Young Flame

The crate jostles once more and I try to reorient myself into a comfortable position. It is an unending challenge though. Without being able to stretch myself, I will never find comfort.

I’ve been stuck, alone, in this wooden crate for far too long now. I have to stop myself from gnawing at the interior of the box, my flames edging to burn my way out. Charred markings already cover the walls I can see, from times I’d gotten too restless.

The space within the box is cramped, it feels like I am constantly crushed by the proximity of each side. I can’t imagine what it is like for the others, I am the smallest of our group, but we’d all been given same size crates. I worry for Leslie the most, she is the tallest and I can’t imagine she’d enjoy sitting still for so long.

Something whacks against the crate. I can feel the impact through the wood at my back.

A creaking noise fills my box and I look up to see light breaking through a new gap. The Lid of the crate snaps off with a crack and I look up to see a stranger’s face.

The woman steps away from the box, giving me room to stand up.

“Join your friends, we’ll be moving soon. Also, I probably don’t need to remind you to never remove your hats.”

The rush of fresh air makes me breathe deep. I stand and extend my arms far from my body. It feels so unnatural to remain still for so long, finally having my movement back is incredible.

The other five are already together and stretching amongst themselves. I hop over to them, feeling great now that I can stretch my legs. Also, the fact that they hadn’t sold me out when I expected them to, improved my mood. I feel slightly guilty for doubting them so long, but it is a humbling feeling to know they care enough not to throw me away for their selfish benefit.

I can’t say for sure I would have done the same. And I now feel terrible for it.

“Hey Solvei. How are you feeling?” Ash asks.

“Better than you look.” And it is true, each of the others look horrible. I won’t be surprised if they haven’t managed a wink of sleep since we started our travel within the confines of the crates. Each of them makes a pained face every time they stretch. I am right about the crates being tighter for them.

I look around and take in the sight. We are clearly not in Kelton anymore. The buildings have a similar architecture to what I’d seen in the city I’d spent the last couple of weeks, but they look new and well cared for. I can’t see a single collapsed or obviously abandoned building around. The city I find myself isn’t as clean or impressive as Morne or Fisross, but it is an incredible improvement over Kelton.

“Where are we?” I ask.

The lady who broke me out of the box is the one to answer. “We’re in Serron, north of the wall. It’ll be a month before we can get you to the northern states, but you won’t have to hide in a crate for any of it.”

“Praise Belobog,” Leslie says without moving from her spot on the ground. She’s stretched on her back with arms wide.

I can understand how she feels. There’s nothing I want to do more right now than stretch my flames as far as they’ll reach. I know I can’t though, it’s best the woman leading us up north doesn’t think there is anything strange. I may trust Ash, Leslie, Kerry and the twins now, but I still need to be careful around others.

“Now brats, it’s my job to get you past the north border, past that you’re on your own. Call me Ivory and let me do all the talking as we travel. Understood?”

Her voice is followed by a few “yes, ma’am,” and nods from us.

Satisfied, she continues. “Good. Now we’ll be together for a while from now on, so I want you all to follow a few rules. First; you will always follow my orders. Second; you will stay together, no one wanders off by themselves. Third; no complaining. And finally; don’t give anyone a reason to believe you shouldn’t be here. Pretend like you grew up here.”

“Okay…” Ash says, as off-put as the rest of us. “How will we be moving?”

“We’ll walk. If anyone asks, we are a family travelling to trade our harvest,” she says. “Well, my new nieces and nephews, I hope you’ve stretched enough, we best be moving.”

We are already at the outskirts of the city, so after Ivory climbs onto the pholo pulled wagon — not inviting anyone else — we walk north.

❖❖❖

A few days later, we arrive at a town. Well, saying ‘arrive’ is not really correct. The homes, storefronts and other assortments of structures litter the landscape between here and the city we’d travelled from. Never a true town or village, but not decreasing in the density of construction. The buildings look poor in their construction, but it is still a significant improvement from the layered trash heap that was Kelton.

I call the place we enter a town, simply because the quality is far greater than what we’ve seen until this point. The ground is a proper cobblestone path rather than compact dirt.

The people we passed rarely wore head coverings unlike their near universal use in Kelton. Instead, their hair is on clear display, long and tied in odd ways to show off their rather pure white colour. Those with the whitest hair almost always have the best looking clothing.

I struggle to find many of the darker-haired albanic as we move through the bustling town. Are they all stuck between the wall and the border to New Vetus like my friends, or do they just not come out to the forefront? Either option is rather disgusting. It means they cordon all their ‘lesser’ albanic to the space between the border and their main line of defence or the dark-haired are too fearful to show their faces amongst the usual crowd. I don’t know which is worse.

A caw snaps my attention up to the roof of the stables as Ivory ties away the pholo. A magpie rests at the edge of the covering. It caws once again, looking down on our group as a shadowy mist seeps from its dull, red eyes.

“Come now, let’s grab some dinner,” Ivory says. “I have a friend who’ll let us stay the night.”

As the others follow her down the street, I look back at the bird. The eerie black smoke spreading from its eyes disperses in the light breeze. It caws again, before flying off.

I’ve fallen behind the others and quickly catch up, remembering Ivory’s rule.

We walk with her for five minutes or so until she has us stop in front of a double story house. She tells us to stay here before she knocks twice, then pushes her way through.

Her muffled voice reaches our ears, but we can’t make out what is said. It sounds like she is happy or jovial, but the few crashes and bangs we hear seem to undercut that. A man’s yelling has us eyeball each other before the house goes quiet.

A few minutes later, Ivory returns alone. “Alright, my cousin let us stay in his shed. He’s not as happy to see me as I thought he’d be, but that’s fine, we got somewhere to sleep.”

The beds she lay out for us aren’t particularly comfortable. In fact, I’d rather the cruddy little things we had back in the basement of Kelton.

“What do you think it’s like, outside Zadok?” I hear Ash whisper after we lay down. Ivory taking a spot at the far side of the room by herself.

“Have you seen the places we’ve passed? I hope there’s more like this where we’re going. I want to live somewhere we don’t have to worry about the roof collapsing,” Kerry says.

“I heard they have to deal with creature attacks from the Titan Alps,” Leslie says, rolling to face us. “Solvei, you’re the only one of us that’s been outside. What is it like?”

I tilt my head to look at the ceiling, thinking about the places they might want to know. “Well, New Vetus had a lot of enormous buildings. But ursu are a lot taller than albanics. They have these massive feasts every week that were a spectacle to watch. You’d be surprised how much food they prepare, but I guess it is the only time in the week they eat.”

I pause for a moment to parse the memories of the wasteland, the good and the horrid.

“My home, the wasteland, is rather bare. There’s sand as far as the eye can see. Sometimes canyons or valleys break up the monotony, but really the wasteland is boring. There’s nothing to see if you don’t know your way around. But still, I have a lot of good memories of my tribe out there.”

My chest tightens at the memories surfacing, so I try to push through and move on from my family.

“Mum used to tell me of the Agglomerate. She called it the home of áed. I’ve never been myself, but she described it as a mountain of glass that glistened in the sun. It’s somewhere I’ve always wanted to see.”

“Do you plan to travel for it once you're out of Zadok?” Ash asks.

I shake my head without checking if he can see or not. “No. I want to find it eventually, but it’ll take too long and I’m not sure if the water mages are still scouting the wasteland. I’d rather stay away from wherever they’ve been.”

“Well, you are welcome to stay with us for as long as you’d like. Without your help we wouldn’t be leaving, after all,” Ash says to the murmured agreement of the others.

“I think I’d like that,” I say. It’d be nice to create a place for us to live. Hopefully, the northern states are as good as Ash believes they are. “What do you want to do when we get there?”

“I want to earn a place for us to live, something more than just a roof over our heads. Maybe I’ll be able to get an apprenticeship for a gunsmith or construction, I don’t know.”

“What a boring answer,” Leslie says derisively. “Me? I want to get my hands on a gun of my own. Ya think it’d be possible to get me one of them Henosis weapons?”

“I want a dress that doesn’t feel like I’m wearing a potato sack,” Kerry says.

“Chocolate.” “Steak.” The two voices I hear almost make me jump. I realise it’s the first time I’ve actually heard their voices. I can’t help but stare at them through the darkness, but I can’t see their faces.

There is quiet for a moment after their words, before Leslie chimes in. “Yeah, definitely. Can’t wait to try some sweets and meat. When was the last time we had any?”

“We nabbed some lollies from that young mother not long before we met Solvei, remember?” Ash says.

“Yuck, you can’t possibly call those things sweets, they were so sour.” I can’t see her through the dark, but I can imagine Leslie sticking her tongue out and cringing in disgust.

We continue to bicker and talk for a while before quieting to sleep. It feels nice, almost like I’m a part of a family again.

I’d been so hesitant to let them get close because of the distrust I’d placed in them. After Ash proved he wasn’t willing to sell me out, I’ve become more open with them. Despite living in the same room as them for weeks now, I’d never really become close to them. I never talked to them the way they talked amongst themselves. It was never that they didn’t try to bring me in, but more like I was resistant to their attempts.

I’m opening myself to them now. I know that. Whether it will be a good idea, I’ll have to see, but I want to make this work. Having people I can trust and talk to again would be nice.

When I’m certain the others are sleeping, I rise from my bed. The Ember Moon will show herself soon and I want to watch. I don’t feel tired at all, the pace we travel much slower than what I grew up with.

On the other side of the house from the shed the others are resting is a tree that is perfect to watch the night sky from. Its leaf cover already discarded to the grass below. I could climb the shed, but I don’t want to wake any of the others, as I doubt I’ll be able to do so stealthily.

I pull myself to a branch that lets me look over the roof of the house. Lights can be seen near the centre of the town, but mostly the night is dark.

The moon is already missing from the starry sky. It won’t be long until Eldest Ember shows herself.

As I sit here waiting for the darkness to recede, a flock of birds flies overhead. It’s hard to make them out with the lack of light, but the sound of their squawking and wing-flaps reaches my ears as they fly from the town centre over my head.

I look back to the lights of the town. One by one they go out. It must be time everyone’s heading to bed.

I sit there, watching as most of the lights extinguish. Strangely, lights that I thought were stars slowly extinguish as well. I must be mistaken, they are probably just distant houses on the other side of town.

The stars continue to disappear. A chill runs through my arms and I heat myself in retaliation to the feeling. Is it cloud cover? It seems to spread too fast for that. The pace the lights disappear picks up, climbing well into the sky ahead of me.

I jump to my feet, feeling the oddness of the entire situation. I am about to jump off the tree when the sky lights up in the redness of the Ember Moon.

No, only some of the sky glows red. A massive portion of the sky ahead of me remains as pitch black as I’ve ever seen. It doesn’t glow with the colour of the moon as clouds usually do, instead whatever is in front of me seems to suck the light out of its surroundings. Only at the edges between the darkness and the red sky can I see that the blackness is a mist. A fog spreading over the town.

This is the Void Fog.