A spark lit up the dark cavern as two stones collided near the pile of dried pine needles. A face was illuminated for a second before the flame died out. The face belonged to a young woman with tanned skin, and small light brown freckles sprinkled on her cheeks and nose. A wisp of burnt orange hair hung in a tight coil over one of her brilliant blue eyes. Another spark. This time, the flame seemed to want to stay for longer, but it wasn’t long till it was out again. More of the girl was illuminated. She was wearing a dirty light blue dress, and boots that used to keep her feet warm, but no longer did. She was wearing a jet-black cloak, tied around her neck. The cloak was the only thing keeping her warm. Kneeling on the stone cold floor, she slammed the two stones together, in one last attempt to start a fire. The nearest pine needle caught the spark, then twisted inward as the flame engulfed it, and spread. Warmth at last.
Below the cave there was a small village in the valley. The villagers rarely left the village. The only way out was over the mountains. Before, each month, twenty men would set off over the mountains to a marketplace in a nearby village in search of things that the mountains didn’t already provide them with.
Many animals lived in the surrounding mountains, and the ground was extremely fertile. One of the mountains had once been an active volcano, but its flame had long ago died out. Beautiful flowers, and the sweetest fruits and vegetables imaginable grew in these fertile lands. Underneath the tallest of the five mountains lay the greatest treasure of the town. A gold mine. The town sparkled with gold. Every building in town was encrusted with it.
Fifty or so years ago, around the time of the last trip to the outside world, a man named Abbas had brought back a flower seed. The woman who had sold it to him had called it an Azra Flower. He planted that seed, and it grew into a flower. A flower of a color he had never seen before: blue. The whole village came to see the flower, and after seeing it, they all wanted one of their own. Abbas called this new color azra, after what the woman had told him. As soon as the flower started germinating, people started coming to his door begging for seeds in exchange for anything he wanted. Soon Abbas became the richest man in town, turning the town blue.
Slightly less than 20 years ago, Abbas had a daughter. She had curly, burnt orange hair, tanned skin, freckles, and eyes the color of the flower. He named her Azra, after his flower. No one in the village had ever seen any color of eyes other than brown. Every one came to see the girl with the strange eyes, just as they had done with the flower years before.
A couple of years after Azra was born, her mother died while giving birth to twin boys. By her next birthday, her father had already married an evil woman named Jala.
Azra was beautiful, there was no doubt about it. Everyone praised her for her beauty, yet people wouldn’t dare go near her. Life at home wasn’t any better. She hated being there. Her younger siblings constantly went out of their way to make her life harder than it already was. Jala would blame anything that her own children would do wrong on Azra, and Abbas was just getting more violent with every passing day.
Azra was about 10 or 11 when her father’s violence started to trickle out into the outside world. Abbas was known as a kind man in the village, always willing to share his wealth with those who needed it. But with his family, he was selfish and violent. He would often sit alone in his room, counting his gold coins. Every once in a while Jala would intrude on his solitude to tattle on Azra. He would subsequently call for Azra, and slap her on the face, or whip her with a belt if there was one in reach. She had quickly learned where he kept his belts, and would always try to stand as far away from them as possible. The day her father’s violent side was exposed to the outside world was the day Azra first screamed for help. She walked into his room shaking with fear as always. He was standing there waiting for her, holding a belt. Just as he was about to strike her, she screamed. She had never let herself scream before. His face turned red, and he started yelling at her. People from all around the village came to see what the source of the noise was. The people surrounded the house, and peered through the windows. They saw a young girl being tormented by her father. For the first time they saw who Abbas truly was.
The next day no one in the village remembered what had happened to Azra. It was as if it never happened. Except that it had. Azra was the only one who remembered it. Azra no longer got beaten by her father, but the outside world still ignored her. Life carried on like this for a couple of years.
One morning, when Azra was almost 20, she woke up to find her father staring down at her. “What do you want from me,” she asked him, backing towards the far corner of the bed, dragging her woolen blanket with her.
“Jala is dead,'' he announced. “One of her children went to her early this morning, and found her dead.”
“What does this have to do with me?” Azra asked confused.
“Everyone thinks you did it,” he replied, “and frankly, I'm not disagreeing with them. You’re the only one in this house who disliked her.”
“But I didn’t do it!” she exclaimed.
“And who’s going to believe that?” He said as he walked out of her room, slamming the door behind him.
Everyone thought that she had committed a crime, and her father was right, no one was going to believe her if she said otherwise. She had to leave. Azra stuffed her bag with as many of her thingsas she could, put on her boots, tied her cloak around her neck, and ran. She ran away from the town, towards the mountains. She ran until she could run no more. It was almost dusk when she found a small cave to spend the night in. It was rapidly getting colder. She needed a fire.
Once the fire had been built, she looked over the cliff at the village beneath her. It truly was beautiful. The gold and blue of the rooftops sparkled in the moonlight, sending specks of light around to every mountain, mimicking the stars.
The stars were a whole other sight. Azra had never realized the immensity of the night sky before. Normally when looking up at the sky from the village the only things visible were the bright golden rooftops. Now when she looked up, she saw sparkling dots, high up in the sky. She had no clue that the world could look like this.
That night, she couldn’t sleep. She didn't know if it was the bitter cold that was keeping her up, or the thoughts roiling around inside her head. She had so many questions. Who killed Jala? Why would they want to kill her? Why did everyone suddenly suspected her? She lay awake thinking. The killer had to be someone living in her house, that was for sure. There was no way to get in without the golden key that hung from her father's belt at all times. None of Jala’s children would have done it. They were all too little. There was no way that Jala had killed herself. She was selfish, just like Abbas. She only cared about her wellbeing. That and making Azra’s life horrible. The only other person living in her house was her father. “Of course!” No one would have ever suspected it. The only one who knew how he truly felt about Jala was Azra. He hated her. He hated her just as Azra had hated her. But Jala had given him an excuse to hurt Azra, so he kept her around. The rest of the village just thought he was a loving husband and father. They still believed those lies even after what they had seen all those years ago. How was that possible? Now Azra knew that her father was the killer, and that something was manipulating the village.
When Azra finally fell asleep, she had a dream. The most vivid dream she had ever had. It was of her father when he was a young boy, about the age she was now. He was standing in front of a stand of seeds, in an obscure marketplace. There was an old woman standing behind the stand. She had the same blue eyes that Azra had. The old woman picked up one of her seeds and handed it to Abbas. “An Azra flower seed” she said, as she handed the seed over. “ Plant it, and you will get what you want most.”
“What do you mean?” he asked.
“Wouldn't you want to be able to control everyone?’
“Yes.”
“Then do as I say. Plant this seed once you get back to your town. Anyone near it will think what you want them to think, and believe what you want them to believe. Plant as many as you can, surrounding the whole village.” The boy stood there for a moment with his mouth open in amazement.
“Is there any way for me to lose the power?” Abbas asked.
“Yes. If you die, or if all the flowers are destroyed, the power will be lost.” She paused for a second while Abbas reflected on what she just said. “There are some people who are immune to the control of the flower.” That caught the boy’s attention.
“Who?” he asked anxiously.
“Anyone with eyes the color of the flower,” she replied. “ So do you want it?”
Suddenly Azra was awake. The sun was just coming over the opposite mountain. She looked over the cliff. Rows and rows of blue flowers encircled the town. There were at least a couple hundred on each mountain. There was no way to get rid of them without doing irreparable damage. She could kill him…
No. There must be another way. She was immune. How? There must be a reason? Was it something to do with her mother? She searched her mind for memories of her mother. She could barely picture her anymore. Finally she found a memory. The last time she saw her mother before she died. Her mother's name was Nadia. The two of them were out in the field of Azra flowers. Azra was spinning in circles around her mother, who was heavily pregnant. Nadia’s straight hair was blowing in the wind. She smiled lovingly at her daughter. Azra saw the smile; it distracted her from her spinning. Suddenly she lost her balance and fell into her mother's lap. The two erupted in laughter. Azra picked a flower and gave it to her mother. Nadia took it, and kissed it. Azra laughed. “Eat it!” Azra said in between bursts of laughter. Nadia delicately plucked a petal of the flower, put it in her mouth, then swallowed.
“Delicious!” Nadia exclaimed. Azra laughed again.
All of a sudden Nadia bent over in pain. “What happened,” asked Azra, terrified. Her mother looked up and smiled.
“You are going to be a big sister,” she replied. “Now, help me up.” Azra did as she was told, but something didn’t seem right. Something was different about her mother, but she couldn’t figure out what it was.
Azra brought herself back to reality. She was back in the cave, alone again, but now she knew what was different. When her mother had looked up at Azra, her eyes were a different color. They weren’t hazel anymore, they were blue.
Down in the town, everyone was searching for the girl with the blue eyes. They didn’t know why, but they were doing it anyway. Usually they tried to stay as far away from her as possible. No one knew why they did that either. Suddenly there was a voice in their heads. “Once she has been found, and captured, there will be a feast. Everybody will be invited. Finally we will be rid of evil in this town.”
The search continued as Azra left her cave, and descended towards the city, picking flowers as she went. When she was halfway down the mountain, she saw villagers holding pitchforks and other weapons. They were looking for her. The rest of her way down, she was on her hands and knees. Finally, she had reached the entrance to the town. It had taken her longer than she had expected. All she needed to do now was find a source of food or drink to put the flowers in. Something that everyone would eat or drink eventually.
Water.
The town’s water supply came from a river down one of the mountains. There was a large pipe system underground that brought it to every house. She had to somehow get to the river without being seen. The river just so happened to be on the complete opposite side of the village. The fastest way would be through the village. That would be impossible… But what if she went over the village. The buildings were close enough to each other, so getting across wouldn’t be that difficult. She just had to make sure no one could see her, but who looked up anyways.
She climbed up the wall, and jumped onto the first roof. The gold was scorching. It burned her hand. She would have blisters after this. She made her way over to the other side of the roof, then leaped. Pain surged through her body every time she landed. She was about half way across the town when the first person spotted her. A young woman was sitting in the shade taking a break from the heat. The woman had looked up for barely a second when she saw a young girl leaping from roof to roof. She saw the girl, and recognized her immediately. The young woman hesitated for a second as two voices fought against each other in her head, until one of them one, and she called out. “She’s here!”
People were now coming for Azra, but she didn’t care. She had to get these flowers to the river. She leaped onto the last rooftop, climbed down its side, then ran to the river as fast as she could. She dumped all the flowers she was holding into the river, then frantically grabbed as many more as she could around her, and threw them in as well.
The noise of the stampede was growing louder. There was no way she could escape it. She stuffed the last flowers in her reach into her dress pockets just as the mob arrived. In an instant she was knocked out cold.
She woke up in a cage. The sun light was blinding. She looked around. Her cage was in a large grassy field. There were long tables all around her, filled with heaps of food. Every person in the village seemed to be there, celebrating. Even her father. They were celebrating her capture, and soon her death. She leaned against the bars of the cage, and stuck her hands in her pockets, and found the flowers. Something gurgled. It was a pot of soup, large enough to feed the whole town. She looked around to make sure no one was looking. No one had even realized that she had woken up. She took the flowers out of her pockets, and carefully threw them into the boiling pot of soup. It was only a matter of time before the soup would be eaten.
Finally someone realized that she was awake. It was her father. “Azra.” His voice boomed loudly. “Your reign of terror on this town is over, we have captured you. You killed Jala, murdered her in her sleep. The punishment for murder is your life. Any last words?”
“Here's an idea,” she said. “Why don’t you be civilized for once, and finish your meal before you have at me. I believe there is still a humongous pot of soup waiting to be eaten.”
“Fine, the killing will happen after the feast is done!” Everybody cheered. Bowls of soup were dished out, and passed to everyone. Once everyone had received a bowl, Abbas announced that they could start eating. They picked up their spoons, put the soup in their mouths, and then swallowed. Nothing happened.
Suddenly someone screamed in pain. It was the young woman Azra had seen before. Once the pain had passed, she looked up. Her eyes were blue. It had worked. And all of a sudden everyone was in pain, and then everybody’s eyes were blue. They were free.
They all turned towards Abbas. His eyes were blue now too. A sea of blue eyes stared at him. He stood there confused for a second, before realizing what had happened. He had lost his power. He ran as far and as fast as he could, never to be seen again.
The townspeople dropped whatever they were holding, and hugged the nearest person in sight. For the first time in fifty years they were free to have their own thoughts. Azra had done it. She had saved her people, and for the first time in what felt like forever, she smiled.