...And now, for the conclusion
Ashes
Loivissa POV(2 days later)
Grief, it was such a natural phenomenon among all the sentient creatures that roamed the world, and yet it seemed to be seen differently from one race to the next, one culture to the next and even from one person to his own kin.
Elves rarely showed much in regards to emotions, but there had been a few select times where all of the elves' barriers had disappeared in the wake of a terrible loss. Dwarves were more open about their grief, and yet they seemed to always take a strange comfort in momentarily hiding it in favour of trying to celebrate their fallen friends and loved ones with smiles, laughter and drinking.
Loivissa did not know much of the urgal traditions, but she at least had the impression that whenever one of their own died an honourable death, they grieved in much the same way as the dwarves. And then there were the humans, who so easily showed their pain to the world, and yet had far too many customs for Loivissa to even hope of knowing all of, even when she only considered the ones residing in Alagaësia.
Although many dökkálfar had died during their long campaign, Loivissa had only really been present at the funeral pyres of Mercury's Varangian Guard, back when they had held off an enemy ambush by themselves, so her only experience with the dökkálfars' way of grieving had been from that incident.
Back then, everyone that had been close to the deceased had seemed both saddened and with a strange fire of determination burning in their eyes, like they were going to make sure that their sacrifices had not been in vain, but this time was different from then.
This time, they were not still in the middle of a war, but at the end of one. It was a change that could be seen in everyone's eyes even as the preparations were still underway, but Mercury's change had been the biggest of all.
The last time, Mercury had seemed more like he was saying farewell to someone that he respected, but this time, he was not even showing any signs of distress. His face had been stoic since Loivissa had flown him back, and he had not even taken any time off to mourn or put aside the preparations for the funeral pyres of the fallen ones of their last stand.
He had withdrawn deep within himself, somehow separating his conscious mind from his body and then let it continue to function on routine alone. Loivissa had tried on multiple occasions when it was just the two of them to try and force him to open up, but he had not even budged a little, and had instead asked for some time alone if she continued to press on.
Loivissa had given it to him, as she knew at least some of what he was going through. Because Mercury had only recently been crowned and that the war with the ra'zac was now over, he had to keep up the appearances of a strong leader all the time to prevent a civil war from breaking out all across Damocles, as power-hungry influential people would try to secure as much as possible of the land and its riches for themselves the moment that the dökkálfar armies went home, which was understandably something that no one wished.
That meant that he could not show any weakness whatsoever, and given the strategic importance of the loss of Kilgharrah, this became only more vital now. It was not fair, that much Loivissa believed with all of her heart. It simply was not fair of anyone to demand that he continued to act like no great loss had happened, even though Loivissa could not imagine any loss greater to Mercury than losing Kilgharrah.
That was why she had kept pushing for him to open up when in private, to try and at least offer him a place where it would be okay to mourn without calculating eyes judging your every move and expression, but his consciousness had yet to find a way back to the world of the living.
They were going to have the funeral pyres just before the sun set today, two days after the battle, as they had spent the majority of the time after the battle to secure their new prisoners and so on, while the first day after the battle had been spent on moving Kilgharrah's body, building the pyres and generally arranging for everything to be in order for today.
There was going to be two large funeral pyres in total, one for Kilgharrah and one for everyone else. Kilgharrah had not so much been given special treatment because of his status, but rather because it both seemed more fitting to keep the bodies apart by race, and then there was the fact that Kilgharrah's size literally made it quite difficult for anyone else to be on his pyre.
"Are you ready?", Loivissa asked from outside of Mercury's tent, as she was there to escort him to the funeral procession.
She was wearing the armour that Mercury had had made for her, as she had learned that in times like these, sending honoured warriors off in your best battle attire was the norm of the dökkálfar people. Besides, it was not like she had any more fitting clothes for the occasion, as the rest of her clothes were her daily clothes, and the dress from Mercury's coronation neither fit such an occasion nor had she brought it with her from The Capital.
Though Mercury's spirit might have withdrawn deep within himself, he was still able to function in day-to-day activities and even able to conduct meetings and such, so luckily for her, Loivissa had not had to help him dress even once since he had learned of Kilgharrah's death.
"I will be right there", Mercury replied through the canvas in that normal voice of his that both sounded like he used to, and yet to Loivissa, it seemed like it had lost all life to it.
A few moments later, he came out of his tent in much the same attire as he had worn on his coronation, complete with the thin golden crown with the amethyst in the middle and everything, and though Loivissa had Aiedail at her side, Mercury had for understandable reasons not decided to bring his own sword.
"Let us go", Mercury instructed so that the guards would also understand it, before the two of them and their guards began the short trek from the camp and towards the site that was destined to be the funeral site.
They had chosen to place the pyres right next to the shore of the lake, as that was where most of the ones on the pyres had died. No words were spoken in the group as they walked towards the place, while watching how many other dökkálfar warriors also began to gather there in their best armours and with their finest weapons.
When they finally ascended the hillside, Mercury and Loivissa moved to take their reserved spaces at the front of the semi-circle surrounding the two pyres, with Anax Manin and his followers to their immediate right, and those of Mercury's advisors that had managed to get here from their previous posts to their left.
As they waited for everyone to arrive and take their places, Loivissa began to study the two equally large funeral pyres. The one to the left contained Kilgharrah's corpse, which had been looked after and prepared for the occasion, so that the blood and wounds on his body were no longer visible, while the body itself lay atop the funeral pyre with its belly down, its wings relaxed out to cover the sides, its tail circling around its body and its paws under its head, almost like Kilgharrah was still alive and had simply decided to take a nap on top of the pyre.
The one to the right held all of Mercury's soldiers that had fallen during their last battle. The bodies had been laid on their backs in tiers going up the pyre, each body in their respective funeral clothes, mostly military looking ones, and with their hands folded around their weapons that were laid on their chests.
It was a very common dökkálfar custom, though not universal, for the most honoured dead warriors to be burned with their weapons still intact, even more so if the weapon was a family heirloom, as they believed that if the weapon made it out of the fire intact, then a part of the deceased's spirit must have taken residence within the weapon and protected it from the heat, so that his heirs would inherit the weapon and would always carry with them a part of the strength that belonged to their ancestors.
Just as the red and orange hue of the setting sun, which had only just reached the horizon by now, filled the sky, the ceremony began. It was no surprise that it began at this specific time, as it was the custom of most of the dökkálfar city states that practiced these funeral pyres to light the fires just before the twilight hour, where the sun first reached the horizon, but had yet to go under it.
The ceremony started by Mercury and Anax Manin each being handed a torch, before they in unison moved forward to the two pyres, where Mercury then lighted the left one with Kilgharrah's body on it, while Anax Manin lighted the right one with the dökkálfar soldiers on it.
Mercury then drew a small ceremonial knife, which he in slow careful motions used to first cut one cut into his lower left arm, before he let the blood drip out upon the starting fire on Kilgharrah's pyre, before the cut was then quickly bandaged by Anax Manin, so that when Mercury moved over to the other pyre, he could draw a new cut and let the blood drip down upon it without having it mixed with the blood of the previous cut, before that new cut too was quickly bandaged up.
The reason for Mercury having to draw a new cut between each pyre was that the dökkálfar believed that the one that did the act, which was usually the head of the family or someone else that was responsible for the deceased, which was also why it was Mercury in both cases, did not only use his own blood to guide the deceased on to whatever afterlife the dökkálfar had, but also concentrated all of his thoughts and memories of the deceased in that blood, even though there was sometimes more than one body on the pyre.
It did not make a lot of sense to Loivissa, but unlike her mother's more vocal objections to religious customs and beliefs, she kept her doubts to herself, well, and Adûn of course. She was not even allowed to magically heal the wounds that Mercury had willingly inflicted upon himself, as the scars were supposed to serve as an eternal reminder to the one that had sent them off.
Loivissa had learned that in more regular burials, most of the same last rites still took place, such as the blood thing, but a few obvious ones were left out, such as giving the deceased his or hers weapon with him or her.
A chalice full of a strong traditional dökkálfar liquid, which Loivissa only too well remembered under the name of brandy, was then brought to Mercury, which he accepted with both hands.
"To the honoured dead", Mercury said and drank from the chalice, before he poured a little of its contents on the fires of Kilgharrah's pyre, making them wildly flare up, after which he continued, "may their forever find solace and the fruits of their labours grow beyond their dreams", before he again drank from the chalice and then poured the remained liquid upon the second pyre, which again made the flames flare up wildly.
At this point in time, the sun had almost finished setting and the fires were beginning to really catch on to the wood of the pyres, which caused its warm rays to noticeably warm Loivissa's face from where she stood, and she would not even think of how hot it was where Mercury and Anax Manin stood, but luckily for them, they only had one last thing to do before they could retreat to a more comfortable distance.
Just as the sun finished disappearing behind the horizon, Mercury and Anax Manin could finally turn back to face each pyre that they had started and bow down to it one last time, before they both retreated to a more comfortable distance.
The orangey red sky kept darkening as everyone gathered there and simply watched the pyres grow until they reached their full might, and soon, the only light was that emanating from the pyres. The atmosphere was uncomfortably thick for Loivissa's taste, as no one said anything as they watched the pyres burn.
It was part of the tradition that during the burning of the pyres, nothing about the deceased should be said out loud, but rather thought in the privacy of your own mind to allow you to give your final thoughts about the deceased to them without having to risk shame or anger from anyone else.
As the night wore on, everyone slowly but surely trickled away from the pyres and down to the funeral party that would last until the sun had finished setting the next day. One by one, everyone left the pyres, which had by now degenerated into two piles of burning embers, until only a select few people remained.
The ones that were left were Loivissa, Mercury, Anax Manin and a few others that had been particularly close to the deceased, though they were mainly relatives to the dead. Adûn had already gone back to the party to honour Kilgharrah's memory by drinking as they had done together during the coronation.
"I will be going now as well", Anax Manin said as he turned around, while still looking at Mercury, who never let his gaze falter from the embers, "I expect that you will be ready for the meeting tomorrow morning".
And with that, he left as well. As the embers began to die, everyone else also began to leave, until there was only Mercury and Loivissa left to stare at the ashes of where the pyres had stood. Loivissa thought that now that everyone had left them alone, Mercury might open up a little, but he showed no signs of doing so.
A few minutes passed, then half an hour and then an entire hour, and yet, Mercury would not move even a little from his position. According to the tradition, Loivissa was supposed to have left when she no longer had anything to think to the deceased, which she had not had for a long time now, but she chose to stay by Mercury's side, as she did not care about some tradition that did not belong to her.
Finally, after almost having Loivissa believe that he would never move from his post, Mercury slowly but surely moved closer to the pyre that had been Kilgharrah's, with Loivissa following one step behind him the entire time.
The ashes had now cooled off enough for them to be only warm to touch and feel, and not scalding or burning as they might have been earlier into the night. Their heat almost felt exactly like that one would feel when near a dragon's belly, and Loivissa wondered if Mercury had waited for them to become so in order to one last time feel the heat from Kilgharrah's body.
As Mercury stood there, just a few centimetres from the ashes, Loivissa noticed that he began to shake. It started out as a slow twitching of his hands, before it spread until he finally was forced to descend to his knees and hands, like one might do if they were praying.
He started to mumble something, but Loivissa could not figure out what it was as he said it in such a low tone and kept stopping mid-word and then say something that did not fit where he had left off.
It was not until a little time had passed that Loivissa finally began to recognize what he said, "I am sorry, hatchling, I am so sorry for this".
"It was not your fault, there was nothing that you could have done", Loivissa tried to comfort Mercury in a low voice, as she laid her hand comfortingly on his shoulder.
"It is, it is my fault", Mercury kept saying, "I knew about my prophecy. I knew that I was destined to live through great sorrow, anguish and pain, and yet I did not realize that it would not only affect me, but those around me. I might as well have killed him myself! If he had not come with me, he would still have been alive. Oh hatchling, I am so sorry!"
"Shhh, you could not have known that this would happen", Loivissa gently said as she kneeled behind him and wrapped both of her arms around him in a comforting gesture, "Kilgharrah wanted to follow you, there was nothing that you could have done to stop him from doing so".
"No, it is my fault", Mercury denied once again, before he shook his shoulders, as if to try and shake her hands off of him, and said, "please…leave".
"I will not leave you, remember?", Loivissa said without any thought of complying with his current wish, as she felt that he needed her here to help him through this.
"No, you have to leave", Mercury once again shook as he said it.
"I will not", Loivissa simply defied him.
Mercury then did something completely unexpected, as he abruptly stood up and shook her hands off of him, before he turned around to see her stricken expression, as he more powerfully said, "leave me".
"No!", Loivissa objected as she stood up to match his eye level.
"Loivissa, by the power of your oath to me, I command you to leave me, and by my right as king, I banish you from ever setting foot on Damocles again. Now, leave me!", as he said the binding words, Loivissa could not help but obey and slowly begin to back away.
Tears spilled forth from her eyes as she slowly backed away, forced to by an oath that he had never before used against her, but as she continued to try and defy her body, she tried one last time, "please Mercury, do not do this. Rescind your order".
"No, leave!", Mercury commanded in almost a yell.
She could not believe that it had happened, that Mercury had forced her to do something so completely against her will. The betrayal only felt so ever deeper because of how close they had managed to get to one another before this had happened, how she had even let him claim her for his own.
Tears now flowed freely as she slowly but surely backed away, no longer resisting the pull of the order, but just before she was out of hearing range, she looked back one last time to see Mercury once again kneeling in the ashes of Kilgharrah's pyre.
"Hatchling, I promise you that I will find a way to stop wars like this one from ever happening again", he vowed among the ashes, "your sacrifice will not be in vain".
I regret nothing!
...Await Phoenix-Fire and the final conclusion to this series sometime soon.