The cloud castle

In the desert, where even the dunes complained about the heat, a man was walking alone. His robe was flapping like a torn sail, following the rhythm of the scorching wind. Every step was careful, as if he were walking on the Sun itself. The soles of his sandals hissed every time they touched the sand. The smell of melting rubber rose to his nose. He sneezed and almost stepped on a snake.

“Oh, sorry, Snake,” he said, wiping the sweat from his eyes. “I didn’t see you. I’m almost blind from the heat.”

“At least you’re still sweating,” the snake replied.

The man nodded and sat beside the snake. It slithered closer, looking at his bulging pockets.

“A drop of water for an old friend?” the snake asked.

The man pulled out a water bottle and tilted it. The snake drank the drops in one gulp, closed its eyes in pleasure, and let out a satisfied sigh.

“Where did you get water?” it asked. “It hasn’t rained in months.”

“I collect the tears of the stars,” the man said. “At night.”

The snake looked at him with half-closed eyes, suspecting the man had lost his mind from the heat, yet it raised its leaf-shaped head and grimaced. The sky was too bright for stars, except for one.

“The stars cry, huh?” the snake asked. “Why?”

“Light travels slowly. So they still see the jungle that once grew here,” the man replied. “They can’t accept that it’s lost.”

“Useful tears though,” the snake murmured, licking its lips and looking at the man’s pockets. “Well. Where are you going?”

The man was slow to answer. How could he tell his story in just a few words?

“I used to live in a floating castle,” the man started.

The snake blinked.

“I’m sorry, what castle?”

“The one that flew,” the man replied.

The snake shook its head.

“I think your brain is finally cooked,” it said.

“My castle floated on clouds,” the man continued. “It followed the stars. I used to know the paths it followed, but it must have changed. I can’t find my family now.”

“What family?”

“My mother, father and my sister,” the man said. “We all hoped the castle would bring us to water. But it was taking too long, so I went to search for water on my own.”

“And?”

“I found it.”

The snake uncoiled.

“You found water?”

The man nodded.

“There’s so much of it,” the man said, “The rocks are always wet, so even butterflies have enough to drink.”

“Well, what are we frying here for?” The snake looked at the distance. “What’s the direction? Let’s go to your Land of Water right now!”

“I have to find my castle first,” the man said.

The snake winced, and after a pause it said:

“You might not like what you find.”

“You know something?”

“I’m telling you: you won’t like it.”

“Yet I want to know.”

The snake sighed.

“It doesn’t fly anymore, that home of yours, the castle,” it said. “It stopped wandering. It hasn’t moved in years. It sits there, under the same stars, day after day, surrounded by thorny bushes. It has no clouds now, only limestone. I know it’s the one because I met your folks, asked them for water. They threw boiling water at me. They don’t like strangers much, do they?”

“I can’t just leave them there,” the man said, rising to his feet. “I have to try. Show me the way.”

They found the castle half-buried in the sand. The thorny bushes surrounded it like a fence. Inside, the air was dry and heavy. His mother stirred the tea brewed in the tears of the stars. His sister picked the sand from her delicate dresses. His father sat on the roof, mapping constellations whose routes hadn’t changed in years.

They hugged, but even through the tears of joy, they sensed the moat between them. They spoke the same language but to each side it felt foreign.

“I came to take you with me,” the man said. “To the land I found. It has lakes, rains, trees.”

“And what would I do with so much water?” his mother asked, smiling.

“My dresses would get moldy.” His sister wrinkled her nose.

The man looked at his father, but his father turned away to gaze at the sky.

“I love these stars,” the father said. “They are familiar, safe.”

The man watched them silently across the table. His mother crumpled a napkin in her hand.

“You forgot the feeling of sand in your teeth, my son,” she said. “You forgot where you came from.”

“Thank goodness,” the man replied. “And now I want you to forget it too.”

But they didn’t want to. The limestone had sunk into eternal rest.

In the morning, the man left. The snake slithered beside him, looking at the horizon for the first signs of water.

“I don’t understand,” the man finally said. “They always wanted to find water — "

“No, they didn’t,” the snake interrupted. “You are the one who set to search for it. They always chose to stay.”

As they walked away, becoming just two dots on the horizon, the desert burned in silence under familiar stars.