Pantheon

Temple

Thess's charcoal brushes over the paper, sketching out the details of a face. They love to draw. It's so natural, like catharsis, like they can just lose themself in the perspective and shading and colors and –

Goddess, why is the other eye always so hard?

It's exactly like the one they just drew, only facing the other way! It's not like they're drawing with their non-dominant hand or anything! Why does it always look like a lump?

Okay, never mind. They're putting Iolie's hair over half of his face in this picture. He needs a haircut anyway.

They shift slightly to change the angle of their arm, their elbow slipping out over the top of the hammock. They're nestled in bed, sketchbook propped up against their thighs. This is the best place to draw because there isn't anyone to ask them if they drew that, or can they draw them, or why are they putting Iolie's hands behind his back. They can't draw hands. No one can draw hands.

They were able to grab a window hammock again this week, which is pretty lucky. The order of the hammocks, levitating in random places throughout the room via magic, changes every week, because Auricant's Called thrive on novelty. Since the discovery of their flight powers a few years ago, they like spots near the top, never bothering with the boring ladders. They've had this one near the window, wide and curved and showing nothing but blackness, for a few months now. Sometimes they can get up here right before Morannigan folds the void around the temple to shorten its path to the next Realm – it's always utterly stunning, but they've never been able to capture it in color or in words.

They give up for the moment on Iolie and turn to another page in their sketchbook, flipping past market scenes with stick figures and intricate mandalas made of half-meaningful symbols. There it is – a half-finished spiraly doodle of their flight power. Drawing patterns of your magic is a common thing for baby Called to learn, to help channel their abilities, but Thess still finds it calming despite their stellar magical control. They like to scribble out the colorful patterns and make them into magic stained glass.

"Hey!" a voice calls from below them. "Hey, Thess!"

Thess struggles upright in the hammock, peering over the side and praying for it not to tip. "Yeah?"

It's a girl with fluffy brown hair who looks vaguely familiar, but not in a temple way. "Radiya wants to talk to you."

Thess sighs, grabs their sketchpad, and hops out of the hammock. Radiya worries for them. So does everyone, kind of, and Radiya means well, but the thing is, it doesn't help.

The girl nods like she's confirming something and lets Thess lead the way to Radiya's chambers. Is she going to talk to them about spending too much time in the marketplace again? Ugh –

The door opens and Thess petrifies. Oh goddess. Oh goddess oh no oh no oh goddess oh –

Because, um, yeah, that's, that's definitely, that's definitely her. Her. That's Auricant. There she is.

That's the – that's the form she always takes with humans. Curly red hair. Reddish brown skin. Square jaw. Almost human, but eyes that change color. Also her hair moves like snakes. Like there's a breeze. There's no breeze.

Auricant is standing right here.

In front of them.

...Shorter than th –

"You're Thesselaine?" asks the literal goddess. She's very nonchalant about it. Thess nods, then stutters out a reply, because that was probably rude or something.

"Aur-Auricant's T-Thesselaine."

"Huh. Cause – " her eyes go over Thess's shoulder, and she shakes her head – "you're not."

Thess turns around, and oh my goddess, that's Moanuni. That's Moanuni. How didn't they see it?!

Moanuni walks over to stand by Auricant, and turns to stare at them, head tipped to one side and arms crossed. This doesn't feel real. Something is really, really wrong. Nothing feels real. They can't feel the tips of their fingers.

"Wh-what's going on?" they manage.

"You were – "

Radiya interrupts Auricant. Thess bites off a gasp, and even Auricant raises an eyebrow. "You were never Called. Auricant never Called you."

Wh – no. No. No, they have powers. They have consistent, significant, chaotic powers. This doesn't –

"D-doesn't make s-sense."

"See!" Auricant shouts like an explosion, gesturing wildly to Moanuni. Thess feels a flash of shame.

"They've always seemed...not at home here," Radiya confesses. "They've always wanted more. Since they were C – came here, they've always had so many questions, created so many – inventions..."

"Oh, man," says Moanuni, with a tone of sympathy that makes Thess want to giggle hysterically. "You got a lot of anxiety too? Yeah, humans aren't usually built for this much chaos. This place is a bad place to grow up if you don't belong here. Bet you're kind of an angst-ball, huh?"

Thess doesn't even have it in them to feel offended. They nod.

"Thesselaine learned to fly by jumping from the market rafters," adds Radiya. "They didn't know they could, at the time."

Under normal circumstances, Thess would be mad at Radiya for bringing out their personal business without their permission, but these are literal goddesses, and really not normal circumstances. They probably saw it anyway.

"Oh yeah, I saw that part," Auricant giggles. "That thing you made, that was cool."

"Wait," says Moanuni. "When was that? About four years ago, right?"

Thess nods again. "Yeah. I was 14."

"Weird detail," muses Moanuni. "But that's right before the Blight started."

Auricant frowns. "Moa, what?"

"Y-yeah," echoes Thess, "no way, what?"

"Well, I'm just thinking," says Moanuni slowly. "We don't know anything about the Blight. We don't know anything about you. If you weren't Called – "

It's too much. This is too much. Thess bolts. Moanuni shifts, impossibly fast, like a predator, in front of the door, catches them by the arm, Thess pushes past her –