Act I, Part XIX: Mazira’s Discount Sujamma

By Nilas Arobar, Son of Miner Arobar

I can’t look in the mirror anymore, because I don’t like what looks back at me. I’m not the man I was when I left—not even close. That man, the ‘hero’ as he liked to think of himself, he’s dead. He’s dead and gone and he’s never coming back. Nope. He’s gone—gone—GONE! But nobody gets it. Everybody thinks he’s still here and they still look at me like that’s still who I am, but it’s not. I’m anything but some hero now. A hero doesn’t—doesn’t—doesn’t go through what I did when they jumped me after the Trials. A hero doesn’t—go through that kind of thing—but they don’t get that. They don’t know. None of them know. They just think I went off, went through the Trials, and now I’m back and I’m supposed to be some big damn hero who is gonna be just like his father.

To Hell with that and to Hell with him too!

You want a goddamned hero, look at Gandosa, she’s a damn hero! I haven’t seen her since I woke up, but I know she’s out there doing what she always has. She’s probably feeding the poor or delivering medicine to the sick, you know, the kinds of things a good person does. I thought I had to do all the right things and be a certain way and be just like my father to be a good person, but you know what that got me? You really know? It got me taken by those—those—monsters. I swear to ALMSIVI, I’ll kill them all! I WILL! I WILL LAUGH UNTIL I CRY WHEN I STAND OVER THEIR BROKEN BODIES KNOWING THAT I GOT EVEN! THAT I MADE THEM HURT AS MUCH AS THEY MADE ME HURT! But—but that won’t be enough. No, no, there’s amount of pain I can cause them with just a sword or a spear to hurt them how they hurt me. But I wish I could. I wish more than anything that I could. They deserve to suffer. They deserve to suffer in ways I can’t bring myself to inflict, but—it doesn’t matter. I’m not going back there anyways. I just—I can’t. I’m scared. I want to, but I can’t.

It doesn’t matter though.

None of it matters, but you know what? I can make the pain go away. I’ve found that there’s nothing quite like the burn of Mazira’s. One mouthful numbs the pain, two makes everything feel okay, and three? Three makes the world go away and by AlMSIVI do I love that feeling of just making it all go away. They won’t let me drink at the Council Club, but those fetchers just won’t leave me alone. “Oh Nilas, Oh Nilas, you shouldn’t drink so much! What would your father say?” To Hell with my father and to Hell with those fetchers who think they get to tell me I’m drinking too much! They don’t know what I’ve been through! They see me having a couple drinks and they think they have the right to tell me what to do? Look! When you’ve seen the things I have—when you’ve been through the things I have, then you can scold me like I’m some child! And I might make my father look bad? Oh, I might make the man who beat me senseless my whole life look bad?! Oh ALMSIVI forbid I bring shame upon the great Miner Arobar’s name! How dare I! It’s not like he ever shamed me, no, no, the great Hero of Redoran could never do any wrong! The very thought—it’s just—laughable!

But you know what? It’s okay. My father used to always to avoid the Rat in the Pot; he used to always tell me the people there were Western Filth, but they don’t care if I want to drink. They don’t look like I’m some goddamned hero. No, they just pour it when I tell them to pour it, goddamnit! They don’t care who I am and ALMSIVI knows I’d give anything to be invisible right now. To be a nobody, but I don’t get that choice—nope—I’m an Arobar. Everybody’s known me since I popped out and I wish I hadn’t. I wish I’d never been born. It’s not fair. None of this is fair. I just want it to stop. I want to stop seeing their faces. I want to stop going back to it every time I close my eyes, but I can’t—I just can’t—and you know what makes it worse? Everyone looks at me like I’m some hero. Like I’m so brave and heroic for what I went through, but they don’t know—they don’t know anything. I had a Sergeant salute me last night as he crossed my path and he said to me, “I know you haven’t pinned yet, Sir, but I want you to know that everyone in the 61st is hoping you get assigned to us. It’d be an honor to have you leading us, Sir.”

How the Hell do you even respond to that? I’ve never even met this man, he’s even a bit older than me, but he looks at me like I’m some great warrior because I went through the Trials. Let me tell you about those goddamned trials: I nearly died a hundred times going through them, but you know what? Anybody could’ve made it. I did and I’m nothing. I’m less than guar dung and I made it, but we act like it’s some big deal to go through the Trials. You know what the big deal is? You really want to know? It’s a way of deciding who gets to be a somebody and who is stuck a nobody; it’s why my father was so upset that my uncle decided to sponsor me for them. Doesn’t matter though. Doesn’t matter at all. I was supposed to go to my Initiation Ceremony earlier today, but you know what? I just don’t care anymore. You know what though? You know what does matter? That Lirielle keeps the sujamma pouring. God, I love this stuff and hey—I think this glass number three.

Yippee.

-Nilas Arobar, the Broken Prince