Far before the days of coal-blazing, Geravin was no more than a village of thirty or so. Men and women would gather at the shore of Talazet daily to fish from its dark waters and return to the village by nightfall. Teenagers would fetch wood from the outskirts of Palabor and build fires for the adults’ return. Fishermen watched for the fires to guide them home. These fires the children tended while the fish were prepared for cooking. Then the village would eat until the fires died and the people would return to their houses to rest. In the morning, the sun would gleam off Talazet’s iced surface and summon villagers back to its body. Many revered this cycle and would follow this pattern for survival. Just as well, it became the goal of Geravin to maintain the cycle and continue surviving for as long as the sun would shine.
Among these villagers, Lhue was one of the proudest. He would go out fishing before most fishermen even woke up, and he would always be one of the last to leave, bringing in the rear of the group as the sun set. Lhue would pick a different fire to sit by every night, and the children there would gather to hear his stories of being alone on Talazet.
“The lake’s daughter visited me again,” he would say. “Her beautiful hair and dark green eyes glimmered in the water as I cast my first line of the day. She’s weightless beneath the ice. Her hair spreads out and drifts like fishing line tentacles being cast from her face, which is a cold blue and grey. After I pull my line in, the day has begun, and she is already gone, but I know she’s there watching me.” Lhue would go on and on about the lake daughter’s appearances, what she looked like, where she appeared, whether she caught his eye in the morning or the evening and what it meant.
“I believe she’s planning on marrying me some day soon,” he said. “I won’t know how to tell her that I still must return to Geravin every night, but surely we will find a way. Why I knew a woman, once, who brought a river elk leaves from Palabor to nibble on for months. She had to walk ten miles to the forest, ten miles to the river, and then twenty miles back to Geravin to sleep. She would do it every day until one day the elk found Palabor on its own.
“I don’t know where she went after that. For a short time, I saw her pace around Geravin, perhaps looking for more elk on the horizon to bring food to, but after several days, no one could find her. Her mission made her leave, and nothing could stop her. So too must we all dedicate our lives to our missions.”
And dedicated Lhue was. He never missed a morning of fishing, not even for illness or injury. So, when the wind was blowing slightly harder and colder than usual one winter morning, Lhue hadn’t thought twice about it. Geravin needed fish, so Lhue took his bundle and went out.
Lo and behold this was one of Lhue’s best fishing days. Within the first hour, he had caught over twenty talkin. The first hole he had drilled lasted him three times the usual amount. The fish were twice the size they normally were. But this didn’t lighten Lhue’s workload. In fact, he doubled his efforts. He set up two fishing poles as usual, with a net positioned underneath them. When he reeled one in, he would bait it and send it back hurriedly, so as to not miss out on catching. Lhue was having the time of his life. He would yip and cheer as each fish grew bigger than the last. They were beginning to overflow out of his bundle by noon.
He was so caught up in his work, though, that he had not noticed how empty the rest of Talazet was. Lhue was the only Geravinian out fishing that day. Everyone else was quite literally snowed in by the terrible storm that had taken over Geravin by mid-morning. By mid-afternoon, Lhue was also experiencing the adverse weather effects, but as a true Geravinian, he would not let his mission be stopped. The wind got colder, yet he baited more hooks. The snowflakes got thicker, yet Lhue reeled in fish by the dozens. Clouds blotted out the sun, yet he stayed out until meal time, perhaps even later.
By then, the sky was black with clouds and darkness. Lhue reeled in his lines, gathered up the net, and tied back his bundle. He set out for Geravin with high hopes for his village tonight. But his village he could not see, for the cooking fires were not lit. All the villagers were still in their homes waiting for the storm to pass. This made the trip very difficult for Lhue. By the time he got to the ice shore, he couldn’t tell if he was facing towards Geravin or away from it. So, Lhue reached into his bundle, grabbed his flint and firewood, and made a makeshift torch to light his way.
The flames shone brilliantly on the ice shore. Embers caught in the winter wind drifted away like black snow. Before Lhue lay a flat wasteland of frost and ice. Snow dashed by his face fervently. He could try staying put with his torch until the storm slowed down, but there was no guarantee that it would soon. With only half of his mission complete, Lhue knew what to do. He added another piece of firewood to his torch and took a step forward into the snowy field.
The weather was devastating. At times, Lhue felt like he was blind, subject only to a flickering black and white field of vision. Lhue tried to imagine the flames of the cooking fires when the wind blew across the landscape. He’d stare into his torch flame and picture it growing hotter and fatter like the village fires did when they added fish and oil. He imagined the smell of the fish and the warmth of the flames. That was what he lived for. This is why fishing was his mission. He needed to see Geravin again, if not for the fishes, just for the fires.
Lhue felt the night get significantly colder. The wind harshened and blew Lhue into the snow. His torch cooled down to embers and then surged to life again with what sparing life it had left.
Vision was minimal. Heat was fading. All Lhue could taste was water mucus from his nose. He could not take the cold much longer, and he knew it. Lhue did what had to be done. He found a small alcove in the side of a hill and waited. He lowered his torch near his body and paused. Lhue watched the fire and drew in its heat. He watched the wood cinder lower and lower. He watched the flame flicker. He watched it dance. It was both static and dynamic at the same time, a vibrant life contained to a finite space. It reminded Lhue of his own mortality.
In due time after the storm, the villagers emerged from their homes. Many sought to repair what damage had been done to their homes. Neighbors reconvened, replenishing their supplies and sharing experiences from the days they spent locked inside. Few looked for Lhue after they searched his home. He had been gone for several weeks. There was no telling where the storm had taken him. Some proclaimed him dead.
Yet lo, there over the horizon of the setting sun, strode a figure. By his body danced the flame of a Geravinian torch. They knew it was Lhue. But as he approached, they could sense something different about him. The air was filled with some sort of energy,
for there before them stood a man holding fire like a torch, but the wood had all run out.
Lhue carried fire with nothing to burn.