He didn’t mince words either.

The man turned back and yelled, “Biji, he wants to meet Bauji.” The two were ways to call the elderly with respect. The way he spoke made them sound like curse words. Mannat didn’t hear any respect in his voice.

The woman said something inaudible to Sharmilla --who was still hiding behind her-- shook her head, smiled, and gestured the man to take Mannat inside the manor.

The man grunted before he started walking. Mannat ignored his antics, but was respectful to the elder woman. He greeted her on the way with joined hands. The woman looked at him with a smile. She didn’t say anything, but her smile reminded him of his mother. Mannat smiled back.

He walked a few steps before he found Sharmilla staring at him. Their eyes met. She bit her succulent lips and hurriedly looked away to hide the blush creeping up her nape and climbing to her cheeks. He wanted to talk to her, but the man called from the door: “Are you coming or not?”

His hostility didn’t anger Mannat. It reminded him of his priority, and he quietly followed the man inside.