A Poor Day For Digging Graves:

Part One:

The Dead cannot cry out for justice. It is the duty of the living to do so for them.

-Lois McMaster Bujold

It was a poor day for digging graves. Too wet for it, by half. A storm had blown in from the south, winds arcing their way through the Pewhoasil Desert, tracing their way through the verdant foothills of Anacsot, then the craggy peaks of Edral, clawing up moisture as they went, just to drop all the damn water right here, at the most inconvenient of times. Aye, it was a poor day for digging graves. Too damnably wet.

Narm was having a bad day, as he had already had to dig three of the damned holes today. The black vest that marked him as a senior undertaker was stained with mud, and streaked with grime. It could be worse, Narm supposed. He could have a white vest like those of Jeremy and Daniel, the two junior undertakers unfortunate enough to be working with him today. The Bone Yard Mortuary was willing to provide lodging for junior undertakers, providing they didn’t mind bunking two to a bed in a barracks with twenty other men. Narm of course had his own quarters, seeing as he was a senior undertaker.

Narm was currently pacing under the eaves of the main office building of the mortuary, and he could hear the sound of Countess Isabelle’s twin baby girls complaining inside. Count Isaac was desperately trying to keep them quiet while doing paperwork, and praying to the Reaper that his wife’s headache would go away soon. Narm grinned to himself at the muffled prayers and cursing, equally mixed, as he paced.

Narm moved with an easy flowing grace, despite a slight limp, and what little light there was reflected off his bald head, which was shining with perspiration and damp from the rain. His soggy beard was trimmed in the traditional style of Whoid Strian men, shaved on the chin, and full everywhere else, and he held a smoking pipe tightly in his teeth. His grin would appear a wolfish thing to anyone who didn’t know him, a baring of teeth meant to cow. Despite the fact that he looked a man five or six years past his prime, with his salt and pepper beard more salt than pepper, it would take an exceptionally brave man-or a particularly foolish one- to pick a fight with the man who called himself Narm.

Narm was pacing because the wagon with the weekly supplies was taking forever to arrive. Not surprising considering the road was probably gone to sludge at this point, but he had five headstones to put in today, and he would have to supervise Jeremy and Daniel putting one in each, and all of the tombstones were on that cart. The sooner the cart got there, the sooner he could get the tombstones installed, and the sooner he could do that, the sooner he could go inside and sit down. He found himself looking forward to that more and more these days, and it was beginning to become necessary, especially with that damned knee of his. He could remember a time, not even ten years ago, when he could’ve done twice as much as he did now, in half the time, and still have energy to go drinking in the evening. Those days were gone now. Now he was lucky if he could summon the energy to do much more than pleasant conversation with the Count and maybe a game of stones with Countess Isabelle. The Count was terrible at stones. As the wagon finally pulled up in front of the building, the man who called himself Narm smelled something he had hoped to never smell again. Blood. Death.

Narm stepped up and looked down into the bed of the wagon and winced at the sight of the mangled bodies. One of the apprentice undertakers retched behind him, but Narm had seen worse in his 49 years. Hell, he'd done worse.

Not much worse though. He admitted to himself.

The man’s body was in what remained of a nightshirt, stained pink, red, and brown with bodily fluids. His face was a mass of broken bones and cut and mangled flesh. His two eyes peered out of a mouth full of broken teeth, and Narm thought he could see a hint of other flesh that didn’t belong in the mouth. If Narm had to guess, he would say that the man was not completely whole under that nightshirt. The man, despite his appearance, was not what made Narm wince though, it was the woman. The woman was naked, and her face was comparatively whole to the man’s features. Her body, however, had been mutilated in ways that Narm had rarely seen. Whoever did this had made it slow, and probably taken pleasure in it. The only mutilation to the woman’s face was the removal of her eyes. Even with that missing, Narm recognized her. High lady Sherin, wife to Dougal Donovan, City lord of Goldstern, and Baron of the Sea. If he had to guess, he would say that the man found in the back of the wagon was Dougal.

The wagon driver was stumbling out of the seat, and Jeremy, the apprentice on duty who hadn’t puked was harassing him.

“Bloody hell man,” he swore his coastal accent thick with fright, “What happened? Who are they? What’s That you got there?” Narm walked up and clapped Jeremy on the shoulder. Jeremy rarely spoke, so this rapid gush was most probably a sign of his shock. When he spoke, Narm’s voice belied his appearance as a powerfully built working man with scarred hands and one blind eye covered by a patch. His voice sounded smooth, deep, and rich, like it belonged in a palace and not a graveyard.

“Journeyman Jeremy,” He said gently, “Go and get something to cover them.” the young man blanched at the thought of approaching the bodies, and Narm added, even more quietly, “I will cover them Journeyman, just get me something to do it with.” Jeremy looked grateful, and quickly ducked inside, followed by the other Journeyman, Daniel, who looked on the verge of throwing up again. Narm turned his attention to the wagon driver, angry words straining to fly and batter the man like a thousand arrows at full draw. His anger faltered and died when he saw the man’s face.

The wagon driver looked haggard, like he hadn’t slept in days and knew he wouldn’t for several more. His face was as pale as bleached bone, and as blank as the ground of an unmarked grave. In short, he had the look of a man who had lost his will to live and was just doing so now because it was the most convenient thing to do. Narm was almost certain that the man would be dead within the week, whether from his own hand, or from starvation, or maybe even the strange sickness of the soul that can simply cause a person’s heart to stop. Narm had seen all these things happen before, and to look at the man made him want to wince again. The wagon driver finally spoke, his accented whisper marking him as a resident of the lower dock’s region of the city.

“I be… I be seeing things… things no man should be seeing. No man! Ya hear me gravedigger! No man…” his voice trailed off into murmuring phrases about how no man should see such things, and how he needed a drink, and how he didn’t know what to think about nothing anymore. He didn’t even notice when Narm gently extracted the bundle from his arms and looked down into the amber eyed, auburn-haired face of what could only be Dougal and Sherin’s child, Caj. The baby wriggled uncomfortably in his grasp, gurgling complaining sounds about the rain. Caj did not cry though, in fact, his eyes seemed at odds with his wriggling and comfortability, as if to say, “I’m a babe now, but someday I will be a Duke. A Duke isn’t afraid of a little rain.”

His father was like that too, Narm thought distantly, never crying, always dangerous. He looked up at the Wagon driver who had lapsed into silence. When he spoke, his voice sounded almost regal in tone, and it demanded an answer, like the Reaper demanding death.

“Why did you bring the boy?” the wagon-driver’s head came up and he scratched at his wet beard.

“The man…” he gulped and seemed to wheeze with strain, “The man that do be doing this thing.” He gestured over his shoulder at the cart, “He do be having a signed certificate for there’s deaths and what’s not. I do nae understand such things me self, but I was learned my letters enough to know that be what it said. He told me that the babe be my concern now, he do be.” The man seemed on the verge of panic and he started to mumble fiercely to himself. “I ain’t never had a child in near on 70 years, and I don’t know what to do with one. What do they eat? What do they-” Narm shut the man out as he peered down into young Caj’s face. He looked into the babe’s eyes that seemed to be claiming that he was nobility. He had a sad thought then.

No one will ever teach him to be noble now, or anything else a young lordling should know.

He sat pondering that as the Journeymen brought out the tarp and sat staring at him and the Wagon driver mumbled on. He smiled as a thought occurred to him and it turned into a fierce grin, a dangerous grin, wolfish to even those who knew him. He spoke his conclusion aloud.

“Well then,” he murmured to the babe in his arms, “I suppose I will do it myself.” The babe, as if delighted by his words began to laugh, a high, gurgling laugh. The babe laughed, and Narm laughed with him, with reckless abandon, as if the bodies of Dougal and Sherin Donovan, the family third in line to the throne of Whoid Stria, were not mere paces away. He laughed, and the junior undertakers looked at him like all the world as though he were mad. So it was that Caj Donovan came to reside with the undertaker who called himself Narm of the Fallen Oak Mortuary, Largest Mortuary on the continent of Fleigula, and more commonly referred to as “The Bone Yard”.