Arum

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A sudden gust of wind pulled dust from the ground and threw it in their eyes. Arum sputtered and wiped at their face, trying uselessly to clear their vision; they needed to be able to see for this kind of work after all. It took a moment, but they managed it, their face now streaked with the false tears of irritated, watering eyes. They turned back to their task, scraping at the long-dry earth to carve water channels that would be needed to irrigate the season's new crops. The arid soil yielded easily under their paws, and the channel came along quickly, running east-to-west parallel to the others already dug out that morning.

It was just past midday now, and Arum had been at it for hours without bothering to take a break. There was no time for a break when there was work to be done and no one to help - they cut the thought off there before it could go any further. It would do no good to think of that now. They simply needed to keep going, they depended on the farm, and someone had to get everything done or there would be nothing for the next winter. And so they toiled on, late into the day with only momentary respites for a hasty drink so they didn't overheat.

The work was hard, quiet, with no one to speak to but themself, but it kept their mind busy, away from dangerous thoughts. Thoughts that might shatter the delicate balance they had lived over the past month, one that was doomed to break eventually, but not yet. Twilight came and went before Arum finally had to call it a day with no light left to work in, and they meandered back to the small structure they had called home for some years now.

It was old, once made entirely of stone and mortar, but it had been repaired over the years with whatever had been available at the time. A thatch roof they knew needed repairs - but it was the dry season still, it could wait a week or two - wooden supports beginning to dry rot where they stood. All were repairs they catalogued in their head and scheduled to make when they could, if they could. They shoved the flimsy wooden door to the side and strode into the main part of the house.

The hardened dirt of the floor was cool, welcome against their well-worked paws, but even now they could not stop to rest. A low fire-pit stood ready with coal and a pot strung over it in a corner of the main room, and they lit the tinder with sparks from a flint, though it took a minute to get their tired digits to cooperate. When it finally took, they were able to check the pot, and, finding the contents lacking, fetch a few more ingredients from the pantry to enrich the stew.

As their food heated, Arum set about doing what they could for the structure by the light of the fire. A merchant had come through last week and - along with the seeds they needed - they had bought some lumber. A hole punched in the wall not long ago needed to be patched, and they went about it as the fire crackled behind them. They kept a careful watch of it, not wanting a repeat of That One Time. Replacing the entire ceiling by themself had not been fun.

They returned to the pot just as it began to boil and ladled out a portion into a smaller bowl and removed the pot from its perch. It tasted just as it always had, salty and hearty, though it was thinner now than it might have been a few months ago when the others - nope, not thinking about that. Dinner was finished quickly and their mind turned to thought of what they would do tomorrow. A final channel needed digging, and then they could begin turning over the soil and planting the first seeds.

Plan made, they banked the fire and walked away down to the other side of the room which they had avoided since they walked in, not even daring to look at it. They moved swiftly over the empty, cold two sleeping places to the third in the back, decorated with the brown-green feathers they had shed last spring. Among them sat a single red plume, smaller than their own, more delicate, and they turned away from it as they settled in for the night, tucking their wings around them and squeezing their eyes shut. As they drifted off to sleep, the faint humming of a song they had learned as a hatchling danced through the empty house.

And they were alone.

Except, the next morning, there was a lone mirror standing out behind the house, looking over an upright stone and the inscription on it.

Arum fanned their wings in a brief warning at the smaller dragon to back off, surprised to see someone this far from civilization, but wary. The last traveler had brought a fell omen with them, and they would not see it happen again. "Back off a' there!" This mirror was tiny, pale, not a Necromancer, not as the last one had been, but they were not about to take any risks.

The smaller dragon squeaked and retreated from the grave, "I was just looking, I wasn't going to touch it, promise! I'm a traveler, only passing through, I just haven't seen anything like it before." There are notes of desperation in her voice, fear in her stance. Arum was bigger than her sure, but they were briefly confused at such a visceral display, until they remembered. This was still the plaguelands, albeit at the border, and rumors of what they are were sure to abound, regardless of the truth.

They sighed and folded their wings, "Ye jus' startled me is all. Not used to visitors this far out." And what the last one had done - dark red eyes flicked over the stone marker, still only a month's worth of weathering marking it - they could not bear to think about. The mirror seemed to reconsider her position as Arum dropped their hostile demeanor, relaxing slightly, and they both just stared at each other for a moment, awkwardly.

"You've got a nice place. I'm surprised to find something so put-together out here. I hate to beg, but I've been starving the last couple days. I'm willing to work at whatever you need." Silence broken. Arum didn't think they've ever heard such a strange plea, but they'd never been one to turn away someone in need. And the mirror did need help, wasn't lying; they could see the ribs standing out from her body. Despite their wariness of the stranger, they couldn't turn her away.

So the two of them sat down for a meal of salty broth together in the quiet of the early morning. It was quiet, neither of them sure what to do or say, but eventually Arum decided there was enough light to work by and left the mirror to rest for a bit. They had the last water channel dug out within an hour, and the mirror came out to work alongside them shortly after. It was, nice, to have someone to work beside again, after so long in solitude, even if they were strangers.

The mirror talked as the two of them worked, regaling Arum with tales of the wide world that she had seen. Her travels had taken her from the starry isles of her homeland across the northern edges of the continent before she circled south and back toward her birthplace. This place was just the last stop in the road for the mirror; she was intent on heading home when she left Arum. She never offered a name or properly introduced herself, so Arum never gave their name either, but neither of them needed it.

They worked until late that evening, planting and watering seeds that would not sprout for a week. The traveler seemed to enjoy the work, though she struggled a few times and Arum had to direct almost every move she made. Despite that, a lot more work got done that day than they could have done on their own, and they were glad. And listening to the stories the mirror told made their thoughts turn in a direction they never had before.

There was an entire world beyond this farmstead on the edges of civilization. It was all they had known for most of their life. They had taken and failed in the Trials as a young dragon, barely old enough to even take them. Coming out of them a ghoul, they had thought their fate sealed, and had set to wandering the wastes, determined to die alone without hurting anyone else. But a Necromancer had come with her Servus and healed her despite the risks. They had followed the two back here and been with them ever since.

A longing, desperate and cruel wormed its way into their heart and mind. The mirror was gone the next morning when Arum woke, not even a note left behind, nothing but the swimming thoughts in their head and the extra work on the field to prove that she had ever existed. Sometimes over the next months, they wondered if there had even been a mirror at all, if she had perhaps been a fever-dream. But Arum didn't get sick to have fever-dreams.

But time to think about all of that - the thoughts the stories had pulled free, the lingering grief - was a rare gift, one that Arum avoided at all costs by distracting themself with work. At first it was keeping the seedlings watered and the fields weed-free, then tending to the growing plants in-between making repairs to the house. Then, when the summer heat faded, there was a harvest to take and sell. They made less money than they had in previous years by a wide margin, but that had been expected.

Finally, almost nine months after the mirror had unexpectedly visited them, Arum stood with everything they needed to do finished and with nothing else to occupy their thoughts. They tried to stay busy by sorting and resorting everything from the crops they had kept to go to seed, their meager belongings, anything. Eventually, even the busy work that wasn't really work failed them, and their thoughts spiraled into the grief and despair they had been shoving off all year.

Arum allowed themself to cry, to scream, to vent everything they hadn't let themselves feel, every frustration and fear, everything. The fit went for hours, but it was worth it. They stood, exhausted and shaky, but feeling better than they had for a very long time, and their mind was clear as it had not been for ten months. With that clarity, they were able to come consciously to the conclusion they knew was coming in the back of their mind ever since the mirror had left.

It was time to move on, to leave the farmstead behind and begin anew somewhere else.

They gathered the coin they had made and packed what little they owned into a dusty bag thrown over their shoulders. As they sat before the grave they had dug and erected, a pang of sadness ran through them. In a way, they hated to leave. It had been a second chance they never thought they would see, a gift, and their Necromancer had given it to them. The same Necromancer, the most caring person they had ever met, always smiling and laughing with them and her Necroservus, lie now in the earth, gone forever, and there was no one to give her a second chance.

The Necroservus had left Arum alone to bury her, though not of his own choice. The one who had challenged and slain her had taken him away, but abandoned Arum to this place. They hoped he managed to get away and live a better life somewhere else out there. A part of them wanted to try to track him down, just to see him again. But they had been bound together by their Necromancer, and she was gone: it was better for them both to start over now.

Hope and regret burned in their chest, but they knew they were making the right decision. There was nothing left here but bones. They had tried their best to make it work and nearly gone mad in the process. And, she wouldn't have wanted them to stay and suffer like this. This was for her too.

Arum whispered one last prayer to the Mother to watch over Her children before spreading their wings and leaping into the wind to pursue their future somewhere else. Below, the wind whispered over the earth, blowing dust across the surface of a broken home lost to time.

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