I was born during a thunderstorm in a tiny mountain village named Amaris, where the rain sang lullabies and the clouds whispered ancient secrets. My mother told me that the moment I cried, the rain stopped, and the first lightning bolt in hours split the sky in half. She used to joke that the storm gave me its voice.
My early years were quiet, surrounded by pine forests and the endless hum of cicadas. My father carved violins, and I grew up among wood shavings, varnish fumes, and the haunting sound of unfinished symphonies. At the age of six, I could tell the difference between maple and spruce just by their scent. I didn’t speak much to people, but I had conversation with the wind.
Everything changed when I turned twelve. A fire broke out in our workshop. My father saved his tools, but not his hands. He never carved again. The music left our home, and silence filled its place like smoke. That’s when I began to build violins on my own. I never told him. I worked in secret, using the blueprints I found in his notebooks, mimicking the rhythm of his lost hands.
By sixteen, I sold my first instrument. A blind cellist bought it and played it in the town square. I listened from behind a stone column as the notes curled into the air like incense. For the first time in years, my father smiled.
Years passed. Left the village with nothing but a pack of tools, a hand-built violin, and a promise to return when I had created something truly unforgettable. I traveled across Europe, worked in dusty shops, slept under cathedral roofs, and learned languages I forgot as soon as I crossed border.
