Lead story / Lives remembered
MARTERUS — A private farewell became a gathering of neighbours when residents of the Cloudcombe followed Lithen Dennison's funeral procession out of the city and into the woods to the north.
The dwarven herbalist was laid to rest beside a lakeside tree at a ceremony led by her brother, Brogmar Mossbeard, formerly known as Harry Dennison. It was a tree the pair had climbed as children.
The companions brought her there in a small wooden cart, her body wrapped in white bandages. Brogmar found an old carving in the trunk, placed his hand against it and called to Eldath.
A life returned to the woodland
“I return my sister to the ground, so her body can feed the forest.”
His farewell spoke of the tree, its acorns and the creatures they would nourish. Panda offered condolences; Elion and Skaf shared memories from their own lives. Beneath the branches, the gathering remembered a sister, a daughter and a woman whose work had been caring for others.
Lithen had been found dead at the family home after her brother and his companions returned from the Temple in the Fen. The circumstances of her death remain unclear.
Grief becomes a public appeal
As the crowd grew, Brogmar stood on a fallen log and urged those present to stand against Polin Garten's influence over Marterus and the destruction of the Dennison name.
His words were a declaration of opposition, not evidence that Garten was responsible for Lithen's death. Before that public appeal came the quieter farewell of a brother to his sister.
“Lithen, here your body will lay, next to the tree we once climbed in as children.”