by
If the Gods were real, could you believe?
Hitra, high priestess of Revestre, already has enough on her hands: political upheaval, a distractingly attractive male servant, and an upcoming harvest festival. But when a column of flame from the heavens sends a city into tumult, it upends more than just her schedule. Now, Hitra must deal with a religious schism, ethnic strife…and a God growing out of control.
Publisher: Journey Press
Cover Artists:
Genres:
Word Count: 80000
Word Count: 80000
Illoe’s mind was calm, prepared for the walk through the city, contemplative, like the minds of the laborers carrying burdens across the high square. A row of pillars prevented draft beasts from befouling the temple mount and everything the temple ordered from the city had to be carried by men.
The cobbles of Penitence follow a covered streambed; the water that once flowed overland now swept through masonry vaults underfoot. At the narrowing of the road, where it dipped sharply to the plaza below, the underground passage narrowed as well, to force the water through a wheel that powered Chagrin City’s primary uphill transport, called the Water Car.
READ MOREI could feel it—the tense water squeezing its way under stone in its passion for down. I felt it in a way none of the people walking above it could. A few were aware of the vibration under their feet,some excited by it, but most had traveled this road often and had long since stopped noticing. The water was powerful and dangerous. I felt the edge it gave even to unnoticing minds. I was moved to be passionate. I recalled the hunger for touch the girls had felt, unexplored cravings for untested flesh. I was hot with impatience and impotence. I wanted to touch, move, change. Was I a god or not?
I felt myself pressed on all sides, tight and fast and narrow. I brushed Illoe’s cheek. The down of his young skin bent against my briefly-formed fingertips. The world froze in that moment, and I could count the hairs I’d touched (twenty-six) and I had had two fingertips. It was the briefest, gentlest touch.
Illoe toppled like a broken reed, the rough pavement tearing cells from his skin.
The sting of injury, however minor, drew Illoe into an unreasoning rage, jerking his limbs to strike imaginary foes. Bluster kept the tears back. He swore on “Revestre’s Golden Tits” to beat the twelve bodily humors out of whoever had bumped him. He wanted, desperately, for someone to come forward, for a reason to hit and hurt. No one was near him. No one but me, and his fists passed through me without impact on either of us.
People were staring. He stood out on Temple Mount, in his secular clothes. It wouldn’t take long for someone he knew to hear about him swinging at air and yelling at nothing. He wished the ground would swallow him whole.
But I’d touched him!
He stomped his way down to the market, feeling more embarrassed and less angry with each step. I had touched him. It just took focus. I flew with this new knowledge, expanded like steam. All the city was mine. I could touch things!
I poured myself back toward Illoe, who was bumping shoulders through the plaza to get to the water car. A woman “accidentally” brushed his leg, a subterfuge neither of them believed, and I was reminded how he’d fallen, and hurt—his wounds still smarted on his palms.
I should try someone I liked less, first.
COLLAPSETobias S. Buckell, Crystal Rain wrote:“An innovative slant on a fantastic religion, its worshipers and divinities!”
“Creative, quirky, fun, Vibbert delivers a wild new take on divine gods and their petty squabbles in The Gods Awoke!”
