the Hearth and Fire

The mine under Ironwood has been burning since 1926. It is not the worst thing in that town.Ohio, 1952. Republic Steel runs three shifts and the sky stays the color of an old bruise. The company owns the houses, the store, and the hole in the hill that has been on fire for twenty-six years.Caitlin Doyle is nineteen. She works the register at the five-and-dime. She is dependable, she is on time, and nobody in that valley has ever looked at her twice.Then her brother comes home off the night shift with something riding him.What Caitlin learns on Commerce Street is older than the mills. The gods withdrew from this world a long time ago, and they left an order behind them. A knight to carry the fire. A priestess to be the hearth it comes home to. It has been holding the line in valleys like this one for five thousand years, and nobody in it ever volunteered.The knight is forty-four years old and burning alive from the inside. He has held this valley on his own for eight years, and he will not take what Caitlin is offering him, because he knows what the town already calls her.And the thing they are standing against does not come with horns.It comes with its hat in its hand. It pays for the funerals. It remembers every child's name. It has been the kindest man in Ironwood for thirty-three years and it has never once had to hurry anybody. It asks for one thing only.A day. Sometime. Of its choosing.Six hundred of that valley's dead are standing in the workings under the hill. They are patient. They are coming up.One of these two is going to die for this town. You will be certain it is the man.