The Torch

The Torch was first lit in the fall of the Ageis Kingdom, when the army who had faithfully followed the General away from King and Country died in battle on the Verdan plain. Though they were victorious, their battle came at a heavy cost, and the General knew that the army's days were numbered. And with Ageia fallen, there would be no one to tend to their fallen souls.   So, as any army would do, they tended to their own. Calling upon the loved ones that followed the army away from Ageia, the remnants of the army built the Garden of the Dead. Row upon row of crypts and masoleums, each carved with the victories and triumphs of their soldier. Between the crypts soon grew the red flowers of the battlefield, followed by all manner of wildflower, creating a truly beautiful garden. In its first plaza was a brazier, forged from the armor of a hundred fallen men. Finally, only the General of the garden stood watch, waiting for the day that death would come to claim him as well.   He hadn't told the army he, and they along with them, had been cursed when they left the city. At first he'd put no stock into it, calling them the ravings of a jealous man. But now, watching the souls of his fallen men wander about, lost, he knew the madman's curse to be true. the words still echoed in his ears.     It had been a desperate hope, carving the accomplishments of each man on their tomb, that they may not be forgotten. Even the Tomb of Lost Souls, those who had nothing to identify them, stood tall and proud. Yet so long as no one knew their names, they would be lost.   Unless...   The Brazier was lit, soaked with the oil of the red flowers and the embers of his own funeral pyre. To the young men, the boys who had been left behind by fathers and widows by their sons, he gave his final decree.   And the Brazier has remained lit ever since. First by loyalty, then by tradition as the centuries passed. Even as those who lived in the little village that sat alongside the Garden of the Dead grew up and moved away, replaced by strangers, And the original meaning was lost, the Tradition Remained:   Keep the Torch Alight.

The Tradition is simple: Keep the Torch Lit. Fresh embers are shoveled into it every day, and ashes are carefully removed through a grate at the bottom.  Not once has the torch gone out in the thousand years since the Ageis Kingdom's fall, save once; a mad ex-Mage broke into the garden in search of forbidden magic, desecrating tombs and dousing the Torch. Bound by their curse, the army came to undead life once more and began to patrol the graveyard, searching for the one who had broken their creed.    After the man was caught and summarily executed by a wandering adventurer, the Torch was swiftly re-lit. Their Garden Safe and the Torch relit, the Army returned to their eternal slumber.