Mistress' Return

Overview

The Mistress' Return are the entire graveyard grounds right behind the Royal Palace.

The graveyard is called that way because the people of Vraitha believe that their -hopefully - beloved Mistress returns after her death to the side of the Mother of Ravens to become one of Her ravens. That gave the gravyard its name.

Here we can find the Royal Crypt, the Morgue and the Mothers Pyre, which is exactly that, just a pyre. Inside the Morgue the deceased Mistress - and her deceased Consort if she had any at this time - is prepared for her flaming end, which also means to remove one of her - or his - molar teeth as sacrifice to the Graveyard Fairies who are going to decorate the urns with the memories, secrets and whatnot of the deceased.

The entire house with the Morgue and the Royal Crypt - and even the place for the Pyre - are carefully crafted out of black stone. This is polished and sealed with clear lacquer which can withstand great heat and cold. One can clean it without much of a hassle and even after the burning of corpses the caretaker of the Mistress' Return only needs a broom.

Royal Crypt

The Royal Crypt is - in contrary to their name - not a single house but a tall and wide black stonewall with indentions for two urns and a golden nameplate for the names of the Mistress and her Consort.

Here one can hear the Fairies rustling with her wings and chatting with each other. One can spot them sometimes during the sunset. They mostly live behind the urns in the indentions or in the ceiling of the Crypt, some even in the park behind the Crypt.

"The Crypt, the Morgue and even the Pyre are strangely beautiful. As beautiful as a place of death and burial can get. The stone looks like marble, but isn't. It looks like someone from a different nation had misplaced their graveyard and it went here. It doesn't look like as it would belong here."

Tradition

As said above, it is believed that the Mistress returns to the Mother of Ravens when being burned. The same goes for the Consort to the Father of Crows if the Consort is a man.

The caretaker prepares the corpse(s) for the burning. They are being washed, oiled up with herbal oils, dressed in white and their molar tooth extracted.

The royal family, nobility and as much civilians attend the Burning on the Mothers Pyre. The corpse(s) are placed on the stone table with the wood for the Pyre underneath it and being burned while the priests give their blessing and sing a song of their choice.

After the Burning the family and some invited nobels attend a dinner to honour the deceased in their own way. The caretaker is gathering the ashes of the deceased which has fallen through a funnel into a box out of metal. This ash and the remains of bones are placed in a white urn. Those urns are inspected after the dinner and formally placed into the indentions. In front of every urn the molar tooth is placed, displayed on a wooden plate. The plate is an offering for the Fairies, they use it for houses, decorations or fun.

After a few days the family returns to inspect the paintings of the Fairies. This is the time when the family notices which urn is which based on the paintings. The tooth and the plate are gone in the best case.

"It is a shame mother and father had to die this way. Bad crab meat... blergh. Our investigations showed that it was bad luck. But at least they are being burned here. The fires reach high, it is so hot that I sweat even from far away. The flames glimmer and glitter in the black stone and illuminate even the Morgue. I can hear the popping and sizzling of fat and the chittering of the Graveyard Fairies, even from far away.
The Dinner isn't so bad and the placing of urns was surprisingly unspectacular. But after the Fairies had done their work, I wished I never had taken that look. Some things I didn't want to know about my parents. From this day on I won't eat a single crab for the rest of my live. Not even one!"

— Son during the burial of his parents

Type

Graveyard

Parent Location

Royal Palace of Vraitha

Owning Organization

Vraitha