The night was quiet. Unnaturally quiet. Even the dogs did not bark. They only growled low at the sky, the fur along their necks bristling.

  Dan stepped out of the hut and stretched. The moon hung low like a yellowed fingernail. The stars were so bright it looked as if someone had polished the sky clean. That was when he saw it, a burning streak slashed across the black canvas.

  A comet.

  Bright, trailing a long tail like something out of a disaster movie. Except this was not a movie. This was here. Now.

  He froze. His heart thudded once, then again.

  “So much for getting away from civilization,” he muttered. “Now we have a comet dropping by.”

  While he stood there, the village began to stir. Women wailed. Children cried. Men poured out of their huts, squinting at the sky. And among them stood Keo the shaman, tall and gaunt, eyes glowing like coals.

  He walked to the fire and tossed a bundle of dried herbs into the flames. Bitter smoke rolled out, sharp enough to sting the throat. Dan took an involuntary step back.

  Keo raised his arms.

  “Taaaar-aumba… Tau-Kiri… Ini-uagaaa…”

  His voice was thin and dry, like palm leaves scraping in the wind.

  The tribe fell silent.

  “The old light is leaving. The spirit of fire speaks. A new hunter has come. He saved our blood, he brought strength, and now the spirits demand change.”

  He turned to Tumo.

  “Do you hear the sign? Do you see the tail of the sky?”

  Tumo stood in silence. After a long moment he lifted his hand and pressed it to his chest.

  “I hear.”

  He removed his necklace. It was no simple ornament. The fangs of a cave lion had been drilled and strung on sinew, polished smooth by generations of hands. With that necklace Tumo had once led his people.

  He walked toward Dan.

  There was no anger in his eyes. No submission either. Only tired understanding.

  He did not place the necklace around Dan’s neck. He simply held the heavy fangs out in both open palms and set them into Dan’s hands.

  The gesture was plain and final.

  Power is not given. It is passed on.

  Now it rested with him. What he did with it would be his choice.

  Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.

  A whisper moved through the crowd like wind through tall grass. People dropped to their knees. Even the dogs crouched low beside Dan.

  He remained standing. Alone among the fires. Alone beneath the stars. A comet above him and a weight settling onto his shoulders.

  “Well,” he murmured, “guess I’m chief now. Hope that comes with insurance.”

  Did this make Tumo an enemy? What would he do next?

  Dan did not sleep much that night.

  Morning after the comet felt wrong. A yellow haze hung over the camp. Far to the south, brush often burned after lightning storms. But this time the smoke was thicker. Closer. The fire was moving too fast, as if the air itself were driving it forward.

  Keo stepped out of his hut with his eyes closed, something he rarely did. He inhaled slowly, as if listening to a scent.

  “The flame is coming. Not like before. This is fire that fell from the sky. It comes for the one who must leave.”

  Tumo stood at the center of the clearing. He did not respond to the shaman’s words. He picked up his spear, looked once at his daughter, then at Dan.

  “If a man leaves, he does not turn his back.”

  And he walked toward the fire.

  At first Dan thought he meant to scout ahead. But Tumo spoke to no one. Not even to Anisha. He walked the way warriors walk when they believe the spirits are calling their name.

  A few young men started after him, but Keo lifted his staff.

  “This is a crossing. We do not touch the one the sky has called.”

  The fire suddenly flared into open flame. The wind shifted. Dry trees ignited in an instant. Several warriors ran toward the forest’s edge, then stopped.

  Through the smoke they saw him.

  Tumo stood on a rock high above the brush. He raised his spear toward the sky. For a brief moment the comet glowed through a break in the smoke, still smoldering above like a scar of fire across the heavens.

  A gust of wind swept the slope.

  His silhouette vanished into the smoke.

  When the fire passed, only the charred spearhead remained where he had stood. Later they would plant it in sacred ground. In the sand they found a single footprint turned toward the east.

  The tribe did not see death in that. They saw a sign. The fire of the sky had not come without reason. The old chief had chosen to go. He understood his time had ended.

  The wind came in hot waves. The ground trembled faintly beneath their feet, as if some ancient beast had stirred below the world. Thick black smoke rolled over the horizon and climbed above the trees, blotting out the sky. Within minutes a tongue of flame ran down the slope toward the village, hissing and hungry.

  “Fire,” someone breathed.

  Anisha gripped Dan’s hand. Bob stood nearby, jaw clenched, eyes wide but steady. He did not panic. He waited.

  Dan looked at the burning forest. The answer came to him in a flash. There was only one way to save them all, and it was not prayer.

  “Bob. Torches. Anything that burns. Move.”

  Bob nodded and disappeared. He returned moments later with armfuls of burning branches and bundles of dry grass. Dan took one and handed another back to him.

  “Listen carefully. Here we put it out. There we light it. Understand?”

  Bob’s eyes lit with understanding. He even managed a quick grin.

  “I understand.”

  They ran along the edge of the village, smothering the first flames with dirt, beating them down with branches, pouring the last of the water from their skins. The fire was still young there, only the first probing line of heat. Behind it, though, came the real inferno.

  While Bob fought the flames creeping toward the huts, Dan moved to the other side, the side facing the oncoming wall of fire. He set the dry grass and fallen wood alight.

  The flames caught quickly. Wind seized them and pulled them toward the forest, toward the advancing blaze.

  Behind them people screamed. Some called for the shaman. Some cried out to spirits. Some simply wept in terror.

  Dan and Bob worked.

  Fire against fire. Human will against the wild.

  “Look!” Bob shouted, voice raw, face black with soot.

  Dan saw it.

  The two lines of flame met on the slope. For a moment it roared as if two beasts had collided. Then the fire collapsed inward on itself, starving for fuel. It choked, faltered, and died, leaving smoke, ash, and the bitter reek of charred earth.

  The hillside lay blackened.

  The village still stood.