The return to the stables went well enough. She slid like a child back down to the pylon’s base, the Nexus retreating further and further away as she fell. Her friends, too, further away, their help and their wisdom now out of her reach. But she’d chosen this. Her other choice was to walk away, and that was unacceptable. She needed to either exonerate the Studdards’ of Alex’s murder, or prove they had done what the mythology said.
There wasn’t enough blood in the universe to put out the wrath she felt burbling now, ever beneath the surface. Divine blood might do it, if she could get to it fast enough. What was her alternative to wrath and Ragnar?k? Collapse into the sucking black hole of grief newly incarnate within her body? Mourn via melodramatic poetry while other people risked their lives? And what about the twelve hundred parents for the six hundred missing children? What right did she have to fold when those parents deserved the same answers she wanted?
No. She needed to go.
She crawled back to the stable door, went inside and slammed the doors shut. She couldn’t lock them and the bar was out of reach. She supposed the Archon would put it back together. She found two of the Hares saddled up, bridles in place, all four of the packs she’d helped build strapped to their backs. She guessed what was desired, took hold of the bridles, and walked out into the courtyard.
It was bustling, to put it mildly. White robes and green robes were everywhere, moving huge bags of hard tack, huge sacks of fresh fruit and vegetables, and a great deal of dried and salted meat. This was loaded onto the back of creatures who looked like a cross between oxen and, once again, rabbits. Only these did not have long, velvet soft ears, but truncated little things that reminded Hawk of a Doberman''s ears. She hoped that didn’t mean that they’d docked the poor things. She suspected they had.
She made her way through the cacophony. A few times she was stopped, as often by white robes as by green. No one here knew her. She would say “Archon said,” and then be waved off and allowed to wander. Apparently what Archons said was law. Nice, as long as they were talking about the Archon of Light. Hawk didn’t trust the other woman any further than she could throw her…and they were about to go on a trip together. Lovely.
She managed to get a green-robe to tell her where the Archons were, and she walked in the indicated direction with the Hares. The indicated pavilion had just been built with many panels of green and gold, plants running from deep green to that strange pale white, and flowers in jewel tones, each seeming to glow slightly in the blinding Temple light. There was even a fountain, which was kept in perpetual motion by a single green-robed child and a cup. The robe itself was beautiful, with many strange, alien animals embroidered into its hem. The child was too frantic, too frightened to be beautiful. Her big-eyed stare reminded Hawk of those 80s kitsch paintings of round-eyed children. They were an apparent girl-child. Down she bent, and filled her golden cup with water as hastily as she could. Then she sprang up so hard she bounced a bit, and stretched as high as she could to pour the water down the fountain. The water splashed and splashed and made the gentle babbling brook noises you’d expect from a good fountain, and as soon as the cup was empty she started again, fast as she could, so that the flow of water over the fountain, and its burbling voice, were neither interrupted.
She ducked into the pavilion with the Hares in tow, and quietly made her way to the Archon of Light, who naturally sat beside the Archon of Earth. He saw her before she was too near and waved her over. When she was part-way there, two green-robes relieved her of the Hares, though these were brought over to the Archon of Light. There was a line of twenty Hares on the Earth-side of the room. Apparently the Archon of Light was allowed two.
And Hawk felt even more terrified, because she recognized the spirit sitting in this room. It was the same dreadful ghost that showed up when two competing academics face each other across a crowded room. It was the dance she’d done often enough, the dance Henry and Em had performed until they figured out what they really wanted was to fuck each other on the nearest table. There was no mercy in this role, no bloodless release possible. The Earth Archon was showing off her wealth, her followers, and the fear she engendered within them. She’d chosen violence, and as such was a bomb waiting for a chance to explode.
And Hawk, being new and ignorant, was highly likely to set her off.
The two Archons sat with a fire-pit between them, a thing of chilling wrought iron that had little connection to the opulence in the rest of the tent. There were golden trays of grapes before it, and cuts of meat and a selection of cheeses, cakes with a thick crust of sugar on them, like they’d been candied, jam tarts that were perfect for all they’d been made in haste. There were flowers piled up, arrayed in columns, wrapped into garlands strewn throughout that tent. But the Fire-pit…there was something very wrong about it. Hawk thought of blood and seared things when she looked at it.
“Two Fleet-Hares?” The Earth-Archon was saying as Hawk knelt beside the Archon of Light. “That is the entirety of the procession you wish to offer? Two hares for my lady? And this chit, of course. Mustn’t forget her.” The green-and-gold mask tilted in her direction.
“You will forgive, of course. Tithes are down, as are the yields from our farms. We cannot support more than what we need. Even these two Hares will be a great loss to our Temple. Again, my Sister, I pray: How long are we to attend to the God?”
“As long as She requires. You know better than I than to question Her will. If She has not spoken, we wait until She speaks. And She has not spoken on this matter. I was bid only to retrieve you, that you can express to the Quartet why the Light is failing.”This novel''s true home is a different platform. Support the author by finding it there.
The Archon took up a cup of iced herbal tea—and where he got the ice, Hawk would kill to know—and sipped it without exposing a single inch of skin. Then he set the cup to the side. “The Light is failing,” He said, quite clearly, pitching his voice to the entirety of the Tent, with a childish, sing-song tone that would have been amusing in another setting. Here, Hawk called it deadly. “The Light is failing because of the Nexus. This is known.” The Archon flicked a small speck of dirt from his robes. “This has been known for two hundred years, since it appeared above us. We must bring down the Nexus—the true one—before we have a chance of restoring the Light to what it must be.” And then, in a softer voice, traveling only to Hawk and the Earth-Archon’s ears. “And that has a chance of restoring the Gods’ full power, too. Or do you truly worry over a few peasants working pathetic fields?”
The Archon of Earth lifted a cup, looked at it, then flung it down, hard, upon the table. “You care for them. And you flaunt your blessings.”
“I apologize. Do you wish me to have the girl cease with her bareface ways? Let her be Archon now, and not later?”
“Do not mock me.” Said the Earth-Archon.
“Indeed. That was beneath me. I apologize. But tell me…you know of this failing of the Divine powers, yes? You are at Her elbow. You must know.”
“I know nothing of the sort.” The Earth said.
“At least, nothing that you would share with me. Well, as I said before, we were waiting on my Acolyte with the Hares. Here they are, and here she is, and now we are ready to leave.”
“So soon? My sibling-in-service, would you waste the effort of my people?”
“What do you mean?” the Archon of Light said.
“I have ordered a fine House for the Earthmaster be built in the Courtyard of Light. Look about you and feel its magnificence.” She spread her hands, and Hawk did have to admit, it was an impressive tent. Reminded her a bit of a three-ring circus, complete with a dancing clown. “Don’t disrespect the acolytes of the Earth Temple by demanding we disrespect the House of our God.”
“Our stores cannot sustain you and ourselves. One day of fodder for you and your kin would sustain us for a week. The harvests have been poor. Our coffers are empty.”
“Your coffers are empty because you choose it. If you gathered your will and your wrath, you would extract a far better tithe from your people.”
“And then I would have no people. You cannot force a man to the yoke for more than eight hours. Elsewise they collapse.”
“And then the Temple of Light should ask my Master for more. It is to Her Husband’s glory that she keeps the Temple of Light alive. If the fodder she sends you cannot sustain it, then demand more, and care as much for the waste of flesh as you would the waste of grain.”
“I care very much for the waste of grain. Every part is valuable to us, these days.” The Archon’s mild voice undercut Earth’s more strident approach.
“Ask, I say. Demand. Stand up and shake this Temple to the foundations so you lose that dead weight. I am ashamed of what you have made of our Father God’s House, Archon. And my Master is also displeased.”
The Archon of Light simply nodded, and took another sip of tea while watching the Earth-Archon’s growing ire. “Be that as it may, our stores are empty. Unless your God wishes to grant us a true miracle, we will be out of food for any creature in three days.”
The Earth Archon glared at him, then turned to the nearest green-robe and gave orders in their common tongue. The green-robe protested. Earth spoke again, more harshly.
The Archon of Light grabbed Hawk’s arm. That was her only warning.
The green-robe protested a third time, and the Archon responded by whipping out a blade. It sat in her hand like an extension of her arm, and she had the green-robe in her grasp before he could flee…not, Hawk thought, that he would have. He kept trying to fall to his knees and likely beg for forgiveness. There was none to be had in this place. Two more green-robes stepped forward, these burly men with bare chests. Their green was tied around their waists, along with thick chains of gold and huge swords. They used neither of these, but pulled the wailing acolyte from the Earth-Archon. She barked orders that made the Light Archon wince.
“That is not necessary—” He began to say.
“What is necessary,” the Earth-Archon said, “Is that your girl be punished for making us wait two hours. What is necessary is that my people remember the grace and gratitude of our God. Her command is law, and She speaks through me. This one has doubted my words. There must be propitiation. There must be blood.”
Hawk tried to rise, but the Light Archon’s grip was like steel. He kept her seated with a hissed, “Stay down,”.
The Earth-Archon gave the order a second time, and, expressionless, the two green-robed guards began to pull the disobedient acolyte down into the fire pit. Hawk thought they couldn’t mean it, that this was all some elaborate show. They continued to force the struggling man—who was young, little more than a boy—into the edge of the wrought iron pit, and then, when his knees were hard against the hot metal and the scent of burning silk, then burning skin, filled the air. They bent him over backwards, into the flame.
His scream was incredible. So was the instant stench. She did not want to think about it, about barbeque, flesh on hot metal, meals she’d eaten that smelled the same. She looked away, then back, because this man deserved to have a witness whose judgement wasn’t drowning in religious fever. He kept screaming and writhing, and the Earth-Archon looked down at him, her mask blank and terrifying and her hands both clenched upon the knife. She waited until the man’s struggles began to slow, his screams turning soundless, and that stench growing higher. Then she plunged the knife into the man’s chest where the heart ought to be, crying Aiyiyiyiyi in a high soprano scream.
The reaction throughout the room was instantaneous. Immediately the instruments began to play, the harps, the horns, the symbols, the drums, all launching into a well-practiced tune of stunning complexity. And then a chorus of maidens began to sing,
Blessed be our God
Who was and who will always be
Blessed is She who walks in the Light
And Blessed is Her Husband who comes
He comes.
Blessed is her husband, who comes.
And then it was done. The instruments and singers were silenced with a gesture, and immediately they all sat in their places beside the twenty Fleet-Hares, the Chorus near the Archon and the altar Hawk had mistaken for a fire-pit. The body in the flames continued to burn. “Bring the Resin! Bring the roses! And a tenth of a tithe to the family. It is not their fault they produced such a fool.”