The Flames of Ougou-Nagarth ('ō-'gō nag-ärth)

The fires one often look upon to gift warmth to their friends and family alike, to cook their food and light their way, is a fire that can be understood. Once such flames were fully grasped by the cultures of Arsharin, such a thing was hardly feared beyond levels of natural disaster that were clearly the manifestation of a punishment by gods or wielded by their own mortal hands against their foes. It is this assurance of the nature of fire that led to the tragedy of nagarth.   In a time of history before history lost, a young child of redvale had found a truly peculiar thing. In a tale known to many within the southern kilopsian kingdoms and baronies, a child walks upon a ritual site to a god long gone, with intent long forgotten, to a singular spark of flame residing within a pit of dirt. The flame does not seem to burn but brings great weight upon it that makes the flame heavy to the ground, the child does everything to take it as the rains begin, and hides it in a nearby cave for the first night. The flame stays a lit, never growing nor going out, and the child, nagarth, brings his friends to look at his discovery. The soft flame makes no attempt to harm them as the untamed flames man are use to do   The children grow curious, and began to feed the flame random things they come upon, grass, leaves, food they wished not to admit to disliking. Over time the children realized the flame was growing from their daily feedings, and one by the one children stopped approaching the flame. Only little nagarth and his brother stayed to keep visiting the lifeless flame, and despite the growing indent in the ground the sprite of fire was causing, nagarth treated it like a friend. His brother grew worried, realizing the banter to be more then a child simply making friends with a flame, but something truly talking back to the young nagarth. The brother finally forsake the flame too, but took with him his brother to prevent him from getting closer.   Nagarth did not accept this, and refused to leave the flame without goodbye, and had snuck out of the house immediately the night of. As one final gift to the tiny sprite of fire, he slept in the cave near the fire, and even lifted it up to look around with it and play, he climbed trees with it in his hand, he showed it the night sky, he drew on the cave walls, and finally, he let it sit on him, forgetting it's great weight.   The brother knew where to find him when he woke to the crack of dawn. Searching the cave, he found the young nagarth, and much to his horror, the flame was heavy, and sunk into nagarth's head, deep, deeper, and deeper still far beyond the depth of the child's mind. And the brother ran away from the endless gaping hole of smoulders that the sprite of flame nestled in, like a candle light.