Yond, enraged, shot bolts of lighting at the dragons. The bolts had no noticeable effect whatsoever.
I laughed, my brother was a idiot. Creatures born of stone and fire had little to fear from lightning. I rode forward and engaged the dragon nearest me. He saw me coming out of the corner of his eye, but he was slow to react. What after all was I but a nuisance? He casually raised his great clawed forepaw to bat me away and I swung with the Bright Blade.
My blade severed the clawed hand completely, and as it separated from the beast it turned back to stone and fell smoking to the ground like so much broken masonry. I executed a return swing and and cleanly took off the dragon’s head. The entire body collapse in an avalanche of stone, killing several of the Jegu priests in the process.
I pointed my blade at the remaining priests. “There’s your target, brother,” I shouted. Even though I distrusted him, I was enjoying sharing the battle with Yond. I had been away from my true calling for too long
Yond smiled and swooped down upon the priests. They desperately attempted to direct the fire of the dragons toward myself and Yond. The dragon fire washed over us like water. I laughed and rushed toward the second dragon.
Yond began raining fire down upon the priests. They died screaming, wretched deaths. When the last priest fell the remaining dragons returned to stone, the magic having animated them banished. They became silent statues to witness the rest of the battle.
I felt the presence of Pandron, my father, the All Father blessing me with the power to focus upon our enemies. His will filled me with a destructive rage. The God of War together with the God of Thunder were invincible and would destroy this upstart called Jegu no matter what the cost.
Yond was joyous. He shot bolts of lighting all around him just for the celebration of it. “Come on you dogs of Guldon, rise up against these Jegu scum! Rise or I will slay you myself, you cowards!” Yond screamed and his voice was like thunder rolling over the hills. He sent lighting bolts into the body of the Guldon troops. Many men died. I didn’t know how many, nor did I care. They were pawns, not worthy of consideration.
Yond flew into the heart of the Jegu horde, toward the holy of holies that contained Jegu. I spurred Blackflame to follow. We hacked our way through human flesh. No blade, arrowhead or spear could touch us. We were invincible.
As Yond approached I saw the pyramid of Jegu unfold. From within the heart of the container came a red glow, and a giant figure emerged. It was a man, at least forty feet tall. His face was set in an expression of compassion and concern. He stood with his hands outstretched as if to welcome Yond. My brother stopped before the giant figure and summoned a great ball of energy from within himself. He held his hand together in front of his chest and the glowing, crackling globe of power grew.
Jegu spoke. “Yond, why do you strike out at me? I am only here because you called for me.”
“I made a mistake. I wanted power, but you stepped out of chaos to destroy everything. You’re an abomination and I’m going to make sure you go back to the nothingness you came from.”
“But Yond, I am your god. Surely, you must realize that. I am as far above you as you are above these pathetic mortals. I am the answer to all of your questions. The mysteries of the soul and the afterlife, these are my true domain. Through my grace, you shall have all the power you crave. All you must do to feel the peace and fulfillment deserving to you is to accept me into your heart as your god.”
Yond shook with fury. “No, I’m a god. I do not accept any power over me.”
He struck with all of this accumulated energy. The bolt was massive. It momentarily blinded all that were on the battlefield with its luminosity. The thunderclap was nearly deafening. But when the flash cleared, Jegu stood as he had before. Untouched and undamaged. The giant god shook his head slowly at Yond who still floated before him. Jegu seemed even a little sad. Then Jegu’s visage turned brutal, and in an instant he brought his outstretched hand together and smashed Yond between them. Jegu locked his fingers and crushed. And when he opened his hands, Yond fell from them to the ground with a thud, unconscious or dead. I didn’t care. It was obvious that this had been his fault.
Jegu was claiming to be our god? It sounded familiar to me. It sounded like the type of thing our family had said many times before to mortal men. It sounded like a lie. Why should Jegu bother to lie to us? But how could it be truth? Lies and more lies. Lies I had told again and again. Now Jegu was peddling the same soap.
What was I doing?
The shine of my armor dimmed. A faint feeling came to me, sadness. Angelina’s eyes, bright and smiling, forever closed by death. I looked at the dead on the battlefield. I remembered Olo, his wife and children. What was true?
Kaltron was certainly a lie. I had believed it for a time. It was safe and comfortable. If I believed in Kaltron I didn’t have to hurt. Nothing was my fault. I didn’t have to grieve. But it wasn’t truth.
I remembered now why I did not want to take up the Bright Sword. It made me loose my humanity. But perhaps my humanity was stronger than I had realized. I’d forgotten it for a moment, but my humanity was the strongest thing about me.
My godhood was nothing compared to the type of honest bravery of men and women who defended their homes and protected their children. There are those souls that although they only live for a blink of time are more noble than the gods in all their eternity. Those who fight not for glory, gold or hate, but for that which is just. Those who will fight no matter the cost. Those that act because it is right and will not back down from doing that which is truly honorable. There will always be those people, and because of that no god or army can destroy man’s true honor. I had forgotten that for a moment when I took the Bright Blade, but now I remembered, and it made me humble, but stronger.
Then Jegu looked across the battlefield at me. He made a gesture to his army and the ranks parted. I slowly advanced toward him. I craned my neck to stare into his face forty feet above me. Jegu’s face was again peaceful and benign as before.
“Kaltron, God of War.”
I nodded. “That is I, although I’ve tried to live it down.”
“I give you the same offer I gave your brother. You saw what happened to him. Must you take the same path?”
“Answer me this, Jegu,” I said. “If you are truly a god, or perhaps I should say, The God—the One who knows all the mysteries and secrets of the afterlife and the universe in general. Then why do you feel the need for this battle? Why have a war at all?”
“Because, the people are enslaved by the lies of your family of false gods, they need to be set free with the truth.”
“And if someone doesn’t see the truth? What then?”
“Then they have chosen and must be punished.”
“Can’t you just wait until they die and say I told you so?”
“You cannot understand the ways of god. You are not capable of comprehending.”
“Sorry, Jegu. But that sounds like crap to me. This is all a bunch of bullshit. You have power enough, all right, but you’re no different from me. And you know what? I’m no different from these mortals. If there is a god, he’s a hell of a lot bigger and better than any of us and he sure as hell has no need for an army of ass-kissers.”
Jegu’s face turned ugly. He raised his foot high and crashed it down upon me.
I dodged to the left and he missed. I noticed then that the ground beneath that enormous foot had not been crushed. In fact, not a blade of grass had been disturbed.
Jegu screamed again, but as I looked up at his gigantic form I looked past the exterior and saw what I needed.
I adjusted my phase of reality and his trampling foot passed through me it as if I were a shadow. In fact, however, it was Jegu who was the shadow. He was a mere projection. He wasn’t even in this reality at all, but was sending forth his mental control using the object in the reliquary. He could certainly bend the will of masses of people, charge the magical powers of his priests and give them ar
cane knowledge enough to set loose monster on the world, but Jegu himself was nothing more than a whisperer from the realm of chaos.
He could no longer harm me. The blind rage had given me over to his manipulations. The glorious egotism of taking on my godhood would have been my undoing had I not checked my recklessness. The truth of him made me realize that I now possessed what he could not touch, the power of a god combined with the power of my humanity. I was not opposing his power, quite the opposite I was ignoring it. I aligned my energies so that they offered no resistance. I willed myself so that Jegu’s wrath passed through me like water.
I raised my sword and advanced toward the holy of holies. The priests ran in all directions to get away. After all, their god was just a shadow compared to me. The army had seen the impotence of Jegu’s attack. Their faith in their god was evaporating, and with it the power of his suggestions and the vampiric force that was Jegu began to starve from the loss of followers.
I saw how he grew so quickly through the belief of my foolish brother. When you are fed by the power of a god, you rapidly become a god.
The forty-foot Jegu was shrinking. He was screaming and yelling about holy this, and righteous that, and I tuned him out completely. I whipped down my sword blade and tore the little gold pyramid in half. I reached my hand inside and gathered up what looked like a small meteorite. I laughed at it, tossed it into the air and caught it like a toy, then put it into my pocket.
Jegu faded from sight. His army, free from the madness that had driven them to attack their own countrymen began to walk away.
The war was over. I looked at myself. My sword and armor were nice, but they weren’t amazing. Maybe they never were. But one thing had not changed, Blackflame was still an excellent horse, however, and I’ll kick the ass of anyone who says otherwise.
As I passed through the battlefield, I saw Captain Rosten and gave him a nod. He stood to attention and saluted me as I went by. Others followed suit. The soldiers were from both armies. They saluted me as a warrior, as a man, but not as a god.
Call me a pussy, but I actually teared up. I actually felt good about myself. I hadn’t felt that way in about a thousand years. I set a slow trot toward the horizon. Good as a felt, there was still a hole in my heart. That was the cost of humanity as well. Never a victory without a price, never a bit of laughter without tears. It was like a sort of cosmic balance that seemed to try to take away any joy you felt before you had time to fully appreciate it. But it was the choice I had made, and I would live with it no matter what.
The two parts of my soul in balance for the first time. And for the first time I felt that I actually felt that perhaps I too might have a soul hiding somewhere within my old body.
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
I didn’t stay for the victory celebration. I didn’t see anything to cheer about. To the poor went the gathering the dead and notifying the kin, the royal family and the nobles were the only ones celebrating anything. The rest of the folk were just trying to pick up the pieces.
I took my time returning to the quiet valley. On the way I recalled the few hours I’d had with Angelina. I could remember every moment I’d looked at her, every conversation, every time we made love… the only time we would ever make love. The entirely of our relationship was but an instant. I was a being who had lived an eternity, the percentage of my life I spent with her hardly qualified to be a number at all. And yet, the impact had been huge.
Perhaps it was because of my newfound humanity. The hard won strength I had found to resist the egotism and amorality of absolute power also had its corollary weakness. The tightness in my chest and the sharp knife of agony in my throat as I fought back crying were new sensations I could do without.
How did mortals deal with mortality? Not the fact of their own deaths. That was a matter of non-existence or perhaps the potential of a new beginning in a new reality. But the certain death of others and the loss of their unique personality. How was it bearable? Day by day they lived and loved in the absolute knowledge that they were eventually going to lose everyone they cared about. It was a disaster looming over everyone and yet, they smiled, they danced, they dreamed.
Sometimes they listened to the lies told to them by gods. If that made them happy I suppose they weren’t all bad. As long as the lies didn’t take away the joy of what happiness could be had today—now—this one moment of existence in which we perceived the universe. “Now” was all anyone had, even a god when you got down to it.
I looked at the cottage next to the brook one last time, then at the fresh mound of earth where she lay. Angelina was gone from my now. Would she have lived if I hadn’t tried to save her? No, because I would have never stopped Jegu. No matter how I juggled events and possibilities in my mind, Angelina always seemed to die. The what if’s were a trap of despair.
Her life could not be cut short, it was as long as it was, as long as it could have been because it defined itself. There was no greater purpose, there was only an ending of her being. My tears and curses were meaningless, and yet still I cried and shouted in frustration at fate. This is the price I paid for being what my family could never be. They could never feel the depth of emotion, good or bad, that I had experienced in my time living as a mortal.
Loss was now as painful for me as it was for any mortal man, but I was long lived, and I knew that it would pass as all pain eventually ended to be replaced by the fresh pain of new loss. But this moment was for Angelina, and what might have been. I allowed myself the luxury of wallowing in my despair for a good long time before I left to do what needed to be done next.
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
There were untold creatures of fae to be encountered in the spaces between realities, but there was one path I could always count on traveling alone. The road to the Golden Realm may only be traveled by my family, as far as we know. The Realm was the birthplace of the gods, or at least what eventually became our family of divine miscreants. The Realm has also always been populated by angelic creatures who act as the servants of the gods, but they do not possess the gift of traveling. So, as always, it was a lonely trek home.
After passing through the Guardians of Eternity, the giant silent beasts which protected the gateway to the Realm itself, Blackflame’s hooves finally trod the golden cobblestones leading to the Citadel, the house of my father, Pandron the Creator. In all my long life the guardians had not moved. I had no doubt as to their consciousness and latent power. The enormous wings remained folded patiently. Their fangs, each as long as a man, sharp as a pike, rested motionless in a frozen snarl. I wondered what the guardians would have done had Jegu eaten the rest of creation and made it to the gateway of my childhood home.
Even as mortals know nothing of the moment of their birth, but suddenly become self aware of a personal narrative—their existence, at some hazy, random point in their toddler years, so too I did not remember my origins. I was never a child and although I must have had a beginning I cannot fathom it. My memories go back to a earlier time when I simply was.
I lived here for a time and then I went forth into the myriad realities of the world at the bidding of my father and fulfilled my purpose. I inspired one tribe to fight the other. I became the patron of some city states and the destroyer of others. Always I returned to sit at the hand of my father, until another epiphany of self-awareness ended my time of obedience.
The Ream radiated tranquility. Each tree, each flower, each blade of grass existed as a perfect model of creation. The sky was always deep azure with golden sunlight streaming down through shining white clouds. The green blush of spring was on everything, also as always. There were no seasons in the Realm. For long eons of time I truly thought all this meant beauty.
But eventually, as if I had been walking in darkness and the new dawn finally revealed the truth, I no longer saw beauty. I saw a dull, lifeless imitation of life. That day the nectar of the gods became as tepid water. The fruit lost its sweetness. I looked in a mirror at my own reflection
and finally saw the truth. I never recovered.
Perhaps I did have a childhood after all.
As soon as we passed in the Realm, I found myself wearing a red and black tunic and riding trousers and a heavy belt with ornate buckles. The Bright Blade lay in a dark scabbard at my side. It was dingy, tainted, but it felt right. After all, I was tainted as well. We had found our common connection and I could live with it at last.
I was met at the door by two of the fair folk that serve our kind. Angels? Valet parking attendants? It depends upon your perspective. I gave them the reins to Blackflame. He pranced like a yearling pony as he was led away to the sweet grasses and honey grain.
I opened the gold doorway and strode into my father’s mansion
Its true name was the Citadel of the Gods, but I liked to call my father’s mansion “Graceland.” A name I’d picked up in my travels. Basically, it was gaudy and overblown, almost to the point of being sickening. The wallpaper in the hallway was an animated forest scene with satyrs chasing after teen-aged nymphs in diaphanous gowns. I had really enjoyed this room in my less inhibited days.
The vaulted ceiling displayed moving galaxies and planets and the occasional shooting star. The floor was polished marble covered here and there by the shaggy hide of some great monster or the other that father had created and then killed for sport.
I found him being attended in his gaudy throne room by ten well-endowed fair folk of various gender and anatomical configuration—some quite creative. It was good to be the king.
I stood before him. “Well, here I am.”
He smiled. “Welcome, my son. I knew that you’d come to our aid There will be a grand feast, we will celebrate your victory.”
“I didn’t do it for you. I did it for them.”
His smile faded. “Very well, whatever your motivations. I am as proud of your actions as I am ashamed of your brother’ treachery. It nearly cost him his life. Jegu might have been able to consume him. As it is, his wounds are grievous, but he will heal in time with the aid of ambrosia and rest.”
Duty Calls: The Reluctant War God Book 1 Page 12
