Eternity Glass

XXI: A Human In a God's Seat

"I thought time worked differently in the realms," Fallon muttered under her breath as they passed the gates.

"Not in this little pocket of the Celestial Plane," Lita explained. "It's like a bubble, really. Time is paused so we can discuss important issues or hold rituals for hours on end while the other planes and the worlds within them aren't affected by any sort of delay."

Fallon sighed, thinking about how many times she could've used that to her advantage and holding herself back from shaking her head outright. The other gods were waiting and watching, after all. Nine of them stood around a circular table which took the place of the cauldron from the Eclipse Ritual. Skies above, that felt so far away.

She recognized those ten, too. Each had dropped an item of value into the cauldron, but with Lita and her coming into the mix, there were only eleven total. Twelve participated in the ritual.

Lita and Tristan rounded the table, searching for their place. When they came across a chair with a heart at its head, the deity took a seat while her son stood behind her. Fallon blanked. Where the hell did she belong?

Only two seats were left empty: one with a Nazar amulet and the other with a skull. Salulla and Eyal's places.

"Fallon, dear, why don't you come over here?" A deity with glistening pearlescent skin offered her seat.

A male deity scoffed. "A human in a god's seat. Esdione, you're taking your mothering too far."

Esdione clicked her tongue. "Reius, she's an orphan."

I'm right frigging here. Fallon chewed on the inside of her lip and sighed inwardly. Another annoyance about deities, she found, was that their personality duly reflected their position. Kamalita and Tristan held both the beauty, conflict, and strength of love. Beneath Morgant's cool and collected exterior rested the wrath and dangers of the ocean. Salulla... well, nothing needed to be said about her.

Judging by the behavior of the two that just spoke as well as what she remembered from the Eclipse Ritual, Fallon recognized them as Esdione, the deity of charity and motherhood, and Reius, the deity of war and violence. Quite the daring move to nominate such polar opposites into the council of twelve.

"We have two empty seats; I doubt that gambling imp isn't gonna show up. Human, take her seat," spoke another as he shoved fruits into his mouth. Fallon looked at the mark on his chair and quickly averted her eyes. Adnas. Deity of pleasure.

"That doesn't make any sense." Fallon definitely recognized this one. Nadia, the deity of wisdom and logic. "Besides, it was Veone who wanted her here. Where do you think she should be?"

All eyes turned to the matron of order and balance, who kept her face stone cold. Fallon could hardly believe a being like her existed. Veone wore a thin, see-through fabric over her eyes that tied into her braids like some symbolic ornament. Markings inked her copper skin with such precision that one half of her perfectly mirrored the other. It was like she was painted and prepped for a position of ruling, but just decided not to. If the table weren't round, Fallon could easily picture at the head of it.

"It does not matter where the human girl sits," Veone said. Her voice didn't waver in the slightest. Not a dip in intonation or an emphasis on an accent gave way to her true feelings, if she even had any. "But... I assume it is not comfortable for a human to stand the whole time. Half-blood or not."

From the corner of her eyes, Fallon saw Tristan roll his eyes and widen his stance.

"Salulla will come," stated a deity with a large hood covering their entire face. The head of their chair held a symbol of an hourglass.