Year twenty-five of the firefolk era, the night of the Seventh Evening Festival.
The children of the Nine Provinces were all having the same dream.
In the dream, the spring equinox was drawing to an end, and early summer held a slight chill. Fireflies dotted the fields like stars fallen to earth. A woman in plain robes walked through the grass, an old wooden pin tucked into her hair and a paper lantern in her hand. The lantern was not dazzling, but glowed as gently as a breath, bathing even the dew on the grass in soft light.
She called softly, "Come, carry a lantern."
The children stepped forward, one after another, to take the paper lanterns she offered. They were pasted together from old book pages, still bearing phrases such as "fire has a home" and "people have warmth." Their wicks were twisted from hearth ash, their oil pressed from okra seeds—it was the scent of Gray Ridge Village.
The woman smiled. "You light lanterns not to illuminate the road, but to make the road remember you."
She led countless children across the wilderness, over bridges spanning streams, through mountain valleys, and past city walls. With every step, a lantern fell and buried itself in the soil. It did not go out, but sank deeper, as though planted in the veins of the earth.
"These are the roots of heart flame," the woman said. "For heart flame to become a river, it must have a source. Your lanterns are that source."
Suddenly, she released her lantern. It drifted away from her and became countless fireflies, carrying tiny lights as they burrowed underground. The lanterns in the children's hands rose too, following hers and gathering into a winding river of light that flowed toward the heart of the earth.
That