Pudding Lane

A narrow medieval thoroughfare where wooden shopfronts lean into the street, their upper floors jetting out past wave-washed stone crosses that warn of the fire’s swift climb. Charred timber and singed thatch cling to the walls as fiery tendrils lick above the eerie curves of the buildings, folding over one another like a beast devouring the path. A single wrought-iron signpost, once proud enough to bear the lane’s name in flowing letters, now bends under the heat until it glows red and buckles floorward. Smoke coils upward, casting striations of light that pick out figures silhouetted in doorways—hands over faces, useless against the gold-flecked ruin of their street. The air stinks of pine pitch and roasting tar, heat prickling exposed skin even from yards away.