The Archon found her. He moved swiftly, but not harshly. “You are not meant for this place, Hawk of the West.”

Please, she thought, with the tiny part of her mind not consumed with Alex’s fate, Do not ever call me that again. “Was he here?” She asked.

“Was who here?” the Archon said.

“Alex, my…” She trailed off. This masked man might be polite, he might be kind, but he was definitely a stranger. He wouldn’t know Alex from Adam, or Adam from one of the white robed quasi-clerics she’d just slammed past. She had to get control of herself, and she did it by forcing herself to look at the things around her. Left, at the statue of a man wreathed in fire. Argos, she thought. The next one was a woman on a dolphin. Illryis. Next to that was Kali’Mar, with…well, with something. It looked a bit like a cross between a bat and a rabbit, and gee, didn’t she hope she was never going to see one of those. Deep breaths, deep and slow, until she felt better.

“Who are the two statues in the middle?” She asked, when she felt steady enough.

“Excuse me?” Said the Archon.

“The two statues. I’ve guessed that Argos, Illyris and Kali’Mar are on the outside. So the middle two…are they Nashthresh and Ehred?”

“Quite, and I would have more praise for you if this were not the holiest spot in the Temple. Please, I know you mean well, but we should leave this place.” The Archon began making signs with his eloquent fingers, as if he were warding off the devil.

“What is this place?” She said.

He sighed in disgust. “If I tell you the sacred story, could I persuade you to leave before we both earn execution?”

“Oh.” She swallowed. Execution, just for standing in a room?

He led her out of the huge, main corridor, where the effigies of alien gods stood, remarkable in their human-ness and air of western beauty. In fact, these statues were the first things she’d seen so far that looked…well…not alien. They looked, in fact, like something you’d expect to see from the students of Bittermoss School. Emphatically Western, emphatically classical beauty. Nothing offensive, nothing daring. In Hawk’s opinion, it was the most bland of unpalatable slop, disguised by the shape of Nasheth’s breasts in her toga.

The Archon lead Hawk out of the Temple and back to the moss lawn, down to a small stream that trickled with water, running away from one of the primary cream pylons leading up to the geode—geodes, Hawk assumed, because if their team was mining through one, there had to be more. And how did they get here? How did any of this get here? The looming overwhelm seemed threatening and immense. The Archon, kneeling beside the stream, drew a long-handled scoop out of his robes and filled it with the water, then offered it to Hawk to drink. She did. The water was cutting cold, as sharp as the crystals above had felt. It came with sanity…and sorrow.

Alex! She thought, despite herself. But were those small hooks in the ground proof he’d been there? Or was she stretching facts to fit an outline she wanted to stay vague?

The Archon registered nothing, save that she drank the water and seemed reserved. Or, if she’d given any sign of her true distress, he’d kept his observations to himself. He said, “There. No harm done. Nothing nasty let out, or let in. Calm yourself, and let me tell you the story behind the grave sin you just committed…with the promise this will stay just between us, yes?”

And without waiting for her answer, the Archon launched into story.

Once, long ago, when the world was young, both it and the first God were born, together. The First God was young and unafraid, and created a world of bright light, open sky, good soil and deep waters for His Children to play upon. The First God created other, lesser beings and delighted in them, naming them Man. And they were a bright and wholesome race, Man, good to the eye of the First God.

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(Hawk, reflecting on some genesis mythologies from Earth, began getting a plagiarism-related twitch right about here. It wasn’t quite “In the beginning, God created the Heavens and the Earth,” and that was probably because somebody down here didn’t like cribbing that directly.)

But the First God was not alone. His Light was so great that all things cast his Shadow into the cosmos, and a God’s Shadow is no small thing. It rose, and seduced the First God away from His creation, away from the bright limbs and great arts of Man to a world of ravenous darkness. There the Shadow did make chains of Hunger, Pain and Want, and Loneliness, which is worse than all the rest, and did bind the First God to his own flesh, and then made war with Man.

“Worship Me”, said the Shadow, “And treat me as your God, and I will give you the seas, the skies, the earth, and all things shall be bathed in Light.”

But Man was good, and faithful, and refused the Shadow, who responded with unyielding wrath. Shadow reached out his hand and took hold of creation, and threw it down into the depths, where no God hold sway. He sealed the sky and darkened the water, made the earth turn foul and sour, and hid the light from all but those with the highest of secret arts.

But worse than all of this is what he did to the First God.

For he was cast down into the pits of the Outer Dark, and left there until time and light had both lost meaning. Then He was taken by the Shadow and divided into five parts, with a piece given to each tribe amongst Man, that they might remember what the wrath of the Shadow has wrought.

(“You could…like…summarize parts of this.” Hawk said.

“No, I could not. For it is a sacred story, and should be given due reverence.” The Archon said.

“What about revulsion?” She muttered.

“That is its own kind of reverence,” Archon said, and continued.)

But this would be the Shadow’s undoing. For two of these humans were the Mother and Father of all Gods, Nasheth and Ehred themselves. Ehred was a wise man and had foxed out the ways of the Shadow, and he commanded many men. He bade them do battle against the Shadow and worked with his wife and three of his most beloved children and the darkest of their arts-workers, until they had discovered how to save the power of the First God from the prison Shadow had made for it.

Nasheth and Ehern took the substance of the First God and gave it to their son Argos, who ate it, and so became Master of Fire, and he did rain fire down upon the forces of Shadow and crafted spear and axe, shield and helm to do war against the Shadow. But he did not win, for the Shadow was too crafty for him.

So Nasheth and Ehern took the substance of the First God and gave it to Illyris, who—

(“I get the point,” Hawk said. “Fire, then Water, then Kali’Mar and Air.”

To which the Archon smiled. “Don’t get ahead of the story.”)

But yes. Nasheth and her husband did give the substance of the First God to each of their children, and each of them fell to Shadow in turn. War was bent until it was man against man. Illyris’s song curses men with madness and sorrow as often as it does with Joy, and the Air…well, the less we speak of gasses and misery, the better we all shall be. But Shadow was, as I said, still coming against Nasheth and the Beloved one, the Bright King Ehren. And so Nasheth kissed her beloved husband goodbye and took of the substance of the First God herself, and became the Master of Earth, and of the Healing Arts, of Medicine, and the mother of us all.

But even her power and grace was not enough to best the Shadow, and she reached out her hand with the last of the First God in her hand. “Take this, my beloved husband, and do battle against the darkness. Save us all from Shadow!”

(“Gag me,” Hawk said.

“This part does tend to drag on,” he agreed.)

But Shadow had been waiting for this moment, and thrust out its hand to sever the life of the King of Beauty. Ehren, King and blessed God, perished at the flash of the dark-god’s hand before his own glory could be born; the piece of the First God fell, uneaten, at his dead, mortal feet.

Enraged, the Queen of Heaven Herself did raise her own two fair hands, and she did bring them down upon Shadow. Again and again did she battle against him, and he returned to her in kind. And so she did strive against the forces of Shadow for time on time on time again, until we reckoned two thousand, three thousand, five thousand years had passed us all by. Until finally the Queen of Heaven, mother of the Earth and Lady of all Light did act against her own heart. For she knows her Husband Ehred did not perish in darkness and Shadow, but did escape through the Ways of Etheria, to the Ethereal Plane and thus out of our notion of time.

(“Really?” Said Hawk.

“I did not write this story. I merely protect it with my life because I don’t favor being hung from a damned tree,” he said.) But one day he will return and take his portion of the First God, and his place at Nasheth’s side. So reads Nasheth’s promise, and one must never give lie to a promise from a God. And so do the four-square Gods do battle, in the name of the Light and the Fifth God for all eternity.