Fire Dancer

by Catherine Jones Payne

  When we reached a quiet spot, far from most of the festivalgoers, we sat together at one of the long tables, right next to a glass jar full of fireflies. The insects faded in and out, glowing one moment and invisible the next in the dark.

  Ten yards away, a mage suspended a ball of flame in the air to the delight of a thronging crowd of children. He moved the position of his hands, and the ball elongated and took shape, becoming a fiery dragonbeast.

  The Fintan told stories about two kinds of dragons. The first, the dragonbeasts, which had the cunning of a person and the personality of a cat, were great lizards that flew and breathed fire. They hadn’t been seen in a thousand years, some stories said. The elders said there had never been any such beast. But I didn’t believe them.

  The second kind of dragon were warriors, who wielded the fire with incredible power, bonded to it in a truer, deeper way than our most talented mages could ever hope to be. The dragon-warriors had vanished from the earth around the same time the dragonbeasts did. If the stories were to be believed.

  I chuckled. No point mourning something I’d never see.

  The children squealed, and I took Nolan’s hand.

  “I brought you something,” he said, reaching into his pocket. He pulled out a smooth, shiny stone, like polished coal, and set it on the table in front of me.

  I tilted my head in question.

  “Light it.” He traced his hand across its smooth surface. “Not right here. Not now. That would make a scene. Sometime when you have some privacy.”

  “Thank you.” I gazed down at it. “It’s beautiful.”

  He grinned. “You haven’t even seen what it does yet.”

  I pocketed the coal and gazed out at the festival. “What’s your favorite part of all this?” I asked.

  “The food.”

  I rolled my eyes. “Be serious.”

  “I thought that should be obvious. Seeing you dance.”

  “Besides that,” I said. “You’d come to the festival even if you didn’t know me, wouldn’t you?”

  “Of course.”

  “Why?”

  He ran a hand through his sandy hair. “It feels like home, I guess. I mean, don’t get me wrong, my papa’s always made a good life for us. Home is with him and my sister and my brothers, as well as the people my papa takes under his wing. There’s usually a few of those at any one time. But it’d be nice to have a community, you know? Something like this where we’re all working together for a greater purpose. I mean, I guess my papa . . .” He fell silent.

  I elbowed him. “What?”

  He shook his head. “Nothing. Sorry. Just thinking. I . . . I guess I just love seeing all the beauty. Everything that the Fintan have built. Even though I wasn’t raised here, it’s where I come from. I want to belong here.”

  “I want that for you too.”

  He put his arm around me, and I leaned my head against his shoulder. “I know you do, Kyla. It just can’t be. The council won’t allow it. I know that. Deep down, I think you do too.”

  In the distance, the first of the sky lanterns rose up from the earth to kiss the sky. Though Fintan fire blazed in every color imaginable, we used only golden-white, blue, and purple flame in the lanterns.

  It always took my breath away.

  More lanterns rose into the air, the thin paper globes held aloft by the heat of the flame. They glimmered as if a thousand stars had come down to greet us and were now returning to the heavens.

  “This is my favorite part,” Nolan whispered. “Besides seeing you dance.”

  “Mine too.” We sat there, in the silence of that perfect moment, for a long time. I thanked the eternal flame that such bliss existed in the world.

  When the lanterns burned through their fuel and fell dark, sinking from the sky in soft, silent waves, I focused my gaze on the glassed-in fireflies. “You know I’m not an optimist by nature, Nolan. It’s not that I have blind faith that everything will work out. It’s just . . .”

  That I won’t give up until it’s done.

  “That what?” he asked.

  “That . . . I’m determined to see it through. And you know I don’t give up on anything I put my mind to.”

  “Kyla, don’t—”

  “Kyla Brannan, what are you doing?” screeched a voice behind me.

  I tensed. Mama.

  Blazes.

  Chapter Four

  Nolan shrugged away from me and whirled around to face Mama. I stayed stock-still, staring at the fireflies, my knuckles white, my fingers clutching the edge of the rough wooden table.

  “Hi,” he stuttered. “You must be Mrs. Brannon. Honored to meet you, ma’am.”

  The distant sounds of revelry and music and crackling flame could not mask the ice in her voice. “And you are?”

  “Nolan, ma’am.”

  Though my eyes were still fixed on the jar of captive fireflies, I heard her take a step closer, her sandals crunching in the gravel. Then her voice went up an octave. “Are you . . . Dallan Malone’s son?”

  “Aye, ma’am.”

  At this, I spun around, my taut nerves snapping like the string of a violin. “Nolan’s a friend, Mama. He came to see the festiv—”

  “Home. Right now.” She pointed in the direction of the encampment.

  “But, Mama, I—”

  “Was I unclear?” she snapped. In the light, her hair—auburn red but streaked with silver—seemed to wreathe her head like a crown. She gave me an imperious look, and I knew better than to argue. Not when she was in this mood. Best to continue the conversation at home, where Papa stood a chance at calming her.

  Nothing I could say would satisfy her.

  I stood up and whispered to Nolan, “Sorry. See you soon.”

  Then I marched away toward my family’s tent, anger hot in my chest, leaving Nolan to his unenviable interrogation.

  My own would come soon enough.

  I sat in the grass outside our white canvas tent, gazing up at the stars. My eyes traced the constellations—the pegasus, the phoenixbird, the dragonbeast, the dog.

  I’d always loved looking at the stars. It was like they were tiny pinpricks of fire in the sky. Fire, untamed yet still safe. And that soothed me.

  Reaching into my pocket, I traced the piece of coal with my fingers. A sliver of the heaviness in my chest dissipated. Maybe tomorrow I’d go down to the river, where no Fintan eyes would find me, and inspect the stone more closely—see what it did, why Nolan had been so excited to give it to me.

  A deep, gruff sound from inside the tent lifted my spirits. Papa had come home first. He’d be a buffer between Mama and me.

  I heard a rustle of canvas, and I stood, brushing the dirt off my pants. I hadn’t even gone back to the dressing tent to replace my costume and change into my skirt and blouse. Deirdre would give me her infamous peeved side-eye when I brought the costume back the next day, but I didn’t care.

  I was more afraid of Mama’s wrath than Deirdre’s.

  Pushing through the flap, I called, “Papa?”

  Our tent was warm and comfortable. The coals of a small fire burned in a portable cauldron in the center, the fumes venting up through a pipe that also served as the centermost tent post.

  A table with thin legs and a few chairs—all collapsible so that they were easy to fold up and pack whenever the camp moved location—stood off to one side.

  Papa was nowhere in sight, but I heard him humming in the partitioned-off room where he and Mama slept.

  On the other side of the tent, another partition led to the room I’d shared with Breanna for so many years, until she married and moved out. The space was lonelier now.

  “Papa?” I called again.

  The humming ceased, and the canvas rustled again. Papa ducked through the flap and strode out into the main room. “You did wonderfully tonight,” he said, beaming. He walked up to give me a hug, his arms spread wide, but pulled back at the last moment. “What is it?”

  I grimaced. “Nolan wa
s at the show.”

  He nodded, his eyes alight with amusement. “Was he, now?”

  “He and I sat and talked afterward, near the edge of the festival. Mama saw us.”

  He wrinkled his brow. “So?”

  “She wasn’t happy. She’s still giving Nolan a talking-to, I think.”

  He tilted his head and gestured to the table. “Come, sit down.”

  I followed him, and we each sank into chairs opposite each other at the wooden table.

  “She was angry because she saw you talking with someone from the outside?” Confusion wrinkled his weathered features.

  “Um . . .” I threaded my fingers together and clenched my hands until the knuckles paled. With a desperate hope that Papa wouldn’t be angry, I plunged ahead. “I was leaning against his shoulder. I think she thought he and I were . . . having a romantic moment.”

  His eyes softened, and a smile seemed to tug at the corners of his lips. “Were you?”

  “It wasn’t like that!” I said. Then I sighed. “I mean, I care about him. I . . . do think of him in that way. I think we both do. But we’ve never outright said it. Just hinted at it.” Looking down at my lap, I blushed. “Sometimes hinting at it a lot. But at the festival, we were just talking about everything we were seeing and . . .”

  “And?” His gentle voice urged me to continue, reassuring me that I would be met with nothing but kindness and understanding.

  I buried my face in my hands. “That I want to find a way to help Nolan’s family join the clan.”

  He pushed himself up from the creaky table, his footfalls heavy as he walked around the edge to join me. Amusement laced his voice as he sank into the chair next to me and rubbed my back. “You know I can’t hear you when you talk into your hands like that.”

  I kept my fingers over my eyes but shifted my palms so I could speak audibly. “I want to help Nolan’s family join the clan. Be Fintan again.”

  He sighed, and I heard the regret in his voice. “Oh, Kyla. It’s not possible.”

  I sat upright and turned toward him. His eyes were serious, and I pressed my trembling lips together. I wouldn’t take no for an answer—I couldn’t. “You don’t know that. I’ll figure out a way.” Despite my turbulent emotions, my words were clear and strong.

  He tilted my chin up. “If your heart is set on this boy, I won’t stand in your way. He’s treated you well since you were children, and his papa’s an honorable man. Dallan Malone would have raised his children well. But if you choose Nolan, you must fully realize what you’re giving up. Your position in the troupe. Your life here in the community. Your relationship with our fire.”

  The coals in the cauldron grew redder and brighter, as if they sensed Papa’s strong emotions.

  “You can have a good life here,” he said, seeming to choose his words carefully. “You can have a good life with Nolan, outside of the clan, apart from the Fintan way of life. But you can’t have both.”

  I leaned forward and buried my face in his shoulder. “I don’t want to leave,” I said.

  He pulled me into an embrace, and I relaxed in his warm, comforting presence. “I want what’s best for you. What will make you happy. I just want to make sure you fully understand your decision—whatever choice you make.”

  The thwack of fabric being thrust aside told me that Mama had come into the tent. “Don’t think we are done with this conversation, young lady!” Mama called.

  “Fiona,” Papa cautioned in his even, steady way. “Don’t be too hard on her.”

  “Too . . . hard on her?” Mama sputtered. “She was consorting with Dallan Malone’s son at the festival! In front of everyone! What will I—”

  Papa held up a hand. “Dallan Malone is a good man. There’s no cause to think badly of his son.”

  I looked up but couldn’t meet Mama’s eyes. Not yet.

  “He’s a defector,” Mama spat. “What am I supposed to tell the parents of our young men? That Kyla’s running around with an outsider? I’m tasked with finding her a steady young man for betrothal, and—”

  “Mama!” My spine stiffened as straight as a rod. This time, I searched out her gaze and held it. “Nolan and I haven’t even said anything about a romance. Not really.”

  She crossed her arms. “I saw the way you looked at each other. I’m not an idiot. I was sixteen once, too, you know.”

  My mind raced. “Aye. I care about him. But I’m barely sixteen. There won’t be a betrothal to anyone for at least a year. And I might want to wait even longer. I don’t want to rush to get married and have children. You know I want to be the next Phoenix.”

  She sniffed. “You can be the Phoenix if you’re married.”

  “Not if I’m pregnant,” I shot back.

  She was at my side in three long strides. “You might be pregnant?” she hissed.

  I stood up, rage coursing through my veins like fire. How like Mama to listen to an individual word but not to what I’d actually said. “Nay. It’s not like that. Point is I don’t want to get betrothed on my seventeenth birthday and married on my eighteenth. Because I don’t want to be pregnant any time soon. I want to do things first. Become somebody.”

  Mama’s eyes flashed. “Do you think I’m nobody because I had you and your sister?”

  “Fiona,” said Papa, a warning note in his voice.

  I exhaled a hot breath of frustration and fought to keep my voice even. “I’m saying that marriage and family will close off some of my options because the council thinks that women need to spend all their time focused on their husband, their babies, and their tent. And that’s not what I want right now.”

  She shook her head. “You’ll think differently when you have your own children. Your whole world will change.”

  I slammed my hand on the table. “Everyone always says that. Stop. I don’t want my whole world to change. Not yet. So stop griping at me for being friends with Nolan. Aye, I like him. But I’m not going to run off and marry him. Blazes, Mama. We’ve never even kissed.”

  Her eyes narrowed. “What does you’ve never even kissed mean? How long have you been running around with this boy?”

  “Since we were seven, Mama. I’ve been friends with Nolan almost my whole life.”

  “Fiona,” said Papa again.

  She whirled on him. “You knew? And didn’t put a stop to it?”

  “He’s always been good to her. Respectful.” He stopped and placed his hands gently on Mama’s shoulders, and his voice grew quieter so that I had to strain to hear him. “Fiona, you know Kyla is different. Even more so than Breanna. She’s not going to be content with the options available for her here, among our people. We’re going to have to let her go someday, or she’ll be miserable.”

  A chill ran down my spine.

  Papa had never said anything like that to me. He’d always made it clear that I was free to stay or free to leave, that I was his daughter no matter my choice. That he wanted me to be happy. But he’d never said he thought I’d choose to leave.

  My heart beat faster, and I withdrew, murmuring an apology to them both. I pushed out through the tent flap, leaving Mama’s harsh, whispered reply behind.

  Leave the clan? It made my stomach hurt just thinking about it. Because I didn’t want to leave. I loved my family. I loved the Fintan. I loved the festival.

  With a deep sigh, I plopped back down in the grass, eased myself onto my back, and stared up at the stars again.

  I just wanted to achieve something. Something that wouldn’t be dismissed as ornamental. Something everyone took seriously. I wanted to be successful in my own right, and not find my success in being a prop for my papa, my husband, my sons.

  The drive to be something was so strong that sometimes it felt like it was eating me up from the inside.

  But the most I could hope for was to dance as the Phoenix for a few short years before I married and began raising children.

  It wasn’t that I thought there was anything wrong with being like Mama. She lived
for her husband and her daughters. She found her life here, in our tent. She was happy that way.

  But I wasn’t like her. And it wasn’t fair that my options were so circumscribed. If I were a boy, I’d be in mage training. Performing magic at the festival. Eventually, I’d work repairing the sets, teaching the children, or quelling out-of-control fires. Maybe even take a seat on the council. But as a girl, I could hope to dance. And then quit to devote all my time to raising a family. I supposed I could aspire to teach dancing, like Deirdre. But I suspected she’d cling to her position until the day she died.

  I dug my fingers into the dirt. I just wanted choices.

  “Kyla?” It was Breanna’s voice.

  I turned to see my sister coming from the direction of her tent. She wore a long, flowing dress that brushed the grass as she walked. I waved at her but didn’t try to hide the emotion brimming in my eyes.

  She sat down beside me. “You get in a fight with Mama?”

  I sighed and wiped my tears with the backs of my hands. “It was about Nolan. She caught us talking at the festival.”

  Breanna chuckled and took my hand. “I always said you were taking an awful risk being with him there.”

  A Fintan family walked past us—a husband and wife and their four clamoring children—and Breanna and I hushed our voices to whispers.

  “Papa told Mama that someday I was going to leave the clan,” I murmured.

  Breanna squeezed my fingers. “It wouldn’t surprise me. And if you go, you’ll go with my blessing.”

  “But I don’t want to leave!” I snapped. “I just want to make something of myself. I want to be the Phoenix. I want to be a . . . mage. Blazes, why can’t women be mages? It doesn’t make any sense.”

  “You should know better than to voice that desire aloud.”

  I shook my head. She and I would never agree on that point.

  Breanna shifted. “About that.”

  Something in her tone made my throat run dry.

  “What?” I tilted my head.

  “Well, about being the Phoenix, that is. There’s something I’ve suspected for a month or so,” she said, “but I’m quite sure after today. I wanted to come and tell you and Mama and Papa. I’m not going to be the Phoenix for much longer.”