I did not understand why until I blinked and my eyes made that strange, involuntary adjustment that hurt so much-and suddenly I saw Dateh, through whatever veil he'd cast around himself with his scrivening skills.
And I screamed. Because what stood there, enormous and heaving, rocking on twenty legs and flailing with as many arms-and oh gods, oh gods, his FACE-was too hideous for me to take without some outlet for my horror.
Shiny rounded on me. "Do as I say! Now!"
And then he charged forward, blazing, to meet Dateh's challenge.
"No," I whispered, shaking my head. I could not take my eyes from the great gabbling thing Dateh had become. I wanted to deny what I had seen in Dateh's face: Paitya's gentle smile, Dump's square teeth, Madding's eyes. And many others. There was almost nothing left of Dateh himself-nothing but will and hate. How many godlings had he consumed? Enough to overwhelm his humanity and grant him unimaginable power.
No one could fight such a creature and hope to survive. Not even Shiny. Dateh would kill him and then come eat my heart. I would be trapped within him, my very soul enslaved, forever.
"No!" I ran for the wall of the bubble, slapping its cold shimmering surface with my hands. I could not think through my terror. My breath came in gasps. I wanted nothing more than to escape.
My hands suddenly became visible. And between my hands, something new flickered into view.
I stopped, startled out of panic. The new thing rotated before me, flickering faintly, a bauble of silvery light. As I stared at it, I realized there was a face in its surface. I blinked, and the face blinked, too. It was me. The image-a mirror reflection, I realized, something else I had heard of but never seen-was distorted by the bubble's shape, but I could make out the curve of cheekbones, lips open in a sob, white teeth.
But most clearly, I could see my eyes.
They were not what I expected. Where my irises should have been, dull disks of twisted gray, I saw instead brilliance: tiny winking, wavering lights. My malformed corneas had withdrawn, opening like a flower, to reveal something even stranger inside.
What-?
There was a cry behind me and the sound of a blow. As I turned, something streaked across my vision like a comet. But this comet screamed as it fell, trailing fire like blood. Shiny.
Dateh uttered a rattling hiss, raising two of his stolen arms. Light, sickly mottled, dripped from his hands like oil and splattered the floor of the Empty realm. Where it fell, I heard hissing.
The small bubble winked out of existence between my hands.
Escape and strange magic forgotten, I ran to where Shiny lay, not so shiny now, and not moving. He was alive, I found as I pulled him onto his back; breathing, at least, though raggedly. But crossing his chest from shoulder to hip was a streak of darkness, an obscene obliteration of his light. I touched it, my hand trembling, but there was no wound. No magic, either.
Then I understood: whatever it was that made demon blood negate the magic of a god's life-essence, Dateh had found a way to channel it-or perhaps this was simply the culmination of what he had become. Not just a demon but a god whose very nature was mortality. He was turning Shiny back into an ordinary man, piece by piece. And once that was done, he would tear Shiny apart.
"Lady Oree," breathed the thing that had been Dateh. I could no longer think of it as a man. Its voice overlapped upon itself: I heard him echo in female registers, other males, older, younger. It wheezed as it lumbered toward me. Perhaps it had developed multiple lungs, or whatever godlings shaped within their bodies to simulate breath.
It said, "We are the last of our kind, you and I. I was wrong, wrong, wrong to threaten you." It paused, shook its massive head as if to clear it. "But I need your power. Join me, use it for me, and I'll do you no harm." It took a step closer, six feet shuffling at once.
I did not, dared not, trust the Dateh creature. Even if I agreed to its plan, its sanity was as distorted as the rest of its form; it might still kill me on a whim. It would kill Shiny regardless, I was certain-permanently, irreversibly. What would happen to the universe if one of the Three died? Would this god-eating madman even care?
Unthinking, I clutched at Shiny, a bulwark against fear. He stirred under my hands, semiconscious, no protection at all. Even his light had begun to fade. But he was not dead. Perhaps if I stalled for time, he could recover.
"J-join you?" I asked.
Dateh's form shivered, then resolved again into the ordinary, mortal shape that I had known in the House of the Risen Sun. It was an illusion. I could feel the warped reality still present, even if it had found a way to fool my eyes. Dateh was like Lil, safe on the surface, horror underneath.
"Yes," it said, and this time it spoke in a single voice. It gestured behind itself, toward the corpses I knew were there. "I could train you. Make you st-st-strong." The Dateh-creature paused then, eyes unfocusing for a moment, and there was that curious blurring again, the outward mask cracking for an instant. The effort needed to hold that mask in place was a taut, palpable thing. No wonder the Dateh-creature hesitated to devour me; one more heart, one more stolen soul, might be too much to contain.
Shiny groaned, and the creature's face hardened. "But you must do something for me." Its voice had changed. I choked back a sob. It spoke with Madding's voice, gentle and persuasive. Its hands flexed from fists to claws and back. "That creature in your lap. I thought he had no true magic, but now I see I underestimated him."
My vision blurred with tears as I shook my head, and I reached across Shiny's body as if I could somehow protect him. "No," I blurted. "I won't let you kill him, too. No."
"I want you to kill him, Oree. Kill him, and take his heart."
I froze, staring at Dateh, my mouth falling open.
It smiled again, its teeth flickering from Dateh's to Dump's back to Dateh's. "You love too many of these gods," it said. "I need proof of your commitment. So kill him, Oree. Kill him and take that shining power for your own. When you've done it, you'll understand how much more you were meant to be."
"I can't." I was trembling all over. I barely heard myself. "I can't."
The Dateh-creature smiled, and this time its teeth were sharp, like a dog's. "You can. Your blood will work, if you use enough of it." He gestured, and a knife appeared on Shiny's chest. It was black, shimmering like solid mist-a piece of the Empty given form. "I will have your power one way or another, Lady Oree. Eat him and join me, or I eat you. Choose."
***
You may think me a coward.
You'll remember that I fled when Shiny told me to, instead of staying to fight at his side. You will remember that throughout this final horror, I was useless, helpless, too terrified to be any good to anyone, including myself. It may be that by telling you this, I have earned your contempt.
I won't try to change your mind. I'm not proud of myself or the things I did in that hell. I can't explain it, anyhow-no words can capture the terror that I felt in those moments, faced with the starkest, ugliest choice that any creature on this earth must face: kill, or die. Eat, or be eaten.
I will say this, though: I think I made the choice that any woman would when confronted by the monster that murdered her beloved.
***
I set the knife aside. Didn't need it. Shiny's chest heaved like a bellows. Whatever Dateh had done had hurt him badly, despite the magic that still wavered around him. Unnecessarily, I smoothed the cloth across his chest, then rested my hands there, one on either side of his heart.
My tears fell onto my hands in a patter of threes: one two three, one two three, one two three. Like the weeper-bird's cry. Oree, oree, oree.
***
I chose to live.
***
The paint was the door, my father had taught me, and belief was the key that unlocked it. Beneath my hands, Shiny's heart beat steady, strong.
"I paint a picture," I whispered.
***
I chose to fight.
***
Dateh let ou
t a rattling sigh of pleasure as the shimmering bubble formed again between my hands, hovering just above Shiny's heart. I knew what it was at last-the visible manifestation of my will. My power, inherited from my god ancestors and distilled through generations of humanity, given shape and energy and potential. That was all magic was, really, in the end. Possibility. With it I could create anything, provided I believed. A painted world. A memory of home. A bloody hole.
I willed it into Shiny's body. It passed through his flesh harmlessly, settling amid the steady, strong pulses of his heart.
I looked up at Dateh. Something changed in me then; I don't know what. All at once, Dateh hissed in alarm and stepped back, staring at my eyes as if they had turned to stars.
Perhaps they had.
***
I chose to believe.
***
"Itempas," I said.
Lightning blazed out of nothingness.
The concussion of it stunned both Dateh and me. I was flung backward, slamming against Dateh's barrier with enough force to knock the breath from my body. I fell to the ground, dazed but laughing, because this was so familiar to me and because I was no longer afraid. I believed, after all. I knew it was over, even if Dateh had yet to learn that lesson.
A new sun blazed in the middle of Dateh's Empty, too bright to look upon directly. The heat of it was terrible even from where I lay, enough to tighten my skin and take my breath away. Around this sun glimmered an aura of pure white light-but it did not merely glow in every direction, this aura. Lines and curves seared my sight before I looked away, forming rings within rings, lines connecting, circles overlapping, godwords forming and marching and fading out of thin air. The sheer complexity of the design would have stunned me in itself, but each of the rings turned in dizzying, graceful gyroscopic patterns around a human form.
I stole a series of sweeping glances through the brilliance and made out a corona of glowing hair, a warrior's garments done in shades of pale, and a slender, white-metaled straightsword held in one perfect black hand. I could not see his face-too bright-but it was impossible not to see his eyes. They opened as I watched, piercing the unrelenting white with colors I had only heard of in poetry: fire opal. Sunset's cloak. Velvet and desire.
I could not help remembering a day, so long ago, when I'd found a man in a muckbin. They had been the same eyes then, but so much more beautiful now, incandescent, assured, that there was no sense in comparing.
"Itempas," I said again, reverent.
Those eyes turned to me, and it did not bother me that I saw no recognition in them. He saw me and knew me for one of His children, but no more than that. An entity so far beyond humanity had no need of human ties. It was enough for me that He saw, and His gaze was warm.
Before Him huddled the Dateh-creature, thrown by the same blast of power that had flattened me. As I watched, it clambered unsteadily to its many feet, the mask of its humanity shattered.
"What the hells are you?" the Dateh-creature demanded.
"A shaper," said the Lord of Light. He raised his sword of white steel. I saw hundreds of godwords in filigreed patterns along the blade's length. "I am all knowledge and purpose defined. I strengthen what exists and cull that which should not."
His voice made the darkness of the Empty tremble. I laughed again, filled with inexpressable joy. Pain suddenly blossomed in my eyes, grinding, terrible. I clung to my joy and fought back against it, unwilling to look away. My god stood before me. No Maroneh had seen Him since the earliest days of the world. I would not let a simple thing like physical weakness interfere.
The Dateh-creature shouted with its many voices and let loose a wave of magic so tainted that the air turned brown and foul. Itempas batted this aside with all the effort of an afterthought. I heard a clear ringing note in the wake of His movement.
"Enough," He said, His eyes turning dark and red like a cold day's sunset. "Release my children."
The creature stiffened all over. Its eyes-Madding's eyes-grew wide. Something stirred at its midriff, then bulged obscenely in its throat. It fought this with an effort of sheer will, setting its teeth and straining. I felt it struggling to hold all the power it had swallowed into itself. This was futile, however, and a moment later it threw back its head and screamed, streams of viscous color fountaining from its throat.
Each color evaporated in the blaze of Itempas's white heat, becoming thin, shimmering mist. The mists flew to Him, swirling and entwining until they formed a new ring of His multilayered aura, this one turning in front of Him.
He lifted a hand and the mists contracted to encircle it. Even through my agony I felt their delight.
"I'm sorry," He said, His beautiful eyes full of pain. (So familiar, that.) "I have been a poor father, but I will do better. I will become the father you deserve." The ring coalesced further, becoming a swirling sphere that hovered over His palm. "Go and be free."
He blew on the gathered souls, and they scattered into nothingness. Did I imagine that one of them, a green-blue helix, lingered a moment longer? Perhaps. Even so, it vanished, too.
Then Dateh stood alone, half slumped and knees buckling, just a man again.
"I didn't know," he whispered, gazing at the shining figure in wonder, in fear. He fell to his knees, his hands shaking as if palsied. "I didn't know it was you. Forgive me!" Tears ran down his face, some caused by fear, but some, I understood, were tears of awe. I knew, because the same tears ran slow and thick down my own face.
Bright Itempas smiled. I could not see His face through the glory of His light, or my hot tears, but I felt that smile along every inch of my skin. It was a warm smile-loving, benevolent. Kindly. Everything I had always believed Him to be.
The white blade flashed. That was the only way I knew that it moved; otherwise I would have thought it had simply appeared, conjured from one place to another, through the center of Dateh's chest. Dateh did not cry out, though his eyes widened. He looked down and saw his lifeblood begin threading the Bright Lord's narrow blade in pulses: one-one, two-two, three-three. The sword was so fine, the strike so precise even through bone, that his pierced heart just kept beating.
I waited for the Bright Lord to withdraw the sword and let Dateh die. But He reached out then, with the hand that did not hold the sword. The smile was still on His face, warm and gentle and utterly merciless. There was no contradiction in this as He took hold of Dateh's face.
I had to look away then. The pain in my eyes had grown too great. I saw only red now, and it was not anger. I heard it, though, when Dateh began to scream. I felt reverberations in the air as bones cracked and ground together, as Dateh flailed and struggled and finally just twitched. I smelled fire, smoke, and the greasy acridity of burned flesh.
I tasted satisfaction then. It was not sweet, or filling, but it would do.
Then the Empty was gone, shattering around us, but I was barely aware of it. There was only the red, red pain. I thought I saw Sky's glowing floor beneath me, and I tried to push myself up, but the pain was too great. I fell, curling in on myself, too sick to retch.
Warm hands lifted me, so familiar. They touched my face, brushing away the strange thick tears that issued from my eyes. I worried, irrationally, about staining His perfect white garments with blood.
"You have given me back myself, Oree," said that shining, knowing voice. I wept harder and loved it helplessly. "To be whole again, after all these centuries… I had forgotten the feeling. But you must stop now. I would not add your death to my crimes."
It hurt so much. I had believed, and belief had become magic, but I was only mortal. The magic had limits. Yet how could I stop myself from believing? How did one find a god, and love Him, and let Him go?
The voice changed, becoming softer. Human. Familiar. "Please, Oree."
My heart called him Shiny even though my mind insisted on something else. That was enough to stop me doing whatever I was doing, and I felt the change in my eyes. Suddenly I could no longer see the glowing floor,
or anything else, but the pain in my head immediately diminished from a shriek to a chronic moan. My whole body went limp with relief.
"Rest now." The disordered bed beneath me. Sheets came up to my chin. I began to shiver violently-shock. A big hand stroked the soft mass of my hair. I whimpered because this made my head hurt worse. "Shhh. I will care for you."
I did not plan what I said then. I was in too much pain, half delirious. But I asked through chattering teeth, "Are you my friend now?"
"Yes," he replied. "As you are mine."
I could not help smiling all the way into dreams.
20
"Life" (oil study)
MORE THAN A YEAR it took me to heal.
The first two weeks of that I spent in Sky, comatose. The Lord Arameri, summoned to my room to find a barely alive demon, an exhausted fallen god, several dead and nearly dead godlings, and a human-shaped pile of ash, reacted remarkably well. He sent for Sieh again and apparently spun a magnificent tale of Dateh attacking Sky only to be repelled and ultimately destroyed by Shiny, the latter acting to defend mortal lives. Which was more or less true, as the Lord Arameri had learned long ago that it was difficult to lie to gods. (Not for nothing was he ruler of the world.)
I slept right through the restoration of the sun. I'm told the whole city celebrated for days. Wish I could have been there.
Later, when I regained consciousness and the scriveners at last pronounced me well enough to travel, I was quietly relocated to the city of Strafe, in a small barony called Ripa on the northeastern coast of the Senm continent. There I became Desola Mokh, a tragically blind young Maroneh woman who had been fortunate enough to come into money after the death of her only remaining relative. Strafe was a midsized city, really a large small town, best known for cheap fishskin leather and mediocre wine. I had a modest town house near the ocean, with-I am told-a lovely view of both the placid town center and the churning Repentance Sea. I liked the sea, at least; the smell reminded me of good days in Nimaro.
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