The fire-message is one form of communication for Shadowhunters, who used to refrain from the usage of electronic gadgets and phones, and is used primarily when they are in Alicante, as most modern devices are still impossible to use within the city wards.
Description[]
Fire-message rune.
A fire-message is sent by burning a piece of paper with the message. The Nephilim do this by Marking the piece of paper with the rune for fire with a stele;[1] the message will burn itself up, and the process can be sped up by setting it on fire. The message will then reform wherever the receiver is, assuming something isn't blocking it.[2] It is possibly better to be sent out from a wide, open space.[1][3] A warlock's fire-message is apparently powerful enough to bypass the wards around Alicante.[4] Fire-messages cannot be sent to places like Edom and Faerie.[2]
Invention[]
The fire-message was invented in 1903 by Christopher Lightwood. He had spent many years trying to develop a way for Nephilim to communicate information to one another after numerous instances of his family members being severely injured and near death.[5] Christopher managed to develop the method of sending messages with runes but couldn't figure out how to get the full message to deliver successfully. He turned to Grace Blackthorn for feedback and after his death, she discovered the final piece to the puzzle: the stele used needed a Communication rune.
After the use of fire-messages helped save London from the Prince of Hell Belial, all steles were modified to include a Communication rune so that fire-messages could be used regularly.[6]
Trivia[]
- The first fully successful fire-message was written by Grace Blackthorn and reads as follows: “If you are reading this, this is the first Fire-Message that has been sent with success. It has been written by Grace Blackthorn and invented by Christopher Lightwood."[6]