Fourth Cream Cake: [Action/Voice]

[vor]

[It has been some time since he did this.

Tonight, Gregor is behind CH7 with two large aluminum bowls. He places them on the ground.

One, he fills with sweet-scented bark and sage leaves. The other, with twigs and dried paper.

His hair has grown too long anyway. Carefully, he snips two locks of raven-black hair from his head. One for each bowl.

He kneels in front of the second bowl, the one filled with ordinary fuel, and tosses a tuft of hair in. Then, he strikes a match and sets fire to the contents. As it burns, he quietly adds a slip of paper with his signature written on it in his best handwriting. His official Imperial signature.

He says nothing as the death offering for his father burns. He's done this many times, at the guidance of Lady Alys. There had been no funeral offering for Prince Serg but the one which had filled the sky of Sergyar.

He returns to the first bowl, tenderly adding the lock of hair, a slip of paper with an invisible kiss, and, of all things, a child's shoe. As the offering burns, tears glisten in his eyes. When he's sure no one is around, he curls to the ground and quietly weeps.

He's aware of the limited privacy, but he'll whisper a few words over each offering. Anyone clever enough to sneak up would have to come very close indeed to hear them.

It is supposed that the burning of these offerings helps to drive away ghosts.

When that's over, he simply sits with his back to the wall and speaks into his journal. It's soft and hesitating--he's certainly not the "inspiring speeches on a dime" sort of ruler back home, but writing in the dark is ill-advised. His voice is somewhat rough.]

On Barrayar, we burn offerings for the dead. People died on the draft, but generally, the usual rites don't apply if they're coming back. It's limbo. What do you do?

Um. Could...someone give me a haircut?

Comments

[ voice ]

[herotypical]

[ gently: ] The someone I usually went to is gone, now. Otherwise I'd recommend her.

[vor]

...Thanks. [So, so dry. His tone softens.]

How are you?

[herotypical]

Bored. I'm...bored.

[vor]

You were in bad shape.

[voice]

[mydearapple]

I don't think it matters to a lot of people. If a person dies here, they still deserve the same rites that anyone else does, even if you have to do things a little differently. I know someone who made makeshift graves on the battlefield despite there not being any bodies to fill them with, for example.

[voice]

[vor]

[He hesitates.] Back home, we never burned offerings for people in cryostasis. Too much like giving up, I guess.

[voice]

[mydearapple]

I guess that's different. [He's not entirely sure what cryostatis entails, but from the word alone...] There's still the hope that things will change, right?

[Voice]

[geniustheveil]

I think... what happens should still be respected here, even if they can return. They'll still be suffering, and when they're revived, the Malnosso will have taken something.

[Voice]

[vor]

That's kind of the way it works back home, too. Sometimes when people die, they're put in cryostasis. It's very rare for them to come back in one piece, and sometimes they can't be saved at all. But we don't burn offerings for them because it's too much like giving up.

[Voice]

[geniustheveil]

I think... I like the way your people treat it. Because if it was me, I wouldn't want to be forgotten.

[voice]

[cop_an_attitude]

[She has thought about it - rites for the dead - but she doesn't have an answer. Not for that, anyway.]

I haven't given anyone a haircut in years, but if you don't mind that I'm a bit rusty, I can do it.

[voice]

[vor]

I don't mind at all. [Maybe he'll save some hair for the next offering.]

Re: [voice]

[cop_an_attitude]

In that case, just give me a time and a location. Not like I have many places to be nowadays.

action:

[shenevermisses]

[It can't be easy to hide, burning offerings.

Or, at least, that's what Clove thinks when she sets out. It takes her twenty minutes to find him.

For a few more minutes, she just watches. The bowls are nearly extinguished, but she still hangs back. He announced it. An open invitation, she feels, but the sense is more like seeing a village family bury a child who fell ill and died. Something private. Where she, a girl of the Academy, had every need met and every cough examined by a doctor.

At home, there was a funeral. She knows because she's attended them. All of the Academy students turned out in immaculate uniforms. Six boys or six girls to bear the coffin of their dead tribute, both this year. A stirring speech by the headmaster about sacrifice and glory. Then the coffins would be buried with the rest of the dead children, killed by the Hunger Games. She knows she and Cato were buried. Side by side.

But she didn't see it. Didn't get to say goodbye.

Finally, voice uneasy as she shifts her weight from foot to foot:]

What do you burn?

action:

[vor]

[Gregor looks up, a little...surprised anyone showed up. He hadn't extended any kind of invitation, but...well, no reason not to share the custom. With her coloring, the girl might almost be Vor, and certainly has the stiff upper lip for it. After a degree of shuffling, he hoists awkwardly to his feet and brushes himself off.]

Whatever you want, along with a piece of yourself. Usually hair, since it grows back. Maybe something that smells nice when it's burned, like sage. Whatever you think suits them. Something you'd want to give them if you could. Something you shared.

[The charred remains of a child's shoe lie in one bowl.]

Or just...something that burns and a piece of yourself. It doesn't have to be complicated.

action:

[shenevermisses]

[Something you shared.

Whatever you thinks suits them.

A piece of yourself.]

Does it help?

[There are no bodies, here, to bury. Nothing for any of the tributes. Nothing for Cato... Nothing for her. Because that's just as frightening. That she is dead. Should be dead. But here she is, walking around a village, talking, fighting.

Burning things...

Is it more effective than smashing things? Throwing delicate pieces of glass against a wall, throwing her knives so things break.]

video;

[stillplaying]

[Mostly, she's been ignoring the journal. Only checking once a day for the bare minimum. To see who else might have disappeared while she was away. To find out what else has been destroyed.

But when she sees this entry, it makes her pause. Makes her stop and think. Not so much about everyone she's recently killed. No, those thoughts will plague her at night. But she's thinking of someone else. A little girl who is now gone.]

We only bury them in Twelve.

video;

[vor]

We do that, too. Usually when we burn offerings, it's at the grave. Although my social secretary and her son burn theirs on the spot on the street where her husband was killed. [On Ivan's birthday, no less.]

video;

[stillplaying]

[There's a lot of information in that. A lot. But one thing stands out more than everything else. Gets her mind off of death and the loss of the little girl. Makes her regard him a little suspiciously.]

Social secretary?

[Voice]

[thebellthatbinds]

In Ancelstierre they bury the Dead. Generally flowers or candles are left by the tombstones but in the Old Kingdom the Dead are cremated.

[It wasn't safe to leave the bodies in the earth...they'd be like vessels just waiting for a Dead Adept or Necromancer to come along.]

[Voice]

[vor]

We have flowers at funerals. Burning an offering can be considered somewhere between putting flowers on the grave and having another funeral. Where it falls between sort of depends.

[Voice]

[thebellthatbinds]

What sort of offering do you burn? Does it have to be anything in particular?

[Voice] late tag is late x-x

[fleurdesel]

Greg.

[Gregor Vorbarra. One of the Vor, from what he's said. It'd taken a moment for the connection to click. Longer for her to decide if she wanted to say anything or not. It's late, she's worn, but. It bears asking.]

...join me for a drink? It is what I do, for the dead.

[Voice]

[vor]

We do that, too. In private, though. I live on the third floor of building seven, if you'd like to join me. I'll have food there. [You fast before an offering, so he should probably eat before doing any heavy drinking.]

[Voice]

[fleurdesel]

Your poison of choice? I will bring over a bottle of whatever you like.