Chittacobra (Novel)

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If you would travel with me through time and space, you must hear me out.

Someone asks, 'Where does the road go?" The answer: 'Nowhere. It stays where it is.'

Yes, it goes nowhere. Shall I call the road fortunate? Indifferent? Indolent? It does not move. It is silent, still, and stands arms akimbo. People stray into its embrace. It lets them. It does not care.

The travellers do not care either. They take refuge in the road's arms and trample its bosom, not even pausing to look at it properly; so intent are they on their journey. Can they be called fellow-travellers-travellers of the same road?

The road does not care. Why should it? It has no journey to make. It knows neither a beginning nor an end. It starts nowhere; it goes nowhere. It needs no fellow travellers.

I am like the road, indifferent to my end but not to the beginning. That I remember. Not one but many beginnings.

I can tell you when and how my journey began.

I want to.

I need a companion to travel with me but I have no destination in mind. I know that you cannot accompany me to the end, but stay for as long as the story lasts I will try to finish it before the journey ends. Yours, I mean. My journey is one with the story. Once my tale is told, the journey will end. I will set aside a little time for you. After I finish telling my story, I will cross to the other side of the road and walk away. You will see me for a while before I vanish. No ill omen will blight your voyage, my fellow traveller. You will know nothing of my journey thereafter. I will walk alone. Incognita. You shall be my fellow traveller, but not my fellow sufferer in hopeless waiting.

One more thing. I will try to relate the story from the beginning to the end, but I am confused. I cannot remember when he was and when he was not. When did he first come into my life?

When exactly?

It is impossible for me to conceive of a time when he did not exist. How could I exist if he did not?

You will not mind, will you, if he is there throughout my story, from beginning to end?

**Contents and Sample Pages**