Undying

[The Mongrel]

This is hella rusty, written quickly, and I didn't even proof it. Also, I riff on a folk song. Take it for what it is.

Is this what it's like to be dead?

I knelt on top of a crumbling building in the roughest part of Radasanth. Since dawn, a turbulent torrent of emotions had battered and drowned my soul, leaving me exhausted and numb beneath the cold light of the stars. If the universe had any sense of justice, rain would have fallen in frigid floods, dulling my senses and matching my mood. But I've never had justice, and the same Stars who had dragged my life into this terminal mess mercilessly spectated the death blow. Even the constant wind from the sea was still, letting a miasma made of misery seep up from the ground and choke the life from the high air. The stench mingled with the taste of bitter wine in my mouth, making me want to gag.

Is this what it's like to be dead?

The thought thundered through my mind as slowly and loudly as a yoke of oxen dragging a heavy cart through mud. It turned and repeated, pushing aside any other musing. In that moment, I had nothing but that thought. Nothing but that knowledge.

Below me, a slow procession filtered out into the night. No torches or lanterns lit their path; they had no need of them. These streets had been their cradle, their playground, their office. I had been their friend, their mentor, their confidante. They had been my blood, my breath, my home.

A tiny toddler looked up from her father's strong shoulder and lifted her hand to point at me. He gently but firmly bent her head back into the crook of his neck. I heard him whisper to her to sleep, that she'd seen nothing. None of the adults in the group looked up. They couldn't. Who would look for a ghost, after all?

I would never lay back on a hot roof with Diamond Knave again and discuss colicky babies. I would never see the birth of his second child. I would never rub Tanner's belly to soothe that child. I would never see their firstborn, Queenie, grow into a child, a teenager, an adult. I would never crash on Rainbow's couch again after a long day of running messages for Unfounded. I would never visit Fishsticks again in his humble Serenti home. I wouldn't help his son Custard grow into the brilliant thief he was already becoming.

I would never sit with Splinter again and discuss direction and strategies for the organization I'd been part of for the last half century. I would never again sit with my Runners and send them scattering across Corone to enact the will of our leader and collect news from the outlying branches.

This is death.

No injuries marred my flesh, no steel had pierced my vital organs. My heart still beat, my lungs still drew breath. Despite all of that, one truth rose from my churning thoughts.

I am dead.

[The Mongrel]

The day of my death dawned with a summons from Splinter, the third and current leader of Unfounded. A decade ago, when Lightning chose the peg-legged former thug as his successor over his own son, Diamond Knave, there'd been some turmoil and backlash in the group. That had only been exacerbated during the civil war, when three in four of our number were wiped out by Ixian violence, including Lightning. Knave, devastated by his father's murder, had threatened to break the organization by taking whoever was loyal to him and waging outright war.


Splinter, who was already in his thirties then - wiser than the young Knave, calmer, and selected for his ability to see the big picture and act for Unfounded's long-term benefit - tasked me with doing whatever I needed to if it would convince Knave to stay. It took a murder, but I brought young Knave back into the fold, like his father would have wanted.


We wouldn't have survived divided. We barely survived whole.

I hadn't had contact with Splinter in the year since I'd left for the Day of Burning, save for one note when I'd docked back in Radasanth:

For all our sakes, lay low.

I understood. Raiaera celebrated me for getting the final blow in on Pode; I was recognizable, and would be for a long time. Any unnecessary association with Unfounded could bring heat down on them, and that was the absolute last thing I wanted. I'd known many members of the organization from the first stirring in their mother's wombs, and nearly all the rest from adolescence, at the latest. I'd watched them, fed them, taught them, loved them. For some of the Runners, I was as much a mother as they'd ever had. For all of the second and third generation members, I was a fact of life, a frequently seen aunt who always brought a bit of candy or performed some fun sleight of hand when they were little and taught them stealth or knife work when they were old enough.

So to protect the people I held dearest, I distanced myself from them. I quietly walked Corone, calling no attention to myself. I got into some trouble on Scara Brae, but always out of sight of the law. I even went back to Raiaera briefly, but was not comfortable there. How could I be?

So I returned to Corone, the only home I had. I lived in the shadows, having only rare and brief contact with any Unfoundling, and only enough to make sure they were still all right. Sometimes I stayed in the woods. Sometimes I stayed with my uncles in Concordia. Sometimes I stayed in little, out of the way towns. I was never more than a few hours in a larger city.

Human memories are short and Corone is so far from Raiaera; I was certain that within a couple of years I would be back.

But that day, as I languished in a dirty inn ten miles outside of Radasanth, a note slid under my door as the first pinks and purples kissed the navy sky. Hope and dread vied for places in my stomach; this message, so soon, either meant I could come home sooner than expected or that I would have to leave Corone again.

See me. A King of Staves was enclosed.

[The Mongrel]

Ten miles is barely half an hour's walk for me, so dawn hadn't even reached its full glory when I broke through the Radasanthian haze and slipped into Splinter's office. My stomach had twisted itself into knots during the trip. Hope surged to elation for a few minutes, certain that this would be the day I was welcomed back as an Unfoundling. Then dread crept back in and turned to despair, fearing that I'd be asked to leave the country for at least another decade. If that was the case, how much would I miss? Births, recruitments, trainings, decisions, retirements, deaths - major parts of Unfounded life would be barred to me; I wouldn't even hear of them.
Both emotions boiled in my gut as I crossed the dull floor to stand in front of Splinter's rough desk, each powerful enough to clamp my throat shut.

This office had changed location a dozen times in the last half century, as previous safe houses were busted, burned, or otherwise rendered unsafe. I remembered it as a grand location, where Lightning, son of Cata, commanded four hundred people from a leather chair and a large mahogany desk. I remembered heavy damask curtains and an expensive hand-woven rug. I remembered vast sofas that served equally as comfortable areas for Unfoundlings to rest as they did platforms for our associates and enemies to be impressed and intimidated at the display of wealth and power.

Now it was smaller and simpler. There was no sofa, merely a couple of sturdy wooden chairs. The floor was bare and constructed of rough-hewn gray planks salvaged from shipwrecks. Instead of curtains, shutters hid Unfounded affairs from outside observers. Light peeked through the slats when it dared; it often didn't. A pair of candles illuminated the room, instead.

Splinter looked sternly at my ashy-tan face from beneath bushy eyebrows and a grizzled brown beard. The crags in his face and rapid spread of gray hair told of stress and exhaustion; he looked much older than nearly forty. His coarse, calloused hands shuffled a deck of cards with a deftness that belied their size. The rapid sound of cards slapping against each other and the flickering of little flames filled the small room for several long seconds before finally falling still, and his piercing brown eyes motioned me to a chair.

I sat as bidden, dread drowning hope. Only a few types of meetings started with cards, and none of them were good. They meant someone was getting disciplined. Every combination of cards represented a different Unfoundling, with Faces representing the most senior members. Splinter was the King of Staves. Diamond Knave was the Knave of Coins. Rainbow was the King of Cups.

Each suite or represented different functions. Staves were the enforcers and protectors, our strong arms. Coins were our thieves and con artists. Cups were our smugglers and drug dealers. Knives were our mercenaries and my Runners.

Ordinary number cards stood for types of discipline. One meant a visit and stern conversation. Ten was immediate death. If Splinter laid a Ten of Knives in front of me, I'd have to kill one of my own. I couldn't imagine him calling me back to lay anything like a Three of Cups in front of me; someone else could rough up an errant dealer. This had to be an Eight or up, and probably of Knives. Had Monsoon gone back to her unruly ways? Porcupine was chatty when he drank; had he spilled details that needed kept quiet?

"Mongrel." Splinter's gravelly voice called my attention back from anxious speculation. "You're looking thin. And those lenses don't suit you."

Of course he'd notice the contacts, thin pieces of curved glass put over my eyes. They were colored dark green in an effort to mimic the color I'd lost in the forest. They never held to very close inspection, but a brief glance almost never noticed something wrong. I brushed a stray lock of black hair behind the point of my right ear. "The silver looked worse. You're looking tired, old friend."

"We've had a long few days." A heavy sigh snaked its way through Splinter's aquiline nose. "I called the Faces together, Mongrel. And none of us like the decision we had to make."

He pulled a card from the top of the deck and tore it in half, then set the pieces in front of me.

A deep chill spread from my core to my extremities, and for a moment I couldn't breathe. My stomach simultaneously surged and sank.

The rent card was the Queen of Daggers.

My card.

[The Mongrel]

I stared at that card in slack-jawed silence for at least a minute. Splinter simply watched me, giving me the time to process what he'd just told me. In that moment, it was the only kindness he could give me. Maybe he felt it was my due; I'd been a loyal member of Unfounded since before his birth. I'd complied with his directions and advised many of his movements, always with the good of the group in mind.

I was the one who had found him as an angry young man, after he'd lost his leg. I was there when Lightning presented him with the peg so he didn't need to rely on crutches all his days. I'd taught him how to pick pockets when he was a teenager. He was the ideal candidate, honestly. Tall and broad, lurching unsteadily on his peg and cane, no one suspected him of having light enough fingers to relieve them of their valuables.

And he was the one who had taken my world and shattered it into so many shards.

"I...I..." Amber light sneaked into the room while I tried to find my tongue. Finally, I drew in a shuddering breath and swallowed the hard lump in my throat.

"Why, Splinter? From the day I returned from Raiaera, I have done everything asked of me to-"

"Mongrel." Splinter's tone was not unkind, but it stopped my protest like a steel shield blocking a bronze sword. "People are looking for you; what you did and who you are will not soon be forgotten. Your true name is known, and that will bring heat down on you if you're ever caught with us again. It's known that a half-Raiaeran, half-Alerian runs with some of our members, and that's bringing heat down on us. We can't risk it, Mongrel. And neither can you."

He stood up and walked around his desk, cane, foot, peg, cane, foot, peg. He sat heavily on the edge, looking down at my pale, clammy face. I finally wrenched my eyes away from my torn card and looked into his face. His mouth and eyebrows twisted sorrowfully, but his eyes were resolute. He reached into his pocket and pulled out a silver goblet, setting it on the table in front of me.

The decision had been made, there was no going back. However little the other Faces liked the decision they had to make - and I knew them all well enough to understand how agonizing the choice had to be - it was made. The good of Unfounded as a whole dictated that I, as a part, must leave.

My shoulders slumped; I hadn't felt so defeated since I'd been split into two halves and swallowed by a dragon in the Red Forest. There would be no debating my way out of this; I could not kill the vote, and I would not harm the people I loved beyond blood.

"When?"

"Tonight, at the Hour of Change." Splinter put an awkward hand on my shoulder and squeezed gently. "I always knew you would gladly give your life for us, Mongrel. I never imagined I would have to give you worse than death."

I nodded mutely, but Splinter wasn't finished speaking.

"...if you want to visit him one last time, you should do so today."

With those words, I felt the shards of my world crumble into dust.

[The Mongrel]

The sun was high when I finally made my way to Mutt's grave. I took with me a knife, a pail of water, a bristle brush, some incense, several pounds of roasted meat, and a jug of his favorite beer. Many friends were buried on the same ground, kept together by and with the only people who had ever cared for them. Cata and Lightning were there, as were Smiles, Ghost, Weepy, Hammer, and so many others whom I had called friend over the decades.

Moss covered most of the plain headstones; we couldn't afford elaborate grave markings for our dead. We couldn't even afford a proper funeral in a real cemetery. We just buried them respectfully in empty ground between Radasanth and Underwood.

I went to visit my friends briefly before I went to my beloved's final resting place. I lit an incense stick at each of their tombs - something usually reserved only for anniversaries or special occasions. But I would never see them again; gifts were appropriate.

I set my burdens down when I reached Mutt's broad grave. I could have sworn he fought at my side recently, even if all evidence showed otherwise. Somehow, in my moment of most desperate need, he had been with me. He had been my champion.

Would that I had gone into the moonlight with you then, my Mountain. I just lost the last thing I was living for.

I cleaned Mutt's grave while I was there with him. The briars, brambles, and weeds that had intruded on his space quickly fell to my knife. The moss and lichen that obscured his name fled from the touch of my scrubbing brush. I talked to him while I worked, telling him of the journey through the Lindequalme before he appeared, of meeting Pode and my poor decisions with her. I told him about waking up with him gone and my brother nearby. I told him about the journey out of the Red Forest, of the journey back, and my adventures since then. I told him of glorious battles against impossible odds, and I told him about another half-orc I'd met and fought beside.

I didn't tell him that I'd slept with and then slipped away from that half-orc, but I knew he'd understand. Sometimes the body and spirit have needs and desires, but whether I took men to my bed as single nights of passion or as lovers for a little while, Mutt knew he'd always be the man who had my heart.

[The Mongrel]

When his grave was clean, I put the remaining incense above the flat stone that marked it and spilled a little beer where his mouth would be.

"This is my last time here, Mutt." I took a mouthful of the bitter, bready liquid for myself. "Tonight I drink the Last Cup, and I can never come back. All Unfounded places will be beyond my reach, forever. Does that even matter?"

I started arranging the meat at his hands. Diet had been the biggest difference we couldn't reconcile; more than a few mouthfuls of meat sickened me, while he thought vegetables were what food ate. We could agree on bread and cheese, and he would eat eggs if I made them, though he preferred to eat his with the shell on.

"Do you go with me, wherever I go? Do you stay with Unfounded? I know you never believed you'd just sit within your body or stay at your grave."

I gave him another drink, then I drank. "I know I do this for me. But where else am I supposed to go when it's all too much and I don't know where to turn? You're the place where I belong; how do I lose that? Where can I go from here? How do I start again with nothing?"

Droplets streamed down my face, though the sun shone brightly. "Wh-who am I, if I'm not Unfounded's Mongrel? What do I do, if I'm not keeping us together all over the country? H-how will I know what my next step should be?"

I curled up between the mounds of meat, just as if I was laying on his chest while he was sleeping. The ground was as hard as he was, though the grass left when I pulled the weeds was soft as velvet. I could smell earth and ale, meat and musk - his smells, and I was almost comforted.

I couldn't remember feeling so lost or broken. I couldn't remember a feeling as oppressive as this hopelessness. I could always flee from my abusive stepfather. I could always fight my enemies, even if they were nearly gods. But here there was nothing to fight; if I was dangerous for Unfounded, the best thing I could do was slit my own throat.

I could even do it while lying with my Mutt. They'd find my body, and since I hadn't had the Last Cup, they would bury me beside him, where I belonged.

Last Cup means much faith in Mousie, much trust. I could almost hear his voice in that moment, soft and reassuring. Mousie is losing her burrow, so Mousie should find place where she become lion. Sun and moon will tremble at her feet! And Mousie will never be alone, even for a breath.

His promise. Mousie will never be alone.

I stayed at his side until the sun sank beneath the horizon, at which point I turned back to Radasanth.

I had bitter wine to drink, after all.

[The Mongrel]

The Room has always been a simple, empty room in an otherwise abandoned building. It's large enough to hold the Faces, and it has enough extra space to go through whichever ritual it's needed for. In half a century, that has meant inspecting people we were highly certain we wanted, initiation and naming, meeting new babies, mourning recent deaths, and celebrating those of our number who lived long enough to choose to leave our ranks. Very, very rarely, it also gets used for a Last ritual. Last rituals are for Unfoundlings represented by Face cards, and are literally their last moments in Unfounded. The Last Staff sees a traitor get beaten to death. The Last Knife means that someone was breaking Unfounded rules so egregiously, for so long, and was so resistant to guidance, that there's no choice but to kill them, but they haven't sold us out and earned the Last Staff. The Last Coin is reserved for members who die suddenly of natural causes - a coin is put in their mouth before they're buried to "pay the guide." It's the only Last ritual that doesn't result in the lost one's name being stricken from memory.

And the Last Cup... That was to be my fate.

Unfounded usually gets a new Room every couple of years, for the same reason the Office changes frequently. We'd been looking for this one when I left for Raiaera, so it was new to me. Everyone else was waiting when I arrived. Their faces and clothing were fit for a funeral, and I was embraced tightly by the people who had decided to throw me from the group I'd helped found. Knave fought back tears; I'd known his grandfather and his father, I'd helped raise him, and he'd thought I'd help raise his children, grandchildren, great-grandchildren, and so on. Tanner's belly was swollen with a baby I'd never be able to meet, but I reached out to feel it stir. I kissed little Queenie on the head.

Rainbow - a half-elf who was the only remaining Unfoundling who had been with the group longer than I - held me so tightly I thought she'd break my ribs. Her hair, usually colored with painfully brilliant colors, was gone entirely. I'd seen her shave it plenty of times, always and only in mourning. Though these moments would be my last, though she had agreed with what would happen to me, it broke her heart and she would miss me. She'd helped recruit me, after all.

For a few short hours, we put aside the heaviness in our hearts and all spoke as friends. We shared memories, talked about people I hadn't seen in over a year, and caught up. There was no malice; there usually isn't if the Last Cup is being invoked.

What I wouldn't give to have those hours back. What I wouldn't give to have never gone to Raiaera. This was the consequence for paying a debt that didn't exist over remaining where I owed my true loyalty. I should never have picked blood over bond. That I had to drink the Cup was my fault in the end, and none other's.

BONG!

Very suddenly, much too soon, the great clock interrupted the bittersweet meeting.

BONG!

Queenie was sleeping on my shoulder, held tight for the last time. She'd never even remember me. Regretfully, I handed her back to her mother.

BONG!

Everyone moved to the sides of the room and took up small glasses, leaving me alone in the center. For eight more chimes, Splinter walked around the room, filling everyone's glass with a rich red Coronian wine. On the final chime, he filled his own glass and held out the empty silver goblet to me.

[The Mongrel]

Silence ruled for a few seconds, letting everything and everyone settle. Sorrow surged through my body, urging me to beg and plead to not be cast out into the night. For a second I wavered, the corners of my mouth quivered, and it was all I could do to stand and maintain a facade of stoicism.


The decision is made. I have to do this.

Slowly, I stepped up to Splinter and took the goblet, then turned from him to face my former peers. I'd re-read the assertion that afternoon, just to make sure I knew it, but I could never forget. I'd helped write it.

"What little money I ever had, I spent it in good company. And all the harm I've ever done, it's been done only to our enemies. And all I've lost for want of will, mention it and I'll deny it all. So fill for me this one Last Cup, and I'll wish joy unto you all."

One by one, my former companions approached me and poured the contents of their glasses into my goblet. Knave took a place in front of the door to give the reply.

"All the comrades you ever had are sorry for your going away, and all of us that you have loved would wish you one more day to stay. But-" He faltered, and Splinter picked it up.

"But since it falls unto our lot, that you must leave and we must not... We'll fill to you this one Last Cup, and we'll wish joy unto you as well."

Rainbow and Knave were the last to empty their glasses into mine, and they joined the others in turning their backs to me. That was as it had to be.

I turned to Splinter, holding out the goblet to him. He poured the contents of his glass into mine, then filled a wine glass for himself and lifted it to me. We drank together, symbolizing the depth of my bond with Unfounded. When our vessels were empty, I set mine upside down on the floor, and he dropped his, letting it shatter to symbolize the breaking of the bond.

He turned his back on me, and I turned and left the Room. I was stripped of my name and my identity; among the people I knew as family, I was now no one.

[The Mongrel]

When the last of Unfounded turned the corner from me, I rose from the rough shingles on the lonely roof. All I had left was Mutt's poetry and his promise that I'd never be alone, as well as the damned Stars' plans for me, whatever they may have been. It was all but nothing; no home, no hope, no place that I belonged.

My contacts itched against my eyes, reminding me once again what all I'd lost since I answered my brother's call to join the Day of Burning. What had I gained? Precious little, certainly nothing was worth this.

I don't need them anymore. I'd only worn the contacts to hide my star-gifted silver eyes so that one day I could rejoin Unfounded and merely be the Mongrel. But that wasn't my name anymore, and Illara Alfheim fit me as poorly as Zarae Rilynrahel.

I pulled the glass off my eyes, dropping them onto cobblestones that had seen equal amounts of rain and piss over the years. Then I crushed them beneath my boot and started walking for Concordia. My uncles and cousin lived deep within the woods; if nothing else, I could lay my head there for a day or two.

I am lost and misbegotten, friendless, faithless...

Though I tried not to, I turned back to look at the gloomy nighttime streets that I'd called my own for more than half a century. Though I still knew every crack in every building, they looked strange and unfriendly now that I was once more on my own.

And forgotten.

[Rayleigh]

Thread: Undying (http://www.althanas.com/world/showthread.php?31251-Undying)
Type: Workshop
Participant: The Mongrel (http://www.althanas.com/world/member.php?17739-The-Mongrel)

The Mongrel receives:
1170 EXP
120 GP

[Rayleigh]

All rewards have been added, and the appropriate AP has been deducted.