When Shadows Fall

by Bruce Blake

  “When days of peace approach their end,

  And wounds inflicted are too deep to mend,

  A sign shall come, a lock with no key,

  Borne by a man from across the sea.

  A barren Mother, the seed of life,

  Living statue, treacherous knife.

  To raise the Small Gods, a Small God must die,

  When the stars go out, the end is nigh.”

  She paused to draw a weak breath and watched her blood etching the cursive lines of her words across the paper. The walls shook and she raised her gaze for an instant to see the marble had gone red with the life dripping from her heart. She returned her attention to the final stanza required on the scroll.

  “One must die to raise them all,

  Should Small Gods rise, man will fall.

  One can stop them, on darken’d wing,

  The firstborn child of the rightful king.”

  As the last word crossed her lips, a wind carrying swirling flames howled through the high windows. Rak’bana titled her head back, watched the fire snake toward her and closed her eyes, waiting for the Goddess to cleanse her and free her from her sorrow and pain.

  And the flames consumed her.

  ***

  Ine’vesi stumbled out of the tunnel into what had once been a picturesque courtyard filled with gardens for prayer and fountains for bathing. Now, instead of a place of beauty, it was a conflagration. The water for washing billowed from the fountains in clouds of white steam, the flowers and trees were ash, all but one of the Pillars of Life had fallen, and the river itself boiled and bubbled in the heat of the inferno.

  The priest raised his arm to his face, protecting himself from the blaze as he fell to his knees, the roll of parchment pressed to his chest. His nostrils flared at the stench of his own hair melting, the stink sickening him, but he ignored it, thankful he’d paused in the channel to set the words of his dreams on the paper.

  He lowered his arm and held the scroll on his lap, closed his eyes. Flames licked at the sleeves of his robe, crackled in the grass on which he knelt. It singed his flesh, but he’d prepared his entire life to concentrate on the task that needed his attention to the exclusion of everything else, including himself.

  Ine’vesi ran his reddening fingers along the surface of the rolled parchment. Its coarse texture instilled hope in him and he brought to mind the solemn, sparse temple in Teva Stavoklis. He imagined each grain in the wood of its posts and beams, every rock and pebble strewn across its dirt floor. Bundles of protection herbs hung on spikes protruding from the walls; greasy smoke snaked up from tallow candles. He breathed deeply and, instead of scenting the blazing gardens, he inhaled the unsavory odor of the burning fat.

  The priest opened his eyes and found himself in the temple. He rose to his feet, knees creaking and vague pain crawling across the surface of his flesh, but he ignored it, concentrating on the table set in the middle of the room.

  When he took a step toward it, pain shot up his spine. Ine’vesi gritted his teeth and pressed on, covering the distance with a stumbling gait. He reached the table and leaned against its edge, raised his hand to place the scroll upon it. Flames flickered along his sleeve, and he fought the urge to shake his arm in an attempt to extinguish them. They’d not be put out.

  With greater effort than expected, he extended his arm and set the roll of parchment down. The flames on his sleeve leaped to his hair and he released his grip on the scroll lest the blaze make its way to the paper. As soon as his fingertips left the surface of the scroll, the humble place of worship disappeared. Fire filled the priest’s vision and the stink of burning flesh replaced the scent of protection herbs and melting tallow.

  He stumbled back, his foot teetering on the edge of the boiling river. A bolt of lightning rode a thunderclap down from the sky, striking the base of the last of the nine Pillars of Life: Faith. The column tumbled, and Ine’vesi watched it fall toward him. He raised his flaming hands and, an instant later, the heavy stone crushed him.

  On the last day the Small Gods walked the land, fire fell like rain from the sky.

  I God and Devil

  The day lay upon the sea like death, without breath nor pulse, movement nor care. The sky ran into the ocean with a drunken sailor’s grace, and even the gulls wasn’t takin’ to the air for fear the heat’d bear them down to be swallowed by the depths. His Imperial Grace’s Ship, Devil o’ the Deep, languished upon the idle water more’n a hundred leagues from the turn, and she weren’t gettin’ none closer on days like this one.

  First Man Horace Seaman squinted out across the smooth and shinin’ sea, watchin’ it stretch to the horizon and prob’ly beyond, like a metal sheet awaitin’ the first strike o’ the smith’s hammer to dimple it. He scanned the green depths, wishin’ for a single wave to break and bring hopes of a windy gust along with it, or at least desirin’ to glimpse a fish jumpin’, its splash relievin’ his boredom, but there weren’t nothin’. A sweaty bead ran off his nose and caught itself in the thick stubble growin’ above his lip, collectin’ with all the other drops o’ sweat. He wiped the moisture away with a cloth he carried for no other purpose and wrung it out o’er the side, addin’ his salt to the sea’s.

  Despite the name and profession given him by his lineage, Horace didn’t have no love for floatin’ atop the water, less so on this sort o’ voyage. It weren’t the dearth o’ wind what increased Seaman’s discomfort, but the trip itself. Any time a boat took the turn, it put the crew too near the Green, in Horace’s estimation. Even sailin’ as far offshore as a seafarin’ man dared, with the jagged coast nothin’ but a mirage on the horizon, that land still crouched there like an animal waitin’ to pounce. Somethin’ 'bout the place were enough to make a man’s staff shrivel and his ball sack claw itself back up inside.

  If that weren’t enough to make a sailor’s tackle shrink, they was on this most damnable boat, too. Who with a good thought in their head named a boat Devil o’ the Deep? It seemed to Horace more’n a bit like temptin’ fate, and he weren’t the only swingin’ dick what thought so. The Devil didn’t have neither her own crew nor a perm’nent skipper, ‘cause no one wanted to spend time on a vessel what were surely destined to get itself ate. Thrice Horace Seaman sailed on the Devil and thrice survived, but the absence o’ wind and the sun’s oppression made him suspect trip number four might’ve been askin’ too much from the poor, o’er-worked possum tail stuck in his breech’s front pocket for the purpose o’ bringin’ good luck.

  The trip’d be faster crossin’ the Inland Sea, but tension with the Water Kingdom meant no ships was makin’ the excursion, 'cept them what were good at skulkin’, and skulkin’ weren’t hardly the Devil’s specialty. Even so, he figured sneakin’ across still might be safer’n gettin’ close to the Green.

  Horace snorted and spat o’er the wale, not partic’larly able to spare the saliva, but desperate to set the water movin’. He watched ripples race away from the floatin’ snot glob, some tiny waves washin’ against the boat and dyin’ without givin’ aid to pushin’ the Devil closer to her goal, others headin’ for the horizon like they stood a chance o’ reachin’ it. Horace watched ‘em as if it were his job, ‘cause what else were a man to do on a day dead as today?

  “What ya doin’, Hory?”

  But one man called him Hory, and he wondered for an instant whether ignorin’ the voice might make it go away. The answer were no. Horace’d tried payin’ the feller no mind before with the result o’ makin’ the questions multiply and come out more absurd. He heaved a breath, the air hotter’n it had any right to be, and answered without facin’ the man.

  “I’m fixin’ to work up to shittin’ a gold block, Dunal. What’s it look like?”

  “Har, har. It looks like you ain’t doin’ nothin’, Hory, that’s what.”

  Horace got the eye rollin’ outta the way first so Dunal wouldn’t see, then rotated slow, feelin’ akin to a ground hen skewered and cranked on the rotisserie o’er a bed
o’ red hot coals. Difference were, the ground hen got to be dead when it got cooked.

  The smile on Dunal’s gob made Horace either wanna laugh out loud or punch the swab in the face, but he couldn’t spare the air to do the one and the other’d get him tossed in the brig. See, Dunal were not only head swabbie for this turn on the Devil, but cousin to the skipper’s wife, or some such thing, and a simpleton on the top. The o’ersized child possessed an eye which pointed off at nothin’, a head o’ thick, straw-colored hair to match the mop he carried with him ev’rywhere he went, and the self-proclaimed ability to fuck a woman for half-a-day without rest. Course, weren’t no women willin’ to confirm the claim, though Horace’d heard rumors a good few goats and other farm beasts knew the truth.

  “Ya caught me, Dunal. I’m starin’ off at the water wishin’ to throw myself in and drown, is all.”

  The simpleton’s eyes went wide and worried. “Don’t do it, Hory. The skip needs you.”

  Horace shook his head, loosenin’ a fat drop o’ sweat outta his hair to spill along his neck and onto his back. He shivered, but whether from the hot water rollin’ down his spine, or the thought o’ Dunal fuckin’ a sheep for a half-a-day, anyone’s guess’d be good as another.

  “I’m just havin’ at ya, Dunal, what you be doin’?”

  “I’m swabbin’, Hory.”

  He held up the mop and shook it with more enthusiasm’n Horace could’ve found for anythin’ on a day as hot and shite as this one. Dried chunks he’d prefer not to identify flew outta the ragged mophead, a few findin’ their way to the jumbled hair perched on Dunal’s head, likely never to be seen again.

  Horace shuffle-stepped to the right to see past the simpleton, peekin’ at the deck behind him. Not a drop o’ water to be seen nowhere on the wood, ‘cause Dunal’d forgot to fill the mop bucket again. Seaman laughed in spite of himself and shook his head, then looked up, seein’ more’n just the planks beyond the big oaf for the first time.

  The sun beatin’ on the flat water were blindin’ on the shoreward side o’ the boat, so Horace squinted and held his hand to his forehead, blockin’ out the glare. More sweat ran offa the spot he touched, stingin’ his eye and drawin’ a curse to his lips. He blinked the salt away and stared out o’er the wale, stretchin’ and standin’ up on his toes as though it’d make him see farther.

  “Whatcha starin’ at, Hory?” Dunal asked spinnin’ 'round to join him in lookin’, the dry mop head slappin’ Horace square in his high, sunburned forehead.

  Horace brushed the stinkin’ strings away and shook his head to get the dirt outta his sweat-damp hair, then gazed out across the water again. He pushed his lips tight together and stared, hopin’ Dunal’d stay the fuck quiet and give him time to concentrate.

  “Nothin’, Dunal.” He took one step away from his post on the ship’s seaward side, movin’ toward the shoreward wale. “Fuck me dead, I don’t see nothin’.”

  His boot heels hammered the planks, hurryin’ him to lean o’er the side, hopin’ to be wrong, but knowin’ he weren’t. Too many miles o’ sea’d passed beneath Horace Seaman’s feet for him not to locate the shoreline quicker’n he’d find his own cock.

  “The tide got us,” he said o’er his shoulder, knowin’ Dunal’d followed him. He faced the swabbie. “We drifted. You gotta run and tell the skip.”

  The head swabbie stared at him with the blank expression he got most times anyone talked in his direction. His one eye stared somewhere up into the sky and his mouth hung open, waitin’ to catch a bug. Another time, Horace woulda stopped and walked Dunal through ‘til he understood, but a matter o’ life and death didn’t leave the time. Rather’n explainin’, he grabbed the lad’s sweaty shirt front and gave him a hard shake.

  “The shore, you simple, thunderin’ oaf! We can’t see the shore.”

  Dunal cranked his head 'round to gawk o’er the wale; his sausage-thick fingers opened and the mop hit the deck with a clunk before the swabbie began shriekin’ like one o’ them goats which preferred not to be fucked for half-a-day.

  “The shore! The shore, skip!”

  The simpleton took off for the aft end o’ the ship, where the Devil’s skipper’d be hidin’ in his cabin, avoidin’ honest work and the burnin’ sun, but Horace Seaman didn’t have the time nor the care for the man to give two shits. He raced back across the deck to his post, the sweat streamin’ from his forehead caused more by fear’n it were by heat.

  He leaned against the wale and gazed out at the same monotonous stretch o’ water what he’d stared at for hours and hours before the oaf took him from his duties to stab him through the heart with a lance o’ panic.

  “Three fuckin’ trips on the Devil,” he muttered, gaze roamin’ the horizon and the expanse o’ glistenin’ sea between it and the boat. “Shoulda never signed up for number four.”

  In all his time floatin’ on the damnable sea, in this boat or any other, he’d never been outside sight o’ the shore. Not when the day wilted and drooped the way it did today, and not when storms threw the ship 'round with the malice of an angry child tryin’ to break his toys. In near thirty-five turns o’ the seasons, the water ain’t never surrounded him the way it were right now.

  Horace gulped down air hotter’n what he exhaled, pantin’ and wipin’ his brow with his hand to keep sweat from fuckin’ up his vision, the cloth stuffed in his back pocket for no other purpose forgotten.

  For a hundred or more racin’ heartbeats, nothin’ changed. The sea lay unmovin’, uncarin’, unknowin’ 'bout the Devil’s presence, and Horace thought the rowers might get oars in the water before it were too late. If it stayed calm for the little bit o’ time it’d take them to get their asses on the rowin’ seats, they might have a chance.

  Before the first oar head came pokin’ through its hole, the bubbles started, and First Man Horace Seaman’s heart shriveled up no bigger’n a grape left to dry on the vine.

  For near thirty-five turns o’ the seasons livin’ a life he never wanted to live, Horace’d laughed off the stories told in ev’ry tavern along the coast, and he’d been in enough to know the tales. Ev’ry time he set foot on a ship, he told himself they was yarns spun by old-wives and older seamen, but down inside, he knew them the truth, even if he’d never seen none of it himself.

  “There!” Horace shouted and pointed. “Keep them fuckin’ oars outta the water!”

  If he hadn’t seen nothin’, they’d already be pullin’ hard on them paddles, as if their lives depended on it, not slowin’ until they saw the shore again. Them what weren’t rowin’d either be prayin’ or gettin’ in a last fuck in case they didn’t make it. But with the sea a-bubblin’, they didn’t dare touch oar blades to water for fear they’d attract somethin’ they didn’t wanna meet and find themselves another tale told in ev’ry tavern along the coast. Until the disturbance stopped, no one’d be doin’ more’n holdin’ their breath and hopin’.

  Thirty man-lengths off the bow, the bubbles roiled and built, as if someone’d stuck a reed in the sea and blew angry breath through it, stirrin’ up the ocean when it didn’t wanna be stirred up. Water spilled o’er itself, mountin’ up to half a man’s height. Horace’s lips formed 'round the approximation of a prayer he’d heard once before but never said himself, prob’ly fuckin’ it up right bad, but his lips gave it a go anyways, in case such things might help his feet find shore just one more time. If the prayer worked, he swore then and there, on the grave o’ev’ry Seaman what come before him, his scabby, callused feet’d never touch a ship’s deck again, so long as he lived.

  The commotion stopped quick as it begun, and with it the whole world paused. An indignant sun glared down on ev’ry swingin’ dick aboard ship, each one starin’ at the low waves rollin’ across the water from where the bubbles was. Each and ev’ry man joined the world in holdin’ their wind, just like it’d been doin’ these last days to get ‘em into this shithole situation.

  The hard wood o’ the wale went slick under Horace’s sweat
in’ palms, but he didn’t move ‘em, just kept leanin’ and watchin’ until the first wave lapped up against the side o’ the ship. He let out a breath, slow and quiet, and drew another, hopin’ this one weren’t his last, neither. A chunk o’ shocked air caught in his throat when the thing bobbed to the surface.

  Too much water lay in between to see clear, but it didn’t appear big enough to be what the stories told at ev’ry tavern along the coast talked 'bout. A white patch, maybe red, too. It didn’t look much bigger’n...

  A man.

  First Man Horace Seaman gave his head a shake and leaned farther out o’er the side, findin’ it more’n a might difficult to believe his own eyes. But there it were, right before him: a white-shirt-and-red-pants-wearin’ man floatin’ atop a sea what a few minutes before’d been smooth as a lookin’ glass. And now it belched up the impossible.

  “What is it?”

  Dunal!

  The bubbles stoppin’ didn’t mean they was past danger—far from past it. The tales told at ev’ry tavern along the coast never said nothin’ 'bout a man floatin’ in the sea, and Horace didn’t know what to make of it. He felt ev’ry sailor on board waitin’ with him and hoped the lead swabbie’d follow what his mates were doin’by shuttin’ the fuck up. Might as well’ve hoped for a giant to appear outta the thin, hot air and sneeze into the Devil’s sails hard enough to blow ‘em right the way back to shore. Weren’t no such things as giants.

  “What’s ev’ryone gawkin’ at?”

  “Be quiet, you stupid oaf.” Horace didn’t look 'round, but he sensed Dunal step up close beside him.

  “You knows I don’t like when you calls me that, Hory. I let you have one ‘cause it seemed like you thought it were somethin’ impo’tant. Don’t call me that no more.”