by Stone Thomas
“As people will do when you threaten to blow up their heads,” Akrin said. “They have free will, Kāya, and I’m forcing them to use it. They’re mine now.”
One by one, Akrin timelined those women to safety. The anibombs they held, however, stayed behind. They floated in midair, stopped from falling by a spell whose duration I couldn’t guess. Kāya’s response was to grab the silver pawn with both hands and hurl him through the window.
“And what about you, little man?” Akrin said. “We have no elves in Roseknob yet, but your soul is as nourishing as the rest.”
“You can see me?” he asked. “But I have sneak socks!”
“You can’t sneak past the gods,” Kāya said. She gave him a wink.
Realization dawned on Greggin’s face. “This is most uncomfortable.”
“So?” Akrin asked. “Roseknob?”
“No, thank you,” Greggin said.
“Well,” Akrin replied, “that’s fine. But you can’t stay here.” He tossed a ball of silver magic at Greggin. The little elf tried to cover his face, but it was no use. His whole shape took on a reflective sheen, then he was gone. Akrin wafted away, leaving me alone with Kāya.
“Gee thanks,” I muttered.
“You know,” Kāya said, “you destroyed my last city.”
“Meadowdale wasn’t your city,” I said.
“I’m not letting you take this one from me,” she said.
“This one isn’t yours either! This city belongs to Gowes.”
Kāya grabbed hold of one of the anibombs that Akrin’s familiar had cast his spell over. She threw it at me and I ducked. It bounced against the wall, then floated to a stop in the air. That time magic was holding up well.
“Argh!” Kāya yelled. “When that spell wears off, you’re dead!” She threw another anibomb at me. I caught it and threw it back at her. This was the worst game of hot potato I’d ever played. Not that any game of hot potato was ever that great. It usually ended with burned palms and a lot of mash between the fingers.
“You’ll blow us both up!” I yelled.
“So be it,” she said. She grabbed an anibomb by the ears, but I swept my leg out, knocking into Kāya’s heel and toppling her over. In an instant, I pounced on top of her and pressed the tip of my Vile Lance against her throat.
“Go ahead, Arden,” she said. “Piercing Blow me.”
“When you say it like that—” I started.
“I mean it!” she said. “I won’t stop serving him, I can’t. All I wanted was to be left alone to gather my own flock and serve the world in my own awkward way. Sure, I was jealous of gods like Nola, but killing her never crossed my mind. Then Duul showed up. I can’t deny him, but I also can’t…
“Nola and I will never be friends,” she continued. “But what Duul has in mind for her, for me… I don’t want to be a part of that either.”
“What is it?” I asked. “What does he have planned?”
She didn’t answer. I could end her right here. Press my god-slaying weapon into her soft purple skin and drain her holy life away. Telara and the Great Mother would applaud me. Nola would live. But how could I? This was the closest I had come to taking a life. A real life, not the life force of a magically conjured cretin or rabbijack.
“Ha, you can’t do it,” Kāya said. She brushed the tip of my spear away from her neck. I rolled off of her. She was right.
“We all have to grow into our roles, Arden. You’re young still. You’ll learn. Killing is living in war. You can’t make the choice to kill when you have your weapon against someone’s flesh. You make the choice when you lay awake at night, counting up the people you’ve already lost and vowing not to lose any more.
“Then, when the opportunity arises, your hands know better than to ask your brain for permission.” She stood and walked to a window at the room’s edge.
“Here comes Nola,” Kāya said. “I can’t let her grow into her role. Only one of us can live through this, and one way or another, that will be me.”
“It doesn’t have to be that way,” I said. I walked to the window next to hers. At the far end of the city, the front gates were dented and bent after repeated strikes from the lumber launcher, but they still held Nola and the girls at bay.
Then, they started to glow. The light was faint and red, but growing brighter quickly. The metal started to warp and bend, melting into a wobbling wave of scalding iron that folded like a wet blanket. They splashed forward in a fickle molten wave of brilliant orange before cooling against the cold ground.
Ambry stood before the city, both hands lifted and glowing from her Red Handed skill.
“Let them pass!” Kāya yelled to her assembled army.
“The thing about chaos,” she said, “is that even I can’t predict where it will take me.” She pointed to the metal spire in the center of the city. One man climbed down that pole toward the oncoming battle while Nola and the girls pushed the lumber launcher through the city’s gates. That man had a large bushy mane and he used his long lion tail to keep balance as he descended the metal spike with feline agility.
“Isn’t that Brion the lionkin?” I asked.
“Yep,” Kāya said.
“Did he just install an energem at the tip of that structure, impossibly high out of reach?” I asked.
“Yep,” she said.
“And isn’t it dark purple, like the location-distorting bunnies I hate so much?”
“Mmhmm.”
“Well that’s not a good thing,” I said. Already the energem was gathering light.
Behind me, a dozen lilac bombs hovered three feet above the stone floor, waiting for the spell cast by Akrin’s familiars to release its hold.
“Bye, Arden,” Kāya said. Then she pushed me out the window.
+23
At four stories, the temple’s tower was the highest point in the whole city. It was not, however, high enough for one to think many thoughts when crashing toward deadly impact. At most I could have one long thought like, “When I’m gone, someone will discover the naughty parchments I hid under the mattress,” or maybe a series of shorter thoughts like, “I wish I could fly. And whistle. Never did learn to whistle.”
As it happened, I didn’t have time for any thoughts. The second I felt gravity latch onto me, silver light washed over my entire body. What started as a desperate plunge toward the cobbled streets below ended a moment later with my nose flat against the road beneath Valleyvale’s mysterious metal spire.
Akrin floated in the sky next to the temple’s tower. He gave me a mock salute, then wafted toward me.
He must have timelined me forward just a bit, just enough to put me on the ground without the inertia of my fall, and much closer to Nola and the girls in the city’s center.
“Well,” I said. “That wasn’t terribly inconvenient.”
As I climbed to my feet, a pair of warm golden arms grabbed me from behind and pulled me tight. “What were you doing in there?” Nola asked. “I had no idea if you were safe.”
“I tried contacting you,” I said. “You didn’t pick up any of my thoughts?”
“No,” she said, staring at me hard. “Your mind has a spot that’s all closed off. You didn’t try renouncing me did you?”
“No!” I said. “I don’t even know what that means!”
“The relationship between head priest and deity can be broken,” she said, “but only intentionally. I don’t know the incantation, but if you do—”
“I would never,” I said. “I can’t believe you even think—”
“I don’t think that,” she said. “I just can’t think of any other explanation. I can’t see into your mind’s dark spot at all. I felt it getting darker all day, but now it’s like that part of your mind is pitch black. Where did your little brain go, Arden?”
I didn’t know the answer to that, just like I didn’t know why Kāya had instructed her assembled army to let Nola and the girls walk right into the city unharmed. I had a good guess at t
hat one though. Kāya wanted a chance to face off against Nola herself.
She wanted a showdown.
“Is everyone alright?” I asked. Cindra, Mamba, Lily, and Ambry all nodded. They held their weapons with white knuckles. I didn’t have to tell them what was coming next. The city’s center was empty except for us, but ten yards out stood one of Duul’s generals and a squadron of cretins and cursed men waiting for the signal to charge into battle.
Kāya threw open the temple doors and strutted toward us while Brion clung to the metal spire’s halfway mark and Akrin sidled up to Nola.
“Daughter,” Akrin said, hovering.
“Father,” Nola said. “Find anything you like?”
“I recruited a few tradesmen,” he said, “but nothing special. It’s the number of citizens that matters. Quality is irrelevant.”
“Roseknob must be a real paradise then,” she said.
He looked her over. “I see you’ve grown into your mother’s wings. Use them. Get out of here before Kāya comes for you.”
“And leave everyone behind?” she asked. “Let Kāya ruin herself by serving Duul? I’m standing up for myself and my people. I wouldn’t expect you to understand.”
“I stand up for my people,” Akrin said.
“As you define it,” Nola said. “He who makes the rules of his own game can hardly break them.”
Akrin sighed. “I wish you didn’t resent me for being who I was born to be.”
“I don’t,” Nola said. “I resent you for not wanting to be more than that.”
Mamba rested a hand on the lumber launcher and leaned forward while Nola and her father traded words. “The shadows,” she said. “They protect the light.”
I peered down the few side streets I could see from there. The glowing outlines of ghostly warriors gathered at the sidelines, crowding in the limited spaces that were still hidden from the sun. There were dozens of them, hiding in shadows that mimicked the dismal hellscape they came from.
“Lumentors,” I said. “They’ve realized the elements here are too harsh for them. As long as we stay in the sun we’ll be fine.”
At least the sky was on our side. It was just about noon on a cloudless day with a warm, lazy breeze. It was the kind of beautiful day Reyna would never see if she spent eternity tossing souls through rifts and waiting for Duul to unleash the cold dark of hell into this world. This was the world of vibrant light, and I intended to keep it that way.
Here she came. The goddess of chaos and awkward moments. The corseted one-piece she wore squeezed her breasts high up her chest, as if they were ready to burst from her only piece of clothing. A long dark ponytail contrasted against her pale purple skin.
I hated the effect her aura of awkwardness had on me. As she approached, I suddenly didn’t know what to do with my hands, so I tried to put them in my pockets. That didn’t feel natural either, so I hooked my thumbs in my belt loops. Just being in Kāya’s presence made me out of place in my own body, like a sixth grader at a school dance with the lights all the way up and the only cleavage in sight belonging to an upper-middle-aged teacher that I simultaneously couldn’t bear to look at and couldn’t keep my eyes off of.
Or so I’ve heard. My only teacher was Father Cahn, and he never showed any cleavage.
The purple goddess walked right up to Nola while Brion descended the metal pole by our side. “Cousin,” she said.
“Kāya,” Nola replied.
“It’s ∉ now,” I said.
“You sound like your nose is full of snot,” Nola said.
“That’s how it’s supposed to sound,” Kāya said. “Nasal and a little boogery. He’s got it.”
“Why are you doing this?” Nola asked. “I’ve known you since we were girls. This can’t be the life you want.”
“The life I had wasn’t either,” Kāya said. “I can’t help what gift I was born with. My parents couldn’t help what they inherited either, but the Great Mother refused to let us form temples in places people wanted to live. She couldn’t stand the thought of gods like us gathering followers and helping to shape the world.
“Awkward moments can be endearing! They provide a harmless discomfort that leads to laughter and shared memories. They provide a personal hurdle that leads to a special kind of humble confidence. The Great Mother didn’t see it that way. My awkward moments were a drool stain on the pillowcase of her planning. And my father’s chaos? Filth to sweep under the rug.”
“Duul killed your father,” Nola said. “Take it from another young goddess who lost a parent to Duul. He won’t stop until he’s destroyed everything.”
“You look at me with cold in your eyes,” Kāya said, “like you think I didn’t love my father. I did. I still do. He was crazy and unpredictable in all the best ways. He didn’t use his chaos to destroy, he used it to create. Art. Comedy. Science. He had ideas that broke the mold, and mankind would have been better off for them. That’s not a talent I have though. My brand of chaos is more… explodey. It’s angry, and abandoned, and it wants what’s hers.
“My father could have knocked down the empire’s walls and told the Great Mother how wrong she was about gods like us, but he didn’t. He was afraid of her. I’m not. I’m afraid of what happens if we don’t stand up to her.
“If I don’t side with Duul now, my father’s death was in vain. You couldn’t possibly understand. Your mother had all of Landondowns feeding her their souls. Your father here has Roseknob. You, a weak and inexperienced goddess founded a renegade temple without the Great Mother’s permission and yet I don’t see her striking you down for it. You’re out here doing her work. As long as your powers fit her grand design, she’ll provide for you while my kind starves.
“The goddess of primal urges, the god of losing streaks, the god of stupid questions. They all disgust the Great Mother, while you and yours are her pride and joy. I refuse to go hungry while you feast on her scraps.
“You’re wrong,” Nola said. “I’m not doing the Great Mother’s bidding. I don’t want the world she built and the rules she enforces. We all deserve a place in the pantheon, but that’s not the world Duul is building either.”
“He’s already started growing his next generation,” Kāya said. “Right this moment, women wait to give birth to Lord Duul’s children. Every woman alive will do the same or die, you included. If that doesn’t level the playing field nothing will.”
“There’s another way,” Nola said. She reached toward Kāya and placed a golden hand on her purple forearm.
Kāya shook her head in violent disagreement. She balled her fists and started to growl under her breath. She couldn’t contain herself. Literally.
“Whoops,” Kāya said as her corset top popped forward, releasing one plump breast from its clutches. “Nip slip.”
“That is the nineteenth time that nipple has escaped confinement,” Brion said. He spoke matter-of-factly, showing neither shock nor disapproval. “The rate of escape is directly proportional to the number of sweet rolls consumed.” His addled mind was a blessing around Kāya. He was impervious to the awkwardness she exuded.
Kāya adjusted the upper portion of her corset, tucking her breast back inside it. “I’m not going up a size, or giving up sweet rolls. It’s just one tiny nipple.”
“I eat a lot of sweet rolls,” I said. “My clothing fits fine.”
Kāya and Nola gave me the look. The one that says, boys have faster metabolisms, so shut up.
“At your pace of caloric usage,” Brion said, “it will take eleven more sweet rolls before the corset top is completely unreliable, resulting in double nipple escape. Another fifteen sweet rolls will render your clothing inoperable, forcing your third nipple—”
“Third?” I asked.
“Yeah,” Kāya said, “that’s the big one. Too late to keep that quiet I guess.”
“What’s not too late,” Nola said. “Is doing the right thing. Give Gowes back his temple. Call off your familiars and leave Duul. Together, we ca
n forge a new world.”
“Is that your plan?” Kāya asked. “March in here and defeat me with the power of logic and karmic balance? Leaving the only god willing to fight for my kind isn’t the right thing.
“The right thing,” Kāya continued, raising a hand against Nola’s neck, “would be to squeeze the power of premonition from your slender golden throat and secure a permanent place on Duul’s council.” Nola stood there, defiant, while Kāya’s grip tightened. “The right thing would be to dig my fingers into your soft, supple skin and — wow, it really is soft and supple. What moisturizer do you use?”
“Enough!” I yelled, stepping between them and pushing Kāya away from Nola. I held my Vile Lance across my chest, ready to counter whatever attack she or Brion threw at us.
Kāya stared at the weapon for a moment. “So, pious Nola,” she said. “What was your backup plan? To kill me? To pierce my heart with a weapon of vile ore and watch some other god inherit the gifts my father left me?” She leapt three feet into the air and stayed there, unbound by gravity or logic. “The darkness comes. I’m the one who brings it.” She floated toward the top of the metal spire.
“Kāya,” Nola yelled, “we didn’t come to kill you!”
“You should have,” Kāya shouted down at us. “We have a plan for you, golden goddess. A hell of a plan. And if you won’t let me keep Valleyvale, I’ll have Halcyon instead. Attack!”
The purple deity took hold of a thin cord that hung from the metal pole and gave it a good solid yank. She laughed and said, “A good lieutenant always keeps her soldiers in the dark.”
The metal spire began to unfold, long metal spokes fanning out from the tip of the tower’s central pole. They were connected to its peak, and as they opened toward the sky, flaps of resin-coated canvas lifted with them. My muscles tensed as I watched the tower open over our heads into something dark and sprawling that blocked out the sun.
“An umbrella?” Cindra asked. “Interesting choice of monument. I suppose chaos isn’t compatible with convention.”
