PolyProse

There was a village trapped in a labyrinth of ice. The people did not know where they came from, nor could they leave. Their only guides were the broken beams of a wooden vessel and an enduring black fire. On the coldest night, the fire faltered. To save it, the villagers tore a plank from the ship and fed it to the flame. The wood blazed, and in its light, visions appeared. They saw shores of green stone bathed in warm waters. Trees along the shore bowed before storms, and beneath the white sands lay gold. Desperation became tradition. The villagers continued the practice, appointing one member from each generation as the teller.

The teller of the new era stood by the ship’s remains. He carried a wooden rib across his shoulders. When the wood burned, the flame bloomed with color. The storyteller carved into the ice the visions the black fire revealed. The villagers cheered at the stories of their ancestors.

But one night, the ruins were bare. The teller searched for wood but found none. He came upon a heavy iron sphere in the frost. No teller had returned without a relic, so he took it. He brought it to the black flame, and the embers erupted. It burned too hot, and the labyrinth became a prison of screams. The lights depicted vessels much like their own, shattered by the very iron sphere the teller had just held.

When the fire settled, the teller dropped to his knees. He apologized to his people and promised to appease the flame. But knives split the sky with slaughter. In an anchor was conquest. In golden coins lived greed. In the fire, pearls birthed monstrous men. The more beautiful the offering, the more savage the truth.

The villagers’ eyes turned against the teller. He retreated to the ruins and gathered the cursed relics. He cowered at the thought of bringing one back and nearly left empty-handed. But at last, an unholy thought struck him.

He returned to the flame, its walls now etched with depictions of terror. His people looked at his bare hands and asked him what he had brought to burn. The teller only smiled. With great shame, he stepped into the fire. He writhed upon the coals, and his screams filled the chamber. The villagers rushed to save him but froze in the light. Against the walls were the teller’s dreams. In the flame, they saw his love. But within the teller’s shadow lay the bitter venom of his heart. The teller’s light blazed so fiercely that the labyrinth melted. Its cold waters filled the space and snuffed out the black flame.

With their fortress destroyed and flame dead, the villagers found themselves on a beach. They sat on warm sand, beneath a gentle sun, and beside a chain of islands—the very lands they had once glimpsed in fire. But their vessel was gone, and the ocean cut them off. Their prison of ice had become a prison of sea. The villagers gathered around the dead embers of their fire. The teller’s remains rested in the ashes. None spoke until nightfall. The next teller, burdened with the weight of his people’s future, asked a question.

“If the ship was never meant to burn, how were we to learn of the fire?”