Her chest seized, and she collapsed forwards, trying to breathe, as the harpies gathered around her. Out of the corner of her eyes, she could see them tilting their heads to regard her with inhuman disinterest.
And then nothing.
Sophia felt nothing as she witnessed her mother’s death. She’d seen it a hundred times before, and it had lost its power to horrify. She reached for her canteen—it wasn’t there, oh, gods, it’s today, it’s really today, and then she was gone again. Trennus Matrugena looked at Adam ben Maor. “I owed Sigrun, so I’ve been going to see Sophia in the asylum. Not anymore, though.”
“What happened?”
“She told me ‘Your beloved first son by Saraid? He’s going to be consumed by fire.’” Trennus exhaled. “Then she started biting her fingers and singing. I . . . just couldn’t, after that. There are things no father should ever have to hear. I’m done.”
Oh, gods no, not the asylum, I don't want to remember that! She tried to look away, to see anything else. There, the safe past, if it was the past . . . . a boat coming in to dock in Shiqmona, finding one of the piers that had been rebuilt after the tsunamis of 1987. Most of the wrecked ships in the harbor had long since been towed to shore where they could be taken apart for scrap. A handful had been cleaned out of all oil and human contaminants, and scuppered at sea to allow them to become new reefs. But in the main, the metal had been melted down to become automobiles or new ships. So the vessel she saw now had few detours to make around wreckage in the harbor as it advanced on the bay town, so like Burgundoi in its fashion, all steep hills as it rippled away from the sea. She could see Frittigil Chatti waiting on the pier, a light cloak thrown over her shoulders, her starshine eyes bleak as the gangplank came down, and passengers, ragged and weary, disembarked. Fritti was used to meeting Goths there, and Franks and Belgae now had become more common, as the Gauls began to find their lands impinged on by the ettin, grendels, and lindworms. The climate was cooling in the north, too, thanks to the quantities of ash in the atmosphere, which made for shorter growing seasons, and low crop yields.
She was accustomed to meeting refugees from Hellas, shocked and pale, their warm and welcoming land, long a bastion of civilization, suddenly turned into a nightmare. Most of the humans aboard those ships eyed the harpies, centaurs, minotaurs, and dryads aboard with a mix of horror, fear, and rage. “Why should they find refuge here? They're the monsters.” “I saw one of them kill my uncle . . .” “killed and ate my son . . . .” “raped my daughter and tore her to pieces . . .” ”They should all die. They’re all just monsters.”
To which the one-time humans turned their faces away, ashamed, and Fritti had to say, “For the same reason that the fenris can come here. Because they were once human in body, and now they're human again in mind, thanks to the intervention of the Lady of the Wilds, who took the madness out of them. She tries to erase the worst of the memories, but she can't take them all. Not and let them remain people. They'll bear guilt for actions not their own all their lives. And you'll bear grief all of yours. Forgive them if you can. They truly are not at fault here.”
“Then who is?”
“The universe, as far as I can tell. Don't look for a scapegoat, as the Judeans like to say. There's no good that can come out of it.”
The de facto leader of the harpies, Lorelei, was often there with Fritti to greet new refugees. Fritti wasn't sure why the woman looked at her the way she did—with interest and confusion and a hint, occasionally, of incredulity—but she respected the woman's cool, hard competence. The way she comforted the people who had become monstrous. “We have all done things that we regret. Everyone alive. Some of us have done worse things than others. Comfort yourself with the knowledge, that it was not you, but the madness, and do better now. You are fortunate in that. Some of us have done vile things, knowingly. And can only hope to repay what we owe.”
These things, Fritti was used to. But she wasn't prepared to see the Evening Star coming down the gangplank. The goddess still looked as Fritti remembered her from her long-ago dream. Clad in white doe-skin, figured with elaborate beading in turquoise and gold. Her hair was long, dark, and braided, and her eyes glimmered with the same light as Fritti's own. She carried a bow over her shoulder, and her face was sorrowful. Behind her were some two hundred and fifty people of the Chahiksichahik, recognizable by the elaborate scalp locks of the men. Simple clothing, as she well remembered. Most of the women carried children with them, and their faces were as tired and frightened as everyone else she'd seen come to Judea's shores. You have hidden from me for a long time, the goddess said, with a tinge of reproach. Baldur was told of your location when your son emerged from the shadows cast by his father, and he told me where you dwelled, as a courtesy. Why did you not come to me when you found yourself with child?
“It doesn't matter now,” Fritti answered, wearily. “I was angry with every god in existence, I think. I thought my love was false. A deception, a trick. I was angry at him. I was angry at you and at Baldur, for making me . . . what I was. And making me a target at the same time. I was angry at the Chahiksichahiks for kidnapping me in the first place. I thought I'd forgiven them . . . I thought I'd grown in understanding, from all my time with them and in the other small kingdoms.” She sighed. “But I hadn't. And when it came down to it? I didn't think that my son was any of your business, and he deserved a life of his own. And that I did, too.”
Baldur was much angered that Loki had taken you from us. The voice was gentle, but puzzled. You could have called to either of us, at any point. Why did you not?
“Last I checked, I didn't ask to be marked by either you or Baldur.” Fritti's tone was sharp. Baldur the Beautiful appeared to me once. So did you. And then you left me to be trained, without any guidance. Loki was the one who taught me, though he had to disguise himself to do it. He did more than just anoint me and leave me to my own devices. The silence had gone on too long. “I was overwhelmed at the time. It was a . . . recompense, I know. But I didn't ask to be either of yours. At least . . . at least Loki . . .” She faltered. At least he came to love me. To see me as more than a tool. I can accept that now. Too late, of course. Everything is always too late.
“But that is all in the past now.” Her tone became brisk. “I'm the chief refugee coordinator for Jerusalem now. We'll move everyone to temporary housing, and ask your people to make some decisions. If they would prefer to stay together as a group, for instance. We're trying not to create neighborhoods solely of one ethno-religious group . . . but it keeps happening. People tend to be more comfortable with what they know.” She paused, as the Evening Star stood at the end of the gangplank. “Aren't you coming with your people?”
I am a refugee myself. The god of Abraham and his people may not welcome me. I am what I am, child.
“We've seen mad gods skirt the whole area. Possibly in fear, or in disinterest. No one knows which.” Fritti's tone was grim. “Hecate took . . . asylum here, not long ago. She caused a certain amount of consternation among the local priests. She's traditionally been a goddess of magic, and considered, rightly or wrongly, 'dark.' She didn’t ask permission of the mortal priests here to dwell in this land, and she hasn’t been struck down by the god of Abraham, either. She hasn’t asked for temples to be erected in her honor, though any number of Hellenes are setting up cairns for her at crossroads . . . which various people promptly knock back down again . . . and there’s a small temple that’s been built to her in Little Hellas, where she dwells among her people.” Fritti realized that she was chattering, and closed her mouth. “The Edict of Diocletian seems to hold most people in check. So long as no one tries to convert anyone else, by word or by sword, refuge is available here. Just . . . live quietly, I think.”
Live as Rome has taught us. A faint tinge of bitterness, there. The Evening Star and Coyote would be the only survivors of all the small gods of Caesaria Aquilonis.
The past faded, as the future raced in to replace it. Years off, or
so Sophia thought, though it could be tomorrow, for all she knew. Lipsk in flames. Germania in ruins, from the Alps to the sea. People fleeing over the snow-clad mountains, carrying a few possessions, muttering curses at the mad-gods, and the sorcerers and the gods who had spawned the creatures. The Valhallan gods had bidden their people flee to Gaul, and now the gods of the Gauls had bidden their people to flee to the Iberian peninsula and Rome. Rome was staggering under the refugee population, and the gods themselves had retreated to Caesaria Aquilonis, trying to defend this power-base, their last stronghold . . . the raw populations of Nova Germania and Novo Gaul. Let the gods of Rome live up to their promises. Take refuge there, and we must pick our battlefields now. Only the Odinhall remains. We will fight, and if, by chance, it is our wyrd to win this war? We will reclaim our lands and avenge the fallen. This, we swear.
And yet, those left behind, though they knew the gods were doing the best they could, raged at their abandonment . . . .
Sophia panted at the top of the next hill. Right now, she could feel Apollo's presence, the sun beating down on her skin far more than it should have, given the time of year. Her skin was red wherever her peplos didn't cover her. She reached for her canteen once more, and heard the god's laughter in her head, and her hand stayed frozen where it was, as she heard hoof beats behind her. She spun, raising her hands to defend herself, expecting hands to catch her hair.
Nothing. Nothing but the afternoon sun, beating down on her, and her god's laughter in her mind.
. . . Coyote, the trickster, keeping pace with Maccis on the Persian frontier. Maccis and Coyote both had slipped behind enemy lines with a detachment of fenris, moving like ghosts. With most of the ghul slaughtered, and with the Mongols ending their war against Qin to focus on trying to hold off the mad gods who were slaughtering the animistic and ancestral spirits they worshiped and bargained with, Persia had taken advantage of the instability. Broke their treaty with the Mongols to start slicing away at their lands, secure in the knowledge that their god had not yet been assailed. Ended their cease fire with Rome, needing to get what was left of Chaldea back under their wing. They needed more Magi to rebuild the Immortals, whose ranks were down to half. And so, Maccis and the others had slipped in behind enemy lines. Set fire to several ammunition dumps. Attacked camps in the dead of night. And promptly ran into a field of ghul, these ‘captured and turned’ by the Persian magisters from those created by the mad godlings. “Gods, don't they understand that every death the ghul cause, feeds the godlings?” Maccis demanded of Coyote. “They're still conduits. They might serve the summoners for the moment, but . . .” The young man was naked where he crouched in the road, all but a collar with a landsknechten rank insignia, but made almost modest, in a savage way, by his covering of blood and mud. Transitioning from wolf-form, where he'd been tearing out throats of ghul all night, didn't clean off what had matted his fur. His eyes were invisible in the darkness, but Sophia knew that they were haunted.
They are aware, I think, but see a temporary tactical advantage. They are not looking at the greater strategy. Unless, of course, they think that they can placate the mad gods by . . . feeding them. Sacrifice has always worked before, after all. Coyote's tone, usually amused or mildly vicious, was bleak. Come. We can slip past this next patrol. No need to fight them, and your brother and his wife are waiting to create a distraction for us, so that we might regain the cover of the Wall.
Sophia began to run now, trying to get away from Apollo, but of course, that wouldn't do any good. No matter how fast she ran, she couldn't outpace him. He was part of her, and had been, since his awareness had slammed into hers when she was ten years old. She couldn't outrun a part of herself. She couldn't outrun destiny.
The past was a refuge. Adam and Sigrun arguing about the role of the god-born. “My people have trained god-born to be the servants of the gods, and of humanity for over two thousand years, Adam,” Sigrun told her husband, in some exasperation. Adam was a bench-mark in time. No gray in his hair, and few shadows in his eyes, yet..
“Servants, or slaves?”
“Servants! We can refuse an order we think to be unjust. We can demand an accounting. The rights of man are fundamental among us, and our Gallic cousins.” She gave him a look. “We have power, Adam. It must be controlled. By social standards, by laws, by belief. The only other result is the oppression of humanity.”
“You admit to that?” Surprised tone.
“Of course I do! How could I not? It's what we struggle to prevent! Look at Tawantinsuyu, Adam. A line of god-born emperors, and nobility related to the gods, all keeping down the peasantry for generations. The pharaohs of Egypt? God-born, and they resorted to incest to try to keep every generation the same. Not that it works that way, but they tried. The Emperor of Nippon and his line? Kami-born. The Emperor of Qin? God-born. The early Emperors of Persia all claimed relation to the gods. And Rome . . . the descendants of Caesar all claim his lineage to Venus, and the lineage of Cleopatra to Isis and Osiris. At least those of Caesar's line have permitted the rights of humanity to grow.”
“Sig, you can't tell me that the Gauls and the Goths have been that different. Your early kings were all god-born, weren't they?”
She shrugged. “Some were. Some, their descendants, tried to keep the line going, the legitimacy of it, anyway, by claiming that they, as mortals, could cure disease by the laying on of hands. But we've always had the right to depose a bad king, Adam. Always. The greatest heroes in our sagas aren't god-born. Sigurd and Siegfried weren’t. They're just gifted, strong mortal men. Because mortals have the furthest to grow, and the most capacity for it.”
Adam opened his mouth to object, but Sigrun had already thrown that subject aside, and moved on. “And if you don’t believe me about how far our cultures have diverged from the ‘gods-given-right-of-kings . . . .’ Take a Pict as an example of a Gaul. A thousand years ago? The nobles and priests would have picked Trennus to be their next king. He's everything a king of that era should have been, and what most people imagine a good king to be. Noble. Wise. Magnanimous. Powerful in body, mind, and battle. He's literally one with the earth, and sleeps with a fertility spirit, so there's the Great Marriage . . . and they certainly keep the ground fertile. Look at their house, all overgrown with ivy and grape vines. In the ancient world? Trennus is the next king of the Picts. In the current one? They don't want him. He isn't useful to them, when what they need is someone who understands laws and international trade and relations with Rome and the other kingdoms of Britannia.” Sigrun shrugged. “So they're going to select his eldest brother as the next king, Tren will heave a sigh of relief, and he'll move on.”
Adam was shaking his head. “I just . . . I'm not getting where this idea of god-born as being somehow less than other humans comes from.”
A sigh. “Not less. Different. We're only nominally human, Adam. I . . . try to be. But there's no real equality in this world. There are humans. There are sorcerers, ley-mages, and summoners, who are also human, but far more powerful. They have to police themselves, and the god-born do so as well, because a normal human can't. The god-born have to police ourselves, and we answer to our gods. It's all relative to the local culture, but you must admit, isn't my people's way of handling this far preferable to the old methods used in Tawantinsuyu? Egypt? Persia?”
Laughter in her mind. Laughter, echoing back from where they hid among the trees. Sophia skidded to a halt, her refuge in the past, with the safety of her powerful sister's presence, torn away. The trees seemed to reach out to her, and she heard, again, hoof beats. Saw them burst out of the trees, and the first rough hand latched onto her loose hair . . . .
Sunlight beating down on her like a hammer on an anvil, as sweat poured from her.
Bound at four points to her bed in the asylum. The god was manifested in front of her in all his glory. His golden hair curled down to his shoulders, and he wore a white chiton, and sandals made of golden thread and finest hide. A white bow over his shou
lder, golden shafts in his quiver, and a sneer on his face. At least, in the end, you'll make an acceptable host. Though your body is unfortunately female. That won't take long to adjust, however.
Sigrun, Sigrun help me! Why couldn't she say the words? Oh, because my vocal cords were cut, that’s right . . . . No way out. No way out, except through her own death. And the doctors were kind enough to push the needle home into her vein . . . no, wait. How could there be two futures here? How was she smuggling a pair of scissors into the room, to use them on herself? There was only one future.
Apollo of Delphi caught sight of that doubled vision in her mind, and suddenly, he retreated. The press of visions receded from her, abruptly, and the sun no longer burned down on her as if she'd been an ant with a magnifying glass over its head. “Coward!” Sophia shouted, making the birds in the trees leap into flight.
She stood at the crest of the hill, glorying in the moment. She knew what Apollo of Delphi feared, and it was what mortals feared, too: death and dissolution. He had feared the godslayers of old, and he feared the certainty of his own destruction at the end of the world. But he also feared uncertainty. Just as mortals did. And without his fear surrounding her, the breeze felt cooler. Sophia smiled. A little moment of triumph.
The Goddess Denied Page 119