Some context for those who haven’t read my other stories: Eirhi is an OC, the son of Jeri (Longbeard, of Sansukh fame) and Khalei, a Blacklock OC of mine. This ficlet explores being mixed race, visibility, and Orocarni Dwarves’ relationships to the term ‘Easterling’. As a mixed person, it was kinda difficult to write in some places. Also, the term ‘mother’ is used in a gender neutral fashion.
See end for notes.
“Are you an Easterling, then?”
Eirhi looked the Longbeard dead in the eye. Something uncomfortable pushed at the space between his stomach and his heart – a bit like the same nauseous pressure he got when someone rudely asked about the nature of his heritage.
He felt his kh’busi, now more than ever, resting tightly on his head, tied like his mother’s behind his ears.
The fabric was heavy, the two twists of cloth weighing down on his shoulders. The mbouraz pierced through his septum seemed to pull down to his lip, even though it wasn’t nearly as stretched as his elders’.
Are you an Easterling, then?
The question had been one he remembered asking his mother when they were baking bread back in Erebor. He had been young and starting to learn how to prepare some traditional Ghomali food, when it had suddenly come to him, rising out of the depths in a garbled question – “Amad, are we Easterlings?”
His mother had given him a long look; he remembered their face being very high up, so he must have been small then. He remembered them crouching down and placing their soft hands on his shoulders, brushing the little plaits of his kh’busi out of the way gently. They had looked very tired, and it had taken them a long time to find the right words.
“There’s no shame in being from the East. There’s no shame in who we are, or the lands we call our home. Do you understand?” And Eirhi had nodded hesitantly, but he hadn’t really felt that his question had been answered – the bread had smelled too good to resist, though.
The next time he wondered it, it had been when he was out in Gondor on a trip with Uncle Bulia. He was much older, but hadn’t travelled in the lands of Men outside of Rhûn. To the Men of Rhûn, the Easterlings as Easterlings were known, the Dwarves of the Orocarni most definitely were kin – and were also, as the Westerners called them (in one homogenous lump) ‘Easterlings’.
While Uncle Bulia swaggered ahead of him in Minas Tirith, talking with Uncle Varhi, he’d lagged behind. From this angle, Eirhi saw the eyes of some of the Gondorians around them, fixed like arrowheads on a target at the group of Dwarves, and he’d felt a defiant blush rising up into his freckled cheeks. He heard the word again, hissing around him in the air: Easterlings.
Eirhi had looked down at his Eastern clothes, his Eastern shoes and Eastern jewellery – all exquisitely made by the finest tailors in the Ghomal or bought from the goldsmiths in Vishderzyu. He’d actually had enough of an ego to twirl for his mother that morning, as they and his uncles had clapped and gushed over how splendid he looked. But now he knew he stood out like a lit beacon, and he’d never felt more like a bloody Easterling.
He had tried to catch up with the rest of the group, but as he rushed ahead he’d felt his other parent take his elbow and turn him around.
“What is it?” they’d asked, concerned at Eirhi’s flushed face and quick breath. Some of the Men around them continued to stare at Uncle Bulia and Uncle Varhi like they were strange creatures, and Eirhi concentrated on his parents’ face, trying to block them out. Without their mbouraz and kh’busi, they looked very much like any of the other Longbeard traders from Erebor that frequented Gondor, and Eirhi’s voice caught in his throat.
Different.
“You don’t understand,” he managed to mutter bitterly.
Am I an Easterling? he’d thought, trudging away to his uncles and leaving his parent behind. Eirhi had been quiet that evening and his mother had questioned him about it – but he couldn’t bring himself to raise the subject. Instead, he’d gone up to his room early and had taken off his kh’busi. He’d looked in the mirror. If he flipped up his mbouraz, the heavy ring through his nose (which he almost attempted), then he could be read like his other parent, like a Longbeard.
You’re not, are you though? spoke a voice in his mind. If he listened to it one way, it sounded snide and mocking. If he listened to it another way, it was the clear, sensible voice of his mother. He’d wrapped his kh’busi around his head again, turning away from the mirror when he couldn’t bear to look at himself any more, and sat in bed silently for a very long time.
I am an Easterling.
Eirhi looked the Longbeard dead in his eye. The snake of embarrassment had the Rhûnic eagle tearing into it, clawing painfully at his insides and forcing him to answer. Eirhi thought of the wide, sun bleached plains, and the vast, breathtaking rivers. The first time he’d been out of Erebor as an older child and had sailed into Ghomal – seeing where he really came from. The mix of people from the East and the South, Dwarves and Men, the languages, the faces, the clothes, the streets. This was his East.
“Yes,” replied Eirhi, a glint in his eye as he raised his chin. “I am an Easterling.”
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beautiful, Jade. Absolutely beautiful.
Aw Yiss 