The grass in the Burnout has that damp quality to it that says it's rained recently, but not recently enough that you'll get soaked by laying in it. There's that crisp, pleasant freshness and mustiness in the air too, mingling with the scents of the fires and their various accelerants. Ramona likes to be prepared, so she's arranged several testing variables. The first one is the forge-fire. Something about the way the Hollow's smithy works keeps it perfectly hot or cooled as needed, and always stocked with coal. Does that, technically, make it a magical fire? Conjured? Ramona doesn't have the answer, but she's arranged the coals in a sort of gradient, from hottest to coldest, for them to test. Then there's the great big bonfire. Also eternal, in it's own way. Mostly because Marcus had a habit of feeding it the branches and leavings of hedge-fruit, Ramona figures, and it'd become sort of common practice. Magical? Probably. Still could be a good source of testing.
Lacking a purely mundane fire, Ramona had also hauled up an old-fashioned bag of charcoal to the Hollow, and poured it into a barbecue. Nobody could doubt that it's a mundane flame. Unless being in the Hollow has done something to it. Too many variables. Regardless, with the forge-fire and the bonfire basically taking care of themselves, Ramona's been keeping an eye on the barbecue. And because it'd be a terrible crime to let such a nice blaze go to waste, she's also been cooking on it. The scent of marinated steak-kebabs, skewered with roasting onions and peppers, is just one more pleasing aroma in the air. Ramona's sprawled out in a lawn chair, feet bare and sunglasses hiding her eyes, sipping a beer and listening to Led Zepplin blasting out of a boom-box. Who says science can't be fun?
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