Cinder Shepherd's Arc

Chapter 1 of 3

Cinder Shepherd knelt at the edge of the lava river and held out an empty lantern. Six embers drifted above the current, small orange coals that had once been a single soul. Cinder had followed them across the ash flats for three days. To gather them into the lantern and lay the soul to rest, Cinder needed to speak the dead one's name aloud. Cinder did not know it. The fox sat on the black rock beside them, tail curled, white eyes fixed on the water. The stag stood farther back, breath steaming from its nostrils, antlers dark against the red sky. Cinder had raised both from cinders of other souls, long ago. They were patient in a way Cinder was not. "Come here," Cinder said to the nearest ember. "I'll carry you home." The ember flared once, then drifted out of reach. The others followed it downstream. Cinder swore under their breath and closed the lantern. Without the name, the coals treated the call as noise. A low grinding sound rolled across the flats behind them. Cinder turned. A caravan crawled toward the river, wagons black with soot, lanterns swinging, skeletal beasts dragging it forward on chains. The caravans traded in stories. Everyone in the depths knew that. They paid in memory and took payment in the same. Cinder had avoided them for years. Cinder stood up. The driver was hooded and did not speak. A thin figure climbed down from the second wagon and asked what Cinder wanted. Cinder described the embers, the drift pattern, the place where the soul had first scattered. The figure listened, then named a price: one of Cinder's own memories, chosen by the wagon, in exchange for the dead one's name and the story that held it. Cinder thought of the fox, the stag, the empty lantern. Cinder agreed. The figure pressed a cold thumb to Cinder's forehead. Something behind Cinder's eyes went dim. In its place a name settled, and with it a short, sharp story about a child who had run toward a burning gate of iron and basalt and never come back out. Cinder returned to the river and spoke the name. The six embers turned in the current like fish and came to the lantern one by one. Cinder shut the glass. The lantern glowed steady and warm. The fox stood. The stag lowered its antlers. Cinder felt the weight of the soul settle against their ribs, and felt, at the same time, that they could no longer remember their mother's face. The name in the lantern was not a stranger's after all. It was the name Cinder had been carrying the whole time, and had just paid to learn.