by Eric Vall
“That I am,” I confirmed with a bow of my head, and she stared at me with eyes that struggled to focus.
“How sad … you were destined to do great things, your holy sigil prophesied it, but here you are, in the nexus of another fallen god and forced to watch her die.” The Dáma’s hands found Morrigan’s, and the elven woman’s dark eyes widened in surprise. The white-haired woman held tightly onto the goddess as she averted her eyes, and for a second, I thought I could spy tears there. “It was probably that little bastard of a brother who got you cast out, wasn’t it?”
I didn’t want to speak on this, not in front of my minions, but felt I needed to since my and the Tichádáma’s stories were oddly similar. “Yes, Otia was the one who brought it to the council.”
“At least they spared you some pain by keeping you out of the council when they called you out,” the goddess whispered as she lay back and lifted the ring above her head to look at its changing colors. “It was not your brother who wheeled out my shame and bared it for all to see, but instead … your mother.”
“Then when I reach the heavens and lay waste to them all,” I began, “I will exact revenge for the both of us, you and I.”
“Thank you,” she muttered as she closed her eyes, and I knew her time was drawing near from the way her chest rose and fell rapidly. She held out the ring to me, and I stared down at her in surprise. “Take it, Dark One, wear it on your left index finger, and it will make you the lord of all of Machstein. I will not need it where I am going.”
I gently took the ring from her fingers and examined its intricate surface, the beautiful emerald green that worked around and contrasted against the icy silver. The sigil in the middle of the ring was the same swirl we had seen carved into the trees, and I stared down at it for a few passing seconds then slipped it onto the finger she specified. The Tichádáma’s hand that was wrapped around Morrigan’s tightened as she gathered her strength to speak once more.
“My name is not the Tichádáma … ” the divine being whispered into the air as more blood spilled from the wound on her chest. Her robes were torn and singed where Tuzakeur’s dark power had exited her body. She coughed heartily, and blood smattered and stained those white robes, and it seemed sickly appropriate in the current situation, the unsoiled goddess being broken and destroyed by those around her. The goddess’s eyes opened, and she stared me down with feverish intensity.
“Holy names are important and should not be forgotten, no matter what evil deeds come from their hands. Before I fell to Machstein and before the people here chose to call me the Tichádáma, I was named Mizu no on'na,” she said firmly, almost pleading as she continued. “Please, remember my name. I don’t wish to be a deity lost to time like the others who have fallen before me.”
The Tichádáma’s hand then fell limply away from Morrigan and down to the cold, stone ground. The elven woman gasped and covered her mouth as tears spilled down her colorless cheeks. A single last breath whispered up the goddess’s throat then her chest stopped moving, and she was gone. The goddess who Haruhi and the people of Kanashimi respected and loved so much died in the arms of my minions.
I felt a pang of regret and pain that I had been unable to assist the goddess into the arms of death peacefully, but she fought hard against Tuzakeur and kept him from hurting Rana. The silence that enveloped us was deafening and only broken by the sound of sloshing water as the fin of the enormous shark broke the water while it swam around the confines of the pool.
The rolling sage eye of the human-souled creature broke the surface once, and Annalise watched it dolefully. Though the high queen’s own eyes were red and puffy around the corners, I could tell she willed herself not to cry. Carmedy used a stray piece of fabric to wipe the blood from the goddess’s smooth face as she sobbed. Her paws shook, but she moved purposefully and tenderly to make sure the Tichádáma’s face was completely clear of the specks of red.
“Master?” Rana squeaked in a high pitch voice that told me she too, like my wife, was holding in tears.
“Yes, my love?” I answered in a soft, comforting voice.
“What does ‘Mizu no on’na’ mean in the god’s language?” the redhead asked as she petted the deity’s ruffled dark hair into place around her serene face.
“That name means, ‘Lady of Water,’” I told them, and all of my minion’s eyes stayed hard on the still body of the goddess. “I must admit, I too am sad to see her die. I believe she was the last deity on this earth who wanted nothing and gave everything to her people out of the kindness of her heart. She was a true goddess, not like the others we have encountered. We’ve encountered many gods who hated human existences, one who mutilated them and created puppets, and others who were overjoyed to trap and torture them in their dungeons for sport, but the Tichádáma was not one of them.”
“I was unable to apologize to her for my actions,” Morrigan started, and the elven woman leaned down and cupped the Tichádáma’s face in her delicate hands. “My actions were unfounded, and I am truly sorry, sorry we were unable to let you rest peacefully the way you wanted. I swear upon my honor we will find and slay Tuzakeur in your honor.”
“And when I tear down the heavens,” I added as I stared down at the beautiful being on the floor below me, “I will do it in your name.”
We stayed with her for awhile while my minions cleaned her up, and finally, once they had finished, I rose to my feet and lifted the goddess’s body in my arms. Right as I did, an orb similar to the ones she used while placing the souls into the empty shells of the animals lifted up out of her body and turned in the air for a moment. All of my minions stared at it with wide eyes as the orb pressed into my chest and was gone.
The sudden wave of power was something I was used to, but for a second, the sadness in my heart deepened, and then it was gone. The Tichádáma’s power was immense, and I let it settle within me for a few passing moments. I felt it spread outward from my chest out until it reached my fingertips and the tips of my toes in their heavy boots.
I glanced down at the goddess I held tightly in my arms and was thankful for all the gifts she had given not only me but my minions. She was as stunning in death as she was in life, and I knew the people of Kanashimi would be devastated once I brought her body and laid it to rest on the front steps of Akuno’s home. Their leader was dead, and now their god was too, and soon all of them would know Kanashimi would be under my control.
I let my minions move on ahead of me, and they huddled together and comforted each other with soft words. Though I knew the death of the goddess hurt them, she would have died in the end anyway, but it was not the way she would have wanted. I glanced back at the rippling water and the huge fin that glided over the surface like a warning.
Then, suddenly, with a thrash of its tail, the shark dived down and left the underground cave for the first time since being created by his lover. I felt it in my heart that the soul of the murdered man trapped inside the hulking beast sensed the absence of the goddess he once loved. He could not remember her, but he had chosen to stay by her side this entire time, and now that she was gone, there was no reason to remain.
I turned my back on the now empty nexus and my minions, and I headed for the city of Kanashimi with the corpse of their beloved goddess in my arms. The town was now mine, a final parting gift from the last true goddess.
Chapter Twenty
The trek down the mountain was slow, and the sun was just starting to rise as I carried the corpse of the Tichádáma. The sky was bruised purples and blues as I looked down at the still face of the goddess. This was probably the first sunrise she had seen in thousands of years, and she couldn’t open her eyes to witness its beauty. My minions, though quiet and solemn, took it upon themselves to wander the fields that surrounded the path and collect wildflowers.
The Tichádáma’s robes were stained from the wound she received from the sorcerer, but even in the end, she had been as graceful and benevolent as we had been told. I li
fted my eyes and glared down at the city of Kanashimi just as the streets started to bustle with the liveliness of its citizens. I wanted them to see this, wanted to show them what they had done to the goddess they thought they had been offering up gifts to. The townsfolk may not have been the ones who killed her, but they were the ones who made the goddess want to renounce her powers and slip into death without protest.
We entered the city with our heads held high as our boots crunched against the heavy cobblestones. My women flanked me and carried their bouquets of handpicked flowers in front of them. To my left, Carmedy was sniffling and wiped at her eyes with the sleeve of her coat multiple times. Beside her, Annalise’s expression was hard, but from the redness around her eyes, I knew she was fighting off the emotion as best she could. On my right, Morrigan held Rana’s paw tightly, and I couldn’t tell which was more upset by the goddess’s death. Fea and Macha cut through the air above us in tight circles, their beaks open and sending loud caws into the air to alert the townspeople something significant was happening.
People in the streets stopped and turned to stare as we passed, and then the realization passed over their faces as they saw who I was carrying. Loud screams were heard as the news spread throughout the city, and soon, hordes of people followed after us. Our silence only raised more questions as they hurled them at our backs, but we kept our quiet as we headed for the heart of the city. I knew exactly where to lay the goddess to rest so that she could be seen by all of Kanashimi.
We reached the center of the city and a magnificent stone statue of the dead goddess I now held in my arms. It was a gorgeous rendition of the goddess, though it paled in comparison to the woman I carried. It stood on a massive marble base with a detailed inscription of the goddess’s name. With one large step, I lifted myself and the body of the Tichádáma onto the foundation of the statue, and for a second, I started up into the doe-like eyes of the statue. It was tall, just like the goddess was in life, and her long-fingered hands were outstretched as if offering something to the town. I lifted the Tichádáma’s body and placed it gently into the arms of her effigy. Then I folded her hands across her chest almost like in prayer, like the way she bowed respectfully to me once before.
With tears in their eyes, my minions offered up the bouquets of bright flowers and subtle baby’s breath held together with stems of other flowers. I took them gently from each woman and placed them around the goddess as if she was laying in a bed of flowers instead of in the hands of a cold, lifeless stone statue. Carmedy held up her hand to me, and I helped her up onto the base next to me. With tender paws, she stroked the Dáma’s silky black hair into place and, for a moment, let her emerald eyes wander over the goddess. I reached out a hand and pulled the feline to my side, and then I enclosed her in my arms as tears began to trickle from her eyes.
“Master, I know she would have died in the end anyway,” the cat-girl sniffled into my hard chest as she took comfort in my embrace. “But this isn’t how she wanted it. She wanted to give up her powers and slip away silently.”
“It is a travesty we were not able to give her the proper death she wished for,” I intoned. “We have Tuzakeur to blame for that, and when we find him and exact our revenge for the goddess’s and Rana’s sake, he will endure the most painful death imaginable.”
“You’ve known for a very long time I’m a pacifist,” the alchemist confessed. “I don’t like violence, and I don’t like when good people die, but when he hit her … when he gave her that fatal blow … Master, he’s a real meanie. I want to see him bleed, I want him to crawl belly-down in the dirt before we strip him of his soul. I want Tuzakeur dead.”
I raised my eyebrows as I stared down in surprise at my feline companion. We all knew how Carmedy abhorred fighting and bloodshed because it was against the beliefs of the Canartian people, so to hear such words come from her mouth was a shock to me. Maybe it was because she had spent so much time in the presence of a vengeful god, but the cat-girl’s softness was becoming hardened to the outside world. Her innocence had been one of the things I liked best about her when we first met, but from the sound of it, it was waning just like the goddess without the moon.
Still, what was more likely the case was that Carmedy was tired of sitting idly by while her friends were hurt and killed around her. This was not a loss of her goodness, but a maturation from a soft-eyed kitten into the lioness who protects her pride. If that were the case, then I would train her to become an astute warrior and to not rely so much on her potions and concoctions when fighting, if she wished to do so.
Carmedy pulled away from me with a comforted sigh before she hopped down from the statue’s base, and I followed after her. I waited for the entire town to appear, and as they did, they crowded around the figure to see the goddess they had worshipped for thousands of years. I watched each of their faces as they huddled around the goddess. Each heart was beating quickly and soon, wails of pain and sadness rose into the air almost like bell tolls. The time of the Tichádáma had come and gone, and they missed it while they were asleep, tucked away in their beds without even knowing. I almost felt bad for these people, they truly loved the goddess, but their worship and rituals had turned the Dáma against them in the end.
I spied Popī in the crowd as she elbowed her way to the front, and when she tumbled out to her knees in front of the statue and stared up at the body it held, her dark eyes glistened with tears. The teenager brought up her hands in front of her, pressed them palm to palm, and prayed softly as tears fell from her cheeks to the dirt. The young girl was no longer clothed in the festival wear we met her in, and now she wore a plain green dress with a white apron over it, stained and smeared with mud. Shida, who pulled a concerned looking Yuri after him, broke through the horde and pointed a finger in the middle of my chest.
“Did you do this?” Shida shouted for all to hear. “Did you slay our goddess?”
“Nay,” I said as I raised my hands in front of me to show no ill will, and the crowd went silent in front of my commanding presence. “Your goddess, the Tichádáma, fought against the great sorcerer, Tuzakeur, and was sadly wounded badly enough to take her life.”
“It can’t be true!” Popī shrieked as she tumbled forward and tried to run to the statue of the goddess, but her father held her back with one strong arm. “She can’t be dead! What will happen to us now that she’s gone?”
“Where is Akuno?” a man shouted from the crowd as he searched for the squat leader in their midst. “We must consult our Lord in these times of panic!”
“Akuno is dead,” I informed them as I rose to my full height. “He was slain by the High Queen. He was a traitor to the land of Tamarisch and was working in secret with Tuzakeur, who is an enemy to all lands under the Tamarischian rule.”
“We aren’t under Tamarischian rule! Machstein is a sovereignty!” a chubby woman yelled from the crowd with ruddy cheeks.
“You are now,” I said as I lowered my hands beside me palms out, and all the citizens of Kanashimi stared at me in shock. “I am the new lord of all of Machstein, Eifersucht included.”
“That’s not true,” Yuri shook her head with a confused look as she stepped closer to me. “Akuno is … or was … our Lord. He holds the sigil ring of the Tichádáma.”
“Ah, yes.” I nodded as I raised my left hand and showed them the very ring she was speaking about on my index finger. “I hold the sigil ring of the Tichádáma, bestowed to me upon her deathbed. You see, the goddess was not pleased with the offerings and rituals held by the lineage of the man named Yoi. She was displeased with the human and animal sacrifices the leader was making people do, and when she gave the word to one man, her lover Klaus, to tell the council of her displeasure, they, in turn, sacrificed him to the goddess. This has been going on for thousands of years, and it ends now. With the goddess gone and your leader dead, that makes me your one and only god and master.”
Whispers rippled through the mass of people, and I allowed them this moment to co
ntemplate this new information. Yuri stared at me, but her dark eyes didn’t look at me with malice or disgust. The pregnant woman’s face cleared as she pressed a hand to her swollen belly and bowed to me. She was the first, and beside her, Shida gave her a confused look, and when she straightened and spoke, her voice was clear and decisive.
“He is the High King, and he holds the sigil ring,” Yuri declared. “When the fighting broke out between Tintagal and Tamarisch, the city as a whole decided to side with Tamarisch, did we not? Akuno was the only one who opposed, and I’m not the least bit surprised that little runt was burrowing deeper in the leaders of Tintagal’s pockets.” The short woman nodded, and Shida’s mouth dropped open then snapped shut as realization dawned in his eyes.
“My Lord,” the tall man said as he lowered himself into a bow, and I smiled at him as he rose back up. Popī, who still knelt in the dirt, lowered herself even farther to the ground in a proper bow like she had done a few days before to Annalise.
I observed all of the townspeople as they spoke in murmurs to each other for a few moments, then they too lowered themselves down to the ground and bowed to me respectfully. Rana gasped at the rows and rows of people bowing before me, and I outstretched my hands into the air to honor their fealty.
My power and control over countries was growing, and the island of Machstein was yet another added to my collection with many more to come. The townspeople slowly rose to their feet and regarded me with admiration. A few clapped and cheered as they rejoiced in no longer being under Akuno’s rule. It seemed my minions and I were not the only one who had detested the weasel of a man, and the citizens were elated to be rid of him.
After the townspeople got over the shock of being under the new rule of another man, my minions and I stepped off to the side to observe them as they mourned the loss of their beloved goddess. Popī stayed at the base of the statue for most of the morning and sobbed loudly. Yuri hung over her shoulder and soothingly rubbed her daughter’s back while she whispered soft, comforting words to the teenager. Thousands of citizens came forward with flowers and other small offerings to place them at the base of the statue to the Tichádáma. We stayed like this almost until afternoon, and soon, the statue was obscured by offerings and boughs of flowers, but the Dáma’s corpse remained untouched except for the few bouquets my minions had left.