Sorry, I couldn't quite finish my chapter of LOTR today. Too cold and dreary and weary with work. Accept instead this little tale I never quite completed, but which popped into my memory today.
THE GODS IN FLIGHT
Val-Tamri, Lord of the Seven
Isles, Master of the Heavens and Father of All Men, looked down in vexation at
the scroll he held in one hand and twiddled the ink brush in the other, his
eyes almost crossed and his tongue between his teeth. There were necessary
changes to be made to the Rite of Harvest, now that his daughter had married an
Ascended Mortal and the new god was taking his place in the sacramental
pageant. Usually Balianat, the Weaver of Words, Sweet Songster of the Gods,
would have taken care of a job like this, but he was unfortunately making his
yearly sojourn through the Underworld and wasn't due home for a couple of
months. Val-Tamri wondered idly what sort of souvenirs he would bring back this
time, and beat his ivory pate over choosing the epithets that could be safely
applied to his newly-acquired son-in-law.
At the moment he wanted to call
him the Thistle in the Heavenly Garden, Stench in the Nostrils of the Great
Host, Pain in the Most Exalted Posterior, but that would have not have redounded
much to the credit of the pantheon. It was a regrettable part of the Path of
the Gods that every now and then the mortals below developed some fresh
refinement of civilization, that one of their numbers through some
super-excellence of talent came to embody that refinement, and that that human
then Ascended to the Divine Palace to begin their new career.
And this Palniki, turning up after
his mortal cremation with the smell of ash and burning still on him, had no
sooner arrived than Melandria, the Prompter, the Urgent, had set her cap for
him, as she did for any new creature of the male sex that crossed her path,
promptly disavowing her last husband, Korda the Warlike, who, as she put it,
had not really paid her any attention for the last half-millenium, anyway.
Korda, who had been growing rather tame and thoughtful in the extended
centuries of peace the Isles had been enjoying, let her go with scarce a
murmur.
None of which Val-Tamri gave a
rotten calf oblation about, except that it came at a poor time, and imposed
upon his tranquility. He tapped his teeth with the handle of the brush, rattled
the paper of the scroll to smooth it out, and finally cast both to the silver
table at his feet. In the far fields near the slopes of the mountains,
shepherds looked up at the clear blue sky and wondered if it was going to rain.
"Summon this Palniki to my
presence," the Father of Gods and Men grumbled sourly. "After all,
he's some kind of scribe, isn't he? Maybe he can give me a few suggestions. And
indeed, he needs to begin earning his keep around here sometime! I suppose I
might as well take a look at him now as later at the wedding." He
shuddered. "But these new Gods are always so raw!"
"I am glad you are finally
condescending to meet him, my dear," said his wife, Jadea, Holy Consort
and Mother of the Starry Host, as one of the many talking falcons that
surrounded the Throne sped off with the message on rainbow wings.
"Melandria has been so anxious for your approval!"
"I don't see why," he
said, laying down the smudgy scroll with distaste and shooting his silken
sleeves once more to their full length. "She never asks my opinions about
her other amours, and at her age she certainly no longer needs my advice about
her domestic arrangements. And if her own husband no longer deems her worthy to
hold onto ...!" He left the thought hanging in the sweet-scented air.
"Yes, poor Korda. He's been
so moody of late. I'm sure the brain of the Drinker of Blood and the Right Arm
of Might was not made to have so much time to think about things. Perhaps we
could prompt the Emperor's heart to go on a raiding expedition or a punitive
visit to the Far Provinces or something ... but shh! Here they are!"
The lower doors of the Chamber of
Presence, the ones made only of golden bars set with cinnabar, swung open, and
Vel-Tamri hooded his eyes as his daughter and her new consort approached. The
upper doors of adamant and iridium (which metal the mortals below had not even
discovered yet) were set wide open to catch the pleasing odors of the morning
sacrifices, but even these scents were not strong enough, to his mind, to
completely drown out the erst-while mortal's scorched odor. It brought back
displeasing nursery memories of long ago when he was a simple mountain god just
starting his pantheon.
Melandria was as buxom as ever,
if anything even more rosy with renewed delight, as she hung onto the newly
deified Paliki's skinny arm and guided him up to the Throne. Although he had
been clothed in the chiton of surpassing brilliance that was the generally
agreed-upon garment of the gods, no-one could say he wore it yet with any ease,
and his figure underneath was less than celestial, with scrawny legs and a most
undignified pot belly. The irritated Master of the Heavens could tell from the
way he peered near-sightedly around the Chamber, taking careful steps up the
Crystal Approach and nervously clutching his stylus and wax tablet (symbols of
his divine function), that the fellow had not quite grasped that he was beyond
mortal frailities and had to get out of these bad habits which he should have
left behind with his old body.
The pair came closer, and
Melandria stopped on the fifth stair and bowed, head covered, as the protocol
of the occasion demanded. "My father," she said, hardly surpressing
her giggles, "I present for your overlooking my new husband and your
latest vassel, Nikky ... I beg you pardon, Palniki!"
Deprived of her guiding hand the
scrawny fellow stumbled blindly forward, tripping on the fourth stair, but
somehow managed to turn the fall into a humble prostration at the last moment.
"Oh, Father of Gods and
Men," he began breathlessly, in what was obviously a well-rehearsed
speech. "Lord of the Seven Isles and Master of Heaven, I humbly present
myself and beseech thee..."
"Never mind that,"
Vel-Tamri said, waving the complements away with an impatient hand. "What
rhymes with 'width'?"
Paliki looked up at the the
Father of Gods, taken off balance, his face screwed into an expression of
startled surprise.
"Biddeth?" he suggested
at last, timidly.
Vel-Tamri looked at him
wordlessly, eyes inscrutable, then snatched up the scroll again and began
reading it almost silently under his breath. He reached a certain point in the
ritual and improvised a line aloud, "... if you do as he bidd'th." He
rolled it around in his head a few times, then clucked his tongue in an
unsatisfied manner. "I suppose it will do for the nonce, if spoken with
enough force." He took up the brush and started inserting a note.
"You are really causing us some bother up here," he said grimly.
"First an apotheosis, and now a wedding, right on its heels! Too bad it
couldn't have waited until the spring. That's the proper season for this sort
of thing."
"Believe me, O Constrainer
of Fate, if I could have put off the final Destiny of Dust and waited another
fifty years, I would. The Red Gripe is not a pleasant way to part from life
when one has not yet tasted the pleasures of earth for even thirty summers."
Vel-Tamri raised his head from
the scroll, thunder gathering on his brow.
"Not even for the eternal
felicity of the Divine Palace and the hand of a goddess?"
"No, no, that's not what I
meant at all!" the other hastily explained. "But when I was dying,
you know, I had no idea that this was to be my ultimate destiny. Even the best
placement in the Underworld is described as rather thin fare after the
red-blooded pastimes of the Middle Plain. Not that I ever had much chance to
enjoy them," he added bitterly. He raised his eyes to his
soon-to-be Heavenly Father-in-law.
"I beg your pardon, Dread
Lord, but I am still most surprised to find myself here. Personally, I hold my
Uncle Yorwelq responsible for my deification. It was he that sacrificed my
young life to my career. That man would do anything to see that our family gets
on, and getting me promoted into Heaven smacks of his devious statecraft and a
nepotism unparalleled."
Vel-Tamri's countenance
brightened. "Would you like me to blast him with a lightning bolt or two?
I have some just at hand, and it would go far to relieve tensions that I must
confess have been building up for a while now ... "
"Oh, no, Dread Lord!"
Palniki squeaked in alarm. "Uncle Yorwelq, while being the most greedy and
ambitious of men, is, at the present time, the sole support of my widowed
mother. And, while I am sure his machinations never accounted for it, he has
brought me to the supreme happiness I have found with my beloved Melly!"
He reached back and grasped the
slender hand of the Goddess of Love and they exchanged the soppiest look of
affection that Vel-Tamri had ever been sickened by in his extended reign. He
looked over at his wife to share a murmured word of sarcasm, but was checked by
an echoing expression of gormless delight on the Consort of Heaven's doting
face. His mouth snapped shut.
Vel-Tamri had wed Jadrea when his
victorious people absorbed the matriarchal society of Third Island, and then
she had produced Melandria as his first-born child. Thus marriage had entered
the Divine Palace before love, but he could not deny the overwhelming effect
both had had on his Eternal Nature. The realization came to him, and not for
the first time, that he had been conquered more completely than Third Island
had ever been. He would tolerate anything that would make these two happy, and
right now that meant this pestiferous Palniki.
"Well, we shall let that
pass for now. Though you may wish to leave a note with Gak, Judge of the Dead,
just to be sure. What concerns us at the moment are your epithets and
addresses, titles and attributes." Vel-Tamri shifted wearily on his seat
and drew another piece of parchment from out of the air. "Tell me, by what
names and titles were you called when you lived on the Middle Plain?"
Palniki smiled wryly.
"The names I heard mostly
were Counter of Beans and Picker of Nits," he said. "There were not
many honorifics applied to my person in the pursuit of my duties, neither from
those above me or those below. What I did hear from all, hardly ever as a
compliment, was the scrupulosity of my application of the laws and regulations,
the tariffs and the abatements. The dukes and reeves always wanted to get a
little more, the peasants to give a little less, and were willing to offer me a
little something to grease the wheels. But I never took anything, from high or
low."
"I suppose your rectitude of
your standards has now been recognized," observed Vel-Tamri. "That is
seldom the case of any mortal's pursuits, even looking backwards. May I suggest
'the Inexorable, the Just' as titles? And, er -- just what exactly are you
supposed to be the god of, anyway? You're a scribe of some kind, I think?"
Palniki's looked at his
betrothed's face in dismay and amazement. He had been under the impression that
the Father of Gods and Men kept a closer eye on the minutia of life both below
and above than he had obviously been caring to. Melandria squeezed his arm in
encouragement and nodded her head. He swallowed and began trying to explain.
He spoke for almost ten minutes.
Vel-Tamri's face grew darker and
darker as Palniki talked.
"A bureaucrat? Middle
management?" he said finally, scowling, as if tasting the unfamiliar words
on a disapproving tongue. "Is this what is deemed worthy of godhood these
days? Love, War, Poetry, the Land -- and Book-keeping?"
For a moment Palniki withered
under the words, but a hand on his back made him glance behind. Under
Melandria's loving look he stood up straighter as he turned back to the Master
of Heaven.
"With all due respect, Great
Lord, I am afraid it must be. For what is a God but the highest standard to
which human endeavor must be held? Love must not be lust, War must not be mere
brutality, Poetry must not be simply self-praise, the Land must be held holy
and not a cupboard from which one can take and take and not restock. The
interweavings of mankind have grown so complex now that the give and take by
which a kingdom thrives must be tended like a garden, lest it wither. And these
gardeners must be held to a high standard; otherwise, they might turn into
plunderers -- how well I know the type! -- or grow cold and indifferent in
their office. This thing, this endeavor, has arisen. If it has no God -- no
standard -- to guide it, it will continue to grow, heedless and headless. If it
has no God, it will be a monster."
Vel-Tamri gazed at him in silence
for a moment. The erstwhile mortal had seemed to grow a little taller in his
eyes while he spoke, to fill out the shining robe of the chiton somewhat
better. Finally he spoke.
"It is not without reason
that I titled you the Just." He sighed. "Very well, then," he
said grudgingly, "The God of Bureaucrats, the Master of Weights and
Measures. There seems to be very little blood in it, though. It is as well that
my daughter sees something in you; at least here in the beginning that might
attract adherents to your Way." He inked a few words onto the scroll in
his hand. "Now as to your part in the Rite of Harvest ... What is that
noise?"
An excited murmur that had been
growing into a babble of voices as he was speaking crested into a wave that
burst against the wall and doors of the Chamber of Presence and suddenly,
unceremoniously, the room was flooding with gods and goddesses, demigods and
spirits, all talking as fast as they could in fear, excitement, and wonder.
Vel-Tamri's rising anger at the serious lack of decorum and respect shown to
his Throne was struck cold with amazement when he saw who was leading the
route.
It was Balianat, the Weaver of
Words, Herald of Heaven, released somehow from his seasonal durance from the
unyielding jaws of the Underworld, looking even paler than his yearly lack of
sun usually made him, and walking at the head of the crowd as if in a mute
trance, his eyes apalled, his jaw slack. He seemed impelled forward up the steps
to the Throne by the force of the hurled questions of those behind him. In his
hands, instead of his ubiquitous harp, he carried a chest that was, even to the
penetration of divine eyes, there and not there, as if it were a mere concept
and at the same time more real than simple frangible matter.
Palniki took one look at
Balianat's face and shrank aside, out of his way. He had seen an expression
like that several times in his mortal life; the worst was when his mother had
come to tell him that his father had perished in an accident while inspecting
the Bolnian High Pass. He wondered what it could mean here in the felicity of
the High Halls.
Balianat took the last steps up
to the Throne and stopped before Vel-Tamri. In the long heavy cascade of his
beard his mouth twitched a moment, then opened as if he would say something,
but no words came out. This filled the Lord of Gods and Men with even more
dread that it had before, for if the Singer was struck dumb ...
"Balianat!" he said,
voice trembling under the commanding tone. "Balianat, what means this
untimely presence in the Palace of Va-Tamri? How came you from the Stone
Prison, whose Jailer lets none go ere his sentence be fulfilled? Herald of the
Gods, what bear you here before your King?" His voice suddenly broke in
appeal. "Damn it all, Bally, what the hell is going on?"
"Dread Lord ...,"
Balniat began. He swallowed. "Dread Lord ...," he started again. He
closed his eyes and bowed his head, raising high the chest, offering it to
Vel-Tamri's reluctant hands. "Take, and open," he said hollowly, as
if helplessly repeating another's order.
Vel-Tamri reached out his hands,
then hesitated. He looked out over the crowd of upraised faces that gazed up at
him wildly, silently, then steeled himself and took the thing from Balniat. It
sat there a moment, heavy in his hands. Then his thumbs probed up the unseen
side, felt the lid, and flipped it open. The world went white.
There was a Voice. It made no
sound, yet everyone heard. In seven days, the barbarians of the Neb Coastlands
would attack and utterly overwhelm the Seven Islands. Every temple would be
overthrown and desecrated, every priest that could be found slaughtered, every
holy book burned. The Gods of the Neb Coastlands would become the new gods of
the Seven Islands, and Vel-Tamri and his pantheon would be found no more. They
must withdraw to the Paradise of Paradises by the time the first foot of the
invading force stepped on the shore or face the consequences. This was Willed
where what was Willed must Be.
Then the world came back. There
was a stunned silence around the Heavenly Throne, then an unholy clamor from
the gathered throng of deities that rang across the welkin.
"I don't understand,"
said Palniki finally. All others, save Jadea, Queen of Heaven, had finally
departed the presence of the Father of Gods and Men, to prepare for their
imminent discommodation. Only the very inexperienced new deity had the
thoughtless temerity to question Vel-Tamri where he brooded on his soon-to-be
vacated throne. "I always understood you to be omnipotent."
Vel-Tamri bristled.
"I am omnipotent!" he
thundered, frowning angrily. Then he seemed to deflate. "Er, ... as long
as there is no one more powerful than I. And not only do these young invading
gods have most strong, numerous, and enthusiastic followers in their van, but,
as, you heard," and here his voice sank into a dread whisper that Palniki
could barely hear, "This has been Willed where what is Willed must
Be."
Palniki leaned in earnestly, brows
drawn.
"What do you mean?"
"You know," Vel-Tamri
hissed. He made a quick furtive gesture upward. Palniki raised his head vacantly
towards the rafters of the Divine Palace. The messenger hawks were huddled
there like doves in a stormy barn, their rainbow plumage dull with fright. He
looked down at Val-Tamri, his incomprehension palpable.
"You know. Him."
Val-Tamri said furtively. He jabbed his finger overhead violently twice again,
then quickly hid the hand in his sleeve, as if fearful of the lese majeste
it had committed. "The One Above."
"The One A...," Palniki
began, then stopped. "Can it be?" he asked wonderingly. "Do the
gods have a God over them?"
"We do not speak of
it," Vel-Tamri said, gesturing him to silence, half in anger, half in
fear. He went on in tones that the erstwhile mortal remembered his own father
using, when he had spoken about the sacred secrets of whence babies came. "It
is not comfortable speech. But yes, we arise, we wield our little scepters for
a while and god it merrily, and then comes a time in life when we realize the
truth of the matter, and it is not ... comfortable. We do not speak of it, we
try to not even think of it, but then ..." He threw up a hand in
surrender. He raised his eyes to Palniki.
"Go now. Be with Melandria.
You have a week to be a god on earth. And then, the Paradise of
Paradises." He shrugged. "We know little about it, as none have ever
returned from there. But from what is spoken, it sounds deathly dull. No
humans, no chance, no change ..." He shrugged again -- or was it a shiver?
"Leave me now. Go to my daughter. The wedding shall take place as
planned." He grimaced. "It will do double duty as a farewell party, I
suppose. Leave me."
Palniki went silently down the
steps to the Heavenly Portal. As he opened the doors he turned and looked and
saw Vel-Tamri slumped on the Throne, head bowed in his hands, and Jadea turned,
patting his back, trying, with no visible success, to comfort him.
The week that followed was wild
and restless, full of strange activity and varied reaction. Some of the
inhabitants of the Divine Palace went into a frenzy of packing, gathering up
the holy relics and sacred emblems and other hallowed furniture from their
halls and stowing them in hastily improvised arks and handcarts for the faring
forth. Sapit, God of Thieves, was considered especially fortunate at this time
because of his bottomless Sack of Acquiring. Some gods were notably absent as
they left to rove over the earth and revisit favorite spots for a final
farewell; there were groves and temples at this time perceived by mortals to be
especially numinous, and many an earthly lass felt peculiarly honored by a
celestial visit in her sleep. Some gods were struck with a great stillness, and
stood or sat, overwhelmed with horror or apathy, contemplating the change to
their existence that they had known was coming someday, but had, in their pride
of life, never truly considered. But there were two deities who seemed to take
the notice of eviction in the strangest way of all.
One of these was Korda, the
Warlike, the Drinker of Blood, the Right Arm of Might. His mansion had been a
strange hub of calm in the chaos. It was not the frozen calm of despair; there
was constant activity. But it was not the frenzied activity of preparation for
flight, either. Palniki happened to be there when he gave his explanation, for
he was accompanying his bride-to-be Melandria on a visit to her ex-spouse, about
the disposition of some common property they held and to grab a few things of
hers that she still kept in the Hall of Battle.
Vel-Tamri had gone with them, at
her request. Korda had been so odd of late these last few centuries, and with
the upcoming wedding and this new stress, there was to her mind no telling how
he might react, and it made her nervous. She felt it was just as well that
Vel-Tamri went with her, for as his leige-lord there was nothing the God of War
could do against his will.
As it was, after salutations the
iron-gray god kissed her gently on the cheek and sent her to her old
apartments, which he had locked away safely and never entered since the day of
their parting. Melandria called him an old dear and went skipping away to gather
her things, leaving Palniki and the Father of Gods politely and awkwardly
standing next to the Throne of Skulls while Korda sat thoughtfully drawing the
Sword of Lightning over the whetstone called SharpGrinder.
"So," said Vel-Tamri
after a silence. "Three more days."
The whetstone rang sliding along
the sparking sword.
"Aye," said Korda.
A silence.
"I see you haven't packed
anything up yet."
The whetstone rang sliding along
the sparking sword.
"Aye," said Korda.
A silence.
"Don't you think you'd better
start? You don't want to leave anything behind for these usurpers, do you? I
mean, there may be nothing we can do to stop them, but we shouldn't leave
anything behind that would actually help them!"
The whetstone rang sliding along
the sparking sword.
"There will be naught."
Korda's eyes were mild, but steely-blue. "On the last day, I shall kindle
the Fire of Wrath, and this stead and all its treasures will be consumed to ash
in its inexorable nature. It will be a fine light to illuminate the wedding
rites of Melandria, Goddess of Love and my once-wife." He turned to Palniki
and smiled. "Do not worry, though, little human God. It is only my Throne,
and my Hall, and my House it shall devour." He turned back. He seemed to
be gazing far away, contemplating an ancient memory. His hands stirred.
The whetstone rang sliding along
the sparking sword.
"But damn it, Korda, you
must bring something with you!" said Vel-Tamri, face creased in anger.
"Who knows what the accommodations are in the Paradise of Paradises?
Considering the peremptory nature with which all pantheons are eventually
disposed of, I cannot imagine they are too indulgent. And I for one, refuse to
share a throne with a god who smells of blood and pine-pitch!"
"That need not concern
you," said Korda. He held up the sword at eye-level and examined the edge.
"I am not going."
"What do you mean?"
"I shall remain," the
War God said. "And abide the consequences." He lowered the blade.
The whetstone rang sliding along
the sparking sword.
"Are you mad, Korda? You
know what it's like when a new pantheon moves in! If the old doesn't go, the
new slaughters them like weasels in an unguarded nest."
"Aye, I should know,"
said Korda darkly. "I've done it often enough, and at your order."
The whetstone rang sliding along
the sparking sword. Viciously.
"Then you know it's
pointless. Why put yourself through it?" Vel-Tamri put a persuading hand
on the other god's mail-clad shoulder. "Why not just come with us."
Korda raised the sword again,
eyed it and stood up.
"Because," he said,
slapping the blade into its scabbard. "Three day's hence my people,
warriors, some who have depended on me all their lives, will be facing their
doom. They will look to me for courage in the hour of their death. I cannot
save them, but I can still give them that. They shall not be slaughtered like
sheep; they shall die like men, and I ... I shall die like a god, with
them."
"But nobody knows ... "
Vel-Tamri began helplessly.
"Exactly," said Korda.
"Nobody knows what happens to a dead god. In three days hence, I shall
know." He sat back down on the Throne of Blood. He gazed far off past his
puzzled and appalled fellow deities, dismissing them from his contemplation.
"Besides," he said, almost to himself. "I do not know if any god
of such destruction as I have been merits a peaceful retirement."
At just that moment Melandria
returned with her things, and after hasty farewells the visitors left.
Melandria gave the unresponsive Korda a hug, and Vel-Tamri raised a half-hearted
salute. As they passed the threshold of the Hall, Palniki looked back to where
the grim gray god sat unmoved on his throne. During his mortal life he had
always considered every aspect of war a stupid waste. Looking back at Korda he
wondered if that were entirely true.
Outside the gate, Palniki found
that the others had hurried on. A small, bent, wizened goddess was in the
street, sweeping the pavement outside the gates. He vaguely recognized her as
one having helped Melandria rearrange her palace when he had moved in.
"Pardon me," he began
hastily. "But did you see ... ?"
"Eh, they've gone that way,
young sir," came the creaky answer, accompanied by a skinny, pointing claw
indicating the westerly side of the empyrean. "Right along toward the
Orchards o' Youth." She cackled. "Not that they'll do anyone any good
much longer." She bent back to her sweeping.
"Thank you," he said,
and had started in direction when he stopped, hesitating. "Your pardon,
grandmother," he said, "But shouldn't you be preparing to leave? Why
waste your time cleaning a place you must abandon?"
"Oh, I'm ain't going
anywhere," she said serenely.
"What! First Korda, and now
you, too? Has a suicidal mania started to spread amidst the Immortals?" he
said worriedly.
"Don't expect to die
anyways, neither," she said serenely. "Tain't my first flit nohow.
I'm Aunty Momo, I am, and I been through seven pantheons in my time."
Palniki stared at her in
disbelief.
"Have there been so many?
How -- how have you survived? I understood that the jealousy of new gods never
allows the old to endure!"
Aunty Momo leaned on her broom
and straightened her back.
"Don't have no powers
anybody could be jealous of at all, and new gods don't got nobody that does the
things I does. 'Tis all thunder and lightning and murder and screwing with
them." She laughed drily, shaking her head, and went back to her work.
"But ever'body always needs somebody to sweep up."
Palniki looked at her
incredulously for a moment then hurried on his way, not without glancing back at
the diminutive, ragged figure that scratched unconcernedly away at her labors.
It came to his fleeting mind that, among all the gods, Aunty Momo had somehow
found the secret of true immortality.
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