The Dance of Fire on Water

This is a work of fiction. No real people, places or events were used. Copyright ã 2011 Plot Roach.

The Dance of Fire on Water

By Plot Roach

He stood by the river, spear in hand. He was covered in mud and blood. A cold so deep it ate at his bones like the camp dogs that fed on the people’s scraps. But still he did not shiver. He watched it come closer, the light in the darkness. As soon as he saw it he knew that it was time. A burning serpent, its head raised above the water it tread. Almost silent in its path towards the shore. But inside it roared with inhuman rage.

Morack shouted as he woke from his dream, the first thing he did was grab for his spear. He heard noises around him, the snores of the other warriors not old enough to marry and make homes of their own. He was barely a warrior himself, only one season ago he had been a nameless one, a boy. A few of the others stirred into consciousness, shaken by his scream.

“What is it now, little chipmunk?” asked Isus, his friend of many years. He had been in the warrior house for six full seasons before Morack, and never let him forget it. Using any chance he got to tease his friend as he would a child.

“A dream, nothing more.”

“They seem to be coming more frequently now, do you still miss your mother?”

“No, I miss yours. Her breasts make good pillows in the night, but her snoring shakes the mountains themselves.”

“Oh, yeah?” Isus said, grappling the younger man in a fighting hold. The two fell to the floor and carried on with their mock fighting until they ran out of breath from laughing.

“If you two could keep the noise down…” Joxpeth whined, peeling away a flimsy blanket from his face and wincing against the light that filtered through the window slats of the warrior house.

“Too late for that.” Isus said. “We’d best be up and off looking for food before the rest of the village wakes to taunt us for being boys instead of men.”

“So what did you dream about this time?” Joxpeth asked Morack.

“The same thing. The fire serpent on the water, coming to the village.”

“Have you asked the shaman about its meaning?”

“He said it would reveal itself in time.”

“So he didn’t know and still wanted to sound self righteous?”

“That’s not what you want to get caught saying about old Wixmoth.” a voice said from the doorway. It was the head warrior, Lukus. He was not the head of the village, but not for lack of skill and wisdom. His father, still virile and strong had chosen to remain in the village while letting his son “train” the youngsters to become warriors in their own right. He had a wife and three boys of his own in his own hut away from the warriors home. But he came to collect them every morning for their training and their hunts, and he loved and taught each of them as if they were his own sons.

“Sorry, Lukus.” the boys mumbled.

“It’s not like I don’t feel the same way at times. I just don’t want you boys getting into trouble over it.” he smiled and hurried them out of the building and into the cold morning air. Their breakfast was cold meat and flatbread cooked from the day before. It meant that they would be traveling far that day in search of food. They grumbled, as boys will do. But devoured the food none the less. “If you want better fare before you sleep, you’ll have to carry it back before sunset on your backs, my lads.”

They set off across the forest, following the calls of the Mitas birds. They were dark feathered scavengers who learned that they could get a meal by leading the men of the forest to the herds of animals that grazed amongst the green haven that they all called home. Before the sun was at it highest, they spotted a pair of grazing dappled horns, pig like beasts with horn like antlers growing from their heads. But the hunt was spoiled when a twig snapped beneath the foot of Morack, sending the beasts bounding into the darkness of the forest.

They stopped for a quick meal and Lukus pulled his youngest warrior aside for a pep talk. “It could have happened to anyone.”

“I know, but it happened to me.” Morack said, frowning into the mud beneath his feet. “Sometimes I think I’ll never be a great warrior and hunter like you.”

“Maybe you were meant for something else.”

“Like what? A potter or root tender?”

“Or a shaman.”

The idea swam in Morack’s head like the brightly colored fish they often hunted from the shores of their home with spears. He shook his head quickly, dismissing the notion. “But a shaman can see into the future and talk with the spirits of nature and the gods. I-”

“’You have the dreams.”

“I have a dream. One. The same dream every night since my naming day. And no one knows what it means.”

“The time will come when you do, and it will let you know what path you are destined to walk in this life.” Lukus said, slapping the boy on the shoulder. He called out to the boys to ready themselves for the next hunt. The clouds were gathering in the sky and they would have to find something for the village to eat or else all would go hungry that night.

Before long, the warriors had a handful of fowl and a few of the smaller herding animals slung upon their backs as they headed back to the village for the night. The rain pelted them mercilessly until they were forced to stop at a stand of trees until the worst of it passed. The floor of the forest became almost like a river itself, rising almost to the thighs of the younger boys. Morack shifted his weight from one foot to the other in an effort to relieve himself of the pain of the cold as it consumed his body. He was thinking again about his dream when his legs were swept out from beneath him. He was sent tumbling over the edge of a hill and was at the mercy of the water that flowed like a creature in its own right.

He gasped and struggled against the current, the warmth of his body sapped along with his strength. At last he gave up against the cold water and prayed to the gods that his death would be swift. Darkness swooped upon him like a Mitas bird and plucked his consciousness from him.

When he woke, he found himself on the edge of the mother river. If I follow it, he thought, I should find myself back in the village. He counted himself lucky, despite the scrapes from his fall. He was covered in minor cuts that had closed enough that only a trickle of blood flowed from them. The rest of him coated in the mud from his misadventure. He navigated himself to the edge of the river, using the light of the stars to guide him. He began to wash the worst of the filth off of him when he heard a noise from behind him. He grabbed at a broken limb of a tree. It was not a proper spear, but it would have to do under the circumstances. He pulled himself into the line of trees, hoping that whatever predator was out and hunting would leave him alone.

The sound did not come from the forest, but from the water itself. He watched as light crept upon the water like a miniature sun. Soon the creature revealed itself and Morack gasped at the shock of it. Here was the fiery serpent that had haunted him from his naming day, when he first became a warrior. But it did not look as it had in his dreams. The creature had the head and the tail of a serpent, frozen in place, as if it were dead. In its belly, cupped like a leaf, sat men in strange clothing. They did not wear the colors of the earth and trees as his people did, but red like the color of sunset, blood, or-

Fire. He thought.

They had torches of fire lining the back of the beast, to light their path as they rode the beast through the darkness. They pushed wooden limbs though the water, making the beast crawl almost silently through the river. The ripples left behind made it look as if the fire was dancing within the water. Despite their silence, he felt the fear and anger coming off the men that rode the beast. It was like the heat coming off of a campfire, even when it has been extinguished. He knew where they were headed. And at last he knew his path as he raced back to his village to warn the others.