Selben

Standing on the beach, Selben pulls out a handful of items from one of his pouches and lays them in a small pile.  Picking out bits of yellowed finger bones, harvested from some of the dead barbarians that attached Dagger’s Deep, he begins to arrange them into a little family of stick figures, finishing them with other odds and ends—bits of cloth, discarded tangles of hair, and tiny vertebrae he found that may have come from a small fox he found in the woods.

He shapes the bone figures, representing Audric with a tiny bone sword, one for Zargon while quietly humming the Ode to Laerch, then Zeb with a bleached knuckle bone that looks uncannily like his wolf helm. 

Beside them he makes more, one for Bonie next to Zeb, then Lom, then finally one for himself.  Distracted by his work, he jumps to avoid a small wave that washes onto the beach, sent by the passage of an errant river craft.  Selben flashes the boat’s pilot a cold look, but the boat passes without the pilot paying any notice.

When he returns to his bone marionettes, he frowns.  Though he, Bonie and Lom are undisturbed, the wave has ruined the others.  Zeb, Audric and Zargon are in a jumbled mess, missing arms, legs, and Zargon’s head has been displaced, washed away by the receding wave.

Seirsha, passing nearby while about her tasks, stops to examine the young mage.  “Selben?” she asks, having seen the black-robed apprentice jump.  “Everything alright?”  She drops a heavy bundle to the ground at her feet. 

Selben smiles up at at her, unblinking, holding her gaze just beyond the point of comfort.  “All is well,” he says, stirring the bones into the sand with his boot, kicking the last few into the river.  “You look pretty today.  Can I help you carry that?” 

Seirsha stirs uncomfortably, but without waiting for a response, Selben stoops to lift her bundle, giving Seirsha another thin-lipped smile.  As they walk into the village, he resumes humming, his steps in time with the lilting notes of the Ode to Laerch.