Saturnalia (SAMPLE)

chapter two: a man twice scorned

The first to reject are the parents. Through no loss of love, an accident nonetheless will repel offspring, and the mother, clinging to the sinking body of the father, will think no more of her child.

Iyan Lutton's parents had died when he was a young man, old enough to understand what happened, but not so much as to be responsible for his own well-being. To be raised under the intelligence to know what had happened (an unfortunate accident, involving such horrid details of fire, drowning, and the eventual death of the late Luttons) suffused him with a stern melancholy for many years after the separation. The melancholy was not overbearing, however, and he wore it well for some time. His aunt and uncle had remarked often amongst themselves about its affect on him; he was a sweet, mild-mannered individual for it, and they would have gladly kept him in his self-built isolation, if only he would remain so pleasant to be around.

When Iyan was ten and six years old, he stopped attending the public school (a rather dull and uninteresting affair, catered more towards the children of semi-affluent parents), and joined his uncle in the post office, at first sorting and the like behind the counter and the eye of the visitors. Only when it would have been markedly less strange to see him at work did he emerge, and take over for the ever-rotating employees, who left before six months time after one another. Iyan envied them greatly, these fickle and flitting people who took shifts behind the counter. They had a liberty to leave, a second option where they could escape to, which Iyan would never have. Where was someone, poor and with no education, no family to influence those around him, going to go but where he had started? The thought stressed his heart and mind a great deal, but there was hardly anything to be done about it.

The day his aunt died, Iyan had been working under his uncle for six years, almost to the day. Such a coincidence was well hidden from him, but had he paid attention at church (a noble, if painfully dull affair), he would have seen that there was hardly such a thing as coincidence.

"What did it?" He was no longer in the house, at the doctor's tender suggestion, but sitting on the front steps of the post office. Uncle Hans was talking animatedly with the coroner, who was waving a clipboard and a pen rather vigourously, some ways off, trying weakly not to attract any attention.

"It was the child," came the quiet response. The doctor was hardly dressed as such, but being the town's only source of medical practise, aside from the coroner, he could be called upon at any given time. The wind had begun to pick up, a strange symptom of the transition from autumnal seasons, and his coat whipped about his ankles. "We're not quite sure why, yet, but that much is certain."

"He didn't know," said Iyan suddenly, looking up from his perch, arms wrapped around his knees. "My uncle, he didn't know she was pregnant."

"No," agreed the doctor. "and I'm not of a mind to alert him."

"How will you explain her death?" The doctor laughed with a frown, a curious expression.

"An accident, unless you feel it necessary to enlighten him." They were silent for some time, absently observing the arguing pair. Uncle Hans could be heard shouting about what to do with his late wife, and the coroner complaining about the logistics of such a thing. Only after they had bickered for nearly an hour, at which point the sky had completely darkened, did they cease their quarrel and make their way back to the front steps.

Uncle Hans looked terrible. His eyes were rimmed with an angry dark, a symptom Iyan had grown to associate with late nights at work with particularly loud orders. Sticking out at every odd angle imaginable was his hair, a dark mess that appeared missing several patches, no doubt contained within the grip of the widower. He staggered to a standstill by the porch, before collapsing against the nearest wall.