She shook her head, her lavender hair shining in the sunlight. “No.”
Some of the onlookers laughed awkwardly.
Lichas flicked his thumb, the fume turning to ember as he used it to light a fresh cigar. “Then I believe you may be in the wrong place, young one.”
Agaprei took a knee. “I mean no disrespect, oh great one. I only meant to answer honestly.”
He smiled, pleased at her answer. “If no offense was intended, then no offense is taken. I have heard your prayers at my shrines, what do you seek, young siren?”
“I wish to fight for the honor of serving Mónos as her champion.”
Mónos furrowed her brow, grabbing one of her cats and holding it to her tightly. “But, I have no champion. I’ve never had need of one.”
“Exactly,” Agaprei answered enthusiastically. “You value your privacy, and I totally respect that. If you had a champion, she could act in your stead, attend your festivals, collect tithes, hold public events, recruit new supporters, run errands and clean up the temple. Don’t you see? A champion would allow you to enjoy your privacy even more than you currently do.”
Mónos grabbed a second cat and became increasingly uneasy at all the eyes that were fixing upon her from around the arena.
Lichas held out his hands. “See? You needed a champion and the Fates provide one for you. Truly, this is an auspicious day.”
“But, I have no quarrel with other deities. I don’t want a champion,” Mónos whispered, reaching up to touch the brand on her neck.
“She’s a beastmen herself; who better to help you gain new followers among them than one of their own? Besides, after her, you only have ninety-nine to go.”
Mónos looked like she was about to die.
“But, can she even fight?” she asked, desperately grasping for any reason to refuse her.
“We shall see.”
Lichas blew a ring of smoke, then created a smoky dragon that flew through the ring before they both dissipated. “You may display your skills, young siren.”
The giant frothed at the mouth, pulling against its chains in anticipation of a fresh meal.
“My lords, this beast was merely meant to be the preliminaries in your tournament. As I am the only applicant for champion of Mónos, it would not be a full display of what I can do.”
“What do you suggest?”
Agaprei grinned confidently. “Unchain him.”
The crowd gasped. Many spilled their mead and drunkenly rolled to the ground.
From the pit, Kaia nearly jumped out of her seat. “What are you doing, sis? Are you crazy?”
Lichas smiled to himself. “This one’s got moxy. What do you think, niece?”
“Yes, that’s perfect,” Mónos gasped. “The giant will eat her and then I can go home.”
Lichas held up his fingers and snapped. “You may begin.”
The giant’s chains disintegrated into dust, and the great beast clamored forward on all fours, the ground shaking beneath its filthy feet and hands.
Agaprei adjusted her spectacles and countercharged, sprinting fearlessly at a creature ten times her size.
The giant swiped, its clumsy hands digging a deep channel in the soil, but Agaprei had already leapt free. She rolled beneath a fist that slammed behind her, jumped sideways clear of a kicking foot that nearly took her head off, then came to a screeching halt, the giant’s other foot stomping down right before her, shattering the ground and nearly throwing her off her feet.
Quick as thought, Agaprei drew a dagger and planted it deeply into the huge toe before her.
The giant squealed in pain, rising up far above her and blocking out the sun. It lifted its injured foot, grasping it with clumsy hands, then bellowed out in rage, stomping back down at her with frightening speed and strength.
Agaprei drew her second dagger and planted the handle into the ground as she rolled away. The giant stomped down, impaling itself on her blade.
Agaprei was thrown wild as the ground reacted like water to the impact, a shockwave of soil rising up and crashing down over her. All throughout the arena, spectators screamed and scattered, their bodies tossed about like rag dolls as the wave of dirt splashed upon them.
The giant screeched in injury, falling backwards as it clutched its foot. The shadow of the falling beast grew over a section of the stands, the people scattering and dragging their inebriated compatriots free.
The giant slammed into the stands, hundreds of tons dirt and boulders upheaving as if they weighed nothing, the sound a crack like thunder echoing off the cheimónas mountains. An explosion of dust rose up like a fountain, blocking out the sun and raining down on everyone.
Agaprei dug herself free and charged again, scaling up the beast’s flank as it stirred and kicked. As she ran across its chest, it lashed out, snatching her in its enormous hand and squeezing tightly. Agaprei strained under the pressure.
Kaia clasped her hands. “Oh, no.”
There was a sharp hissing sound and the giant flinched in pain, its fingers springing open and dropping her free, the inside of its hand burning with boils and sores.
Agaprei reached to her belt and pulled two pouches free as she sprinted, leaping up into the air as the beast swiped at her with its other hand.
For a moment she hung in the air, a ray of light breaking through the dust as she sailed graciously above the giant’s gaping foul maw.
She threw the pouches down as the beast snapped at her, catching her boot with its rotten teeth and flicking its head to the side. The leather of the boot tore free and she hit the ground hard, rolling and tumbling out of control.
The giant rolled onto its side, nearly crushing her as she sprang to her feet and leapt free; then it flipped again, its mighty fist crashing down right on top of her. Agaprei rolled to the side, and was nearly flattened by his knee as he fought to right himself.
The giant kicked at her one last time as it came to its feet, digging a channel of dirt and stone that rained down on her amid clouds of dust.
The giant stood up, its face pale and sickly as green smoke spewed from its mouth and nostrils. It tried to spit, but lost its balance, teetering this way and that, green spittle dribbling down its chin.
Even the few stalwart remaining onlookers turned and ran, unsure of which way the giant might fall.
With a final sickly burp, the giant’s eyes rolled back into its head and it collapsed, the ground shaking and rumbling as tons of bones and flesh came crashing down, vomiting a green ooze from its pale lips.
Kaia watched worriedly as the dust began to settle. A silhouette formed amid the cloud, and Agaprei walked out, cleaning off her daggers with a cloth, her right leg barefoot.
Kaia jumped up and cheered. The other candidates cheered. The audience cheered, but were far enough away at this point that their voices were mostly lost.
“Ero’s holy lance, that was the coolest thing ever!” Kaia shouted.
Lichas and Mónos sat there, slack jawed with amazement as Agaprei calmly sheathed her daggers.
“Was that a magical gift you used?” Lichas mumbled.
“Nope, just a simple compound of karreit root, hala thorns, and insea rind. Perfectly harmless to most folks, but as you can see, giants react rather violently to it. I have the antidote, but even then he’ll probably need a few days’ rest.”
“Just who are you?” Mónos asked quietly.
Agaprei’s long ears twitched happily as she tilted her head and smiled sweetly. “The name’s Agaprei Sonata, your new champion.”
Chapter Twelve
Aeneas is the steward of wisdom, god of the archives. Keeper of the halls of the past, and the summoner of visions. His great library stretches on for hundreds of miles in all directions, and even the other gods have not plumbed the depths of it. His archives exist neither in the heavens, nor in the earth below, nor in the underworld, but within their own pocket realm, protected from the ravages of war and fire, accessible only from a few sacred places kn
own to his followers. His library is among the fairest places in the world, built of rose gold and silver glass, filled with countless scribes, copying and preserving the records of the past while chained to their desks. It is said that every ill deed and thought is recorded in the halls of Aeneas, and it is prophesied that his archives will be used to judge the world at the end of time. Those who follow him can experience great and powerful visions. They can visit places long past and destroyed, for they still exist as spirits in his great library. Many are those who have stepped into his halls and never returned, so bewitched by the wealth of wisdom that they stay voluntarily, learning and discovering the wisdom of the past, wandering off into forgotten and forbidden paths, never to be seen again.
- Get to Know Your Pantheon: A Handy Guide to Avoiding Damnation. Published in Erotan 389 H.B. to present
Priestess Ophira walked into the sanctum and shooed away the construction workers.
“Hurry, the goddess is coming. You plebes, get out of here. The rest of you, look happy to see her.”
The guards straightened themselves, the priestesses grabbed their fans and plastered on their best smiles; the slaves scurried for the shadows.
Priestess Ophira tapped her slate and brought up the relevant figures she knew the goddess might want to hear. In her time working underneath Acantha, she had learned that gods and goddesses really couldn’t care less about the minutiae of running their empires, they just wanted to know what their net worth was at any given time, and their relevant schedule over the next month or so. So, as long as you had both those ready to call out at a moment’s notice, they would assume you were doing a good job.
She looked up and noticed the head guard reading an antique scroll, with gold embossed lettering in the old tongue.
“Piers, what did I tell you about stealing books from the archives?” she scolded.
He looked up, frowning. “Seriously? This is the Voyages of Tanabori. You don’t even have this in the archives.”
“Oh, whatever, just put it back and admit you got caught.”
Before he could respond, the doors were kicked in, their bronze hinges creaking in protest and nearly tearing free. Ambera floated in, bobbing and weaving drunkenly, bumping into an urn and knocking it over.
Several of the slaves scampered to catch the large, priceless object. It landed on top of them with a fleshy thud. Piers and the other guards ran over to free them, their limbs kicking out from beneath the object they had cushioned.
“It’s useless…it’s all useless,” the goddess slurred as she slumped down into her throne. “I can already feel them laughing. LAUGHING! That fat tub of lard Krasi is probably toasting my demise already.”
The priestesses flinched, forcing themselves to inch close enough to fan her and offer her trays of delights. The goddess grabbed a piece of gum with her fist, knocking chocolates and pastries off the tray. As she began to chew, she wiggled her body as if something was poking her.
“Has someone been sitting in my throne?”
“Not that I know of,” Ophira answered honestly.
Ambera sniffed. “It smells like human.”
“We’ve received another message from the Alchemy Tower,” she reported, trying to change the subject.
Ambera smacked her gum. “Ignore it.”
“That will be the third time we haven’t responded.”
“I don’t care!”
The goddess threw her head back, rubbing the deep bags forming underneath her eyes. “Eighteen millennium of scheming and colluding. And all for what? I’m going to default on my tithes and lose everything. They’ll give my job to some ambitious, upstart boot-licker. A younger goddess, a thinner goddess, a prettier goddess.”
“You are more fair and lovely than any other in the pantheon, my goddess.”
Ambera looked down and noticed her.
“You aren’t my regular human. Where is the high priestess…ah-what’s her name?
“Acantha.”
“Yeah, her. The thin one.”
“I’m her second, I’m filling in for her right now.”
“Why? Where is she?”
Acantha could feel the perspiration trickling down her back as she wore the heavy woolen fox costume. It smelled like death; it felt like living inside a sweaty armpit, and somehow a pebble had managed to work its way into the paw and it dug between her toes every time she bent forward.
“Good morning, how are you?” she bowed to an elderly couple.
“I don’t want any blasted pitas,” the man grunted back.
“That’s not what I asked, but okay.”
She pulled the wolf snout further down to hide her face. If anyone recognized her like this, she’d never be able to live it down.
“Hey sweet-cheeks, do a foxy little dance for us, will ya?” A teenager hollered out, his buddies laughing and cheering.
“I’ll come over there and pull your tongue out, you filthy turd bucket!” she screamed.
“Ahem.”
She looked over sheepishly and found the manager standing beside her.
Her shoulders slumped. Her hood fell down low, causing the ears to droop down apologetically.
“Sorry, Mr. Ransu.”
“We don’t yell at the customers. We don’t throw things at them, and we don’t kick them. We talked about this.”
“Yes, I know.”
He set down a plate of food for her and a mug of water. “In three more hours you can take a fifteen minute break.”
Acantha set down the flyers and dug into the food. The whole front of the wooden building was a garish mural of a big, goofy-eyed fox holding a tumbling stack of pitas. It was as mortifyingly clownish as she felt. Stuffing an overly-salted morsel into her mouth, she imagined all the ways she was going to get even with Storgen when she got back to the temple.
“I’m telling you it’s her,” a voice said.
“There’s no way it can be her,” responded another.
“Um, excuse me, miss?”
Acantha hesitantly turned around, her mouth stuffed with dry pita. Before her stood a pair of adult conjoined twins holding grocery bags.
“Get a free meat pie with every purchase,” she mumbled, handing out the flier. “All you can eat gyros on Saturday.”
“Well, thank you,” the one on the left said. “I’m sorry for being so forward but we heard you scream and I just had the feeling we know you from somewhere.”
Her face turned bright red. “Ah, me no speako common-o.”
The twins chuckled. “No, I’m quite sure we’ve seen you somewhere before, I just can’t place it,” the one on the right added, looking her over.
Acantha pulled the fox snout down even farther over her face and held out the flyer farther. “No, I’m pretty sure we’ve never met. In fact, I’m positive.”
The one on the left rubbed his chin. “Did we date? I feel like we may have dated at some point.”
“Her scream was very familiar,” the one on the right concurred.
“Just take the blasted flyer and move along!”
The one on the left snapped his fingers. “That’s it! You’re one of the priestesses from Ambera’s temple, aren’t you?”
Acantha drooped over and groaned, her arms hanging limply. “This isn’t happening.”
“Why are you wearing that costume?”
The one on the right gasped with excitement. “Could it be Ambera finally decided to host our idea for the costumed animal celebration?”
“Oh, the furry festival! Are you going to host it?”
“Do you want us to join you?”
“Oh, marvelous, we should go home and get our costume.”
“We absolutely should!”
The twins gave each other a high-five.
Acantha gave off a death moan. “Somebody kill me.”
Ambera burped drunkenly, her gum rolling out onto her robes. “He has Acantha working?”
“Yes, my goddess.”
Ambera’s eyes went
distant. “That’s it. That’s the solution.”
The guards all looked at one another.
“What is?” Ophira asked.
The goddess grabbed her gum and stood up, her eyes flicking as her thoughts went a mile a minute. “I’ve been trying to come up with a way for my followers to generate more ambrosia. But, that’s not the answer. They don’t need to work harder, my priestesses do.”
“I’m afraid I don’t follow.”
Ambera put her gum in her mouth and smacked confidently. “When the acquisition team leaves tomorrow to lay claim to Kólasi, you’re going with them. All the priestesses, from every province. You’ll hold a festival on Kólasi like they’ve never seen before. A weeklong celebration. A true orgy.”
The priestesses all looked at one another worriedly.
“A fertility celebration would certainly generate a lot of tribute,” Ophira began reluctantly, “but the people of Kólasi have not yet converted to our faith.”
“Oh, they will when they see what we’re offering, believe me. Nisi is as prudish as they come. Those poor saps living under her rule will have a lifetime of pent up emotion just waiting to be expressed, and we’ll reap every last bit of it. Why, I bet when we’re done they’ll have to invent a new size barrel.”
“But, my goddess, there is no festival on the holy calendar for next month.”
“So, I’ll invent one. A victory celebration for the mighty acquisition of Kólasi. That’s a good enough reason, isn’t it?”
“But…”
“I’ll even let you name it.”
Ophira scratched her cheek. “Your grace, my fellow priestesses and I have consecrated our lives to the celebration of the power of creation. The sacred union of male and female that creates new life, the holy cultivation of the land which brings forth harvest’s bounty. The glorious treasures of the womb and of the field. The veneration of family and feasting.”
“And that’s exactly what I’m asking you to do. By the Fates, you all have just one job, why are you even here if you don’t want to do it?”
“It is not what you are asking us to do, but the way that you are asking us to do it that troubles us. What you are suggesting threatens to strip away what is meant to be a deeply spiritual and transcendent experience and reduce it to little more than a monetary exchange. This feels…it feels wrong.”
Ambrosia Page 24
