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Levi McAllister
Levi and Charlotte’s father (a fire spirit who most people know as Jack) left the family several years before Edith’s death, creating a rupture in his relationship with his children aren’t willing to repair. His existence as a fire spirit—a being who was first brought to life by an indigenous woman who lit a fire for warmth, and who can now appear in any fire on the island—is only known to himself and the late Edith. To everyone else, including his children, his identity is profoundly mysterious. When Graham Malik attempts to investigate him, there seems to be no sign of his existence apart from a driver’s license, and those who see him are unable to confirm anything about his physical appearance. Because he’s foremostly a supernatural fire spirit, Jack can rarely maintain emotional connections with human beings, even his children, and the pain of Edith’s death only magnifies this detachment. Though he makes halfhearted efforts to help and protect his children, he’s never truly able to repair his relationships with them—relationships that first ended because Edith learned that he’d used his powers as a fire spirit to force her to him. Jack has a long-running habit of lighting “sparks” in humans’ brains to make them more receptive to people and ideas they consider foreign. While this suggests that the fire spirit genuinely desires to use his powers for good, his broken connections to his wife and children emphasize that relationships built on exploitation and dishonesty—or even partial honesty—are harmful and unsustainable.
Fire Spirit/Jack (Levi and Charlotte’s Father) Quotes in Flames
The Flames quotes below are all either spoken by Fire Spirit/Jack (Levi and Charlotte’s Father) or refer to Fire Spirit/Jack (Levi and Charlotte’s Father). For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
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Coal Quotes
He even met others like him—beings of rock, of sand, of earth and ice, that lived in much the same way he did, although they weren’t the same, not really. Some wore fur and feathers and watched over the creatures they resembled. Some floated high in the sky and released rain, on a whim, to extinguish him. Some swam through rivers and called themselves gods. Some were kind. Some, like a blood-hungry bird spirit he encountered deep in the southwest, were cruel. Most were calm, seeking only to care for the creatures and land that they felt drawn closest to.
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What part of the world had thrown hooks into his soul? The answer, he had learned early in his life, lay in the hands that had clashed two stones together to create him. It was people, always people; only people that he really cared for. He had helped them cook, create, shape and heat themselves, and had come to think of them as not so much a family but as part of himself. For of all the shapes of life he had encountered, they were the only ones who had shown him that he had a purpose in this water-edged world.
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They brought pain to the people he’d been helping for centuries—pain that he initially responded to by burning down their buildings, their docks, their great bird-like ships—but they also came with a vast multitude of new purposes for him. With them he was not merely cooking marsupials, sharpening spears and burning scrub; he was exploding black powder and flinging balls of metal through the air faster than any bird could fly.
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After all these years he was reduced to the same state he was in at the moment the woman, crouching by the riverbank, had first summoned him with the clash of two smooth stones.
So when Charlotte began leaking the fire he’d given her, he did nothing more than watch. When his son started unravelling, he intervened with only half of his flaming heart.
Just like their mother, they would eventually die. And he did not want to be close to them when they did.
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"My students can't get enough of your charts and their results have gone through the roof." -Graham S.
Fire Spirit/Jack (Levi and Charlotte’s Father) Character Timeline in Flames
The timeline below shows where the character Fire Spirit/Jack (Levi and Charlotte’s Father) appears in Flames. The colored dots and icons indicate which themes are associated with that appearance.
Ash
...third day, she stops showering; on the fourth, she walks for a full day to Levi and Charlotte’s father ’s house. She waits on his lawn, and by the time he finds her, the...
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Sky
...to, picks her up, and they drive away from her home. Charlotte deliberates going to Levi and Charlotte’s father , but she quickly realizes that she still resents and mistrusts him after he left...
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Iron
...pleased that he let Charlotte live. He knows she has a purpose, and he knows Levi and Charlotte’s father , too—he’s someone the Esk God doesn’t want to get in trouble with. He swims...
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Ice
...with whom the detective is familiar. When she gets up to leave, she asks for Levi and Charlotte’s father ’s address. She has to stare him down before he gives it to her.
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Half an hour later, the detective arrives at Levi and Charlotte’s father ’s address. His house’s grandeur impresses her, and although the garden is now overgrown, she...
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The detective thanks Malik. Just before she leaves, she asks about Levi and Charlotte’s father . Malik says he seemed to appear out of nowhere before marrying Edith, Charlotte’s mother,...
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...gets a call from Malik. He tells her he’s been looking for more details on Levi and Charlotte’s father and couldn’t find any documentation beyond a driver’s license—no birth certificate or work history. He...
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...to eventually ask him who he is. He says, “I think you know.” He ( Levi and Charlotte’s father ) walks away, only pausing to tell her to stay away from his daughter (Charlotte)....
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Snow
...his seal died and Charlotte describes Levi and Charlotte’s mother’s death, Levi’s difficult nature and Levi and Charlotte’s father ’s absence in general terms. At night, they change clothes in separate rooms before climbing...
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Wood
...and reflects off the water. He reaches for a pair of sunglasses. They belong to Levi and Charlotte’s father , who would wear them while driving no matter the weather. Levi wonders if his...
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...he left the pelt in the house. He goes back to retrieve it and finds Levi and Charlotte’s father sitting at the dining table. He asks his father why he’s come; his father asks...
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...pelt. He picks it up and his confidence renews. He mentions that he hasn’t seen Levi and Charlotte’s father since Levi and Charlotte’s mother’s cremation. His father tries to explain why he’s been absent,...
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Coal
...earlier, when a woman strikes two rocks together to make a spark, a kind of fire spirit is born. He falls in the form of a spark onto a pile of dried...
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Later, the fire spirit comes back to life when lightning hits a dead tree. Now he’s somewhere different, a...
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The fire spirit keeps coming to life in new places. Eventually, he realizes he can bring himself to...
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Once the fire spirit has finessed his human form, he looks around him at the wallaby skinner sleeping amongst...
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...“paler people” arrive on the island, they cause the indigenous people pain, to which the fire spirit responds by destroying the settlers’ buildings, docks, and ships. Eventually, though, he’s tempted by their...
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As more and more settlers arrive, the fire spirit begins to walk amongst them as a human in order to gain more of their...
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The fire spirit is happy with his ever-changing existence until he meets a woman in Notley Fern Gorge....
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The fire spirit follows Edith, watching her tend to the animals on the farm and pondering how to...
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The fire spirit ’s spark doesn’t convince Edith to take him seriously, so he lights another, and then...
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The fire spirit (who now thinks of himself as Jack, his human name) and Edith have a child—a boy, Levi, who looks just like Edith...
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Edith witnesses Jack and Charlotte leaking fire. Though she’s wary of Jack’s ability at first, after he explains...
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Edith asks Jack to explain what he did to the teacher. He describes his ability to change people’s...
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As Jack burns around Edith’s dead body, he suffers “his biggest death of all.” He only keeps...
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Grove
...in sight. As they drive on, she realizes this image of her family is missing Levi and Charlotte’s father , whose house they can see from the road. She doesn’t want to let their...
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...from the flames. Only Charlotte sees him. From his smile, she instantly recognizes him as Levi and Charlotte’s father . She must be hallucinating, dreaming, or dead. Her father mouths something to her, looks...
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Sea
Like Levi and Charlotte’s father , Levi has always feared the water. He remembers his father watching him and Charlotte...
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...biggest the island has seen in centuries, that the whole island is flooded, and that Levi and Charlotte’s father emerged from the flames briefly. Charlotte is furious and hopes Levi’s burns hurt—Nicola’s injuries are...
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