Most of the loggers grunted their agreements.
“And then, when the snow cleared, we’re ordered go back to work in the western woods because ‘it’s the best lumber we have.’ Did that prick forget he had us bury these traps in the snow, or did he just not care? And the mayor sits up there, in his cozy little mansion, while we bust our balls! Where is the justice in that?”
The man threw the trap angrily against a tree, forcing a loud thud. The loggers around him nodded, muttering swears and curses of their own.
The patrolmen on the other side stepped forward. “Careful. That is Haid’s mayor you’re talking about.”
One of the loggers wrapped an affectionate arm around the infuriated man, trying to calm his friend. It seemed to be enough for the moment. Samuel expected the sheriff to speak out a rebuke, but he didn’t say anything.
“He’s right,” the doctor said. She reached in her bag and pulled out a black vial. “Tree was falling. The men cleared the way, but then he stepped on the trap, and … ”
Samuel wondered if the logger’s legs were visible on the other side of the fallen tree, and if so, how he’d not seen them before. Those traps had been set to catch the mayor’s thief. So far, they’d only caught Zei and this unfortunate logger.
The doctor uncorked the vial and put it next to the man’s open lips.
“You’re going to have to swallow this. It’ll feel like you’re drowning, but you have to force it down. It’ll help with the pain. I promise.”
The dying logger groaned, and Samuel’s chest felt heavy as he imagined the weight of the tree on his own chest. The logger drank the doctor’s medicine, nearly gagging as he managed to get down most of it. The doctor wiped the blood and spilled medicine from his cheeks and lips with a rag.
“Rites,” the logger choked out. His red eyes welled with fresh tears. “I want the rites. Please.”
Some of the loggers fidgeted uncomfortably once they heard the request of their dying friend, while others looked on with sympathetic gazes. Samuel wanted to be surprised as the other men were, but he couldn’t be. As much as society despised the clergy and all their archaic practices, the dying were forced to deal with their mortality in a way that others didn’t have to. Samuel had only seen the living rites performed a handful of times, but he’d seen enough to know that those near the end worried about only a handful of things: the lives they’d lived, their loved ones, their pain in death, and the afterlife.
The doctor peeked at the sheriff before turning back to the man. She made her voice sweet. “I’m sorry. There’s not enough time.”
The logger huffed harder, almost as if his chest were fighting to lift the tree. “Rites,” he whined. “Please? Rites.”
“Can’t we just lift the tree, Elizabeth?” the logging supervisor asked as he came around the other side of the pine. He straightened his posture as his boots dug into the mud. “The sheriff can drive him to the cleric’s place. Give the man what he wants.”
“He’s not going to make it.”
The logger who’d thrown the bear trap came to Samuel.
“You’re the cleric’s son, aren’t you?”
The sheriff turned, his heel sinking deeper into the ground.
“He’s a patrolman.”
Samuel pushed his glasses up his nose. He could feel the eyes of the loggers and the patrolmen on him.
“I’m not a cleric,” Samuel said with a forced calm. “My father is. You have to be ordained and marked in order to perform the rites.”
The logger clenched his arms together, shaking his limbs. He got closer to Samuel, their faces nearly touching. Samuel was forced to look at the man, and it made him feel helpless.
“Come on,” the logger whispered. He bit his lip before continuing, making sure to keep his voice low enough so only the two of them could hear. “That’s a good man dying down there. He’s got a wife and three kids. Works hard every day. Even talks about the roots all the damn time like some religious do-gooder. Really good guy. And he never complains about the job. And he never asks for anything. Never. Which is more than I can say for most of us. For me. More than I can say for me.”
Samuel arched his head into his left shoulder, trying to hide himself from the logger’s desperation. It had been easy for him not to think much about his father the past few days, but death always reminded him. People often despised the clergy until they needed them, and his father always did his duties diligently. But he was not his father.
The logger kept on.
“I don’t know you, kid. I don’t care. But if you can, help Wilkens. Give him what he wants. Do it. Even if it’s not real. Please. Do the rites.”
“That’s enough,” the sheriff called out.
“Please,” the man pleaded once more.
Samuel forced himself to look at the dying man. His breaths were slowing, his face growing more and more pale.
“I can’t. I’m sorry. I’m not a cleric. It’s against the law.”
The sheriff waved his hand. The wiry-haired patrolman raised his firearm, and the others around him did the same.
“Tell your man to back away, Josiah. Or I’ll have Jax here make this nasty.”
Samuel’s jaw twitched. He wished more than anything that his father were there to perform the rites. For the first time in a long while, he would’ve been relieved to see his father holding the scriptures tightly. But the guilt of the dying man wasn’t enough. He couldn’t stomach the vision of reciting the old lines or slicing his hunting knife over his palm. He wasn’t a cleric. He never had been. He would rather be the one under the fallen tree than be the one to conduct the rites.
“Back away, Gibbs,” the logging supervisor called out.
The logger squinted his eyes, his nose wrinkling. He grunted loudly before stomping away, heading deep into the woods alone. The doctor petted the dying man’s hair as he fought to stay alive. Several of the loggers started tearing up, while others remained stoic. The sheriff stood next to Samuel, both watching the man breathe his last breaths.
“I can’t,” Samuel said to himself weakly. His eyes turned wet. “I can’t do it. I won’t. I’m sorry.”
The sheriff lifted his hand as if to put it on Samuel’s shoulder, to give him some sort of reassurance, but put it down and shoved his thumb into his belt.
The rest of the day, Samuel felt frozen. He went to the jailhouse and did his duty with Zei. They shared a meal of boiled potatoes and half of a roasted chicken, but Samuel struggled to keep the food down. His stomach weighed heavy, each breath causing his ribs to twinge. He was nauseated and threw up twice. He didn’t do any new lessons with Zei, content to only stand alongside her and watch her sketch pictures of whitelands mountains.
Ebauch Wilkens’s funeral wouldn’t take place until the next day. Samuel pictured the logger’s bloodied mouth quivering as he made his request, his voice weak and desperate.