Fire.
When Beltane's basket first underwent the change, shifting its colors from dull wicker to reveal to the seers an inkling of the life inside, the gem flashed with fire. Fire, the shamans had said, fire was in this foal's soul.
And when the foal burst forward from his basket, he was alive with the spirit of fire. Fire that shone in the young cerynei's eyes. His parents gave him the name "Beltane", for the season he was born, and the fires associated with the festival. He embraced Fire as his personal totem, following its life and energy.
But life did not stay simple in the great Cerynei herd. Fire came up to meet them, and take from them their home. Beltane was hurt, personally affronted and confused why the force he embraced as his totem would turn on them. Why it would drive them away from the secluded forests that had been theirs for generations. Their numbers had already been dwindling over the years, and they feared the fires would be the nail in their coffin if they didn't flee.
Beltane.... couldn't. Fire had been his ally, his friend since he was a foal, and as a young stallion, he could not let it drive him away from his home without understanding why. What they had done to affront the spirit of Fire. Besides... he could hardly look the members of his herd in the eye; the very force that he respected and virtually worshiped as his Totem had become a force of destruction in the eyes of his people.
He traveled for many moons. Sometimes only a few miles in a day as he had to pick through charred lands or double-back when raging fires made him find a different route.
The road was not always harsh, however. An angel of the skies visited him one day and renewed his spirit.
But none could prepare him for the end of his road. He had expected some great revelation. Something his people had done to anger fire. But the answer he had spent months of his life, refused to join the emigration of his people, left his family... was nothing more then, from what he could piece together... two-legs. Traveling through the reaches at the edge of their territory. A combination of little rain and not handling the force of fire with the respect and berth it deserved. He found charred paths from circles outside torn-down trees, spreading to the woods themselves. Thirsty trees...
He was familiar with the force to understand the signs... and it saddened him. He felt... empty. Unfulfilled in finding this "answer"... and alone.
Slowly, Beltane made his way back... following old trails that he hoped his people had used, finding his way into the new world.
HE started to see new wonders - soquili the likes he had never seen before - most much stockier than he, some with all kinds of shapes of horns, and he even saw ones that bore familiar traits - the deer-like builds and tails... and he began to start to smile again.
But then... then the rain stopped falling. For months on ends. The grasses turned brown and the people grew thirsty, and Beltane began to worry. He remembered this time. He remembered the time of little water among his people... and he feared... feared that he had not solved a true mystery that Fire needed solved. He had not appeased his Totem and its wrath had followed him even to these green lands.
He tried to warn the people here... the other soquili, but what could be done, really? The land was parched everywhere anyone knew. And many didn't see the signs....
***
Unfortunately, Beltane was right. It was a perfect storm, and he watched history repeat itself. This time, it wasn't careless two-legs, but the heavens themselves. Lightning struck, and where it touched fire sprung to life, eating through the plains as the dry grasses fed Fire's hunger.
Beltane was devastated. He had refused to abandon his totem - it had been Named as his totem since birth. But it wreaked its anger on the lands, it destroyed lives, communities, separated families who were torn apart and lost in the leaping flames.
Surely, he must be cursed. His presence must have brought the flames. At least it seemed that way to the cerynei buck.
He did what he could, helping foals to escape the blazes. He refused to sit idly and watch Fire take more lives if there was anything he could do. He traveled with the fire - knowing its ways - how to judge where it would move as the winds changed or it ran across fields or trees or water. And, Beltane began to start to realize... he did have a place, something his knowledge and his totem could do to help.
****
Eventually, Fire slept once more. The land was blackened with ash; the lives of many people and soquili alike were claimed...
But as Beltane began to pick his way through where the fires had eaten through a forest one day, singing chants and prayers for the spirits of the fallen, he saw a spring of green pushing up through the ash.
New life.
Rebirth.
And the more he traveled those days, the more rejuvenation he found - trees growing where the old, ancient trees had kept new life from taking root. Flowers and brush. Butterflies... and soon, fawns and foxes and new life all taking seed in the wake of the destruction of the fire.
And like a bolt of lightning, epiphany hit the cerynei.
Fire was a harsh mistress, but with the destruction she brought change... hope... and new life. His people had been losing numbers in their old herdlands. Too few foals with each new year, and even fewer that were not sisters or cousins or otherwise related. The fire had driven them from their own home, but the land they found was not the terrifying stories that they used to tell the foals to keep them home. Certainly, there were monsters, but there were just as many warm faces and kind soquili. Since he had followed, much later, the hoofsteps of his fellows he had seen other cerynei he had never seen before. Soquili that were crosbreed with his kind. They had blossomed and flourished after the fire in this new land - perhaps thanks to fire for making them finally overcome the old traditions and move on.
It was frighting - fire was frightening, leaving their homeland was frighting. And certainly, there were costs. But it was, in the end, for the good.
He looked out over the new growth in he Kawani lands with a smile. He had made it, many people and soquili had made it - and it would make them stronger and healthier for it in the long run.
Beltane continued on his walk, his antlered head held high with confidence. Fire was his totem. And he felt like, for the first time, he truly understood what that meant.
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