In days long faded from the memory of Men, an island sprang up in the heart of the World Sea. Here on the Isle of Yev, the Fire Mount Pirro raised her summit to the sun and knew the purity and the longing of solitude.
As time reached its fullness, Life arrived in the form of plants and the small things that served them, and animals and those that ate them and those they ate. Birds circled, allowing their brilliant colors to flow into the blooms and bushes. Fish shimmered in the clear waters in numbers too great to count, stirring the tides and waves. Beauty set pace and purpose on the isle.
On a day no one foresaw, something amazing swam in from the East. The Whales had come to the Isle of Yev. There was Numla the Daring and Fahli the Curious. Deelun the Seeker came, too. Finally, there was Arqwhal the Gentle, through whose mighty heart flowed all the salty waters of the World Sea and all the songs therein.
Beguiled by such a complex being, Pirro called to Arqwhal. “Come, let me show you the grandeur of my undersea passages and the many creatures who live there.” This delighted Arqwhal, who enchanted Pirro with tales of his long journeys through the World Sea. Pirro, who was by now ancient, fell in Love with Arqwhal in the way that those who have felt nothing for a very long time suddenly realize they can feel all. “You are Life,” she told him.
There followed a parade of days when Life proceeded as Life was meant to happen. The sun passed over the Isle of Yev, illuminating the many mirrored scales in the World Sea and sharing its brilliance with the feathers dancing in the Over Sky. When creatures hungered, they fed and then used their strength to comfort others. No one records such peaceful days, then or now.
On a day no one had planned for, Men from beyond the horizon sailed to the Isle of Yev in crude and leaking boats. The Men had names, but they shouted them so loudly and insistently that the sounds bounced off of Pirro’s stone ears. The Men went to work, stripping as much fruit from the trees as they could gather and weaving nets to pull the shimmering fish from the sea in such numbers the Whales struggled to find their portion.
The Men could not eat all they had gathered. On the Isle of Yev, unwanted fruit and fish piled high, rotting beneath the Over Sky. The perfume of the colored blossoms vanished, and corruption fouled the clean air.
Pirro rumbled at the presumption of the Men, that they would take so much. She vowed to blast fire and enormous stones down upon the Men until they either left the Isle of Yev or learned to take their proper share and no more.
The Men laughed and told each other mountains did not speak. They repeated this until every Man believed it so.
Arqwhal the Gentle spoke to Pirro, saying the Men were new to Life. They had yet to learn the limits and the satisfactions of assuming their place in the greater community. Pirro argued, saying Men were blinded by want. “It would be best to return our island to the way it was before they came.”
“Give them time to learn,” Arqwhal pleaded in a way that softened even Pirro’s stoney heart.
Pirro ceased her rumbling.
In the days that followed, the Men cut deep into the Isle of Yev. They bore holes into Pirro’s majestic sides to find yellow metal and tiny stones that played with the light. These they draped upon themselves, each demanding praise for sparkling more than any other. While they argued, the holes went unfilled. Pirro rumbled again.
In the next days, the Men cut the trees to build themselves fine homes. The most sparkly gave themselves the largest homes and the most land around them, forcing the less sparkly to crowd together in cramped homes that creaked uncertainly when winds blew off the World Sea.
The Men’s takings created vast patches where nothing grew. The Men caught birds to pluck the bright feathers that they might add the brightness to their garments, for they had grown tired of mere rainbow stones and yellow metal alone. Stones, metal, and feathers. That was best! Though the birds were good to eat, the Men threw the bloating carcasses on the ground beside the uneaten fish and fruit.
Pirro rumbled louder. The Men told each other there was no sound.
“What can be done with such creatures as these?” Pirro asked.
“Give them time,” Arqwhal implored. “They must learn their own nature.” Such was the sweetness in Arqwhal’s voice that Pirro’s fiery heart cooled within her.
At night, Arqwhal sang to the Men. His deep melody told them of the joy of belonging and of giving. Arqwhal and his fellow Whales circled the Isle of Yev, singing and singing. Most of the Men stopped up their ears and went back to sleep. A very few Men listened to the Song of Arqwhal.
The sun floated again and again over the waters and the island. The Men filled their bellies and cloaked themselves in vanity, but it was not enough. They left their boats untended, feeding worms and cracking under the relentless sun. Instead, they turned their labors to one project only. They built a Light.
The tower proudly rose as tall as Pirro’s peak, and at its top a cauldron burned all the wood that the Men could carry. It failed to dazzle. At night, the flames lost their power before reaching the farthest breakers. Frustrated, the Men searched for something that would burn more fiercely.
The day came when Arqwhal called but got no answer from Fahli the Curious. Arqwhal raised his head above the waves and learned a bitter truth. Men were cutting and parsing the body of the Whale, boiling the bits into oil for their Light.
That night, Arqwhal the Gentle wept under the dazzling Light. He wept both for Fahli the Curious and for the Men who could not know the treasure they had wasted to fuel their ego tower.
The following day, more Men appeared. A fleet of well-made boats carried them to the Isle of Yev. The Men of the Isle of Yev greeted the newcomers and made bargains. They traded birds and shiny stones and yellow metal to some of the Men in exchange for other men. Her stoney eyes could peer deep into the truths of the World Sea, yet Pirro could see no difference between those who traded and those who were traded.
The Men of the Isle of Yev took and beat the men they bought, locking them in chains just loose enough for the men to labor. And labor they did, netting great numbers of fish, of which the men ate only what scraps the Men left. The men repaired the boats and the houses and the Light. They slept little and died often. The Men of the Isle of Yev lighted the Light and summoned more men to their purpose.
Pirro called out to Arqwhal, “Can you not see the heart of these Men? Their nature is fixed as firmly as the stars. They will not change. Let me scour Men from the Isle of Yev for the sake of all.” Smoke bellowed up from her heart and filled the Over Sky. She started to rumble mightily.
“They took one of us for their Light,” said Arqwhal the Gentle. “They must know they cannot go on like this. You must let them learn. They are living beings, as I am. It is in the nature of all living things to change. This is Hope, and Hope is why we live. Wherever Men go, bringing pain with their vanity and greed, there too must go Hope. Show patience, Great Fire Mount. For their sake. For mine.”
“For you, and only for you, will I be patient,” Pirro told the Whale she loved.
Pirro had seen much, and in her heart, she knew what was to come. The knowing did not lessen the pain. The heat within her slowly rose.
The Men beat the men harder and harder, preparing for a Great Festival. They were to celebrate the Greatness of Men for days upon days upon days, singing and dressing themselves in yellow metal and feathers and sparkling stones. They composed harsh words they called songs, though Pirro had heard finer music coming from her own belly when it was upset. She pulled herself deep into her rocky interior and deadened her senses.
At last, the Men held their Great Festival. They filled many tables with fish and fruit until nothing moved in the waters around the Isle of Yev and the trees stood bare. Each night, they lit the Light, broadcasting a brilliance never seen before. This ushered in a brisk trading in metal and feathers and stones and men and oil.
At the end of the Great Festival, the Men lay drunken and fattened and hoarse from singing about themselves all night.
Pirro welcomed the quiet, but when she raised herself up and looked around, she was aghast at what had become of the Isle of Yev. No bird or fish or Whale or Fire Mount could have done this. The land and the air and the water were torn and tossed, slickened with foul liquids and reeking piles.
“Arqwhal, my love! Behold what the Men have done. Surely, now I must do what I must do!”
No answer came from the still waters.
After a terrible time of waiting and searching, Pirro found Deelun the Seeker.
“Do not look for Arqwhal the Gentle. He has burned, making a brilliant light that passed into the void.”
“No!” wept Pirro, feeling small for the first time in her long existence.
“The Men took Fahli the Curious and Numla the Daring and finally Arqwhal the Gentle. I swim alone. And I must flee, for they will come for me.” Words could change nothing, so Deelun the Seeker swam to the blue rim and beyond.
Pirro’s thoughts darkened even as her inner fire spread. “You took the best of us,” she hissed to the Men. “Now, know the worst.” From deep below, she summoned molten anger and bid it rise. The ground shook and shifted until one could not see the difference between land and sea. Feeling the coming doom, the Men ran for their boats and sailed with all speed.
Pirro used her fierce will to shower the Men around her with ash and lock their bodies in orange liquid stone. She thrashed her cold, hard sides and splintered the Light into ten thousand wretched bits. Beyond this, she thought to obey the commands of despair, to tap the white-hot core and unleash All Fury from all of her Sister Fire Mounts. “Let the World Sea boil into a scalding shroud over all lands and all Men!”
It was at this hour that her heart conceived an idea of such finality, such total stillness. To embrace utter malice brought upon Pirro a sadness more bleak than any in all her long existence.
It was enough. Gone from the Isle of Yev were the Men’s tall homes filled with their garish attire and frivolous possessions. Men were gone, but then, so too gone were Beauty and Life.
Pirro calmed herself, for hatred had drained her almost to her end.
Try as she had, she knew some Men had escaped.
To the wind, Pirro lamented, “No lesson goes with them. This is their nature, dearest Arqwhal. They are as locusts, moving, eating, moving on. Nothing remains but your bones and my memory of something wonderful.”
On a night only dimly within memory, Pirro looked outwards over the waters in all directions. Wondering. She thought thoughts and smoked from her peak and rumbled so deeply that her heart cracked.
Then she was silent. At last, across the Over Sky, the Song of Arqwhal floated back to her. It was different now. New voices carried the Song far across the World Sea.
Pirro thought for a time without measure and finally spoke, though only the Over Sky and the World Sea might hear. “I shall be watching, for where Men go, so goes evil,” she said. “But I recall your words, Arqwhal, my love. Where Men go, so too must go Hope.”
To this day, Pirro remains in her stoney solitude, stoking her terrible fires and waiting on the deeds of Men.
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If you like to play with fire and fine storytelling, I hope you'll read Come the Eventide,
the saga of a brave dolphin trying to save us from our own foolishness.
https://www.amazon.com/Come-Eventide-Chris-Riker/dp/1631834525
(psst! free as an Audible book!)
