Role

Chapter 21

As tears struck the gray flagstones in the altar room, a great keening tried
to claw its way from Aurew's throat. Her skin crawled and quivered with an
inconsolable grief, and suddenly the Fortress walls closed in upon her. She
fled to the only other sanctuary she had left: The Cathedral. Habit guided
her through the literal fog of the shallows and she collapsed in an empty,
sobbing heap at the edge of the bottomless well. She wanted nothing more but
to crawl in upon herself and disappear, but she felt a cold hand rest heavily
upon her shoulder. Aurew looked up to see Elra, the Mourner.

"Oh, Aurew."

Aurew stood and turned to the lady, and bawled against her shoulder.

"It's all right, my child."

"I know I... should embrace it but..." Aurew struggled to beat back the sobs
long enough for speech. "It just hurts so much."

Elra stood, implacable against the onslaught of Aurew's tears. "It does. I
know it does. It is like the sea outside, isn't it? Stormy, vast, deep..."

"Unfathomable," Aurew whispered.

"But fathom it you must. These feelings. This grief. Dig deeper. You are
staring at the bleeding wound. But what was the blade?"

Aurew pulled back, trying to gain composure, trying to find understanding.

"Love."

"Is that love gone?"

It wasn't, Aurew knew. She shook her head, but it did not make her feel the
despair any less.

"What is gone, then?"

Drissa was gone, but that was not what Elra was nudging her toward. "I... I
understand. But... I am not ready. For now, it is simply too fresh, too raw.
All I can feel is the pain."

The effort of suppressing her own crying momentarily distracted Aurew from
the appearance of her sweet Lord Rahsael. He stood before her and silently
bade her to follow. And they spoke of secrets, of Loss, the tears falling
at every mention of Drissa's name. And by the end, she knew what she had
to do; "It will be left to you to inform Thera about what it has lost," he
had said. "Baptize others with your tears, my child." It would not quell
the grief that threatened to drown her every breath, but it was a place to
start.