Gleur found himself wondering if the candles knew. If the brick and mortar of the deadwell was aware. If the sun rays were mocking them. If here, among brothers and sisters as taciturn as him, anyone could notice that between his sadness and inadequacy nested a pearl of relief. For a brother of his age or about it to suicide was a disgrace, but not a concern like a natural death. Death in battle, that was just desserts for a soldier. It was either quick, or the agony was relatively short. Death alone in a bed after months where one has the body stop responding, where the mind slip away from reality and the eyes not only become clumsy, but unreliable liars. Natural death was to be feared as much as a Masterwork’s torture, or so Gleur believed.
Learos, esteemed scholar of Felsian theology, walked in circles around the deadwell, his white and red garments gracefully flowing after his movements, the light and delicate cloth a mantle of ghosts enveloping him. He let out a prayer as he caressed the bloodied water, for the ears of everyone that had attended the Sage’s wake. Young as Kali or older than the dead, brothers and sisters from all over the city had gathered around the Departure plaza, where all Felsians whose bodies could be recovered ended their existence, and he had to pray in words they all understood.
“Brother Mirn, you left us by your own volition, with your reasons known to our parents alone. Your soul gone form the body, allow us to destroy this vessel, to feed it back to the river whose water irrigates our city. You cannot communicate with us anymore, but in Mother’s grace you hear our cries for your absence, cries of sorrow and cries of joy, for now life shall never burden you again. Free are you of the Ratchet of Horror, free are you to enjoy the boons of heaven. And we who still walk this soil, who still drink the water of the Worldvein, will miss this brother that went the way of all Felsians. Hear, please the words your brethren and sistren wish to elevate to you, and intercede with Mother in their stead, if need be.” Then the priest let down his hood and stared at the minced remains of the sage, floating in the surface of the deadwell. “Farewell, beloved littermate,” he whispered, and then shook his head. It was the job of theologians to lead departure, and none other than him was worthy of sending a Sage’s remains.
He descended from the circular platform of the deadwell. A sister, still dressed on her lab coat, rushed to step on it. Nobody wanted to be the first to speak. The caretakers didn’t want to leave their little children alone to talk to a dead Felsian. Some fostered the naive belief that maybe, if they didn’t speak, Mirn would be alive in their minds for another day, or until they needed him. For most of them, he wasn’t an empty chair at the workplace, a letter never answered, a tranquil night without his annoying ranting. For them he was grief today, and a little sad memory tomorrow.
She cleared her throat and with big copper eyes she addressed the multitude. She had to say something, and her mind wasn’t cooperating. “Mirn was my teacher. I found him dead over his desk, where the turtles used to be. I don’t know how to tell the turtles he is gone, they won’t understand. They don’t have the capacity to do so, but I refuse to believe they are so cold blooded they couldn’t love the man that took care of them for decades. He gave them all away, the turtles. Testudora, now mine, will likely outlive me too. Professor, I will take care of her until death takes me…” And with commas too long and periods too short she carried on with her monologue.
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Gleur grunted. Not because he was annoyed by the girl’s discourse, but because he had been in one too many funerals. And this was among the macabre ones. A funeral in spring, under the early sun that dispelled the understanding shadows.
High above the carrion eaters described circles, and every sage wondered the same: Which is she? Or perhaps, which isn’t she?
The musicians played the strings and the winds away from the multitude. A funeral’s music had to be distant, a background melody that one could pay no attention to. The caw of a raven took priority over the notes from chords and pipes.
Milod stood from his forged wood chair and crouched in front of Gleur.
“The altar is empty for you to talk, brother.”
“If I get up there, Milod, I am getting lynched. I have nothing good to say about the gods, so let me say nothing.”
“You were really close to him, Gleur. He would talk about you and the… subjects you brought him from your expeditions, while alone with me, or other sages.” There was certain despisement in Milod’s voice at the mention of the misshapen, but, overall, Gleur didn’t feel the clockmaker was attacking him for his profession this time.
“I owe Mirn a discourse. I do. And I hope he listens if I speak it out tonight, alone by the piers. But here, in front of children and their caretakers, in front of so many that still have faith in Mother… I cannot.” Gleur whispered on his brother’s ear.
Milod frowned and began fidgeting with a curl of his black hair. “Fine. His soul will know to forgive this little caprice of yours. Of anybody else, I don’t know, but of yours, Gleur, for you Mirn would have stopped the Ratchet from spinning with his bare hands, if he could only grasp it.”
“And for any Felsian, I’d do the same. I know my tongue, old enough thing to be untamed in moments like this. This is a sad day, a day that doesn’t need my rants. And, furthermore, Mirn deserves a proper funeral.”
Milod gave up and went back to his seat. If Gleur wouldn’t talk, none of the other sages had the right to do so, past the protocol final salutation. And so they sat in serene contemplation as the citizens that had made of Mirn their favorite sage —and even a friend— pured their hearts out. A bar owner ranted about how the naturalist liked to annoy other clients with long winded explanations of animal anatomy when he pretended to get drunk. A rancher and veterinarian that studied under him narrated how patient and easygoing he had been to her during her formational years.
And so several members of the community paraded, some exposing Mirn’s virtues, and some his vices. All brothers and sisters, however, had held the sage at least a bit dear, enough to ak to be let in the plaza during the ceremony. And yet, Despite the many caricatures drawn by their anecdotes and at-times-soppy monologues, Gleur felt Mirn wasn’t there. He was too good for some, too annoying for others. Too brave and too responsible. Nobody had called him coward. Nobody had called him traitor. And while he wasn’t neither of those things, Gleur felt that such insults were appropriate to be said. Not then, not there, but at night at by the river.
The river, where the drains powered by runic magic would lead Mirn’s remains by the end of the wake. The river, that, with Felsians gone, would rode the base of the northern walls, swallowing them in time too. The river, from which crabs and snakes and all the things that crawl would invade the dead city. Felsians went to rest with their remains spread in the waters of the Worldvein. And in time, their city would follow suit.