The rueful

The only thing all rueful have in common is that they have the strengh to keep going but there have nowhere to go, and believe that their energy is well used in helping others that are where they had been.
Their past and beliefs and even the what they lost is different, but now they are together in their loneliness because what used to be their life and home feels distant or painful.

Most outsiders come to the The company's premises because they have been recognized as potential clients. And many of them will actually receive an oportunity and pay a reasonable price—or promise to do so when the time comes. Many of the almsmen get exactly what they want, and others get "something".
But there are others who are never accepted as clients, or end up failing on their attempts to fix what they miss the most. People who has to go back home as empty and hopeless as they were when we invited them. Maybe even more. Imagine, all the hearbreak of loosing what you loved, again!
Some manage to go on, others want to but don't know how. Some are angry, looking for someone to blame or a way to forget. Some feel guilty. Or they are just lost and don't care of anything anymore. Some of them want to stay here, because life feels umbearable.
Once in a while, when a client's wish fails and this person is too hearbroken of guilty to go back home, but at the same time wants to recover—or when The Granter sees potential for it too happen—, they are considered as potential employees for the Last Time Company.
The boss has never given a set of rules to recognize a rueful, he recognizes it when he sees it (sometimes it's evident but most of the time I have no idea what he's thinking when he offers them to join). But there is one think every employee must have: empathy of some kind. It doesn't matter if they see themselves in other clients, or if they want to help for selfish reasons, it's important that they care.
They usually accept the offer without a though. They feel that everything they care for ar the shards that they gave to the Company, after all.

Diverged ethnicities

• The "Reading Club"

I don't think all the employees are rueful forever. Some actually find their home in the company, specially at the village. We are all rueful because we will forever miss home and feel the guilt of failing to recover it, but here, the term means a little bit more. We can't build or find a home, because we live in the past we ruined or failed to save.

— Gael

We have this strange mix of traditions and beliefs, you know? Because whenever one of us feels nostalgic about something from what used to be their home, there is always someone willing to recreate it to some extent, and it becomes part of... whatever it is we have at The Village.

— Sigil