Book 2 The Gods of Light and Liars

Chapter 33: The Hidden World

Hawk was exhausted past all reason by the time the Light Archon told them they could stop. He identified two edible roots and three different edible leaves, and set Hawk and the other two scientists to gathering, while he and Kaiser made camp. From the sounds of it, the Archon was having a wonderful time and Kaiser most definitely was not. Hawk returned with ten of the large, edible roots (Two of these were rejected as the wrong kind of plant; not poisonous, but the kind you cooked by boiling and discarding the water) and found five large piles of moss and two very muddy men. The Archon in particular had stripped down to just the inner chemise and his mask.

"Where's your robes?" She asked, after he had inspected her finds and culled the bad roots.

"They're down near the stream. I washed them as best I could, but they're going to stain. That's best, if we're running. White is noticeable under light, and surely they'll begin searching with cold light soon."

Henry Dyson asked, "Why are the lights different colors? I noticed there was a significant difference between your light and...you know. His." He glanced at Hawk and then back down.

"Ah. Yes. It differs from individual to individual. You can learn to tune yours to be more or less bright, more or less this color or that one. It is a basic skill. I wouldn't even call it a spell, because it isn't as if we're pulling the crystals from the earth and draping it about a God's altar. Proper spells involve prayer, and I...have not prayed in some time. After all, my God is dead."

There was a silence.

"Except he's not," Hawk said. She couldn't help it anymore. "He's a man named Edgar Studdard who attempted suicide after his daughter died."

"And he's an Archetype now. Which is what they've identified as gods." Em said, very gently. "So his God is alive."

"Alive?" the Archon said, softly. "Then why is he not here?"

"Because he wasn't there when your world was made. He was somewhere in our world, doing whatever it is an Archetype does when his Rift closes. He still is. Hell, I'm pretty sure it hasn't even been a full four fucking days since the whole world fell in." Em threw themselves back on their hummock of moss and looked up at the starless, roofed-in sky. "It probably hasn't even been an hour since we walked down here. Can we leave fucked up Narnia now?"

"I think we have to. We have to warn folks topside about this. First, that the Glass energy is pulling...life, for want of a better word, down here, and that there is an extremely hostile, super powered...whatever the hell you want to call this pantheon, down here. And in the time it takes for us to bring anything to Boston in response to this, they will have an army." Hawk said.

"And they won't be able to get out of here until just before the Rift closes," Em said. "Which will kill everybody inside."

"Do you think they actually want to invade Earth? The Gods?" Henry said.

"I think they're fucking psychotic." Em said. Thought for a minute, in the dim, warm glow of the Archon's light. "I think they want to go home. I think there's a part of them that's as disgusted by all this as we are. But they'd want to control their homecoming. They'll want the same comfort, the same control, the same power they have in the Rift."

Hawk was already shaking her head. "They're not going to have that. If their power is based on the Glass energy, the only way to keep that going—"

"Is to manifest Glass outside of a Rift...and I'd go as far as to say outside a Rift's field of influence." Hawk said.

"Or else, just open another Rift when this one closes." Kaiser Willheim said. Finally, he knelt in the mossy dirt with the rest of them. "It's what I'd do. No point in trying to milk this one for what it's worth. Just make a Prism, plop it down wherever. If you can make coldlight work, you wouldn't even need a focused laser. Power on command."