SELAQ
Episode "Is this Love?" (51)

Pancalita stayed during recovery in a small hut. On the hidden land. On the north, west, and south sides stood haughty hundreds of years old trees. While on the east side there is a cliff that is quite deep.

Those trees, growing tightly resembled a sturdy fortress. Behind it lay a dark and dense wilderness. Only an occasional wind broke through the fortress, bringing news of the mysteriousness of the forest.

I don't think anyone knows where the hut is. A hut that is beautiful when day comes and the sun is shining overhead. Then curled up in the cold as the night curtain unfolded.

The path that the travelers or ascetics walk is under the cliff. While the stairs mossed towards the field, hidden among the lush thickets and full of thorns.

Below this cliff is another small hut. Where Puq Amet and Artha Prana live far from the village center. The hut was at once like a guard house for the hut hidden on top of the cliff.

Artha Prana only visited Pancalita in a recovery hut in the morning as the three-pear-high sun at the eastern end, and in the afternoon, when the parted rooster showed off his manhood.

***

The yam on the weathered table had been thrown away by Pancalita. Sneakily. Throw it into the belly of a forest crowded with ancient trees that stand mighty against age.

Only with that, Pancalita can force Artha Prana to come every morning and dusk. Delivering sweet potatoes that he really does not like.

Her beautiful lips were unlikely to ask the young man to accompany her at all times. Even though his heart was like a drunkard who could not be far from the cups of wine. His lips were too proud and authoritative to utter such an embarrassing yet intoxicating word,

 “Me company. Don't go again,”

Its appearance always impresses the prestige and height of the caste. Graceful and praiseworthy movements like a princess who every day crammed with the doctrine of adab kramama. Hand and body movements impress high civilized women on par with kings.

But in the morning that slowly went that afternoon, Pancalita was like a stupid rascal. All the elegance and prestige packed in a small pond with clear water behind the hut, lost its charm. His body was no longer upright, but was bent like a fern grass that was buffeted by the wind of nothingness.

“Why haven't you come yet,” withers with a worried face.

Pancalita almost cried incoherent. If it were not for the prestige and a set of arrogance inherent in the curse of the blue-blooded woman, he would have wanted to scream:

“Why haven't you arrived yet?”

But damned he, if he is desperate to do that. Even the guardians of honor would call him a very low and despicable human being.

“I beg to come,” whispered.

Her lips that were as beautiful as the mangosteen hemisphere trembled. His sharp nose secretes a dew-clear liquid. Pancalita could not survive in the pride of authority.

He began to bend his knees in the enormity of love-spenders.

“A... Do you feel what I feel?” lirihnya.

And the day came very slowly. Pancalita still sculpts herself under a thickly-mined banyan tree. He could not believe in doing this foolish act just for the sake of a young man he had not known for a week.

Trees and shrubs swayed in the wind. Melabai but seen mocking, cheering, laughing at him that froze like the statue of Aphrodite in Greek love mythology.

Shame and longing to be raging so one filled the space of his heart.

 “Why am I still here,” Her lamur with teary eyes.

Almost no longer able to hold a swab of tears that expand in the eye fertilizer.

“Oh Sang Hyang Agung, why don't you just create a heart that can be uprooted. Can I put in the crate and then kularung in the swift river Kokoq Putiq, let it drift far into the ocean and oscillated among the raging waves of the south sea,” savagely mengayu-dayu. Piteously.

In that agonizing despair, suddenly, one-by-one fully armed warrior heads appeared behind the stairs of the ravine. Their faces implied fatigue and hope that was starting to flare up. His footsteps were rough and hasty. Its roaring breath rivaled the sound of wind among the lined hills forming a cluster similar to a turtle's back.

“Dende!” screams of a woman.

“Dende, is that Dende Pancalita?” exclaim the woman with a hoarse voice.

Pancalita knew the woman very well. A disheveled face, thin black patches on his forehead and face. Obviously it was the traces of sweat drying up in the wind that blew away the fine dust.

“Inaq Bangkol,” Ogre Pancalita.

Her face flushed. Resisting the accumulated, mountainous outburst of feelings, burdened every inch of his suffering in that hut. So many people are worried about their fate. Even so, he realized that no one would remain silent with the calamity that befell him.

And the meeting was like affirming one very special thing. It was so precious that many people were starving, looking for it all over the forest.

Two women of different ages hugged. A moment later their shoulders shook. Soluble in haru-blue cries.

Pancalita hugged Inaq Bangkol. Wrap her hands around her waist and neck like a lion snaring prey.

“Dende Pancalita,” weaned the soldiers. They breathed a sigh of relief. Until not a few who kneel on the field is so happy.

They folded their lips, smiling happily. Even from the look of his eyes, when viewed more deeply, looks tired that whack.

Weeping Inaq Bangkol screeching. Heart's whistling. Happy and sad to be one.

Saddened? Yes sad. Inaq Bangkol, like seeing the agony creaking from the thin body of Pancalita, tinge of hair, not neatly combed. Until the clothes that stick really far from the word decent, even for the poorest kingpin in the village of Lolo.

Black color shabby fabric, perforated here and there. Winding without form. Just covering up parts of his body that shouldn't be open.

***

“Dende, we must leave here immediately,” said Inaq Bangkol with a look of uneasiness and fear.

“We have just met, the soldier also looks tired, rest a little Inaq,” said Pancalita calm the feeling of Inaq Bangkol.

“This field is stealth land!” inaq Bangkol said with a detained voice. His eyes were shaking keeping the horror.

Pancalita frowned. He did not understand what kind of fear made his foster mother, horrified not playing.

“Nearly a week I was here Inaq Bangkol and nothing happened to me?” pancalita said astonished.

“Sang Hyang Agung protects you Dende, but now we have to get out of here,” urged Inaq Bangkol again. The panicked face had not disappeared from his old face.

“What are you afraid of, aren't dozens of warriors with us?” ask Pancalita again.

“This is not about the dangers of humans, but of the jinn and demons, Dende,” replied Inaq Bangkol.

The silver-haired woman then told of the necromancers of Lolo village deployed when she was lost to the current. They were tasked with tracking his whereabouts. But strangely, in the light of the inner eye, all told of the mysterious and impenetrable wall of fire.

“This valley is enveloped in black flames,” whispered Inaq Bangkol with a vibrating sound.

Pancalita. Think about what Inaq Bangkol just said. He could hardly believe it, because during his stay in the hut it was fine. But the glare of the necromancers could not be ignored.

“When to end the fret that plagues the hearts of the villagers. The return of Dende, will also be a healer for villagers who do not sleep during the night waiting for news,” added Inaq Bangkol.

The wind whistled in the valley. Interspersed with hissing sounds as if out of thousands of stealth snakes. His voice was heart-shaking. Swinging the heart metaphysically until it feels painful.