The dangling silver string swayed back and forth, slowly stretching. "My breeze indicator" he thought, "without it I would've never guessed there was a stirring of the air." It was impossible to say what was to become of this. "Might just stretch to breaking point". Another thing that didn't make any sense was how all these twigs and sticks and weeds that he'd throw on the fire, they were all so dry and brittle yet, after some time, the heat would make them begin to bend and twist and squirm as though suddenly alive and not happy about being there. "Why do they do this?", he thought. "They're dry and brittle! Some as thick as my little finger. and yet, here they are!".
"It's the heat", he realized. "Heat softens even solids.". Remembering his days casting bronze. Extreme heat will liquify even metals. The long-nosed, horned mask, scowling at something.
Carrots get soft in soups. It's all pretty simple. All this stuff in the fire squirms and twists and turns and burns to change into dust, into the finest of ash. Pure. White. Clean. Meanwhile, the snot was showing signs of drying. "Will it too burn?", he wondered.
One eye bulging out in disbelief... A fire's a fire is a fire. Why see things that ain't there? But the transformation from a bunch of twigs and roots and branches, with a match, into all this, somehow did something to him. To his mind? Even that was uncertain.