Читать книгу MillyLilly. Chocolate Battle - Harry Boro - Страница 7

Alright, alright, I’ve mentioned this name, Sage Keon, several times now, and didn’t really explain who he is. Actually, nobody knows where Sage Keon came from, and nobody knows his age either. Normally, MillyLilly live about two hundred MillyLilly years. The birthday records of Ambia don’t trace ages beyond thousand years because nobody can be that old. But Sage Keon’s birthday was not recorded back in thousand years. Was he older than that? Maybe. Who knew?

Nothing could be concluded from his appearance also. Yes, Keon had the snow-white long hair, typical of a very old person, but, at the same time, he had a baby face as if he was a baby that was scared in the middle of the night and his hair turned white. Was Keon’s baby face due to his healthy diet or because of some other natural explanations? It was difficult to verify. The only certain thing about Keon was rumors. And the rumors held that Keon visited all the cities of Sweetland, and that was definitely impossible to do in the average lifetime of an ordinary MillyLilly.

When Nole and Chaps came to the ceremony, the whole city was already there, and the fish was sticking out of water, waiting. Nole and Chaps squeezed in the middle of the crowd, trying to make sure that Sage Keon didn’t notice that they were a little bit late which was as usual for them.

“Cool,” whispered Nole to Chaps. “He didn’t see us.”

But when Nole raised his eyes, Sage Keon was looking right at him. Nole blushed and turned aside, and when he turned aside, he saw HER for the first time. SHE was just ten feet away, a beautiful lilly with amazing curly hair of the caramel color, big green eyes, and with two older MilliLillies – most likely her parents – at her sides.

She stared at Sage Keon who was preparing to rub the lantern, and she seemed completely absorbed in what was going to happen.

And it happened: Keon rubbed the lantern, stuck it out in the air, and the night sky, the lake, the city behind – everything was lit by the magical bluish light.

“Good MillyLilly of Ambia!” said Sage Keon. “We are here to say thanks to each other, to grasshoppers, to chipmunks, to fish, to dragonflies, to birds, to everybody who crawls, flies and runs, for being kind and caring neighbors. We are here to say great thanks to our ancestors for making the first ambia. We are here to say thanks to the stars, moon and sun.”

And everybody was nodding and saying “thanks,” “thanks,” “thanks.”

“Now, find at least three neighbors, give them a hug and say thank you!” offered Keon.

Nole decided that it was a great opportunity to get to know the new beautiful lilly he’d noticed earlier. Nole made a move towards her, but Chaps grabbed him from behind in a smothering hug.

“Thank you! Thank you!” Chaps kept saying in a voice, cracking with tears.

“Okay,” Nole barely could manage to say due to the force of the hug. “Thank… you… too.”

Grasshoppers were harmless, emotional, but actually pretty strong creatures. They were strong, probably, because of the constant jumping that make them very muscular. Nole had to catch his breath when Chaps finally let him go. The beautiful lilly was still not far from Nole, and he ran towards her. But when Nole was just steps away from the beautiful lilly, and even opened his arms to embrace her, the milly Grilly sprouted right in between and hugged Nole.

Grilly was on the chubby side and very sweaty; he was so sweaty that Nole’s face that got buried for a quick moment in the Grilly’s chest, immediately became wet.

“Thank you for finding me to give me your hug,” said Grilly.

Nole wanted to say that he didn’t actually look for Grilly, but chose not to say anything.

“Thank you, thank you,” quickly said Nole.

Grilly moved aside, and here she was, right in front of Nole, smiling and looking straight in his eyes. Nole blushed again.

“So,” she said in amazing gentle voice. “Any hugs left?”

“Y-y-es,” squeezed out Nole and, secretly making sure that Grilly is not around, opened his arms again. They hugged with Nole’s heart beating as if he was running a marathon.

“Thank you,” she said.

“Thank you,” said Nole. “Are you new in our city?

“Yes,” she said. “We just moved here a week ago from Muffinado.”

“Was it boring in Muffinado?” asked Nole.

“Not really,” said she. “My mom’s health requires her to live close to lakes, and, of course, everybody knows about the healing qualities of ambia.”

“What’s your name?” asked Nole.

“Mela. And yours?”

“Nole.”

Mela smiled and said, “Nole, may I ask you to do me a small favor?”

“Anything you want!” readily agreed Nole.

“Could you please unlock your hug? I do enjoy your passion, but it looks a little bit strange now.”

Only then Nole realized that he’d kept hugging Mela all the time they were talking. What’s more, everybody around had stopped hugging some time ago and now were watching Nole and Mela.

“I’m so sorry!” said Nole and hastily stepped back.

“It’s okay.” Mela smiled. “We can meet up and talk later.”

Mela returned to her parents. Nole turned around to look for Chaps and found him right behind.

“I’ve heard everything,” said Chaps, sweeping tears of joy off his face. “It’s so beautiful. When you two are getting married?”

“Married?” exclaimed Nole. “I don’t even know her! She might be married already.”

“It’s not a problem,” said Chaps. “I can easily divorce her if you two love each other.”

“And why would you divorce anybody?

“Because I’m a master of divorce,” humbly said Chaps. “I used to work as a divorcer.”

“Where?”

“In a divorcing company.”

“We don’t have a divorcing company,” objected Nole. “Nobody ever divorces here.”

“The company is in RaspberryJamville,” said Chaps quickly.

“I see this RaspberryJamville has a lot of interesting companies,” said Nole. “And what did you do exactly when you were divorcing couples?”

“Nothing much. I would stand in front of a couple who wants to divorce, and say, for instance, ‘Nole and Mela, with the power of a handsome grasshopper, I declare you divorced. You can spit at each other now.”

“Spit?” repeated Nole, instantly forgetting about “the power of a handsome grasshopper” which he’d wanted to question Chaps about first.

“Of course. When a couple is getting married, they kiss each other; when they divorce, they spit at each other.”

Nole wanted to say that he’s never heard about the spitting tradition, but Sage Keon raised his staff again and said, “MillyLilly of Ambia!”

He looked around, making sure that everybody was listening, and everybody was listening.