by Luke Tarzian
Alerion had a point. It had been some time since Varésh had seen Sonja. Should she return with the rest of her damned brethren, Varésh wasn't sure he would be able to hold her off, let alone all them, however many the rusalks numbered.
He hissed at a sharp pain in his ears and it nearly made him double over.
“Are you all right?” Alerion asked.
"Her song..." Varésh hissed. "Such pain. I...can feel it, feel her." He pressed himself to straighten up and looked about Banerowos. Its tallest spire still stood sadly, if not proudly in the center. That was where he would find Mirkvahíl.
Or whatever thing is mimicking her song. The thought raised goosepimples on the back of Varésh's neck. Until now he hadn't considered the possibility this song he'd been hearing for some time might not actually be Mirkvahíl but something else. Something...malevolent or vengeful. Luminíl, perhaps.
“The only way to know for certain is to climb,” Alerion said.
Varésh nodded.
They pushed on.
What have I done…?
Trees.
So many trees.
Leering, laughing, knowing.
...Gods, what have I done?
Her heart beats yet. My beloved Luminíl.
Gods...what have I done?
...Shut up. Just shut up!
...Trees. Whispering to me. "What a way to end the world, with false hope in a false god."
They know. They all know.
...But what?
What
do
they
know?
Varésh blinked. He stood in the anteroom of the spire, mind swirling, buzzing with a frantic memory that...wasn't his.
"Did...you see that, hear that?" he asked Alerion.
Alerion nodded. “Energy runs amok here. Threads and fragments of the past. The destruction of Banerowos, the conflict between Mirkvahíl and Luminíl left pockets to the illum network open. Illum can, to those who possess the innate talent, provide glimpses into memory, into time itself.”
Varésh was aware of illum's capabilities. "That memory..."
“Mirkvahíl’s." Alerion's expression softened, saddened. “This tower holds great sorrow.”
Varésh didn't need the memories of someone else to tell him that. He had been party to much of what had transpired in this place. So much judgment. So much death. So much arrogance and ignorance.
They ascended, the occasional snap of memory assaulting them, though not enough to disorient Varésh as badly as Mirkvahíl's had. What further bits and pieces of that moment in time would he be witness to? His curiosity came partly from simply wanting to peek into the head of a goddess, but mostly it was born of fear. The fear of seeing what he might have driven Mirkvahíl to. Guilt—
Luminíl rages in her cage. This...this is for the best.
Right?
"The guilt will always call you back," she hisses. "No matter what you do, Mirkvahíl, it will always call you back. Hell is a place of one's own making and you've just dug your way into the first circle!"
Tears stream from her eyes, swimming in rivulets through the black cracks in her ashen flesh.
Gods, what have I done?
It was necessary.
You were...compromised. You would have killed them all.
You should still kill them all.
I look at the acolytes. I wonder
if they know
how absolutely sane I am.
Stop it!
I had to …
alter memories…
Everyone…
Rewrite history…
I had to
take
my Luminíl.
Her form.
Her power.
Had
to…
Dying.
...am the Vulture.
Always.
Varésh sat for a time, dazed. Horrified, even.
"Did you know?" he asked Alerion.
Alerion shook his head. Varésh had never seen the Raven god shocked but there he was, wide-eyed and trembling. Trembling still, an hour or so after the memory had left them.
"I...don't understand," Varésh said, trying to comprehend the madness he'd been witness to. "Mirkvahíl is...—was?—the true Vulture goddess, and Luminíl was the Phoenix?" He massaged his forehead, then rubbed the space between his eyes.
“It should have been Mirkvahíl inside the cage,” Alerion said. “For so many reasons.”
His form dissolved, leaving Varésh to his own devices in the ruined spire.
Am I to blame for this? He had no recollection, had seen nothing to suggest he had swayed Mirkvahíl to such an atrocity, not that he was anyone to judge.
He pressed on, finally emerging from the darkness, greeted by a cold, gray sky and a figure curled into a ball.
"Mirkvahíl." Varésh was certain of it.
Despite being—no, masquerading as the embodiment of preservation, renewal, and creation, Mirkvahíl looked closer to death than rebirth. What had happened to her? How long had she been here?
“Hell is a place of our own making,” Mirkvahíl murmured.
"I know."
Her eyes were the darkest shade of black Varésh had ever seen. He studied her, gazed past the sorrow and ruin, and realized
She is Rhona, which means Luminíl is Djen. It made sense in the way a parable should, especially given what piece of Mirkvahíl's dream Alerion had shown him several nights ago. Her conversation with Varésh in his home.
Mirkvahíl gripped his arm and pulled herself upright. “Hell is a place of lies, a thing we dream to escape our deepest fear. But the truth is never far behind; the guilt will always call us back.”
She looked at Varésh, tears streaming down her cheeks. Did she recognize him as the lie he was or did she think him Alerion?
“I should never have... I should have died. It should have been absolute. My Luminíl…"
Varésh knew how that felt. He had condemned Sonja to her end. Gods, what a pair he and Mirkvahíl were. Two vultures playing at gods. What a way to end the world, with false hope in false gods...
“I wish I had stayed dead,” Mirkvahíl said. “It would be the very least I deserve. So much death...on my hands.” She coughed, spitting blood. “I wish…I wish I would stay dead this time.”
Varésh took her hands in his. "Our hands, Mirkvahíl." He paused. "But we are here, and...there is a chance to set things right, but it will not be easy by any means."
“What do...you mean?”
He cradled the false Phoenix in his lap. She was beginning to fade, her body turning to ash. "Luminíl runs wild. Her entropic power is unbounded by our doing and I know not whether she is in control of the mirkúr; she may be a slave to herself. For now the best thing we can do is temper the entropy, keep it from wholly devouring Harthe."
Mirkvahíl groaned. “And how will you—we—do that…?"
"The past informs the present. I have begun to sow the seeds," Varésh said. "In a place far from this ruin and decay. They are an incipient race, but in time they will help us right our wrongs. They will help us reshape Harthe. Will you help me, Mirkvahíl? Will you take this chance at reclamation with me?"
She was silent a while. As the minutes passed, as she waned, Varésh was increasingly sure she would leave him without an answer. But she did not.
“Without preservation, entropy erodes,” murmured Mirkvahíl. “A...world will only survive...if there is balance.” She looked Varésh in the eyes and it was like being addressed by a gathering storm. “We will rebuild. We will rectify. We will reshape. But for now…”
She closed her eyes. “With every life, another name. With every life, a memory…entombed."
Mirkvahíl fell to ash, leaving only a brilliant white-gold feather in her wake. Varésh took it lightly in his hand, gazing out across the ruin they had made. "Who," he wondered of the false Phoenix, "will you be when next we meet?"
When would they meet?
Varésh heaved a sigh.
Snow fell,
and the world
was
still.
Acknowledgments
This was not an easy book to write. Regardless of its length, The World Maker Parable was a constant source of frustration early on. I had the idea, but I was struggling to bring it to fruition. I did, eventually. I’m very proud of this story, and I’m extremely grateful for the friends who helped me see this book to completion.
Clayton Snyder, Angela Boord, Krystle Matar, Justine Bergman, Queen Timy the Terrible, Bjørn Larssen, & Nick Borrelli, I applaud and thank you for keeping me relatively sane.
Angela and Krystle, thank you both for beta reading this story and providing me with fantastic feedback. You both helped me make this book better.
Thank you to my wife, Jenny, and our little girls, Celia and Naomi, to whom this book is dedicated. You make me a better person every day.
Lastly, thank you to anyone who reads this book. You make writing these weird stories worth it.
About the Author
Fantasy Author. Long Doggo Enthusiast. Snoot Booper. Shouter of Profanities. Drinker of Whiskey. These are all titles. Luke is the Khaleesi nobody wanted and the one they certainly didn’t deserve, but here we are, friendos… He lives in Pasadena, California with his wife and their twin daughters. Somehow, they tolerate him.