Light in Dark Places

Chapter Thirteen

Somewhere in the desert is the closest god-compound, where those creatures that fell to the earth when the dimensions crashed stay rooted in darkness until some human will come by to free them with human blood.

Agatha thinks about them a lot these days: how they always wake up in a prison. (like her). She wonders if they ever doubt that someone will come and set them free.

There are supposedly twelve god compounds across the globe, and no one is sure in which one Mathiessen found Sempiternal. But he broke the First Taboo, for no human is allowed to offer up their blood in freedom. The punishment is usually instant death. (Unless you come from a rich family. Or, Agatha thinks, if you have important family members. The only people who could ever escape punishment for breaking the First Taboo are the ones with powerful family.)

In Mathiessen's case, it is a death sentence anyway. He's had Sempiternal anchored to him for five years, he has been Sempiternal's Sacrifice for five years, and already he looks near death. The bond is draining him and soon there will be nothing left.

(And those gods without their human Sacrifice anchoring them to this earth? What of them? Agatha shudders to think about it.)

Carl Mathiessen dresses in impeccable suits and drinks the fanciest of wine. He spends a small fortune on make up and hairdressers to try and make him look healthy. The effect is that sometimes his skin looks a little orange and his blonde hair a little too much like a fluffy wig. Maybe those people out there in Numeh don't realize just how bad it is, because of his brief appearances in the public, and because the red god always looms behind him, a towering example of strength. This close to him, acting as one of his servants, bringing his coffee and his wine and his nail files, Agatha can't help but wonder how anyone can look at him and think everything was fine. All things considered, Carl Mathiessen shouldn't be alive right now.

But Carl Mathiessen has discovered a way to prolong his life.

And that's why she's really here.

*

The man is probably in his mid-twenties, but it's hard to tell. He is Mathiessen's current aid, and he looks Miserable. Hollowed out, hopeless (that's the word, Agatha thinks. He looks hopeless. Mathiessen has taken all the hope from him and devoured it.) The Miserable usually lie in a coma-like sleep, experiencing a strange phenomenon that medicine can't explain and all the scientific research has yet to find a way to understand.

But sometimes Misery just Touches people and they look like this man: bruises under his eyes, so pale it's like all the color has been drained from him, blankness in his eyes.

Right now, Mathiessen is holding onto the man's arm. "And what was your Ash talent?" he asks, conversation-like in tone. "Why don't you show it to me?"

The man flinches. It's the biggest reaction Agatha has seen in him.

"Why don't you show me your Ash talent?" Mathiessen says again, his hand still on the man's arm.

"always on the alert," the man says, shuddering.

"That's right," Mathiessen says, sighing. When he lets go of the man's arm he is looking more lively, and he lets out a jaunty whistling tune. "Rabbit Ash. Desert cottontail, if I'm not mistaken. Gives him the sense of when danger is nearby." He chuckles, probably because even he recognizes that the man's Ash talent didn't help keep him from danger at all.

He calls it quarantine, but he's the only one who's sick. Agatha can't remember who said that, or if it's even something she's heard. But when the man falls to the ground, his eyes rolling to the back of his head, she wishes she knew what his name was. There were too many nameless in Mathiessen's camp.