Ice Breaker

This week on Write on Edge’s Red Writing Hood, (follow the link to read more prompt responses, or, better yet, submit your own!) we were challenged to be inspired by the phoenix, one of the definitions below:

(source New Oxford American Dictionary online)
phoenix |ˈfēniks|
noun
(in classical mythology) a unique bird that lived for five or six centuries in the Arabian desert, after this time burning itself on a funeral pyre and rising from the ashes with renewed youth to live through another cycle.

Phoenix |ˈfēniks| Astronomy
a southern constellation (the Phoenix), west of Grus.

It’s like the universe is telling me to keep adding to the Firefly story, by giving me prompts that move it forward.  There are a few previous pieces in this story, which you can find under my Fiction tab (above), in the storyline called Firefly.

Today’s art-to-go-with-post is actually also the inspiration of a great many aspects of this storyline… I saw it, and have been waiting for a part of the story that would make sense to include this artwork with.  It’s a photomanipulation by Aimee Stewart (USA).  Some of her artwork is in greeting cards, and has been made into puzzles.  Not only talented artistically, she is also in the midst of creating her first children’s book, art and all.  You should check her out HERE at DeviantART, or at her website HERE.

Rachel rubbed her arms against the chill country air.  How can it be so cold in the summer?

She followed the shadow-shrouded figure of her aunt, trying to ignore the prickly sensation of being watched.  They don’t believe, not really.

The fire was already lit, a dull orange glow separated from her by starkly outlined trees.  She could reach out to the heat of it already.  Just a touch to shake the cold.  No.  Too little control, too many burnables.  Once again she felt the futile longing for a teacher.

Her Aunt Miriam smiled back at her, hands fluttering with nerves and excitement.

Breathe.  She stepped forward, already feeling the pull of the fire, so welcoming.  The flames rose in a thunder of crackling wood.

Heat rose within her and she swayed.  Blood sizzling and nerves screaming ecstasy, she let the music and heat of the flames wash through her, out of her.  Distantly, she knew the onlookers were being washed with the echo of what she felt, the merest lick of the heat that washed through her very bones, the softest stir on the surface of what she saw and felt.

The flames licked out, spreading and scattering impossibly, dancing their joy, flickering across the grassy clearing in the form of foxes and cats, birds, butterflies, sprites, boneless and graceful, pulling people into the dance.

The joy of each person fed that of the rest, fueling the fire of the dance, shooting the central fire higher and impossibly bright as its creatures darted out into the night.

She longed to keep going, keep dancing and feeding into the heat and passion of it all.  But Rachel had been Laga to her own coven for a long time, and knew how to fight the fire without being burned.

“Fight it with fire,” her voice was hoarse and drenched in smoke, but it ground her enough to do what must be done.  With that, she leapt into the flames, a flurry of Elementals following her.

The pain was excruciating and ecstatic, the core of the flame heating and tightening around her as its creatures returned to it.  All of its creatures, and I am just one more.

She burned up and let the vision take her.

Fire.  Smoke and ashes tangling through the air, choking her lungs and clawing her towards unconsciousness.  Her hands and bare feet throbbed with harsh burns that should not have touched her. 

The ember fox stood before her, more solid than any she’d seen.  Isbritare, I name you. Ice breaker, you have answered the summons.