“I’ve seen it. It is one of the greatest artworks in the world.”
“I know!” the man cried sharply before his voice grew quieter and almost sad. “I know. I was only a boy, but I think I wept when I saw it. I’d never seen anything so beautiful in my life – and I’ve never seen anything more beautiful since. It was as if the artist had captured the very essence of the divine. It was like he’d glimpsed into the divine realm and laid eyes on Justice herself. Such a thing… it moved my very soul. From that moment on, there was only one thing I wanted to do. I wanted to paint. I wanted to paint and paint and paint until I could make something like that fresco.”
“You’ve set yourself quite a difficult goal,” Muse murmured. Amongst mortals, few artists could make a living from their art alone. Usually, only those successful or fortunate enough to gain the patronage of a wealthy backer could make a living from their art. Her clergy sponsored many promising artists and kept others on retainer, but there was only so much she could do – or wanted to do. Interfering with mortals too much had a tendency to ruin their creativity. She’d discovered that the hard way in the past, and she had no desire to repeat any of her previous mistakes. It had taken her centuries to fix some of them, much to her dismay and Wisdom and Knowledge’s aggravation. Quite a few of her artists were just as much followers of the twin gods as they were of her. “How did your family take it?”
“Oh, they were amused at first. My family are wealthy merchants. They thought it was a phase, some passing fancy that I’d grow out of. Oh, look, my parents said, our son wants to be an artist! And they smiled and laughed. But as I got older and spent more time and effort on my painting, they realised I wasn’t joking.” He gave a short, bitter laugh and shook his head, his gaze still locked onto the river below them. “They threw me out. I’m only a fourth son, so they didn’t need me. They had two spares already. I suppose I shouldn’t speak too harshly of them. They didn’t throw me out with nothing. They gave me some money and let me take anything related to my art before they disowned me. I haven’t seen or spoken to any of them since.”
“How did you end up here?”
“I was twenty when they threw me out. I used most of the money they gave me to make my way here. I painted and sold my paintings to help ease the burden and make ends meet. It was hard – very hard – but I finally got here. I thought it would be different. This place was supposed to be different. People say that Muse herself blessed this city and walks through it from time to time in mortal guise. And for a while… yes, just a while, everything was going so well. I managed to get into an academy for artists, and I did well there. But I could never – I could never paint anything that good. Oh, my paintings were decent enough, but none of them were… were…” He clawed at the air as if it would help him to find the right word.
“Inspired?” Muse asked, a hint of a smile on her lips.
“Yes! Exactly!” He bowed his head. “I lost that fire I used to have, and it’s been years since I’ve been able to do anything more than scrape by. Do you know what I do for a living now? I make most of my money painting the walls of temples with base colours, so the real artists don’t have to strain themselves before getting to work. I haven’t achieved anything. My family was right. I was a fool to think I could succeed. I mean… what’s the point?” He looked up at the sky and scrubbed furiously at his cheeks and the traitorous tears he’d begun to shed. “What’s the point? I’m forty-one years old, and what do I have to show for it?” he reached down and grabbed one of his paintings. He was about to heave it into the river, but Muse reached out and stopped him.
“May I see it before you get rid of it?” Muse took the painting from him and examined it closely. There was no denying the excellence of his technique. He was certainly very gifted in that respect, but there was something missing. “This… it has no soul,” she said at last. “It’s… hollow.”
“I know!” the mortal cried as he fell to his knees and struck the ground in frustration. “I know! I used to be able to put my soul into my paintings, but somewhere along the line… I… I lost it. I don’t know how or why. I… when I first came here, I thought my talent and skills would be enough, but do you know how many times I was passed over because I didn’t have the right connections, because I didn’t know the right people or have the right friends? It killed me inside to watch artists who were worse than me receive favour after favour while I had to scrape, and beg, and crawl. An artist should be judged by their worth, not by their friends or their connections.”
Muse nodded. It was an unfortunately common occurrence that artists formed cliques and associations that promoted members while disdaining and even sabotaging outsiders, regardless of their talent or skill. Her clergy did their best to provide a neutral point of view, but there was only so much they could do. “That must have been heartbreaking.”
“How can I see beauty in a world that has treated me in so ugly a manner for so long? How can I be inspired when there is nothing left here to inspire me?”
“You’ve got a good point there.”
Muse reached for her divine power and looked into him. All of the gods shared certain abilities. They were all tremendously strong, capable of feats that no mortal could ever hope to match. Even the weakest of gods was far stronger than the mightiest of mortals. Muse herself could pulverise a mountain with her bare hands. However, the gods also possessed powers that were, if not unique, at least far more rare, even amongst other gods. Justice could see into a person’s past and see all the things they had ever done, allowing her to make the correct decisions about any crimes they may have committed. Death knew exactly how to kill anything or anyone. Muse’s talent – well, one of her talents – was the power to identify the latent abilities someone possessed when it came to the arts. She could easily identify the very summit of their ability, the one they would reach if circumstances and a host of other factors all went favourably for them.
This mortal’s potential was staggeringly high – amongst the highest she’d ever seen – yet it had clearly been beaten down by life, bad luck, and a thousand over things. His talent should have burned within him like an inferno, yet it was little more than a flickering candle on the verge of going out. No wonder he wanted to jump off the bridge – and what a waste it would be if she let him.
“So you’ve lost your ability to see beauty in this world?” Muse’s eyes twinkled. “Let me show you what you’re missing.” And then she reached forward and touched his forehead with one finger.
In that instant, the flickering candle of his talent roared to life once more. He was going to see the world around him as if for the first time in years with eyes that were, for a moment at least, unburdened by sorrow and regret. Tears ran down his cheeks once more, but they were tears of joy. She smiled. Mortals could not see the world with the eyes of the gods, but the world was still a beautiful place to those who had the time to look and who knew how.
“It’s so beautiful…”
“What is?” she asked although she already knew the answer.
“Everything.” He hadn’t moved to wipe the tears from his cheeks. Instead, his gaze was flitting around, trying to take in everything around them from the river and the moon to the city that still bustled, here and there, with quiet murmurs of activity. Finally, he looked at her. “Who are you?”
Muse smiled gently. “I think you already know. Just keep trying. You’ll get there soon.”
“Thank you!” he shouted as he grabbed his paintings and stumbled away, giving her a hurried bow. He paused mid-step and turned to throw his paintings into the river. “I don’t need those anymore! I’ll paint something better!”
Muse watched him go. He’d be fine now. All she’d given him was one moment – the smallest glimpse of the mortal world as it truly was – but it should be enough to rekindle the fire of his talent, much like how even a dying fire could be rebuilt by adding one log of wood. When she was certain he’d gone, she cloaked herself from mortals eyes
and peeked over the bridge at the figure she’d seen when she first arrived, the same figure that had waited patiently as she and the mortal had talked. She wondered how the mortal would have reacted if he could see him.
Death met her gaze and nodded.
“My apologies,” Muse murmured as she floated off the bridge and hovered over the rushing waters of the river. Death stood in the river, but the waters didn’t even seem to notice he was there. It was impossible to read his expression underneath the hood of his black cloak, and she wondered if she’d angered him. If she had, she’d have to deal with it. Death was not a god that even she could afford to have as an enemy. “It appears I’ve made you come all this way for nothing.”
“Is that so?” Death’s lips curled up ever so slightly, and she knew right then and there that he was not upset. “Or perhaps it was my presence that prompted you to look this way in the first place. Beauty can be so rare in the mortal world. It would be a shame to lose more of it.”
“Or perhaps Fate moved us both? She has always been a meddler.” Oh, yes. He was definitely amused. “However, doesn’t it bother you that I intervened? Had I not spoken to him, I’m certain he would have jumped.”
“The world could use another artist who sees the beauty in it instead of only its ugliness.” He was most definitely smiling now. It was a wonderful smile. No wonder Life was in love with him. “Besides, you’re the one who has to fill out the paperwork. Saving someone scheduled for death involves a lot of forms – consider it restitution.”
“Ah, yes.” Muse winced. Trust Bureaucracy to have a form – or forms – for every conceivable occasion. “I’ll be sure to do that.”
Death turned and vanished through a door of unfathomable shadows. “You won’t have to interfere again.” He could foretell the deaths of all he looked upon. “Unless another one of us interferes, I won’t be seeing him for quite a while.”
* * *
Muse smiled faintly as she walked through the large but cosy house. It had been forty years since that night on the bridge, and the mortal had done very well for himself indeed. All he’d needed was one glimpse, and he’d done the rest himself. It might not have sounded like much, but mortals were so busy. So few of them took the time to simply sit still and really look at the world around them. His faith had been broken once, but seeing the world more clearly had restored it. For an artist, a gift like that was truly priceless, so he’d done his best over the years to repay her in the only way he knew how.
He’d become the greatest artist in more than two centuries, perhaps even longer. His paintings captured the very essences of their subjects. But by far the greatest gift he’d given her – and she considered all works of art as gifts in a way – had been the frescos upon the ceilings of her new temple in Alleron. The largest of them showed her standing on a bridge, reaching down to pluck a struggling man out of the raging waters below. It caught the desperation of the man perfectly – his wild, hopeless struggle against the rushing currents – as well as her care and compassion. It was everything she could have wanted, and it had inspired countless more artists over the years. She could honestly say he’d actually exceeded the fresco that had originally inspired him.
He had married too, and although he was older than most fathers, he had still managed to have five children. Two were artists like him while another two had gone into other crafts. The youngest, however, had decided to try his hand as a merchant. The mortal had laughed wryly when he’d found out before giving his approval. His wife, an old priestess in Death’s clergy, had tended to him as best she could, but everyone could see that the end was near. Death came to all men, and the mortal had accepted that the oldest of the Greater Gods would be coming for him soon. He had no regrets. He was eighty-one years old now – ancient for a mortal. However, she wanted to speak with him one last time before Death took him. It would be more difficult to visit him once he was in the afterlife. There were so many rules and so much paperwork to fill out.
“You came,” the mortal whispered. His wife was sleeping at his side, but she would not wake until Muse had gone. The goddess faded fully into view, not in her mortal guise but as she truly was. Death’s glory was the splendour and majesty of the inevitable, unavoidable end that came to all things. To look upon Death was to know finality and oblivion. In her true form, Muse was the living incarnation of every dream, every ideal, every fantasy, every hope, and every inspiration there could ever be. He chuckled. “You are more wonderful than I could ever have imagined.”
“You’ve done well,” she said, sitting on the edge of the bed. She dimmed her glory, for to look upon it too long would only hasten his death. He was so frail now, and her divine senses had no problem picking up how badly his body struggled merely to sustain him. He had minutes at the most. “I am proud of you.”
“I am… so honoured.” He bit his lip and dragged in a deep, ragged breath. “But how much of it was truly me, and how much of it was because of the gift you gave me?”
“You mortals,” Muse whispered fondly. She put one hand on his forehead to soothe his pain. “Always so full of doubt. I did nothing more than open your eyes for a moment. Everything else – all these years and all your art – was you. It was always you. All you needed was a reminder of how beautiful the world is.”
“I see.” He laughed again, but it quickly became a cough. “Thank you for answering an old man’s foolish question.” His gaze drifted to something behind her. “Is he… Death?”
She turned. It was Death. The older god stood silently at the foot of the bed. He had come cloaked in the eternal shadows he commanded, but there was no sharpness or steel to him today. Instead, he radiated a gentle kindness. This was Death as he preferred to be – a god who brought a merciful and peaceful end to those who had lived long and well. He lifted one hand.
“It is time.”
“Then I will go with you, for I am happy to have lived my life the way I have.” The mortal closed his eyes. His chest fell still.
A door opened beside Death, and the mortal’s spirit rose from his body and walked through it. The door swung shut and vanished, and Muse stood and stared into the empty space where it had been.
“How do you think he will be judged?” she asked Death.
“That is for Justice to decide, but I think it will go well for him. His life is not without blemishes – no mortal’s life ever is – but the good far outweighs the bad unless I have sorely missed my mark.”
Muse was about to leave when she remembered something. The mortal had looked quite chilled when she’d reached him all those years ago, and Death had said something interesting afterward too. “How long did you wait that night for me to notice him and offer my help?”
Death opened another door and stepped through it, leaving only his words behind. “Long enough.”
Love is a Battlefield
Ruin was the oldest of three brothers. His two younger brothers, Wrath and Torment, were cut of much the same cloth as him. Indeed, the Supreme Mother and Supreme Father had said so themselves after creating the two younger gods and entrusting them to Ruin’s care. That wasn’t to say they were identical. Torment spent the majority of his time in Death’s realm punishing the wicked whereas Wrath was better suited to punishing the living. Torment also had a tendency to individually tailor creative punishments for evildoers. In contrast, Wrath liked to keep things very simple. Infernos, earthquakes, tidal waves, and floods were some of his favourites, and Wrath rarely bothered to deviate from them.
As for Ruin, whenever the gods needed something obliterated or destroyed he was usually the first god they asked if Annihilation didn’t want to do it. There were more powerful gods than him – Annihilation was the Greater God he answered to – and Wrath had a knack for sheer devastation than he sometimes envied, but Ruin combined speed with efficiency, reliability, and style. If someone gave him something to destroy, he’d destroy it quickly and with a minimum of fuss, all while maintaining the required level of elegan
ce. In other words, he knew exactly how to make an impression
His pride and joy?
Once upon a time, there had been an entire continent of mortals who had been beloved by one of the Greater Gods. That Greater God had carefully raised them and sheltered them while lavishing every advantage and luxury upon them. For a time, the mortals had been grateful. But their gratitude had eventually turned into arrogance. The mortals became convinced of their superiority, and they sought to conquer the world. They also turned upon the gods, defying them and committing countless blasphemies. Sin and depravity became commonplace amongst them, and they fell so far as to indulge in cannibalism and human sacrifice. The less anyone said about what they did to the other mortals they defeated in battle, the better.
Annihilation had originally been asked to see to their obliteration, but the Greater God had kindly offered Ruin, one of his favourite subordinates, the chance to demonstrate what he was capable of. It went beyond simply showing the mortals that they had angered the gods. It was about making it absolutely clear that there were some things the gods refused to tolerate. Ruin’s orders had been simple: destroy the continent in such a way that everyone in the mortal world would know how bad an idea it was to mess with the gods and the laws they had laid down.
It had taken him one night. That was it. One night. A combination of fire raining down from the sky, massive earthquakes, and a succession of increasingly violent volcanic eruptions had seen the entire continent crumble away and sink to the bottom of the sea, leaving nothing but churning, muddy waters to mark its demise. It had been incredibly poetic, and mortals were still talking about it millennia later. That was what he called making an impression, and even Muse had complimented him. Apparently, the nightmarish scene had forever emblazoned itself on the hearts of mortals, and it was certain to inspire countless artistic masterpieces in the years to come. But even Muse’s praise paled in comparison to receiving praise from Annihilation himself in the throne room of the Supreme Mother and Supreme Father with so many of his fellow gods present. Annihilation had never been one to indulge in idle praise, and he rarely offered praise in public either. It had taken weeks for Ruin to stop smiling like a fool.
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