The Black Fire has but two concerns- what are your ambitions and what will you sacrifice to achieve them? The Fire demands no worship and seeks no followers, it looks instead to those who burn with purpose, no matter what it be. It offers assistance but at a price, and that which it is offered it consumes utterly. Like the Light, the Black Flame is a singular Power without an associate pantheon, but since its creation a number of cults have sprung up, inspired by the philosophy of the flame.
The Lord of the Forge is the God of artifice, human ingenuity and ambition created by the hand of man and appearing as a huge metallic blacksmith made half of black and half of white Flame. The Lord of the Forge embodies the twin, and often warring, aspects of how the flame may be used by mankind. On the one hand the ideal of man as striving to create something better for the good of all and on the other the consuming, self-interested hunger fed by unchecked ambition. While these aspects oppose one another both are held in balance by a code that binds the action of the god to serve mankind. The Lord of the Forge has a small but growing cult in the White City that is strongly associated with Blacksmiths, his symbol is a stylised hammer and anvil.
Younger still than the Cult of the Lord of the Forge, cultists of the White Flame reject entirely the notion of any God of the Flame, adhering to a philosophy rather than worship of a diety. They believe that the power of the Flame is there to be used by those with the will and ambition strong enough to wield it, without regard for anything except the self-interest of the user. The only symbol used by the cult is a small idealised flame wrought in silver that is often worn by adherents. All but extinct after the events of the White Flame.
Drawing upon magic of the Black Fire requires the caster to make sacrifices to the Power. Ordained casters have slightly more leeway in what they can offer and where applicable this is noted in the descriptions below.
A sorcerer may only sacrifice that which is theirs to give- they must be in actual possession of physical items, or have an individual at their mercy in order to sacrifice them. Hence sacrificing a surrendered bandit with your sword at his throat is acceptable; attempting to sacrifice the same bandit while he was still attacking you would fail outright.
The Black Fire manifests itself anywhere upon the caster's body. It casts no light and provides no heat. It flickers inertly until touched to a sacrifice, whereupon it surrounds the offering and consumes it in a matter of seconds. An IC announcement of “I (name) sacrifice this (item) to the Flame” could be made - not that spoken words are required, but it represents the time taken to consume the item and makes clear to people what has just disappeared from view in a lick of Black Flame. Much like Raising the Light or Wind, this is the spell that must be cast in order to cast other spells, although like the others, it may have situational uses of its own.
The caster sacrifices a weapon in their possession to the Flame. In response serpentlike coils of black flame wraps themselves around the sorcerer's body. When next the caster is struck, the Flames lash out, consuming the offending weapon. An attacking weapon will only be consumed if the sacrifice was the same or greater size. For a unarmed attack, the attacker takes a Single if a dagger-sized weapon was sacrificed, a Double for standard-sized weapons and a Triple for Great Weapons. If the caster is struck with a weapon smaller than that sacrificed, the Coils consume it and are expended totally; if with a larger, the Coils do not consume it, but nor are they expended.
With this spell the Caster can restore any dying individual to a (minimum) single hit to every location. This is even effective when the individual has been cut to ribbons, so long as the spell is cast within 60 seconds of their receiving the mortal wounds. In return the Fire demands that the caster sacrifice their own health- permanently losing a hit from a location of their choice. An Ordained caster can instead offer the life of another individual who is in their power as payment.
If their desire to achieve their goals burns strong enough the caster may call upon the Flame to strengthen their mind with unnatural resolve; to strive on where others would fail and fall. While active the caster’s psyche cannot drop below one as a result of psyche damage. In return for this the Flame demands the caster give of their own flesh. For every point of psyche damage they take that would have taken them below one they instead take a through global single as the Flame burns away their physical form. Ordained casters take a through global single for every two points of psyche.
A character reduced to 0 torso hits by this spell is entirely consumed by the flame, their spirit becoming a Tender of the Flame.
This spell does not need to be pre-cast to be invoked and may be used in psychic combat, though the caster’s physical body will still burn. This spell may never be used when psyche is being actively spent; such as with dream or glass magic.
This spell calls upon the Flame to advise the caster on how to achieve some goal. In return the caster must sacrifice one of their memories. The more important the memory to the caster, the more useful the Flame's advise is likely to be. An Ordained caster may cast the memories of another into the Flame with their permission, but this is rarely as effective. The GM may, at their discretion, rule that the loss of particularly important memories will cause a temporary reduction of psyche hits.
Sometimes fighting accomplishes nothing. The Sorcerer sacrifices his ability to ever directly harm (call any type of damage or harmful effect to) a target. In exchange the Flame will shield the Caster from any damage or harmful effect that the target might inflict for the next minute. Any harm that has been inflicted by either party prior to the casting remains.
By use of this spell the caster is able to gain a single permanent level of magic immunity against a particular type of sorcery. To cast the spell the sorcerer must cast into the Fire an object of great significance to a Power. Ordained Sorcerers may also choose to sacrifice the lives of significant people. For example sacrificing a shard of the King In Fragments could grant Glass Immunity, as could the sacrifice of his High Priest. Repeated castings can gain further levels of magic immunity.
With this spell the caster is able to overcome the limitations of their bodies. They may purchase additional ranks of the following skills even if it takes them beyond 5 ranks. (Strong Willed, Empowered, Tough, Quick, Strong). The price of using this spell is that the caster's humanity must be given to the Flame. Afterwards they are something more, or less, than human and this will be apparent to most spirits and beings of power. Moreover the caster immediately loses all ranks of Luck they possessed and cannot purchase any more. This spell can only be cast once (though in theory could be cast again, should the caster somehow regain their humanity), and may only be used on the caster. The caster may purchase ranks of Strong even if they are neither a Warrior nor Troll-Blooded, and may purchase ranks of Empowered without the usual special circumstances.
The loss of the caster's humanity shatters the natural bond between god and worshipper. As a result it almost always results in the loss of Ordination to any power save the Black Flame and frequently results in an angry deity unless they have specific reason to approve of the apotheosis.
You sacrifice your body to the Black Flame, from the moment this spell is cast the caster has five minutes to live as the flame consumes them from the inside. In this time the caster is immune to damage of any kind, and can use all spells of level 4 and below without sacrificing to the flame. Other spells, such as Scorch the Power's Hand, do not need to specifically be cast - the caster can assume themselves immune to all magic while under the effects of the spell.
The caster sacrifices themself, immediately being engulfed by a pillar of Black Flame. Fuelled by this sacrifice the Flame will lash out at the world, removing from existence a particular of the caster's choice.