In a land called Oberlin, the winter had lasted too long, past the
groundhog’s date and past when the snow should stop, even had our groundhog
predicted otherwise than it had. It soon became clear to the students:
Spring was sleeping.
But there was hope. During a week of what should be spring, Oberlin
students were permitted to travel to other places, places closer to the sun,
where they could come close enough to the Fires of the Sun that questers might
be heard.
Ah, but being heard is not the only tricky part. What use is being
heard if one is given no answer? What use even an answer, if the answer is a
dismissal?
But the Fire-folk are not without hearts. They could be swayed, by diplomacy,
or by wit, or, if they were feeling particularly whimsical, by some somewhat
important event brought to their attention.
A young quester had gone to such a warm clime, where the path to the
Fires of the Sun was brief and not exceptionally burning. The quester packed
bread, rock candy, and a top for food, flavor, and fun, since the Fires were
creatures of all such things. (Why else would cooked food taste so much better?
Why else would so many people be drawn to playing with fire?)
Items in thons pack, the quester climbed, and soon enough, came to a
door the color of a full moon on a clear night.
“Have you a key?” came a voice from the door.
“I do not,” thon said.
“Have you lost a key you were given?”
“I have not,” thon said.
“Then how shall you get past the door?”
“I know my stories well enough. I must take a bone from my smallest
finger, and place it in the door.”
“Correct,” the voice rumbled.
“But this is not a tale of sacrifice,” thon continued, “not to speak
with the Fires. The point is the riddle and the story, not the bone itself. The
door opens for the answer, not the bone.”
And the voice said, with a smile thon could hear, “Correct.” The moon
doors swung open.
Next thon came to an old person in a rocking chair, who had aged in the
way that makes gender indeterminate, if gender were ever a proper thing to
apply to this old one. The hair was perfectly golden, the only hint that this
one might ever have been young. “Good day,” thon said with a curtsey, since
thon had worn a skirt that day.
“Good day,” said the old one back, rocking chair creaking. “Why are you
here?” There was a bit of a twinkle in the old one’s eye.
“I am here to bring some late Fires to one of my homes,” thon said.
“But I am in no great hurry as of yet, if you find yourself in need of help.”
The old one smiled. “I would not refuse some bread, if you had it.”
“I do,” thon said, handing the whole of the loaf to the old one with
stars for eyes and sunlight for hair. The old one ate, and beyond the rocking
chair a door swung open. Thon had not seen it before, for it was dark as the
night sky, the same shade as nearly everything else.
Thon saw when it opened, for it opened into a room as bright and warm
as summer sunshine on a day perfect for reading in a grassy field.
“Fires of the Sun, may I speak with you?”
Silence greeted thon. Upon thinking of that phrase, thon bowed to the
silence, on the off-chance that it was a living silence. (It was not.)
Thon sat in the middle of the broad, bright room and took out a piece
of rock candy to suck on, and the top to spin. “Oh! You brought a toy! Why
didn’t you say so?” said a Fire, jumping out from a wall. The Fire could not
stay still, it seemed, flickering from one side to the next. Soon, this Fire’s
Siblings joined Them, and even in a room the color of sunlight, shadows
flickered on the walls.
“Would you like some rock candy?” thon asked, laying out a few more
pieces in various colors of the rainbow, each attached to a metal stick. Wooden
sticks do not work so well with the Fire-folk, you see.
“Yesyesyyeses,” They chattered, voices climbing over each other. Most
took pieces, though a handful instead said, “I would like to play with your
top, may I may I may I?”
“Oh, I don’t know,” thon said. “I got this top for my birthday. That
was just today, you know.”
They cried, “It’s your birthday?”
and, “Why didn’t you say so?” and, “You came here on your birthday? We have to do
something special!”
“Well…” thon said, tapping thons chin with thons forefinger, “there is
something, but it’s a bit out of your way.”
“We’ll do it!” said exactly three Fires in unison. The rest had learned
not to commit so readily.
“Really?” thon said, brightening. “Wonderful! You see, Oberlin’s spring
hasn’t woken up in the proper time. Could you come back with me when I go
there, and help wake our spring?”
They chattered for a moment, too quickly and too many overlaying
threads for thon to keep track of. Eventually, five stepped forward: the
original three—one of whom looked less excited, though grudgingly willing to go
along—and two more. “We’ll help!”
“Excellent!” And so the Fire-folk and the quester played together until
thon had to go home for dinner. The five Fire-folk who were to join thon
settled into the space just about thons diaphragm, where they slept as little
more than a warm and jubilant feeling.
When thon returned to Oberlin, thon brought five Fire-folk. In such a
cold place, they burst from thons ribs and flickered and danced throughout the
campus, the town, and everywhere else they could reach: burning snow, warming
soil, calling the sun to be closer and the clouds to disappear. By the time
they had grown bored and went back to the sun to play with their own, spring
had sprung awake.
