( He would laugh, were it not an ugly thing, embittered. If it did not stain his mouth. Why is it the living feel so privileged, so allied? So offended by the possibility of another's priority?

He looks at stone tablets and names glisten and glare back, fragments of fissured people. Someone's father, mother, son. A beautiful daughter. )

You have so many champions. ( Mouth-bearing, headstrong. ) Permit them one.