Fire did eat sticks and grease, and it did eat all things born from the Earth and Veles’s power. What a terrible foe it was for the creations of Veles! Great and good was the gift of Fire: praised be Daboh for it!

Where the spark was once lit, there now bowed plants and game fled. For Fire wouldst consume all things, leaving naught but ash, and destroying the magic of Veles. And humans were throwing the Bones, called iron, taken from within the bowels of the Earth, into the blazing embrace as taught to them by Daboh, the divine blacksmith. Men did make arrowheads from it, to the terror of the animals, and women did wear the iron on their bodies in praise of Daboh.

Veles did see all of that from his underground lair, and, at first, Fire and its ravages did scare him. Yet, cunning and grim a deity as Veles be, and whatever he did touch wouldst turn to filth and rot. O’, woe betide those who wouldst listen to his whispers! O, woe betide anyone who shalt stand in his way!