While Ornn was sleeping, she flew in through his bedroom window. Then, she tickled his nose with one of her feathers, causing him to sneeze a gout of flame that set fire to the bedsheets! The bedsheets set the floor ablaze! Anivia panicked, and flapped her wings to fly away, but this only stoked the fire hotter with the dry Freljord air. Soon, all of Horn Hall was alight.
The fire raged for days, darkening the skies with ash. Of course, Ornn slept through the whole thing. He awoke atop a pile of ashes in a very bad mood, for he had not had a restful sleep. But he did not know what Anivia had done. And to this day, she has never told him the truth.
"I complimented my own handiwork, and look where it got me," said Ornn, surveying the damage. "Never again will I pat myself on the back. I shall let the quality of the work speak for itself."
Ornn had one goal in particular for his next home: he did not want it to be flammable. He fashioned himself a spade, a lever, and a fork. With these tools, he could dig for ore, move mighty pillars, and eat the delicious spiced cherries he so enjoyed.
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He hammered and shaped chunks of ore until a black mountain stood. Inside was a great forge that channeled the primordial molten flame from deep within the earth. He was pleased with his Hearth-Home—but it was too hot inside to dwell comfortably, even for Ornn.
So he dug a trench from the sea, straight to the mountain. The Seal Sister allowed cold waters to rush through the trench and cool the Hearth-Home. Great plumes of steam rose up. It took three days for the mountain to cool enough for Ornn. In that time, the ocean that fed the river dipped several inches.
By then, so much steam had risen from the waters that the perpetual blue sky was mottled with darkening gray clouds. As these new puffy forms gathered and cooled, they grew heavier and heavier until they burst with snow.
It snowed for a hundred years. This is why the Freljord still has so much snow today.
One of the children frowns at me. "If Ornn did so much for the world, then why is it only you who knows the stories about him?" she asks. The girl is young, but has already seen so much hardship that her hair has several shocks of silver running through it.
"There is one tale that answers this very question," I reply. "Would you like to hear it?"
The children's eager faces say it all.
III: THREE SISTERS ASK ORNN FOR HELP
Once, there were Three Sisters who needed Ornn's help in saving their world. Ornn, however, did not care to help anyone save any world, anywhere. It was for personal reasons, and he did not elaborate on the matter. But this did not stop the Three Sisters journeying many days and nights to ask.
"There are creatures of great and wicked magic that stalk our tribes," the First Sister said. She had fierceness and war in her eyes. "They want to destroy all things and claim the world for themselves!"
