a race through the fires
T
here is a pattern to the bonfires, for those who look close enough to see it.They stretch from one end of the meadows to the next, a thousand blazing eyes that look as much like fallen stars as the people who dance around them. And like stars, there is a story in the way they shift from one color to the next, like it can’t decide which dream to lift above the others.
Maybe a bonfire holds your own wish in its embers tonight.
It feels as though something else has called you to the meadows tonight, like the smoke from the fires has wrapped a noose around your heart that draws you forward. You walk through the fires like you’re searching for something you can’t name, or someone you don’t recognize. And yet when you look at the bonfires spread out across the meadows, you know the secret is written somewhere in their design.
They make a path weaving between the grasses and flowers tonight, their flames reaching up, up, up towards the sky. Smoke hangs like incense over the meadows, sweet with the smell of jasmine and heavy with blessings. Perhaps the first horse who stepped between two twin fires was thinking only of wishes and blessings and dreams coming true — maybe there was a message written for them in the flames, that whispers come closer even when the fire singes their hair.
But over the flames a siren song is playing on the strings of lutes and in the voices of the musicians, calling every horse with dreams held tightly to their chests to come forward. Already a line is forming between the first twin bonfires, as scores of horses take their place standing shoulder to shoulder. A crowd is forming around them, pressing in close to the flames with fever-bright eyes.
It’s a race, the whisper spreads like another fire through the lines. But perhaps it feels more symbolic than literal, when the light of the fires washes over you and fills you with a warmth that seems to fill you from within. They say the fire is cleansing, and restorative, and purifying; and that dancing close enough to the flames to be burned is a magic this world has almost forgotten. The bravest horses are the ones who run through the fires themselves, and in this race, bravery is rewarded more than speed.
So they gather, dreams and dreamers alike, pressed skin to skin like they’ve forgotten the only way to test bravery is through facing horrors. For the night they are all one court, and one heart, and a thousand wishes burning brighter than the fires.
And between them all there is a place for you —
if you, too, are ready to dance between the fires like they are only a handful of fallen stars.
To begin the race, you must post a new thread in the Illuster Meadow board and depict your character lining up and starting the race. Please include [race] somewhere in your thread title, and tag the @Official Dawn Account! You will receive an NPC reply to your thread to continue the event. This event will be interactive - in each NPC reply, your character will be given a choice to make in the form of an obstacle. Whatever they decide will influence the rest of the race for them.
All participants will receive a signos bonus. At the end, one winner will be determined by dice roll to earn a unique event prize. Please have your threads finished by Nov. 30th!
This prompt features a fire purification race, and must be taken alone. Feel free to start side-threads with characters watching the race or inspecting the bonfires!
