FREEMEN IN THAY | Eiren Alaor

[augustaugur]

---

NAME: Absent titles, aliases and other such “names” provided at one time from the end of a whip, it is Eiren Alaor.
AGE: Twenty-eight, born in late spring.
ORIGIN: Mulhorand Mulan
NATIONALITY: Thayan

The body is covered from toe to tip in linen, leather and all matter of coverings, not much more than five foot nine. Its physique is reedy, almost spindly; the coverings fit loose except for the coif and gloves, which are fastened secure. It would be surprising if it weighed in excess of one hundred and fifty-six pounds clothed. It wears a mask for it would not visit its visage upon anyone. Over the years the bronze has been engraved with lays of silver. The eyes which peer from cross-fold slits are mismatched: one is hazel, the other a cornflower shade of blue.

The voice, heard infrequently, is ill to the ears. More often the body will sign as it has been taught.

It breathes, and that is enough.

---

UNTIL I CAN BEAR A FRACTION OF YOUR BURDEN, SUFFERER, I SHALL.
UNTIL I MAY SHOULDER A SPLINTER FROM YOUR RACK, OUR MARTYRED FATHER, I SHALL.
UNTIL I WOULD SEE A GLIMPSE OF YOUR PAIN, BROKEN GOD, I SHALL.
JUSTICE ENDURES.​

“Am I dying?”

“Yes.”

He couldn’t have hid this even if he wanted; the sores were almost bursting, a cruel and blackened rash from thigh to torso. So Eiren said what they both knew. What, instead, gave him pause was how Tyn did not move. His lips opened, shut, but he stared straight ahead. Then:

“I don’t want to come back.”

“…” Eiren replaced the cloth on his forehead. It’d been less than an hour and the last was already saturate with sweat. “You shouldn’t say that. Not so loud.”

“I’m dying,” Tyn said, reaching for Eiren’s wrist with a weak, beleaguered motion. The heat he felt was familiar—like a brand. “What does it matter? I don’t want to come back. Please.”

“Why are you asking me?” Eiren scoffed, pulling his arm away. “What can I do about that? It isn’t…”

“You can. I know you can. You’re different. Not made to work the way I was. What got me sick. Please, Eiren. I don’t want to come back! Swear that I won’t come back!”

He was shouting now, hoarse, meek, eyes blown wide with desperation. Again he reached for Eiren, this time seizing him by the collar and yanking down until they were close. Eiren could smell the rot.

“Tyn…”

“Swear it, Eiren. Swear it so I can die in peace. Please.”

Eiren looked away. The ramshackle thing they called a hospice for the ‘working ones’ was quiet. No footsteps—only the distant, sonorous roar of toil elsewhere. He returned to Tym after a sigh.

“I swear it.”

Tyn loosened, letting Eiren free. He lied there on the cot, settling into the blanket of linen rags. Eiren tried not to think about how his funerary shroud would be those very rags, if He deigned Tyn to be buried at all. If He deigned…

“Thank you.”

… but Tyn was already gone.

---

 

[augustaugur]

---

“Do you understand?”

“Yes.”

“Then you are not a complete affront to our people,” He said. “Mulhorand that you are, there remains a perspicacity for the Art. Recite, again.”

Eiren did; the wick shuddered, then, with a wink and a breath, began to burn. He smiled.

“At last.”

The incense was sandalwood—His preference. The laboratory stank of it on the best of days which Eiren did not mind ranging from any of the probable alternatives. When he looked down at the parchment tabs and leatherwork binding, it was only after this moment did Eiren realize what he held in his hands. What He had given him.

So Eiren asked Him: “Why?”

He laughed, of course. He laughed as though Eiren were stupid, a kind of stupid that a child might be in the presence of their parent. Once He was done He stood up, tattoos glazing by the candlelight until He and Eiren were just a head apart.

“Why wouldn’t I?”

Eiren felt dry in his throat. A better, pragmatic part of him knew he should have fell silent. Dipped his head to Him and let it be. It was not his business to question, let alone in His personal company. Few working ones had the pleasure of it except when purchased at auction yet here Eiren was, in laboratory and library. Seen. What could he say? What would He have wanted to hear?

“I am lesser,” Eiren answered. “But you have—are—teaching me as you would an apprentice. This… confuses me. I did not ask to be taught, I did not think I should read from your work or incant so much as a whisper let alone what you have shown to me. I am grateful, but I do not know why this has been put before me, this task. I do not doubt your wisdom, but…”

He lofted a hand, and Eiren stopped. “You are of the House. My House. I will do with you as I see fit. Beside, we are not in Thaymount. Whenever I have sent for an apprentice I have been met with little more than the cast-offs from other Houses, as though they mean to try and sabotage me. I do not abide by this. If I must raise up from within—”

His finger was on Eiren’s chest. “—then I simply must raise up from within. You are grateful, as you should be. No honor such as this comes easy.”

Of that, Eiren hastened to agree. He stepped off, returning to His perch opposite him.

“I—of course. I will do whatever is in my power to prove that your trust is not misplaced.”

There was that smile.

“I know. Now…” A snap. “Recite.”

---

 

[augustaugur]

OH RACK-BROKEN LORD, I BESEECH YOU.
LOOK UPON HIM AND KNOW HE HAS SUFFERED.
TAKE HIM INTO YOUR CLOTH, YOUR GRACE, YOUR INFINITE PATIENCE AND MAJESTY.
FOR HE HAS LIVED, AND LIVED AS THOUGH HE WERE DYING.
JUSTICE ENDURES.​

Another of the working ones had gone.

There was a whole cavalcade in the infirmary now, men lying from corner to curtain with scarcely a cot for every two. Eiren regretted their circumstances, though it was regretting a matter of invariable fact—where else would they go, if not here? Here, to have their sores bleed black and their wet clothes changed while they lay dying? While Eiren, when he knew that they had begun to fade, said a final word to the Crying God? Where else, where else?

There was nowhere else.

“Aly,” Eiren said. “Come get him.”

Aly produced himself. The Rashemi was at least a head taller than Eiren and twice as broad—even if Eiren could do the work of drawing them out of the infirmary, he doubted He would allow it. Not when Aly was there, dutifully and with pushcart.

“You are sure?” he asked, not referring to the working one’s condition. That much was already prescient.

Eiren nodded, “Yes. There is no contagion, Aly… not one you or I would catch. They have all gone to the mines to become this way.”

Aly considered, then knelt down by the man. His grip was gentle as he moved him from the floor—he had not died on a cot—and onto the wood floor of the pushcart.

“Yann,” Aly said. It was with some embarrassment that Eiren did not know his name. Since Tyn all matter of working ones he had not seen before except to take their spot had come through.

“Did you know him?”

Aly shook his head. Once he had the right of the cart, he began to wheel it away.

“Make sure to come back,” Eiren said. “There’s going to be more.”

Aly did not respond. The pull of the wheels were soon dull and far. Eiren turned back to what he had been given, shaking his head also. Then he reached into his side, pulling out a little black book. It was bound in leatherette. He, of course, had given this to him. Eiren wouldn’t have had the means. He did however have the means for thus:

Incant, and watch it ghost-write.

This was how he managed to sit by the side of one still alive, putting his finger in front of their eyes. There was no reaction.

“I want you to try and follow it,” Eiren said. “With your eyes, please.”

“…”

He started from the left. There was, after a pause, a grunt. They began to follow it, though lagging step for step.

So went into the little black book: Difficulty receiving and interpreting instruction. Impaired coordination. Lethargy. High fever. Sweating. Sores dark in character along chest and extremities.

Please, Eiren. I don’t want to come back.

“Are you hungry? Thirsty?”

“… no.”

Swear that I won’t come back! Swear it so I can die in peace!

“Not at all? You’re sure?” Eiren looked to the book, but he knew.

“… yes.”