I wasn’t thinking. I wasn’t bloody thinking! Before I knew it I was back in the slums with Elde in my arms and we were out the front of our shelter, our home.

I… I was tired, and hurting. Elde too. Without really thinking I started to lower him down so I could get him into the shelter…

“Barde. It’s too nice a day, let’s stay outside” Elde spoke quietly, and clearly. For the first time since it happened.

I’m too tired to argue or think about it so I lower him down in my arms and take a seat outside our shelter. He can look up at me like this and can see the blue sky with its white clouds that drift across it too. He was light, and cold, and his face was growing further pale as the blood continued to soak into his clothes.

It wasn’t good.

“Lad, there’s something in my left jacket pocket. Can you get it for me? The money too.”

I hesitated but in the end pushed my hands through the soaked rags to retrieve the coin purse with all of our wealth in it, also soaked with Elde’s blood, before I went searching his side for whatever he had there. To my surprise it was something I recognised. A flask.

I brought them both out and put them both in his hands but the coin purse he pushed away.

“You keep that lad. I’m not going to need money where I’m going”

“Don’t say that Elde, don’t say that. Yo… you're going to be fine. You… just rest. You’ll get better. Then I’ll find someone to come help y...”.

“Barde.” Elde said. Strength for a moment returned to his voice in that lecturing tone of his.

“I’m dying, so don’t patronize me. No one is coming to help me. I’m bleeding to death here in this hellhole, right here in your arms, and that’s how it is. Denial never helped anyone.”

I open my mouth to that, but nothing comes out.

Instead, only tears respond as they pour out of my eyes as I start to sob, all while I hold Elde to my chest, just the same as he holds onto me too. As we hold onto each other for a while.

“It’s not fair! It’s not right!” I manage in a hoarse voice through my sobs.

“That’s life for you. Now, unscrew this flask for me so we can share a drink, our first… and then some words… our last.” Elde replies, his voice weaker than before.

I fumble with the screwtop for a bit due to the blood on my hands but I finally manage to unscrew the flask and tip some of the contents into his open mouth. As he holds it in his mouth I can see him savouring the flavour despite the pain.

“My father gave me this flask when I passed my exams. It’s made from a metal that bears some life mana so it keeps the contents fresh. He spent half a year's wages on it and it’s the only thing that stayed with me when that blasted ship went down. Damn. Did that man love his drink.” Elde remarked.

“You know, I never told you this but when my wife died, the baby, he was a boy. My son.”

Elde took another sip from the flask before motioning for me to take one myself. It was good, the liquor, but it tasted a bit like pineapple funnily enough. Still good though.

“I really wanted that boy. I really wanted to be his father. It... hurt... so much... when he was ripped from me. Even now, it still does.” Elde whispered before he took another sip.

“Now, you listen here lad. There’s only two things I want you to do for me. Just two things. So you better bloody do it.” Elde said, getting down to brass tax as he stared into my eyes before he went on.

“First. Don’t leave my body in these slums. I don’t care what you do with me: bury me, throw me in the river, set me on fire, I don’t care. But do not leave my body here to be stripped naked and eaten by the hordes of vermin in this place. You understand me.”

I can’t manage to form any words so I just nod at him, which thankfully seems to be enough.

“Next, the most important thing. You have to promise me this lad, you have to promise me that you will do this or die trying. Do you understand!” Elde demands as he brings my head to meet his eyes with his old wrinkled coppery hands.

“You get out of here, you hear me. You get out of here. You’ve got the money now and you’ve got the brains too. You should never have been here in the first place so you make sure that you don’t stay here. Go and do something with your life, something great if you can.”

“I… “ I struggle.

“Promise. Me. Barde” Elde demands of me, holding onto me with the final fading embers of the strength he has left.

It takes all my will, and all my heart. But I gave him his promise.

“I… will…. I promise.

With my words he relaxes, and some relief settles in as I watch it wash over his face.

“Thank you Barde, for everything. I would have died long ago and far more miserably if I hadn’t met you. You made me so much happier than I can remember, than I probably deserved.”

“No” I protested desperately “thank you… I would have been lost without you...and completely alone” I say as the sadness and the grief solidify in my chest.

Elde’s body shudders. I feel the tension leaving his body but I just hold him tighter.

“It’s ‘okay’ lad. This is just what happens.” he says before he pauses.

“You don’t talk about it...haaa... but I know you have a family...haaa... a father...haaa... I can’t be him, but… you have been... a son... to me.” Elde whispered barely, his strength gone.

“Elde, ELDE!” I cry

His gaze wanders away from me, up into the summer sky, as lazy clouds sail on by.

“Haaaa… it’s… a beautiful day” Elde says, as he murmurs his last words.

Before I clutch him. And wail.

***************************************************************************************************************

The sun was setting when I finally got Elde’s body ready.

I would cremate him by the river as it wasn’t right to just toss him into the water, and burying him wasn’t right either. He deserved to be free of this place, just like we planned.

Once I carried his body to the river I searched for bits of dry grass and kindling, adding on some wood I found lying around as well as some of what I had brought from the shelter too until I managed to build him his pyre.

As the sun set I laid Elde on top of his pyre, his grave now, and took one last sip from his flask before I poured the rest on top of him. I used a flint I had scavenged before and I light the pyre.

And then I watched, as Edle burned, as he flew away. To what had to be a better place than this.

“Goodbye Elde” I whispered to the wind “You’re free from here.”

When the fire died and ash remained. When the sun set and only the night sky and it’s moons and stars offered any light.

I went home.