Tremus, the Guttered Candle

Domain: Lost Causes, Desperate Prayers
Titles: The Dimming Flame, He Who Kneels Last, Patron of the Hopeless
Symbol: A candle burned down to its base
Origin Among Mortals: Tremus was not born in temples or battlefields, but in the final moments — in shaking voices that prayed knowing no one would answer, in last stands made with empty hands, in promises whispered into rubble.
He formed in the hearts of those who kept hoping after hope was gone, who lit one last flame not to survive, but simply to not be alone in the dark.
Tremus is not a god of triumph — he is the god of not giving up, even when giving up would be easier. He rose not because people believed he’d save them — but because they called to someone anyway. And someone answered.
Nature of the Guttered Candle: Tremus is fragile and stubborn — like a flame that should’ve gone out hours ago. His power is not in victory, but in presence. He stands beside the dying, the failing, the forsaken — not to deliver them, but to witness them. To say: you mattered. Even here.
He does not offer miracles. But sometimes, impossibly, his flame flickers back to life — and that is enough.
His faith is not built on certainty. It’s built on defiance in despair.
Manifestation & Imagery: Tremus appears as a hunched figure wrapped in tattered robes, face shadowed by a hood of soot. In one hand, he always carries a candle burned to its base — yet the wick never fully dies. His eyes, if seen, are wet with smoke and memory.
His symbol — a candle guttered to its end — is carved into walls of ruins, scrawled on prison stones, or placed in the ashes of homes lost to fire. It’s left where no one expects help to come — but still hopes.
Worship and Followers: Tremus has no formal clergy. His followers — called the Ash-Handed — are those who survived the unsurvivable or who choose to stay with the dying, the hopeless, the abandoned.
They tend to small, forgotten shrines in places where hope failed: battlefields, famine villages, collapsed tunnels. Their rites involve the lighting of a single candle, a whispered prayer, and the promise to remember.
Some become wandering comforters, bringing warmth and words to the doomed — not to save them, but to ensure they are not alone.
After the Dark Awakening: In a world broken by the Awakening, Tremus walks more often than ever. His shrines dot the ruins — not grand temples, but candles left on windowsills of shattered homes, altars of bone and wax in sunken cities.
It is said that when all other gods fall silent, Tremus still listens. That when the last fire dies, his flickers once more. In him, there is no guarantee of salvation — only the refusal to abandon the fallen.
Notable Sayings & Myths:
“The candle still burns. So do you.”
The Last Vigil: A tale where a dying priest lights a candle for a doomed city. Though the city falls, a child survives — drawn to the only light left burning.
The Prayer of Ashes: A whispered litany spoken over those too far gone to save. Followers believe that when it’s spoken truthfully, Tremus kneels beside them in the dark.
The Unseen Flame: A story of a warrior who lit a candle and was struck down before finishing their prayer. The next morning, the candle still burned — untouched by wind or time.

“I know you are breaking. I am here to break with you.” — Tremus, the Guttered Candle