Teeming masses turned out for the funeral of the Prince of Eos. They gathered in the gardens out back of the Royal Palace, a place full of plant life of every color the eye could see, where birds gathered in the branches to sing their songs.
The attendees came from every class, every caste, every walk of life. From the nobles in their clothes of cotton and silt with feathered hats and silver jewelry to the commoners in their patched garments of linen.
Joren stood beside Edric, clad in the closest thing to finery he owned: a black quilted doublet. A young lady in the crowd waved at him and gave a flirtatious smile. Joren waved back, his cheeks red with blush. Edric wondered if he should later punish this disrespectful behavior at the funeral with a stern lecture or a simple smack to the back of Joren’s head.
Among those at the funeral, Edric spied his many brothers and sisters, whom he mostly recognized because of the fleeting resemblances they passed to his late father.
As he stood among the many attendees, Edric craned his neck to look back at the palace, the place where he was born. Not unlike his own keep, the palace had been carved by shamir worms out of a single piece of stone, but instead of quartzite it was polished basalt. The light of the sun gleamed off the black walls, the pillars, and the curved domes of the rooftops. Despite how gloomy the day was, the sky did not reflect the people’s mourning, showing instead its usual shades of gold, red, and purple. All the better that the sky was clear, for the people would be able to witness more of the late Prince’s journey to Ashur.
Returning his attention forward, with everyone else, Edric watched the raised platform at the head of the garden, where lay his father’s black coffin. Dozens of sages stood on either side, each clad in white robes with hoods, androgynous golden masks, and breastplates of gold from which protruded gilded hands clasped together in prayer.
The Grand Sage marched in front of the rest. One could tell that it was the Grand Sage from the golden pauldrons on the robe, each of which resembled the bust of a hooded sage with head bowed in reverence.
When Grand Sage Rami spoke, the voice that issued forth was as emotionless and androgynous as the mask. “Children of the Eternal King, subjects of Eos, and visitors from distant worlds, we gather today to honor the life of this man,” Rami gestured to the black coffin, “who served as Prince during his small part of the Eternal King’s absence. In his time as Prince, he was wise, fair, and charitable. Yes, it is said that all he ever wanted to be, even when he was a boy, was wise, and every time he came to Temple he would pray that the Eternal King would grant him wisdom beyond his years.”
The other sages started a low hum in unison to accompany Rami’s eulogy, and the Grand Sage continued, going on about the late Prince Ehren’s accomplishments.
“Hey!”
Though the displeasure was great, the one who spoke still managed to keep their voice low. Edric turned his head to see who was making such a commotion during the funeral.
The crowd parted as a stranger walked through, a man with long, raggedy white hair and dark circles surrounding his eyes. His flesh was pale as snow, and his nose was knobby. He wore a long cape with feathered pauldrons. With him walked two women and one man, each wearing black uniforms with high collars and indigo epaulets.
“Quillon?” Edric breathed in less than a whisper. “And Regime soldiers?”
They appeared to be unarmed, but by the looks on the faces of those around them this didn’t make it any less unsettling that this son of the now-deceased Prince Ehren had returned to Eos and had brought with him three troopers from The Regime.
Joren whispered to Edric, “You don’t think the sages will make him Prince do you?”
Edric raised a finger to his own lips and returned his gaze to the sages and the funeral rites. It was just in time, too, for the Journey to Ashur was about to begin, a rite reserved only for royalty.
“The Shell’s arrived!” said a child in the crowd, whose mother immediately shushed her.
Out of the sky, a chitinous gray orb as large as the palace descended. Once it hovered only just a few men’s heights over the sages, some of the plates of chitin shifted, and long tendrils extended downward from the gap. The sages shuffled out of the way, and the tendrils wrapped around the black coffin, lifting it up into the Shell.
The Grand Sage called out. “At this time, I would like to call forth four of Prince Ehren’s sons to take the Journey to Ashur with him and ensure that their father’s body arrives safely. Please come forth when you are called. Damek!”
Edric spied one of his older half-brothers making his way to the front. An heir with wild dark hair, a bushy beard, and clad in a suit of black leather.
“Feng!” called out the Grand Sage.
Edric’s eyes met Feng’s, and they exchanged nods as he made his way to the front. Some in the crowd muttered that it made sense that a member of the Royal Guard was going.
“Edric!” cried the Grand Sage.
Edric caught his breath, then patted Joren on the shoulder as he started to make his way up to the front. The crowd moved aside for him, some giving sympathetic nods or bowing their heads.
The Grand Sage called out, “Quillon!”
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And murmurs resounded through the attendees. Edric glanced back over his shoulder at his white-haired half-brother, who left his Regime comrades behind so he could join in the funeral rite.
Edric drew near the raised platform and looked on as the Shell’s tendrils took hold of Feng’s thin arms and pulled him up, to disappear beyond the chitin plates. The Knight Justicar swallowed the lump in his throat as he passed by the sages, who bowed their heads at his approach, a courtesy they’d not extended to Feng when he walked by. Edric gave them a curious look, but continued to the place where his father’s coffin once lay. Tendrils wrapped around his every limb and ever-so-gently raised him off the ground. He clenched his eyes shut as he slipped through the gap in the chitin plates.
When he opened them again, he stood inside a room as large as a stadium. The ground under his feet was covered in violet grass, interspersed with glowing mushrooms. Luminescent moss decorated the walls and the pillars standing in their midst. Off to Edric’s right, a woman with a shaven head and blue skin stood suspended above the floor with tendrils tightly wrapped around her arms, legs, and forehead. She wore a white, sleeveless tunic and black shorts.
Less than five strides from her lay the black coffin which contained the late Prince’s body.
Quillon rose into the room as well, and the tendrils released him when his polished boots touched down on the violet grass. Every step he made crushed the purple blades under his soles. “Feng. Edric. Damek. I don’t believe I’ve seen you since we were boys.”
Damek’s black leather gloves flexed as his fists tightened, and he leaned against the nearest moss-covered pillar. “Some of us are still boys, it seems.”
Feng rolled his eyes at Damek. “Brother, such venom is beneath you. Really, can’t we get along just for today? For Father’s sake?”
Damek shut opened his mouth to speak, but immediately shut it again.
The woman wrapped in tendrils said, “I’m going to move the Shell now. All of you should hang on.”
The room shifted around them, and each young man grabbed hold of the nearest pillar.
Edric pressed his back into the glowing moss and folded his arms. “Quillon, while you are on Eos you will visit your dear mother, won’t you?”
Quillon tilted his head to one side. “What interest have you in my mother?”
“She was kind to Feng and I when our mother died,” said Edric. “And she loved Father very much. I want to be sure she has you there to comfort her.”
Quillon shrugged. “I suppose I can play the part of the diligent son, but I imagine I’ll not be the only one. I have twenty-seven full-brothers, Edric.”
Edric gave a half smile. “Yes, but it’s you she misses most of all, I promise you.”
Quillon scratched his own chin. “You may be right. I think I’ll have a little extra time before I have to leave again.”
“The Sovereign would call you back to duty so soon?” asked Damek, a hint of disgust in his voice. “Is your bereavement leave truly so short?”
Quillon sneered.
“Dear brothers!” Feng interjected, raising both hands between them as if trying to make them remain apart.. “Let us not make this time all about us. This is Father’s Journey to Ashur. If he could hear us now, do you really think this is how he’d want us to spend the time?”
Damek’s shoulders sank. “I suppose not.”
“It’s tradition,” began Edric, “for sons of the deceased to speak of their fondest memories of their father. If the Eternal King has given him leave to hear us, that may be his final joy before he moves on to Eternity. If you don’t mind, I’ll start.”
“By all means,” said Quillon.
Edric cleared his throat and began. “I must admit, most of my memories of him came from my earliest boyhood days. I must have been just old enough to speak at the time. I was fascinated by psychics back then, as most children are. In particular, telepaths. So, one day, Father says to me, ‘Maybe you’re a telepath too. Have you ever thought of that?’ I didn’t believe it, but he asked me, ‘What number am I thinking of?’ At first, I said I didn’t know, but he kept insisting that I concentrate harder. So, I tried to concentrate harder, which really just meant making a funny face. At the time, I only knew numbers one through ten, so I guessed ‘Seven,’ and he tried to look surprised and said, ‘That’s right!’ And we played that game for a long while. Every time I guessed a number, he told me I’d guessed right and that it might mean I was a telepath.”
Though he’d not intended it, the corners of Edric’s mouth pulled back in a grin, and tears formed in his eyes. He decided that this emotion was welcome, and so he allowed it to take hold of him. His voice wavered as he finished with, “It was just make-believe, but I really loved the game.”
When Edric fell silent, Feng spoke up next. “My fondest memory came much later. It was when I told him I planned to join the Royal Guard. He said, ‘I’m proud of you, son!’ I know, not much of a story, but… it stuck with me. I’d earned Father’s pride.”
Damek scratched the skin under his scraggly, black beard and said, “Like Edric I… I barely knew Father. But there was this one time when I had just become a man, Father showed up at my house with an entourage of guards and a bottle of ecane-flavored whiskey. We hadn’t seen each other since I was a babe, and yet he remembered my twentieth birthday. He stayed an hour with me, leaving the guards outside, and we finished off that bottle of whiskey together. That…” Damek cleared his throat and his eyes grew misty. “That was a good day.”
Silence followed Damek’s story, and all eyes turned to Quillon, awaiting his tale.
Feng said, “Well?”
Quillon brushed some of his long, white hair out of his eye and said, “I’m sorry to tell you this, but I don’t have any happy memories of Father. He was always too busy for me, and I left Eos before I became a man, so there was no happy reunion on my twentieth birthday.”
“You have nothing at all?” Feng asked.
“Is there nothing good you could say about him?” asked Edric.
Quillon chuckled and folded his arms under his cape. “I guess I could say this much.” He looked at the black coffin. “Father, thank you for laying with my mother and getting her pregnant. If you hadn’t done that, I wouldn’t be here today to not have happy memories to share with half-brothers I barely know.”
Damek rolled his eyes.
Quillon’s comments had killed any sense of comradery that the four brothers might have otherwise felt in that moment, as the long silence that followed made apparent. Each of them stood in contemplation, unable to form more words for a long while. Feng stared at the black coffin the whole trip, his eyes growing sadder with every passing moment.
The tendrils wrapped around the bald woman in white twitched and she said at last, “We have arrived. We’re in a pocket of Ashur’s clouds that has enough breathable air for you all to be safe. Grab hold.”
More tendrils descended from the ceiling. Each of the four brothers offered their non-dominant arm to be wrapped tight so they would not fly away when the Shell opened up again. With their right arms, they slid the black coffin along the violet grass, toward the spot where the floor would open up.
A blast of wind, at first cold and then hot, flooded the inside of the Shell when the gap opened. All four brothers staggered at the sudden blast, but the tendrils held them fast, preventing them from falling.
“Goodbye, Father,” said Edric, though the fierce wind obscured his words. As the four of them pushed the coffin together, towards the open gap in the Shell’s floor, Edric allowed the sorrow he’d been holding back to take hold, and the gusts caused his tears to stream through the air behind him. He could barely see for all the water in his eyes when finally the coffin left the Shell, and toppled through the orange and red clouds far below them.