Blood Lily Company - Afghanistan, year 1

LXV

We ended our meeting quickly after that, and I went out with the brothers to go and prepare the pyre for the attackers.

We went to look in the trash cans for what could absorb the diesel and burn. I'm not talking about the kitchen bins, no, we compost and recycle whatever we can. No, I'm talking about pieces of clothes, sheets, furniture ...

We collected scraps of fabric, bits of wood from whatever. We went into the generator room to fill jerrycans with diesel fuel and Kris went to sick bay to ask Doc and Nanny if they had any hospital waste to burn. Yes, we burn the bandages and anything that could be contaminated, although I must admit that with the mandatory vaccines, we are really a healthy bunch, as far as diseases are concerned.

Loaded with two fifty-liter jerrycans, two bags made of sugar cane paper – it has properties close to those of plastic, but it's not made from petroleum – and our scraps of fabric and the like, the three of us went to where, that very morning – and it felt fucking far away – we had lined up the bodies of our attackers. Erk went back to get two more fifty-liter jerrycans.

We started the unpleasant job of piling up our scraps to burn on the ground, soaking them with diesel, then laying the corpses on them – also soaked with diesel –, piling them up to burn everything at once, since we did not have enough to make several pyres.

Rigor mortis had settled in, it felt like piling up more logs. Too weird, actually. Especially since the brothers did not say a word during this daunting task.

We stood upwind of the pyre, Kris pulled a matchbook out of his pocket, handed it to Erk who refused. Kris scratched and threw it all in the gasoline. It started slowly and then it ignited all of a sudden. If it had been pure gasoline, there would have been a sudden conflagration with a muffled noise, but this was diesel and it took longer.

The giant crossed his hands in front of him, eyes closed, head bowed. He whispered a few words and I recognized the scansion and sounds of what Lin was saying while grooming our dead. Damn Erk. Holy Erk. I remembered that short little prayer when he finished off the SRH champion with his own knife. The Icelandic didn't give a damn about the other's religion, the color of his skin or his gender. All he saw on the pyre were human beings, killed in action and deserving of his respect and attention.

He lifted his head, opened his eyes, and sang a very slow song, which Kris quickly joined in, Erk's handsome baritone propping up his slightly hoarse tenor. It was slow, it was sad, it was beautiful and made me shiver.

The brothers ended their dirge on a long note that Kris raised as high as his voice allowed, and Erk lowered to his lowest. The effect was startling.

We moved a bit away, diesel stinks. Fortunately, it covered the other scent, which was starting to rise. The clothes that burn, the ... the rest too. I had heard of that smell, but then I experienced it for the first time. It's worse than you might expect.

Lucky for us that day the wind was blowing the smoke away from the caravanserai, otherwise I don't think our patients would have recovered.

Speaking of which, I took the opportunity to report back to Erk. I spent my time reporting that day. I reported to him Doc's remarks on his Healing, on the condition of our wounded.

He nodded thoughtfully. His gaze went to the base, but Kris grabbed his arm.
- Not now, Erik. Please. I... I can't stand seeing you again unconscious in the infirmary. What I did that night, that mark on my soul, was to avoid that, so please ...

Erk raised an eyebrow.
- After Poll, it was too much, bróðir ...
- How so?
- You had a concussion, hálfviti. A pretty serious concussion, and if Cook hadn't used his Gift, you might not have make it.
- But it doesn't work like that... my Gift...