A Girl and the Wall of Fire

Once upon a time there was a village in the woods. It was a small one, the kind where everyone knows everyone, but not everyone is a friend. Even the oldest villagers couldn’t say when and who decided to build the first house so far from all the roads: main roads for big carts and steady travelers, small roads for unconventional goods and those who had something to hide, and even the invisible-to-the-common-eye paths for those who preferred to remain unseen. The village existed literally in the middle of nowhere and the only way to get there was to get lost.

Despite its location, little by little the village was growing. Years went by, but it still remained nameless. Why would anyone name it? The villagers knew no other settlements, as they could never leave. Rare newcomers would tell locals what they knew about the world, the knowledge would create a buzz for a while and then dissipate in the train of similar boring days, one of which was not like the others; even though no one knew it was special.

                1

 It was Friday afternoon when the recent addition, a woman named Olenka, gave birth to a daughter from an unknown father. The village then was big enough for gossips to circle around for months and months. Time flies and there are always new sources for rumors, so when Mirani celebrated her eighth birthday, there were just a few people with very good memory and sharp tongues left, who would whisper something to each other seeing the girl or her mother passing by.

I bet you want to ask why villagers could not leave the place and that is exactly what Mirani did one fine morning:

“Why can’t we leave the village, Mommy?” Everyone knows children grow up too quickly, but you can never truly understand the meaning of it until you get your own.

“Huh?” Olenka lifted her head from what she was sewing. She kept their small family going by making dresses for almost everyone in the village, except the most judging ones, who were not able to make themselves go out of their way and ask for anything.

When she first showed up there, all the women disapproved of her beautiful clothes and called her a show off at best, but after a while, one by one, they came wondering if she could make them something nice. And every time she would say “yes” with a humble smile.

“Why can’t we leave the village, Mommy?” Mirani repeated patiently.

Olenka looked at her daughter: two beady black eyes, curled black hair, a sweet-cheeked face and a weasel-like lean build that had almost nothing in common with the way she herself looked. She loved the personality which was already showing through the features that were yet to form more than anything in the world, but she has been worried that this curiosity and daring mind would lead Mirani to some troubles in the future. She didn’t expect it to be so soon. It was too soon.

“I don’t know, baby.”

“Don’t you?” Mirani’s gaze became piercing as always when she was contemplating something. “I thought you knew everything,” she added with a flicker in her eye.
Olenka shivered. Could Mirani know she was not telling the whole truth? Come to think of it, it happened every time Olenka tried to evade an answer or hide something from her daughter; even the tiniest or the whitest of lies was detected right away by this little girl.

The tired woman massaged her sore fingers and then ran them through her fair hair.

“You see, I know why people can’t leave the village and I don’t know why at the same time”.

“How’s that? I don’t understand.” Two thin brows frowned, almost leaning on one another.

“I know what happens when someone tries to leave, but I don’t know why it happens. No one here does.” Olenka smiled one of her sorry smiles as if it was she who was to blame for the situation. “Why do you want to leave anyway?”
“Because you want to. You are not happy here.” Mirani looked into her mother’s astonished face and continued in a less confident tone: “And I have no place here as well, never had, never will. You see it too, I can tell.”

Olenka shook her head. She was wondering how a child could have known her feelings better than she herself did; how Mirani could phrase with such ease and maturity things that had been bothering her for years and she couldn’t express what it was. She signed heavily.

“You must forget about it. No one has ever left this place. And we can’t either! We just need to humble ourselves and adjust. Do you understand me?” She said it too harshly as she realized the next moment the words had left her mouth. But it was too late to take them back and she did not know what else to say.

Mirani winced. Her mother had never spoken to her like that. The girl bit her lip and sat there in silence, watching Olenka get back to work, eyes squinting in the poor light.

                2

There had been less words and smiles exchanged between mother and daughter in the next few weeks that followed than ever before. Olenka had been feeling guilty, but didn’t want to raise the subject again, and Mirani was busy. She has been using any pretext to get outdoors. She was wandering around the village, asking a question here, listening to a remark there. Adults speak freely in front of kids as they think they won’t understand much anyway. And by the end of the month she had a plan formed in her tiny head.

“I can lead us out”, Mirani said suddenly as they were silently eating their simple dinner.

“Where?” Olenka asked, surprised. “Lead us where?”

“I don’t know where, Mom, but away from this rotting bog!” Mirani started talking too quickly as she usually did when she felt like she had too much inside her and needed to pour it out before people stopped her or stopped listening to her. “I know about the obstacles on the way, I know about the danger that is waiting for us in the woods, I know how scared you must feel to leave our house you’ve worked so hard to build. It won’t be easy, we surely need to be ready for that, but it will be better than staying here, silently turning into one of THEM! Always miserable and happy about it, having no intention to do anything or change anything. They are so scared to look at themselves that they scrutinize everyone else. I don’t want to lose myself here. But I will, Mom, if we stay here, I will. What have you lost to get here? You need to get it back! Now! While you still can! I need the real you, not the shadow of a person you’ve become”. The girl was panting as if after running a long distance. Her eyes were wide with excitement and fear that she had gone too far.

Olenka’s face hardened. Her eyes were glistening, but not with self-pity tears, these were the tears of life-asserting fury. Her right arm was holding her left arm tight. She swallowed loudly and said in a creaky voice:

“Connection. I lost a connection to the world when your father left.” She swallowed again. “But long before that I lost myself trying to earn his love. Maybe I never had myself, who can tell now?” The woman touched her lips hesitantly. “There was no one to treat me as a person: a function, a project, a prospect, an idea and an expectation – anything but who I was. It is easy to lose yourself when you don’t know who you really are.”

They sat in silence for a while, then Olenka lifted her head up and looked at her daughter with a fierce look in her eyes that were bright blue, instead of grayish as Mirany always knew them to be.

“How can we get out?”

“I can’t explain how.” Mirani was answering slowly, trying to find the right words. “I think I know how, I feel it. You just have to trust me with this.”
“Trust.” The woman tasted the word, didn’t like it and chewed her lower lip instead. “Trust is not what I am used to, you know. But I will try. If I had to choose a single person in the world to trust, it would be you, baby.” She was staring in the space in front of her as if the air could come up with the idea of what to do next. “It will take some time. But we shall use this time wisely and get ready for our adventure. We will leave when the spring comes.”

                3

Winter was taking its place outside their small house, but inside it was warmer than ever. Olenka sprung to life after that conversation. Her back became straighter, her hair lighter and her voice stronger. She stopped saving every penny and denying herself everything, and strangely, she started earning more, even though she was saying “no” to people once in a while now.

The whisper started in the village that Olenka must have fallen in love, but since there were no men spotted around, people could not figure out what was going on. Some were very determined to find out as it was disrupting their conventional existence.

There were two people most unhappy with the changes. The first one was the village chief, Urisef, who, being a widower with no kids, fancied Olenka for years, but had gotten tired of her ignoring his clumsy attempts of courtship, and moved on, taking a sturdy and silent woman named Helena as his wife. He considered himself offended and set his mind on knowing who could have been chosen over him. The second one was the main gossiper, Saraya, who saw herself as the wise-woman and tradition-keeper of the village. She hated everything and everyone who at least slightly differed from what she defined as the norm.
One fine morning Olenka heard an impatient knock at the door and was very surprised to find a delegation of four women on her porch. Saraya brought her small but deadly army with her.

The busiest tongues of the village were presented in their range here. Polinok, the blacksmith’s wife, had two chins as well as two faces: one was always smiling and the other one smirking. The good thing about her was that she never mixed them up. Velvetina, a tiny and shy widow, so desperate to please the high and mighty that she followed Saraya day and night and just did what the others were doing without giving it a second thought. Umagwen had a strong name and a strong character, which meant that there was not enough strength left for her body, making it fragile and thin. But one had to be careful enough not to make a mistake and underestimate this woman because of her shadowy appearance, as she was one of the meanest enemies the village dweller could ever make.

“Good day to you, neighbors. What brings you here this fine morning?” Olenka asked respectfully, but did not step aside to let them in as they clearly expected.

 “Ahem” Saraya brought her portly self forward to proudly announce. “We have decided it is time for you to be a host for the women circle this Friday. You know what is required to be prepared. We shall come right after sunset.”
Olenka silently nodded. “I am honored”, and stepped back inside the house, shutting the door quietly. There were no sorry smiles this time, there were no smiles at all. And this fact was not left unnoticed.

Mirani watched her mother pacing to and fro for several minutes then silently dressed, took the water-bucket and slipped out. Olenka didn’t even notice that her daughter left. Being invited into the women circle meant they were being finally accepted as locals. Being a host was a great honor and would mean that their lives would change: no more alienation, no more looking down, no more sharp comments about their origin. A couple of months ago she would be thrilled to hear this, she had wanted for it to happen for so long. But now everything was different. There was no way of escaping it without turning the whole village against them. She didn’t know why it was so important to escape it, but she felt it in her guts, and for the first time in a long while she trusted her feelings. They couldn’t stay.

                4

When Mirani came back, her Mom had already gone through the panic stage “we are not ready”, anger stage “why are they doing it to us?”, desperate stage “we are going to die”, suspicious stage “they know something”, another panic stage “what are we going to do now?” and, having exhausted her energy, finally was composed and calm.

Mirani put a half-full bucket on the floor and hugged her mother.
“There’s a whisper in the village, Mom. Everyone is talking about you being accepted into the women’s circle, some approve of it, some don’t, but there is something more, though I couldn’t grasp it.” Olenka didn’t move and Mirani looked into her mother’s face intently.

“Why did you leave?” Olenka asked in a low voice.

“What?”

“Did you leave because you don’t trust me? Did you leave because you think I can’t find a solution? You said I need to trust you, but you don’t trust me yourself. How do we make it out without trust?”

Mirani hugged her Mom tighter: “I left, because I trust you.” Olenka looked at her daughter for the first time since she came back. “I knew you’d come up with something without me unnerving you here. I just wanted to be useful too.”
 
Olenka hugged her daughter back, tears streaming down her face. “Everyone would think we are getting ready for the circle meeting, so we shall raise no suspicions. We have four days left, we are leaving Friday before dawn. Now rest.”

 
                5

Friday found the mother and daughter sitting in the dark of their house with their eyes wide open, being unable to sleep. Both of them were trying to suppress the fluttering in their stomachs.

They had been very busy these last days, getting ready for their secret escape. Olenka had made a list of what they needed to buy and combined it with what was demanded for the women’s circle ceremony. They tried to split “the secret list” as much as possible, buying a flask here and a warm coat there. Mirany was running most errands while Olenka was hastily finishing her orders, cleaning the house and deciding what to take with them.

Olenka closed her eyes, imprinting their house in her memory. They had very little savings, most of her income went to support their modest living. She spent years making this place cozy, and now she had to leave everything behind.
She filled two big sacks and several small ones. They were taking only what was necessary: one change of clothes for each of them, money, some herbal medicines, dried fruit and meat, and some water. Mirani wanted to take some memorable items with her too, but Olenka made her leave them.

“It’s time.” Olenka stood up, put on her warmest clothes, helped Mirani, grabbed sacks that were piled near the door, took her daughter’s hand and the night swallowed them.

They’d agreed on the route beforehand, and now they walked in silence, trying to stay unseen. Olenka didn’t know why she was in such a hurry. Winter nights were long and they had several hours before someone would wake up. She walked as quickly as it was possible in the snowy night, having a child trying to keep up with her pace. She was hoping that snow would cover their tracks and she was so busy worrying about what was waiting for them in the midst of the forest, that she didn’t notice a shadow following them, leaving a much more distinct trail than they did.


                6

The shadow caught up with the two figures when they reached a clearing in the forest, and mockingly coughed behind their backs. Mirani let out a high shriek. Olenka jumped up and turned around, hiding her daughter behind her back.

“Well, well. What have we got here?” The shadow stepped out to the moonlight and Olenka saw Urisef smiling an unkind smile. The moon distorted the features of his wide face, making him look like a troll from the old tales. Olenka gasped and started stepping back, driving Mirani away from the man.

“We got what I told you – a runner.” Another smug voice answered from behind her back. Olenka jumped up again pushing Mirani closer to her, while turning to face Umagwen and couple of dozen of villagers, who were coming out from behind the trees. “Well, a runner and a half, I should say.”

Olenka shut her eyes for a moment, slipping away from the cold air burning her lungs, angry giggles pinching her and sharp eyes piercing her from every direction, wishing it all was just a nightmare. Then she felt Mirani clinging to her, and took a deep breath.

“Why do you care if we leave or stay?” She asked, trying to make her heart stop racing. She was standing there with her eyes closed, feeling the earth, feeling the trees, feeling the stars, reaching to the strength of the world breathing around her, together with her. And when their breaths synchronized, she opened her eyes. There were no fear in them. “You hate us anyway. You must be happy we won’t be a snag in your eye anymore”. “No one leaves here. No one, you hear me!” Saraya’s eyes were visible in the night lit up with rage. “You are going to bring disaster to us all! Your place is here and you must be grateful to have it! What made you think you are better than us?!”

“Not better, no.” Olenka said firmly. “Different.’

“Oh really? Someone thinks herself special. So special she turned up here knocked up with no husband, no family, nothing to hold onto in the world and nowhere to go. Very special indeed!” Umagwen’s voice was pure poison. Velvetina looked up at her and stepped forward, her body making slight jerking movements as she spoke,

“We have accepted you! Yes, yes. We have helped you.” Her eyes darted to try and find Saraya’s, but she couldn’t see them in the dark, so she continued at her own risk. “And where is the gratitude? Yes? Where is it?”

Olenka was silent, standing with her head lifted proudly. And this silence made everyone dance in their places, blood rushing to their faces, angry words leaving their lips. Urisef raised his voice over the murmur,

“It is decided. The village has lived like this for generations. We lived like this for generations, and you will stop this nonsense now and live like everyone else does. Now turn around and go back with us at once!”

“No.” Only one word left Olenka’s mouth, but it caused a wave of shouts from the crowd. Everyone wanted to be heard and people got more and more excited, getting ignited from each other’s anger. Shouts were turning into aggressive gestures when Olenka realized Mirani was no longer at her side. She looked around just in time to see her daughter’s silhouette dissolving among the trees.

She darted forward without thinking. She was not sure if that was the right direction, she didn’t care that the angry crowd followed her and she didn’t let herself think what they’d do to her when they catch up. She just needed to be with her daughter.

Trees were closing in on her, branches hitting her face; heart pounding and she almost felt the hot breath of her pursuers on her back. No one was shouting anymore, the chase left no room for it. People were running with all their might, though few of them knew why.


                7

Olenka’s sight started to blur. There was no “her” at the moment. There was her right foot that had to take a step and her left foot that had to take another one. Her hands were up to protect her face. The blood filled her head and she almost forgot who and where she was. She only knew she had to keep going.

Suddenly a bright light tore the night apart. She stopped and someone almost bumped into her, panting. She took her hands down, and froze at the sight before her. She stood on the edge of a bigger clearing, and on the other side of it was Mirani, standing in front of a beaming pillar of fire.

She had heard about it, she knew it was coming, but it was not the same as feeling the awe and fear of the unknown uncontrollable danger threatening your child.

She wanted to run to Mirani, but her body betrayed her, so she walked slowly and as steady as she could manage. The villagers followed her in silence, blinking like bats forced to face the daylight.

The fire seemed alive, an immense being, swirling and breathing, colors mixing and moving through its great body: orange, white, yellow, red, blue. When the last villager stepped out of the forest, the pillar protruded and ran like a lightning around the clearing, becoming a wall, keeping everyone inside.

Now no one was chasing anyone anymore. People crowded together, sweating in the cold winter night. The next moment the wall spit out a fiery drop into the sky, which went very high up and then dived down, spreading its wings as it almost hit the ground. The humongous fire bird was standing before Mirani, towering over the girl.

Olenka leaped, covering the remaining distance separating her from her daughter, hoping to protect her, but Mirani’s smile caught her in midair. She was calm. The girl slightly shook her head and Olenka made herself stop and then took two steps back. She promised to trust her.

Mirani stepped forward and raised her hand towards the great bird, surrounded by a fuzz of sparks.

“No!” A shout came from behind Olenka’s back. “Don’t you dare! You! You put all of us into peril.” Saraya was elbowing her way to where Olenka was standing. “We need to turn back and leave, before it is too late.” Olenka got ready to stand her ground no matter what, when the crowd moved and to everyone’s surprise Helena stepped into Saraya’s way.

“Move away!” Saraya ordered. As an answer Helena crossed her hands on her strong body. Olenka couldn’t see her face, but she guessed there was something in it that made Saraya become less confident. “Urisef, what is going on here? Get your wife under control now, will you?” The village chief put his hand on his wife’s shoulder: “What do you think you are doing, woman?”

Being almost as tall as Urisef, Helena looked her husband in the eye: “You have your own life to live now, so stop chasing other’s.” Saying this she took his hand and pressed it to her belly. Urisef’s face changed: there was anger, shock, doubt, and finally joy. He hugged his wife, tears in his eyes.
 
This commotion took everyone’s attention away from Mirani for a while, and when the villagers turned back, everyone gasped. The fire bird lowered its head down and was staring Mirani in the eyes, and the same fire was staring back at it. After a moment, the bird turned to the people and let out a loud cry, as if daring them, while they watched an opening appear within the wall.

“You are next,” said Mirani to her Mom and left the clearing.

Olenka gulped and took a step.


                8

She was floating in the sea of liquid fire, multicolored sparks around her, forming big and small whirlpools. She felt no pain or burning as she expected, so she looked at her hands and was surprised even more to be able to see through them. Fire was permeating through her, as if cleansing every piece of her mind, every corner of her soul, - the sheer fiber of her being.

After an eternity for her and a blink of an eye for the rest of the world, she found herself standing in front of the giant firebird, tears streaming down her face. She was still herself, and yet she wasn’t. She looked at the flock of villagers and smiled. This was a new kind of smile for her, genuine but without any label that could be put on it. She just smiled as she felt light and free again, like it was so many winters ago when she was a child.

It seemed strange that she was herself then, and becoming a grownup tore the connection she always had with the world and made her forget who she was. But now she remembered. She lifted her head to the sky, thanked it for everything, and then realized she’d lost her sack during the crazy chase, but it didn’t matter anymore. She had what she really needed within her. She paid her former neighbors one last glance and stepped through the opening to where Mirani was waiting for her, to where dawn was waiting for her, to where life was waiting for her.