natural
36: breathing flames
Fire needed air to breath, air to alight, air to spread. Fire couldn't take root inside a vacuum, and didn't last for very long at all inside a coffin. After all, the funeral pyre went out after the body was ash and bone – and it never burned long enough to melt or fry the bones. Instead, the ashes were put inside the urn and there wouldn't be ashes if the fire could endlessly burn. But it wasn't just air, otherwise the entire world would be a thick sandwich of flames. It was fuel as well: kindling that hugged flames close.