Stranded in the Northern Night

   Darkness sat impenetrable on every side, creeping ever closer each time Riki nodded off. Hours ago she had used the little energy she possessed to ignite a fire in her palm. Just as the sun had started to go down she gathered what kindling she could find, though it was chilled through with cold dew from the snow. Power and energy tugged in her gut as she focused herself on the flame. It took every bit of focus to keep the flames alight.

   Riki was cold and tired, after the attack on her ship. She was separated from her crew, and forced to flee. She had floated on driftwood to the closest shore, lighting small fires to keep herself from slipping away due to the freezing water. Being blessed by the god of fire had its downsides, she was not built to last the freezing northern conditions.

   If she could not make the fire last through the night she would not see morning. The flames flickered dangerously close to being put out as the strong winds pushed against them. No plan stitched itself together in her mind, no hope for someone to find her crept into her consciousness.

   Riki had no one, no friends on the crew, and no family left to seek her out. No one would fret themselves tonight, as she struggled to keep her fire alight.

   Mesmerizing lights danced across the sky, like nothing she had ever seen before. Maybe this was what reality was like for the people of the North. She felt herself getting delirious with sleep. She laughed heartily, quickly dissolving into manic cackling.

   “This isn’t fair!” Her scratchy yelling ripped from somewhere deep inside her. The crazed feeling in her mind started to feel more sad. “Haven’t you taken enough!” She screamed and this time she found her audience. There were no mortals to listen to her yell so she faced the skies, hoping the gods could feel her anger.

   “You took everyone! I have no home! I have nothing! You’ve cursed me with this thing you call a gift! No one sees it as a gift but you! People hunt people like me! You know that?” Riki kicked the icy ground in protest as she paced the darkened shore. Nothing changed, and the fire grew even dimmer.

   Riki had never expected anything from the gods. She grew up in a religious tribe yet still never asked for anything. Perhaps deep down, she knew they would never step in. If they were to step in they would have stopped the attack on her island, or the thousands of years of people like her suffering.

   After letting her anger out on the sky and the frozen ground she stomped on in anger. She retreated to her weak fire. Any thought of giving up was washed from her mind, she would not go down quietly. She would not fade away like all those that came before her. She would get justice for herself, her people, and others like her who were ‘blessed’ and then thrown to the wolves.

   With a new sense of purpose, she scooped up the waning kindling into her palm and felt her connection with the flame grow stronger. She took herself and her flame to the tree line, not daring to step farther into the ominous, inky blackness.

   No matter how little she used her abilities these days, it came back easily to her. To free her hands she let the flames travel up her arms and onto her shoulders, warming her back and core. The sharp coldness immediately returned to her fingers as the fire left her palm. Her numb fingers worked her dagger from her belt and she went to work on a tree.

   She pulled strips of bark, and meat from the trees and cut branches down. She gathered them into a large pile. When she was finally finished, she had a large pile, enough to get her through the night.

   Her eyes grew heavy as she returned the fire to the hearth and laid out the tender to dry by the flames. She dozed off for only a moment but woke up to a barely there fire. With her eyes half-lidded she tended to the flames once again and added kindling until she was happy with the roaring fire in front of her.

   With the lively fire before her, she let herself slump sideways in exhaustion. She slept closer to the flames than any normal person could. She considered sleeping amongst the flames but thought better of it. Just in case someone would come along and find her.

                         …

   When Riki woke she had inched closer to the ashes of the bonfire, following the waning heat. What had been a roaring heath when she closed her eyes, had turned into a small flame dancing precariously on the last elligable log.

   Refreshed and filled with more energy, she willed the flame to grow stronger. With a tug in her gut, the flame followed her will and grew past the capacity of the log, instead feeding off of her endurance.

   She needed to move, she couldn’t stay on this abandoned shore and expect someone to happen upon her. If she didn’t help herself, no one would. Riki quickly stood to search for supplies to make a torch but was met with that same impending darkness.

   “It’s still dark?” She asked herself aloud.

   In her hurry to sustain the flame, she hadn’t realized that the world was still bathed in darkness. Even the moon was hidden behind the large line of trees. Only the stars and the fire supplied her with light.

   The bonfire should have lasted hours, enough to get her through the night and beyond. Based on how rested she felt, it must have. Yet, it was still dark.

   As she gathered a stick and ripped her oversized pant leg to make a torch, she racked her brain in search of an explanation.

   She remembered a legend that had been told of the outside world, on her long-gone island home. The outside world held horrible inventions of destruction, greedy lords and merchants, fields of hot geysers, mountains of fire, and in the northernmost land the sun didn’t come out for months at a time. The last one had always spooked her to the core. Riki, being someone specifically made for the heat of fire, couldn’t imagine a life without the sun beating down on her shoulders.

   Not only was she stranded in the north, her natural enemy, it was at the worst time of the year. She was sitting in the coldest and darkest conditions the world had to offer. Desperate to find safety on an enemy’s land in conditions built to break her.

   With nothing to keep her company but a flame that ate off her energy, Riki followed the shore hoping to find civilization. She wondered what she would find when she got there. If she got there.

   People in the north were known for following the religious thinking that she and her kind were disgusting and blasphemous. They executed them on the spot, seeing her as less than human. The army that had come to kill her people, all for being kind to her and others like her, had come from the north.

   As she watched the stars twinkle she wondered if her fate would be any kinder if she did find a village. Could she find an excuse for surviving in the climate or would they see right through her?

   The icy waters blew in freezing winds but she couldn’t risk getting lost or hunted by predators amongst the trees and rocky land. So, she stuck to the shore and felt her body weaken the farther she walked. As she made her trek, the trees started to grow sparser, and large man-made fields started to crop up. Her footsteps grew faster and her hopes soared. People had been here.

   When she finally saw the lights from the village, she couldn’t sustain the flame any longer. She absorbed the heat of the flame and dropped the torch. With what little energy she had left, she sprinted into the town.

   There in the dock was a ship with homemade flags flapping in the winter winds. The symbol of every new page in her life, a new ship. She didn’t care where it took her or what she had to do to get there. She wouldn’t stop to see what this town would do to her.

   Though she put the fire out in the darkness, there was a fire in her chest. She would return to the north one day and she would find her justice.