Legends of the Saloli: Approaching Storm

by Adam Bolander

  His senses almost overwhelmed by everything around him, Jeremy began to walk into the forest. When he was twenty feet past the first tree, he heard a strange chittering noise behind him. Turning, he saw the gray squirrel he had noticed before standing before him. Oddly, it now carried a stick in its jaws. Even stranger was that the ends of the stick were smoldering, twin trails of smoke making their way out and upwards. The squirrel flicked its tail towards him, and a gust of wind suddenly came up, blowing away the dead leaves in a five foot diameter, with Jeremy in the center. He noticed that a trail of white flower petals ran along the edge of the circle.

  What in the world is going on? He thought desperately.

  As if waiting for that thought to cross his mind, the gray saloli dropped the stick onto one of the flower petals. It immediately burst into flames, and the rest followed almost instantly. The fire started out short, but quickly grew taller than he was. Then the strangest thing of all happened: the fire began to spin around him! The fiery tunnel closed in on him, until the fire had wrapped itself all around Jeremy. The heat was intense, but it did not burn him. Instead, it felt as though he was shrinking, getting smaller, smaller, and smaller. Then everything went dark.

  <><><><><>

  The first thing Jeremy felt when he regained consciousness was that he was lying on the ground. As he groggily opened his eyes, he looked around. It seemed he was still in the same spot, yes, there was his house. Still, something seemed different. Casting his eyes to his left, he found himself staring at a fallen log. Wait. No, that wasn’t a log. His eyes widened as he realized what he was seeing. It wasn’t a fallen tree, it was a root!

  Looking around, what he had feared was confirmed. Everything around him was now bigger. Or had he gotten smaller? The fire, had he imagined that? Was he still asleep and dreaming all this? It had to be! Nothing like this was possible in real life. This thought put his mind at ease. None of this was real. He had obviously passed out somehow when he had entered the forest, although he couldn’t think how. Now he was having a Wonderland type dream.

  “Ah, so he decides to join the living,” a voice behind him said.

  Twisting his neck sharply to look, he saw the gray squirrel from earlier standing there.

  “What, no white rabbit? I just get a gray squirrel?” he asked.

  “Excuse me?” the squirrel asked, obviously confused by this statement. By the sound of its voice, the squirrel was a female, and very old. Jeremy rolled his eyes. Why should he explain something to a dream? It probably wouldn’t even comprehend it.

  “Nothing. Did you do this to me?” He decided it may be best to play along. Who knows? Dreams could sometimes be very interesting.

  “I did.” She nodded.

  “What exactly did you do?”

  “Haven’t you bothered to look at yourself yet? Try that, and then you tell me what I did.”

  Complying, Jeremy turned his head to look at his body. With a jerk of surprise, he saw that he had bright red fur all over himself! Continuing his examination, he saw that, instead of hands and feet, he now had four paws. A strange feeling came from behind him, and he craned his neck back to see a bushy, red tail flicking back and forth. It was suddenly clear to him what had happened.

  “You turned me into a squirrel,” he said.

  “A what?” asked the gray squirrel.

  Jeremy ignored her confusion. This must be a recurring dream, he thought, remembering what he had dreamt the previous night. Maybe I should try standing up. Placing all four paws on the ground beneath him, Jeremy pushed upwards and raised himself onto his four new legs.

  “Good,” said the old squirrel, “I see you have complete control over your new body. That means the transformation went smoothly.”

  “Interesting,” with that, Jeremy took one tentative step forward, becoming used to the way his new body walked, and then another. He soon was able to walk just as easily as he could in his human body.

  “Good, very good. You are taking to your new form better than I would have anticipated.”

  Turning his attention to the closest tree, Jeremy began to walk towards it. He had been overcome by the sudden desire to climb it, and do everything he had in his last dream.

  “No!” the old squirrel said, and Jeremy suddenly found his way blocked by her. “You may have good motor skills, but you’re not ready to climb just yet. Give yourself some more time to adjust first.”

  “Whatever,” Jeremy responded. He decided to humor this dream squirrel for a little longer.

  “I must admit, you’re taking this far better than I expected you to.”

  “Taking what?”

  “The fact that you are no longer human.”

  “Whatever,” Jeremy said again, “it’s just a dream.”

  Understanding flooded the old squirrel’s eyes, “You think that you’re dreaming?”

  “Of course, what else could this be?”

  “Oh no, I’m afraid this is completely real.”

  “Sure it is.” Jeremy was becoming tired of being with this old squirrel. He wanted to go do something interesting.

  “Perhaps I should explain,” the gray squirrel offered, “my name is Faith. I belong to a tribe of saloli. We call ourselves Icefire. I am their prophet. That means that I am the one who speaks with Valde Abbas on behalf of the tribe.”

  “You talk to what?”

  “Valde Abbas. The being that created this world, and everything on it.”

  “Right.” So, not only was Jeremy dreaming of being a squirrel, he was also hanging out with a crazy, old, superstitious one? What a weird dream.

  “You are undoubtedly wondering why I turned you into a saloli. My tribe needs your help.”

  “What kind of help?”

  “To tell you the truth, I don’t know myself. I have had a vision that Icefire will require your services, and soon.”

  Now his dream was talking about having dreams of its own. Stranger and stranger.

  “Well, I don’t think I will,” Jeremy responded. He didn’t feel like helping anyone right now. He just wanted this old weirdo to get out of his hair, er, fur.

  “Oh? Then how to you plan to return to your human form?”

  The thought startled Jeremy for a moment, but he quickly reminded himself what was going on, “I’ll just wake up, and forget about all of this.”

  “I’m telling you, this is not a dream,” Faith warned him.

  “Well, it’s been nice talking to you, but I think I’ll be going now,” Jeremy said, turning around. Maybe if he walked away, the dream would change.

  “I’m afraid I can’t let you do that,” she said.

  Jeremy rolled his eyes. This was his dream, he could do what he wanted.

  “Get out of my way!” he ordered.

  “No,” she replied, gently, “you need to come with me. You won’t last very long here in the forest on your own.”

  “If I die, I’ll just wake up.”

  “This is not a dream!” Faith yelled, her patience finally beginning to wear thin. Startled, Jeremy took a step backwards. The old squirrel quickly composed herself again. “I’m sorry, but this isn’t a dream. I know how hard this must be to believe, but you have to trust me.”

  “Why should I trust you?” Jeremy asked, deciding to play along just a little longer, “for all I know, you’re just a bit of raw egg from my breakfast this morning.”

  Faith looked away for a moment. Jeremy thought he might have seen a flash of regret in her eyes. Why?

  “I had hoped it wouldn’t come to this, but you have given me no choice,” she said.

  Before Jeremy could ask what she meant, the old squirrel swung around, faster than Jeremy thought possible, and swiped her claws across his face, leaving four bloody lines behind.

  “Ow!” Jeremy screamed, leaping backwards and falling over. That hurt! It hurt more than he could ever remember being hurt before! But this was a dream. How was that possible?

  “I’m sorry I had to do that,” F
aith said, walking up to him, “but it was the only way to convince you that you weren’t dreaming.” She waved a paw over his face, and the pain immediately stopped. Jeremy blinked in surprise.

  “What did you just do?” he asked.

  “I healed your face,” she responded.

  “But magic’s not. . .” he stopped. He had been about to say “not real,” but was he really sure of that any more?

  “No,” Faith corrected him, “it was not magic. It is one of my gifts from Valde Abbas.”

  Standing up again, Jeremy contemplated this. He had just felt pain— that wasn’t supposed to be possible in a dream. Then the pain had mysteriously vanished. On top of that, now that he thought about it, he’d never had a dream with this much detail before. The only explanation was that he truly was awake.

  “Yes, do you see now?” Faith asked, “This is all real.”

  The depth of her words finally sunk in. If he really was awake, that meant that he actually was a squirrel! Jeremy felt his head go light, and he stumbled on his new paws, falling to the ground.

  “Take it easy,” Faith advised, “I know you’re shocked, I would be too. But trust me when I say that I mean you know harm. I require your help.”

  “W- why should I help you? Look what you did to me!”

  “Because, without me, you will never return to your human form, and your old life.”

  Thoughts of his mother crying, heartbroken that her only son had, for all she knew, run away filled Jeremy’s head. It hurt him more than Faith’s claws had.

  “So, you’ll only change me back if I help you?” he asked.

  “Regrettably, that is the way it has to be.”

  He looked at her suspiciously.

  “How do I know you’ll keep your promise?”

  Faith raised herself onto her back legs and placed her right paw over her heart.

  “You have my word as an Icefire prophet,” she said.

  “How strong is that oath?”

  “The strongest I can give.”

  Jeremy gave his house one last look. Who knew how long it would be before he could go back inside? He desperately hoped that this would be over before his mother got home. He turned back towards Faith.

  “All right, let’s go.”

  “Good, follow me. Our camp is this way.”

  Getting back to his paws, Jeremy followed the old prophet into the woods, into his new life.

  <><><><><>

  It was around noon, and the hot summer sun beat down on everything mercilessly. Jeremy and Faith stood outside the Icefire camp, just far enough away to avoid detection.

  “Now,” said Faith, “here is how this is going to go. You will follow me into the camp, and I will bring you to Rust. I will tell him that you are an outsider who wandered onto our territory. You should initiate an old custom of ours. When you approach him, bow your head. If he deems you trustworthy, he will raise his own and expose his neck. This means he has accepted you. He will welcome you into our tribe, and give you a new name. Do not tell him your old name, because that will reveal what you used to be. You should all but forget your human name until the time comes for you to return. Do not tell anyone of your past, because it will most likely turn them against you.”

  “What will my new name be?” Jeremy asked.

  “I do not know, Rust will be the one to determine that. One more thing, you must stop calling us by the name humans use. Refer to us by our true name, saloli. Now, come.”

  With that, Faith turned and walked towards Icefire’s camp. Jeremy followed, thinking about what she had just said. Saloli. He didn’t know why, but the name fit. It seemed appropriate for these creatures, somehow. When the prophet had said camp, he had imagined twenty, maybe thirty more saloli living there. Instead, he was astonished to see more than two hundred. They ran all around the camp, doing their duties for the tribe. The camp itself was little more than a bunch of tall trees, with a large rock pointing out of the ground in the center. On the far side, the ground sloped downward sharply about twenty feet, forming a natural ditch. Jeremy recognized this place, he had walked here occasionally. As the two saloli made their way towards the center of camp, the hustle and bustle of the workers slowly came to a halt. Jeremy realized that they were watching him.

  “Ah, Faith,” one saloli said as it approached them, “I’m glad you’re back. We were beginning to worry.” It was then that he noticed Jeremy. “Who is this you have brought with you?” Jeremy guessed that this was Rust. He had the look of a leader in his eyes.

  “This is an outsider I found foraging on our territory. He has no name. I brought him here for you to judge.”

  “An outsider?” Rust asked, his eyes turning to Jeremy for a moment before looking back at his prophet, “you know what we do to outsiders.”

  “Indeed,” said Faith, “however, this saloli was abandoned by his own family. He has had to fend for himself almost since birth. He seems to be too young and poorly trained to be a threat to us,” Faith went on, “I suggest we just allow him to go.”

  A look of understanding flooded into the chief’s eyes, “No,” said Rust, loudly enough for all those gathered around to hear, “we will not let him go.”

  “But Rust,” Faith argued, alarm filling her eyes, “what use would it be to execute such a young saloli?”

  Execute? Jeremy felt himself freeze with terror. These saloli were going to kill him!

  “He could lead more of his kind here to us,” Rust said, eyeing Jeremy. “It is too much of a risk to allow him to leave.”

  “But. . .”

  “However,” Rust interrupted, “I did not say that I would execute him.” He paused, as if second guessing whatever he was thinking about. “I have decided,” he said at last, to all of his tribe, “that I will allow this young saloli to live here with us, as a member of Icefire.”

  All of Icefire gasped as one, as if they had rehearsed it. “You’re not serious,” one saloli said, “welcoming an outsider with no name into our tribe?”

  “I am completely serious. Icefire may be strong and just, but we are also fair. Would it be right for us to throw this young saloli out on his own to die when we have more than enough food and shelter to go around?”

  “But what if he brings more? What if he’s a spy?”

  “Then we will deal with him appropriately at that time. Until then, this saloli is to be treated as if he was never an outsider. Treat him as your own brother. However, there is one thing that still needs to be addressed. This saloli needs a name.” Rust turned to face Jeremy now. Almost too late, Jeremy remembered to bow his head. “Know this, outsider,” Rust whispered, so no one else could hear, “I may accept you into this tribe, but I will not raise my head to you until you have proven yourself trustworthy. Until then, I will be keeping a very close eye on you. If you step out of line, I will not hesitate to bring the judgment Icefire wants for you.” Raising his voice once more, he called out, “I have decided to name this saloli Blaze, for his fire-red fur.”

  Blaze, Jeremy thought. My new name is Blaze.

  “Blaze,” Rust addressed him, “do you swear your loyalty to this tribe from now until the day you die?”

  This was it. If he accepted now, there would be no going back. He wouldn’t even be Jeremy Lander anymore if he went through with this. Desperate thoughts began to form a whirlwind in his mind. Perhaps he could run away. Maybe there was another creature in the woods that could turn him back. He didn’t have to do this! Surprisingly, Jeremy found that he was not listening to any of these thoughts. Why? What did he owe these animals? Or could he really think of them as simple animals now that he was one? Could he abandon them in their time of need? Would he run away like a coward?

  “Yes,” said Blaze, “I do.”

  Chapter Three

  Blaze didn’t know what he was expecting when he said those words. Uproarious applause? Scornful jeering? A mixture of both? He had no idea. He got neither. What he did get, though, was stunned silence. All t
he saloli in Icefire simply stared at him, as if they couldn’t believe what had just happened. No one moved for nearly a minute.

  “All right,” Rust said, “I know nobody really knows how to react to this, so why don’t we all get back to work and let me handle Blaze?”

  Slowly, the crowd of saloli dispersed as everyone went back to what they had been doing beforehand. This time, though, there was a strange quiet hanging over everyone. Blaze turned to look at Rust.

  “So, what do I do now?”