As the sun set, Rod came back to the house, knocked on the door, and invited Ham and his companions to join him in the center of the village.
The first things that Ham noticed as he left the house was the light. There was lamps on posts at intervals around the village. Instead of stumbling around in the dark, on his way back to the center of the village, Ham could see pretty clearly where he was going. He looked over at Rod, who just grinned at him.
As they reached the center of the village, Ham found that there were lights space all around the center, and some more around the well, and that the space was crowded with Huddlers. As Ham arrived, there was a hush, then a rustling of movement and the sound of voices whispering “the Lightbringer”. Ham looked around, still thinking that they must be talking about the man in his dream, the Lightbringer of his quest.
Rod began.
“Ham, when you came to my village some time back, you taught some of us to do things that only others had done until then. You taught us to make travel packs and sleeping rolls and prepare food for traveling and make walking sticks and more. You taught us to make bags to carry water. You taught us that it was possible to do many things, not just the things we had been taught growing up. You taught us without thinking about what it might mean, and you taught us without reservations.
“A few of us decided to stay here in Rise when you continued on your quest for the Lightbringer. We wondered, when you left, how marvelous the Lightbringer must be. After all, given all that you had taught us and all the things you’ve done that no one else has ever done, we thought you were pretty marvelous yourself. And as time went on, we realized that as far as we were concerned, you were the Lightbringer. Because you had brought so much that is new and wonderful into our lives, particularly in teaching us how to think about things.
“Not long after you left, for instance, we wondered about why we were stumbling around in the dark night after night. We had been teaching the Huddlers of Rise how to do many things, and at that point many knew how to make fire, and how to carry fire with them. And so we created the lamps you see around the village. It wasn’t a giant step for us anymore, although it would have been before you brought the light into our lives. When we did that, the Huddlers of Rise started calling us the Lamplighters. And we realized that it meant more than just creating and lighting lamps around the village. It also meant that we had shared the light of thinking and doing that you had brought to us.
“And so the Huddlers of Rise call us the Lamplighters, because we spread the light that you – the Lightbringer – brought to us.”
Ham was, once again, speechless.
