A true seer | Neteyam

10-year-old me was running through the village, holding hands with Tsireya. She kept speeding up while I did my best to catch up with her. The sky above was fitting to the atmosphere that every Metkayina effortlessly created with their overjoy; the sun was shining brightly, around it were small white clouds floating and an undeniable warmth that could only have one reason. The tulkun had returned.

It had been a year and a half since I arrived in Awa'atlu, and in that time I had only seen the return of the Tulkun once. That time I met Tsireya's Spirit Sister and other members of the Tulkun community. It had been the most fulfilling thing someone like me, a forest Na'vi, could ever get to experience.

The sound of the horn playing still echoed in my eardrums, like an incessant song that blended into the water as every man, woman, and child dove right into the sea in a graceful manner. Splashes of fins against the surface of the water only made the presence of the Tulkun stronger. They jumped and did turns in the air.

Tsireya kept laughing in her sweet, charming voice. "Our brothers and sisters have returned!" She said, raising her voice for anyone who wasn't fully aware of the situation.

She gripped my hand as she jumped into the water and onto the back of her ilu. Lìtzy appeared right next to her, and I mounted her quickly as we swam towards the sea terraces. Tsireya took me to where her Sister was, who still was the size of a calf, even though she was three years old.

"I See you, Sister," Tsireya signed, underwater.

She responded and asked for me. "I'm great, irayo," I said.

"There is someone I'd like you to meet. My little sister, this is her first cycle!"

I heard some clicking on my right and when I turned I met a small Tulkun. She was tattooless, like me, had undefined blotches of white on her dark skin, and her 'horns' were just about imperceptible. She seemed shy, sticking next to Tsireya's Sister and hiding under her fin.

"Kaltxì," she, most literally, mumbled.

"You're so pretty!" I couldn't keep my eyes off the unique patterns on her back.

"Thank you." She shrunk in her place, "So are you!"

"I'm not."

"You are," she insisted.

"No."

"Yes." 

"Yes."

"No."

That was it: the art of messing up with people's heads. I chuckled and had to go to the surface to avoid drowning. We continued talking, more comfortably than before, and I got to know her better. She was called Lowsla, which meant "two souls". It was perfect for her, for she seemed to have two very different faces: shy when you meet her, but loud, stubborn, and somewhat reckless once you get past the shell she puts.

Time passed by faster than it felt like. The rest of the Tulkun swam away and into their home, which was a system of connected water caves close to the highest concentration of crags.  Tsireya had been talking to her Sister just as much as I did with Lowsla, in her case catching up with the past months they were far away from each other.

In a way, the endless Tulkun migration course was painful for both parties involved. I used to watch everyone reunite lovingly, tears coming out of their eyes and ear-to-ear smiles that were only one part of how relieved and happy they truly were, but just as many feelings were put when they had to say goodbyes. Sometimes it was a 'see you later', but the cyclical nature of the universe in which things existed made Eywa call for you sooner or later, and when you least expected it there was no 'later'. There was only the end. And every season was a reminder that life had a beginning and an end; there was always one Tulkun that didn't make it back. When that happened the wave of sorrow was equal to that of the clan losing a newborn child.