Narana's Strange Journey

#####Narana’s Strange Journey

It was a bitterly cold but sunny day when Narana set off on her long walk back to her village. She had been staying with her sister in the hills, and now she was returning to her husband and children on the coast.

With her snow-shoes, shaped like tennis rackets, Narana was able to walk easily across the soft snow. But suddenly the weather changed. The wind grew stronger and stronger, whipping up the snow, and poor Narana could hardly see where she was going. Soon a blizzard was raging, and the wind was so fierce that it knocked her off her feet. Over and over she rolled, blown by the storm, until she found herself wedged between what seemed to be two great trees.

At last the gale died down and the skies began to clear. But Narana had no idea where she was. The hills ahead lay in four curved ridges like the fingers of a huge hand.

Everywhere there were spiky brown bushes. As night fell she reached the top of the highest ridge and found a hollow where she could shelter from the wind. Tired and miserable, she curled up and went to sleep.

In the morning Narana walked along the ridge. On one side the slopes fell away, covered in strange bushes. On the other, the hillside was marked with enormous blue streaks, like underground rivers.

She slithered down between them and began climbing the other side. She walked for hours, every now and then hearing gurgling, bubbling noises under her feet.

“What a strange place this is,” she thought. “I’ve never been anywhere like it before. I wonder where I am.”

Then she came to a great flat plateau, and in the distance she could see a vast black forest that seemed to touch the sky. Narana trudged towards it but before she could get there darkness came again and she found a large wood where she could shelter for the night.

Narana woke tired and very hungry. She ate a handful of snow to quench her thirst, but all her food had been lost in the storm. She had just started out towards the great black forest ahead when she felt the ground throb and move under her feet. Boom, boom, boom, it went, in steady beats. “It’s an earthquake!” she thought. “The ground will open up and swallow me…”

Suddenly, the air was filled with noise like crackling thunder: “Who are you and what are you doing here, where nobody ever comes?”

At first Narana could not speak. She looked all around but could see no-one. “

I—I am Narana,” she said at last to the skies, her voice trembling with fear. “I was on my journey home when I lost my way in the storm. Who are you … what are you? A mountain ghost?”

“No, I am a giant!” rumbled the voice as the earth shook again. “My name is Kinak. I sleep here all alone on the great plain so that I can stretch without crushing the villages or the trees.”

“But where are you?” asked Narana, still looking around.

“I’m underneath you, Narana. You have been climbing over me for two days. You started on my left hand and now you are over my heart. I expect you can feel it.”

“Yes. Yes I can. Oh, I do hope I haven’t hurt you.”

The earth shook again, even more violently than before, and Narana was thrown over and over … as the giant’s laughter rang out for miles across the plains.

“No, little one, you didn’t hurt me. Not even a tickle. Herds of reindeer can be a nuisance, but one human is nothing.”

The giant let out a chuckle, and Narana was once again dumped in the snow. “I first saw you when you were curled up asleep between my thumb and finger. Then you clambered down

my hand, over my wrist, up my arm and on to my stomach. That’s my beard ahead of you. But I can’t see you very well now without lifting my head and looking down my nose. Can you

climb up on to my face?”

It took Narana a long time to scale the heights to Kinak’s face. With his forest of a beard she found the best way was to go along the side of his neck and climb up his ear.

“You had better go right along to the end of my nose. I don’t want to swallow you by mistake.”

Narana asked the giant if he could whisper because she found his voice frightening.

And when he spoke, she fell over. But she still had to yell, even from his nose. “I’ll have to go soon, Kinak,” she said.

“I’m two days late and my family will be

worried to death about me.”

“Well, if you have to. But I shall miss you Narana. It’s very lonely out here some times. Oh well, at least I’ll be able to have a good stretch and roll over. I’ve not moved since I first noticed you for fear of crushing you.”

“Thank you, Kinak, that’s very kind,” said Narana. “But where am I?”

“It doesn’t really matter. Where do you live?”

“The village of Tivnu, by the sea.” “Oh, not far then. I can blow you there.

“What do you mean?” asked Narana.

“Climb on to my bottom lip and sit with your back to me.” Narana did as the giant said and sat on his lip, waiting. Far below her the earth began to rise up as Kinak breathed in deeply. He puffed gently and she flew off his lip and shot through the air, twisting and rolling and turning like a whirlwind.

A few seconds later she landed in a deep drift of snow, safe and sound. She stood up, brushed the loose snow off her - and there, just a short walk away, was the village of Tivnu.

As Narana began to walk joyously towards the houses, she thought she heard the faint sound of rumbling in the distance, like short rolls of thunder. It was almost like the sound of a giant, sobbing.