Book 2 The Gods of Light and Liars

Chapter 25: Firemaster

Argon was tall, white, and very broad, with curling blond hair that fell in Cupid-like ringlets down his back. His eyes were blue. He had a few tattoos that were very badly faded, and wore red. This was the clinical assessment a very small part of Hawk's mind could give.

He was gorgeous. His hair was a shower of gold. His limbs were thick like trees. His eyes were the unfolding of the dawn, his hands were the size of ham hocks. He carried a gleaming silver battle hammer, thick and heavy across his back. The chain mail he wore—a vest, so that his perfect abs and pecs were visible—was plated in gold, and the scarlet velvet falling from his belt was like a spill of blood across the floor. Here was War, here was Fire, here was imminent incarnate, and he was walking up the green silk walkway like the victor he deserved to be...

And that was where Hawk caught herself. They talked of Gods here, but she'd reacted this way to only one being, and that was the Ape from the first Glass Event. The urge to fawn, to lavish luxuries and care, to carry on your own back until you expire, all felt stronger than the command to breathe. But she knew better. The Ape had been kind and gentle and she'd still recognized the danger this fawn response could bring. She could not afford to get sucked down by this man.

Red-robed acolytes danced before him, beautiful women in scarlet silks, limbs supple and refined and sensual in a way that Earth Archon's women were not. All the dancers Hawk had seen so far, in this series of temporary temples, had been a celebration of movement and beauty, but curiously asexual. These women in their red, red robes were a carnival of sex.

One of the dancers collapsed on the way. She was left on the wayside, ignored by Earth's people as a matter of course, but also ignored by her own. Hawk and Em both started to rise. They were stopped by the Archon.

"Do not go near him. Do not help his dancer. Do not help at all." His grip on their wrists was very strong.

"She just collapsed," Em said.

"Yes. And it is a great shame to fall in front of your God. Her punishment is isolation. If you rise to help her, it will be the worse for you both."

"You're afraid of him," Em hissed.

"Anyone with sense is afraid of a God. This one is the God of War and of Sex. You'd be twice the fool, defying him." And he sat back on the pillows.

And Hawk found herself understanding something for the first time. This was how it happened. This was how good men were bent to bad things. It had nothing to do with the quality of character, and everything to do with the quantity of fear. This was absolute control. Love, attraction, devotion, these were all side products, dross from the catalyst. Fear kept people in their places.

Two more dancers fainted on the road to Argon's throne.

Two young children garbed in red began strewing the green with red rose petals. They threw them up in handfuls and danced in the cloud. Em, seeing this, turned to the Light Archon and said, "How do you people grow roses? There's no fucking light down here."

"In a grow-box. With cold-light," the Archon answered simply.

"That's the shit flying over head, right?" Em asked.

"It is the magic giving us illumination, yes." He sounded amused.

"Magic," Em spat the word out, then turned to Hawk. "It makes sense they'd view it as magic. Hell, that's how the Glass still looks to us."

"Glass? As in the stuff for cups, and plates, and windows?" The Archon said.

"No," Em said. Argon was nearly at the stairs now, and the songs parading him could have melted the heart of a mountain lion. "I mean an energy signature that sucks all life out of organic matter. The hole that you live in? Your entire world? It's killing ours. Your world bleeds out—"