The Last Fire We Made

My name is Arjun, and I was born into a family that prayed every morning and evening. My mother would light incense and chant, my father would bow to the gods, but I never felt a thing. I told myself that the supernatural was a fairy tale for the weak-minded, a comfort for those who couldn’t face the truth that we are alone in the universe. I was a student of science, a rationalist to the core, and I had never once in my life felt a chill that wasn’t from the wind or a fear that wasn’t from a real threat. That all changed in the summer of 2015, in a place I had never heard of, on a mountain that had no right to exist as I knew it.

I had joined a group of six other teenagers for what was supposed to be a thrilling trek through the Himalayas. We were all from different cities, but we shared a hunger for adventure. Our destination was a remote village called Kiratpur, tucked away in the folds of the Dhauladhar range, far from the tourist trails of McLeod Ganj. The trek was organized by a local adventure club, and our guide was a weathered man in his forties named Ravi. He had the kind of face that had seen too many winters, and he spoke little, but his eyes carried a weight that I mistook for wisdom.

The plan was to reach our base camp at the village, then push up to Camp Three, a plateau at 12,000 feet, known for its breathtaking view of the valley below. Most groups avoided Camp Three during this time of year because of the unpredictable snowstorms, but we were young and foolish. We wanted to prove something, though none of us could say what. On the second day of our trek, we reached Kiratpur, a clutch of stone houses surrounded by terraced fields that looked like ancient staircases carved into the mountain. The villagers were polite but distant, and I noticed the way they glanced at our group with a mixture of pity and dread. Ravi led us to a small guesthouse, where we spent the night, and I overheard him speaking with the village elder in hushed tones. I didn’t think much of it then.

The next morning, we set out for Camp Three. The sky was a deep, dangerous blue, and the air was so thin that every step felt like a small victory. We trudged through snow that was up to our knees, and by the time we reached the plateau, the sun was already sinking behind jagged peaks. The camp was a simple clearing with a few wooden posts, remnants of previous trekkers, and a crude stone hut that served as a shelter from the wind. There was no electricity, no phone signal, just the sound of the wind and the creaking of the hut.

We set up our tents in a tight circle, and Ravi built a small fire in the stone ring. He was quiet, but his silence felt heavy, as if he was listening for something we couldn’t hear. As we ate our dinner of instant noodles and pouches of dal, he told us a story, though it was more like a warning. He spoke of a time when he was a boy, and his grandfather used to tell him about the ‘Agnikanya’, the fire maiden who lived on this mountain. She was said to be a beautiful woman who was burned alive in a ritual to appease the mountain gods centuries ago. Her spirit, according to legend, was trapped in the flames, and she would appear to lost travelers, offering them warmth and light, but those who followed her were never seen alive again. I laughed at the story, calling it a local myth to scare tourists. Ravi didn’t laugh. He just looked at me with those tired eyes and said, ‘She doesn’t like non-believers.’ I dismissed it, and went to sleep.

I woke up suddenly, my bladder full and my mouth dry. The tent was a cocoon of condensation, and the cold seeped through my sleeping bag. I checked my watch: 3:04 AM. The fire outside had died, and the camp was wrapped in a darkness so profound that it felt solid. I unzipped my tent and stepped out, the snow crunching under my boots. The moon was hidden behind clouds, and I could barely see the outlines of the other tents. I walked a few steps away to relieve myself, and that’s when I saw it.

A flicker of light, not from the fire, but from the edge of the plateau. It was a soft, orange glow, like a candle flame, but it danced and swayed as if it had a life of its own. My first thought was that another trekker had wandered away, but Ravi had told us there was no one else for miles. Curiosity, and a stubborn disbelief, pulled me toward it. The light grew brighter as I approached, and I could see that it was a bonfire, not built by human hands, but made of logs that seemed to be burning without any fuel. And around the fire, there was a figure.

It was a woman, wrapped in a sari that seemed to be woven from fire itself. The flames licked her silhouette, but she didn’t burn. Her face was hidden, but I felt her gaze on me, a weight that pressed against my chest. I tried to move, but my legs wouldn’t obey. She raised a hand, and the fire leapt higher, illuminating her features: they were beautiful, but wrong, like a mask carved by a mad sculptor. Her lips parted, and the wind howled, but I heard a voice, soft and mesmerizing, like the crackling of wood. ‘You don’t believe,’ she said. ‘But I am as real as the cold that bites you. Come, warm yourself.’

A wave of warmth washed over me, so intense that the snow around my feet began to melt. I felt a pull, an urge to take a step closer, to let that heat consume me. But then, my mind caught a sound from behind: the urgent shout of Ravi. ‘Arjun, get back!’ I turned, and he was running toward me, his flashlight beam cutting through the dark. He grabbed my arm and yanked me backward, and as I stumbled, the woman’s face contorted into a smile that was too wide, and she dissolved into a swirl of embers, leaving only the smell of smoke and burnt flesh.

Ravi didn’t say a word as he pulled me back to the tents. He made me sit by the rekindled fire, and he brewed some strong chai, his hands shaking. ‘You saw her,’ he said, not as a question. I nodded, my teeth chattering. ‘And you tried to follow her fire. If I hadn’t woken up,’ he paused, ‘you would have walked off the cliff, just like the others.’ He told me that every year, someone from a group would wake at 3 AM and see the fire, and they would wander toward it, never to return. He had seen it happen before, and his family had a pact to guard the camp on the nights of the full moon. I could only listen, my rationality shattered.

The next morning, we packed up and descended as fast as we could. The other trekkers didn’t ask why Ravi was in such a hurry, and I didn’t volunteer the story. When we reached Kiratpur, the village elder looked at me with knowing eyes, and he handed me a charred piece of wood from that fire, which I had somehow kept in my pocket without knowing. ‘Keep this,’ he said. ‘It will remind you that there are realities beyond your own.’ I wanted to throw it away, but I couldn’t.

It’s been two years since that night. I still don’t pray, but I no longer call myself an atheist. I keep that piece of charred wood on my desk, and sometimes, in the dead of night, I hear a crackling sound, and I see a flicker of orange in the corner of my eye. I know she’s still there, waiting for me to make the same mistake again. And I know that the fire she showed me was not a lie—it was a truth I wasn’t prepared to accept. But now I do, and that is the scariest part of all.