Candle

A candle is read as a light with a known limit — illumination that is also a countdown. Candles are Fire, and Fire in the traditional map is brightness plus consumption. The reading almost always turns on the flame's state.

It points to a function rather than an event. A candle is read as a light with a known limit — illumination that is also a countdown. Traditional readings ask what the object is for and whether it is working, rather than treating it as a sign. Carrying a lit candle outdoors — where it should go out — is a commonly reported image, read as something fragile being kept alive by attention.

A steady flame and a guttering one are the two standard cases. Relighting a candle that has gone out has its own reading and is not treated as the same as a first light. It is grouped under Fire (火) in the five-element system.