The adults had spent most of the evening arguing about names.
Ghost.
Spirit.
Angel.
Demon.
God.
Ancestor.
Entity.
Projection.
By the time someone said “discarnate intelligence”, Chibi had stopped listening.
Mara had stopped pretending she was.
They sat beneath the great wall map of the Inner Flame Society while coloured threads crossed dreams, graves, temples, séances and places where something had answered.
—
CHIBI:
“They really like names.”
—
MARA:
“They think names make things easier.”
—
CHIBI:
“Do they?”
—
Mara looked towards Professor Harcourt, who was currently explaining why a medieval demon and an Egyptian funerary spirit should not yet be placed in the same category.
—
MARA:
“Doesn’t look like it.”
—
Mrs Evelyn Price sat nearby with a cup of tea.
No veil.
No candles.
No mystic performance.
Just a tired woman who sometimes heard voices nobody else could.
Mara walked over.
Chibi followed immediately.
—
MARA:
“When you speak to something on the other side…”
—
PRICE:
“Yes?”
—
MARA:
“How do you know what it is?”
—
Mrs Price considered that.
—
PRICE:
“Sometimes I don’t.”
—
Chibi blinked.
—
CHIBI:
“You don’t?”
—
PRICE:
“No.”
—
CHIBI:
“Then why do they keep putting labels on the map?”
—
Mrs Price looked towards the wall.
—
PRICE:
“Because adults dislike blank spaces.”
—
MARA:
“Even when they don’t know what belongs there?”
—
PRICE:
“Especially then.”
—
Chibi pointed towards the map.
—
CHIBI:
“So if something says it’s an angel…”
—
PRICE:
“It might be.”
—
CHIBI:
“And if it says it’s a demon?”
—
PRICE:
“It might be.”
—
CHIBI:
“And if it says it’s somebody’s dead uncle?”
—
Mrs Price smiled faintly.
—
PRICE:
“I’d ask questions.”
—
CHIBI:
“And if it answers correctly?”
—
PRICE:
“I’d ask more.”
—
Professor Harcourt approached.
—
HARCOURT:
“Identity is one of our greatest problems.”
—
CHIBI:
“Because they lie?”
—
Harcourt paused.
—
HARCOURT:
“Sometimes.”
—
CHIBI:
“Ghosts lie?”
—
HARCOURT:
“People do.”
—
CHIBI:
“But they’re dead.”
—
Harcourt folded his arms.
—
HARCOURT:
“Death may not improve character.”
—
Chibi looked delighted.
—
CHIBI:
“That’s brilliant.”
—
MARA:
“Please don’t encourage him.”
—
Harcourt pointed towards a section of the map marked:
**UNCLASSIFIED**
—
HARCOURT:
“These are the difficult cases.”
—
CHIBI:
“What are they?”
—
HARCOURT:
“We don’t know yet.”
—
CHIBI:
“Then why are they on the map?”
—
Harcourt stopped.
Mrs Price hid a smile behind her cup.
—
HARCOURT:
“Because…”
—
He looked towards the black threads.
—
HARCOURT:
“…something keeps answering from there.”
—
Chibi went very still.
—
CHIBI:
“Oh.”
—
Mara looked at the map.
—
MARA:
“Do they always answer when you call?”
—
HARCOURT:
“No.”
—
MARA:
“Good.”
—
HARCOURT:
“Why good?”
—
Mara looked at him.
—
MARA:
“Because if everything answered…”
—
“…I’d start wondering who was really doing the calling.”
—
Mrs Price slowly lowered her cup.
—
PRICE:
“That is a very good question.”
—
Harcourt was called away.
Before leaving, he pointed at Chibi.
—
HARCOURT:
“Do not touch the instruments.”
—
CHIBI:
“I wasn’t going to.”
—
Harcourt left.
Mara waited.
—
MARA:
“You were.”
—
CHIBI:
“I was going to look with my fingers.”
—
—
Mrs Price laughed.
Then Mara noticed the small flame drawn at the centre of the great map.
—
MARA:
“Why is the Inner Fire in the middle?”
—
Mrs Price followed her gaze.
—
PRICE:
“Because people across many cultures describe something inside us.”
—
CHIBI:
“A soul?”
—
PRICE:
“Sometimes.”
—
MARA:
“A spirit?”
—
PRICE:
“Sometimes.”
—
CHIBI:
“Fire?”
—
PRICE:
“Very often.”
—
Chibi thought about that.
For once, seriously.
—
CHIBI:
“So everyone has it?”
—
PRICE:
“Perhaps.”
—
CHIBI:
“And it helps us reach the other side?”
—
Mrs Price hesitated.
—
PRICE:
“Some believe so.”
—
Chibi looked at the flame.
Then he asked the question nobody else had.
—
CHIBI:
“Who put it there?”
—
Mrs Price stopped.
—
MARA:
“What?”
—
CHIBI:
“The fire.”
—
He pointed at the map.
—
CHIBI:
“If it’s inside everyone…”
—
“…and people have talked about it for thousands of years…”
—
“…who lit the first one?”
—
Silence.
Not ordinary silence.
The kind that arrives when a room suddenly realises it has been asking the wrong question.
Mara looked towards the adults.
Scientists.
Mediums.
Archaeologists.
Occultists.
All arguing about what the Inner Fire might be.
None of them asking where it came from.
—
MARA:
“Has anyone asked that before?”
—
Mrs Price stared at the flame symbol.
—
PRICE:
“Not quite like that.”
—
Chibi smiled.
—
CHIBI:
“I asked a new question.”
—
MARA:
“Don’t look so pleased.”
—
CHIBI:
“Why?”
—
Mrs Price’s hands tightened around the cup.
—
PRICE:
“Because sometimes new questions get new answers.”
—
Then her expression changed.
Not dramatically.
She simply stopped looking at them.
—
MARA:
“Mrs Price?”
—
No answer.
—
CHIBI:
“Mrs Price?”
—
Her lips moved.
—
PRICE:
“No.”
—
Mara stood.
—
MARA:
“No what?”
—
Mrs Price whispered.
—
PRICE:
“No one lit it.”
—
Chibi’s smile disappeared.
—
CHIBI:
“What?”
—
Mrs Price tilted her head as if listening to something very far away.
—
PRICE:
“It was carried.”
—
Mara felt cold.
—
MARA:
“Carried from where?”
—
Mrs Price said nothing.
Instead, one black thread on the wall map slipped free.
Then another.
Then another.
Egypt.
The Highlands.
The Caribbean.
Three different places.
Three threads.
All falling across the little flame at the centre.
—
CHIBI:
“Was that meant to happen?”
—
MARA:
“No.”
—
Mrs Price blinked.
Her face was normal again.
Tired.
Confused.
—
PRICE:
“What happened?”
—
Mara stared at her.
—
MARA:
“You answered him.”
—
Mrs Price went pale.
—
PRICE:
“I did?”
—
CHIBI:
“You said nobody lit the fire.”
—
A pause.
—
CHIBI:
“You said it was carried.”
—
Mrs Price looked towards the fallen threads.
—
PRICE:
“I don’t remember saying that.”
—
Professor Harcourt returned.
He stopped when he saw the map.
—
HARCOURT:
“What happened?”
—
Chibi pointed towards the flame.
—
CHIBI:
“I asked where the Inner Fire came from.”
—
Harcourt became very still.
—
HARCOURT:
“And?”
—
Chibi looked at Mrs Price.
—
CHIBI:
“Something answered.”
—
For once—
Harcourt did not reach for his notebook.
—
Later, Mara and Chibi sat outside beneath the London street lamps.
—
CHIBI:
“Do you think it told the truth?”
—
MARA:
“I don’t know.”
—
CHIBI:
“Ghost?”
—
MARA:
“I don’t know.”
—
CHIBI:
“Demon?”
—
MARA:
“I don’t know.”
—
CHIBI:
“Angel?”
—
Mara looked at him.
—
CHIBI:
“Fine.”
—
He kicked lightly at the step.
—
CHIBI:
“What do you know?”
—
Mara looked back at the black door.
—
MARA:
“All month we’ve talked about what people do with the Inner Fire.”
—
“Control it.”
—
“Hide it.”
—
“Let it breathe.”
—
“Study it.”
—
She looked at him.
—
MARA:
“But nobody asked where it came from.”
—
Chibi was quiet.
—
CHIBI:
“Maybe we shouldn’t have.”
—
MARA:
“Probably not.”
—
CHIBI:
“Are we going to ask again?”
—
MARA:
“Absolutely not.”
—
A pause.
—
CHIBI:
“Tomorrow?”
—
Mara sighed.
—
MARA:
“You really are exhausting.”
—
CHIBI:
“Thank you.”
—
## THE INNER FIRE — WHO LIT THE FIRE?
The Victorians searched beneath the earth, inside tombs, across oceans and beyond death.
They named ghosts.
Angels.
Demons.
Gods.
They mapped the invisible.
And through all of it, one assumption survived:
The Inner Fire belonged to humanity.
Perhaps that was the final assumption left to break.
Because if no one lit the first flame—
and it was carried here—
the next question is obvious.
**Who carried it?**
## QUESTION FOR YOU
If humanity discovered that something fundamental about us did not begin with us—
**would you want to know where it came from?**
Or are there questions where ignorance may actually be the safer form of wisdom?
Walk into worlds that remember:
https://startplaying.games/gm/dunchan
Essays, worlds and the ideas behind Mythveil:
https://www.patreon.com/c/mythveilchronicles_bydunchanhuntergames