Selira and the River of Voices

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Selira wandered for a long time through the strange world, until the stone path that had led her out of the first gate sloped down and flowed into a wide valley. There, a river meandered, wide and dark, yet it didn't flow like water. Instead of rushing and gurgling, a chorus of voices rose from its surface. Some sang, some laughed, some wept, others whispered so softly that the syllables were barely distinguishable. The river was alive—not of water, but of memory. Selira stood rooted to the bank. Every wave was a sound, every splash a word. She leaned forward, and in the reflection of the current, she recognized herself—not as she was, but as she had been. A child, barefoot in the sand of the village beach, laughing, her hands full of shells. She heard her own voice, young and bright, humming a song she had long forgotten. But the river revealed more. Voices she had lost: the stern admonitions of her mother, whom she had left far too soon; the laughter of a friend she had left behind in the village without a farewell; voices that perhaps came from a future that would never come. Selira knelt and listened, holding her breath. Her heart clenched. Everything she had ever loved, feared, and hoped for flowed past here, carried away in an endless current. Then a figure stepped out of the mist hanging over the water. Tall, yet changeable, as if cast from liquid silver. His skin reflected light, as if he himself were a piece of the river that had taken form. His eyes were deep and unfathomable, like two moons. "I am the guardian of the river," he spoke, and his words sounded like falling raindrops. "Whoever would cross this current must choose. You may take one voice with you, a memory that will stay with you. But all the others you leave behind, lost forever." Selira jumped in alarm. "One? Just one?" The Guardian nodded slowly. "This is what the river demands. Every traveler must carry what she can—no more, no less. Choose wisely." He held out his hand, and it was as if he could part the water with a mere touch. Selira struggled with herself. In the waters, she heard the familiar laughter of her friend—a sound that instantly warmed her heart. But beside it, another voice whispered, older, deeper: her own, from a future she hadn't yet lived. "You will be more than you believe," said this future, "but only if you have the courage to let go of the old." She felt her chest tighten. The village, her past, the people she had left behind—all of it was still a part of her. But if she held on to it, she wouldn't be able to continue on the path. Slowly, she lowered her hand into the water. Waves stretched like threads of light around her fingers, aching and burning at the same time. Finally, the voice of her own song caught hold of her, that children's song from the shore, full of hope and unbroken trust.