No. There could be no application of this woman’s beloved, hated, worshipped deity to the world-concept of God. That would be like trying to compare a squirrel to Mankind. Questions of holy acts, divine purity, celestial succor, those could fall by the wayside. Naomi Studdard had been human, still technically counted as human (until Hawk saw proof otherwise, she was going with “human”) and had brought human foibles to the Divine Table, so to speak. She’d been a bad human, tricking Alex and her employees and god knew how many children into joining her school so she could suck them all down in a maelstrom of greed. Of course she would make a bad God.

Any question of good deities was also moot. Sure, there might be good and benevolent Gods out there, beings that did not lie, that held complex truths, that loved as advertised on the tin. That was not this. Discussions of non-human entities could wait until she’d handled all those of human origin. And then gotten enough down time to stop screaming.

But here was the big problem right now: The Earth Archon wanted her. And she knew unequivocally and without delay that was very bad. She was facing a woman, horribly disfigured and forced to consider that disfigurement a blessing, who had murdered an unknown number of people last night, and who was probably going to murder an unknown number of people tonight, all to sate the bloodlust of the being that disfigured her, and that woman behaved like a child. This was multiple stages of “not good”.

Well, how best do you handle a child? Call their mother, she thought…and then looked again. As far as bad ideas went, this one could be better. But she knew better than to leave this alone. The Archon could only be expected to stick his neck out for her, someone he didn’t know, only so far. So Hawk said, “You want me for service with your God, yes? Well, shouldn’t that be her decision? You can pick me and dress me up, teach me to talk pretty and present me to her as a prize. Will she think so?” She waited a moment, would have sipped some tea if she wasn’t sure that would escalate things, and added, “Maybe we ought to leave that decision to her?”

The Archon stiffened…and then relaxed a great deal. “Wisdom from the mouth of babes,” He said.

“You would say that,” the Earth Archon muttered. Then, “Fine. She’s right. Of course she’s right, damn her.”

“You’re just cut that she out-moved you.” The Light Archon said, and his voice seemed filled with a different sort of mood now. One of pleasure, or nearly that. “Yes. I think that’s the very solution to this dilemma. Let the Master of Earth decide our girl’s fate. Bring more wine!”

You could be reading stolen content. Head to the original site for the genuine story.

Hawk couldn’t be sure what his gaze meant, hidden as it was by his mask. But she was pretty sure the majority of it was fear. She hoped it was; her own fear was now big enough to devour the world whole.

But she was going to get what she wanted, wasn’t she? She was going to get to meet a God.

***

The wine was a good excuse to disappear before the Earth Archon got really drunk. Hawk escaped to the baggage train, where her and the Light Archon’s Fleet-Hares had been brought. She waited until she’d reached the Hares before breaking down completely. She probably could have held things together longer if the Hares hadn’t been so insanely soft, and if their two hadn’t been cuddled together. They didn’t move much when she arrived, either. She sank into their soft bulk, greeting curious lips with her empty fingers. They moved their long necks to bring their faces nearer hers…and she just began to sob, openly, her face buried in the creature’s long, soft fur.

That was where the Archon found her when he finally chose to escape Earth’s nightly orgy…or whatever it was she did in the tent tonight. Hawk hoped it was an orgy, and that everyone involved had a very good time. She suspected it was otherwise, that the altar to Nasheth drank deep and long of blood tonight. The smell of it covered the Archon of Light. The stench of burnt things, the cloying scent of incense that tried to cover it. She’d only been asleep for…well, probably a few hours by this point.

The Archon was very drunk. He greeted her apology with a shushing finger, and he finished the last verse of a song she could not understand before collapsing across the legs of his own Hare. “Ah, fair damsel. What a quandary you have put us in.”

“It seemed like the smartest thing I could do. She was trying to trap me.”

“And she managed it. I’m not faulting you, Hawk-of-the-West. No one wins against her when she has her mind set against you. You slipped the net she set for you using the one weapon neither of us expected.”

After waiting a moment for him to finish, she said, “What was it?”

“What?” The ivory mask jerked, then looked up at her. “What was what?”

“The weapon I used against the Earth-Archon.”

“Oh. That. Your compassion, of course. She expected you to insult her, which she could use against you as an insult to her God. Or you could have commiserated with her and said her deformity was terrible, which she could use against you as an insult to her God. Or you could have praised her beauty, which she would have known was a lie, and she could use that against you, and so on. Instead of doing either, you recognized her pain, and managed to offer comfort without condemnation or judgement. You did not lie. You did not blaspheme. And she cannot even be angry with you, because I think no one has said such a thing to her since before Nasheth touched her face.” He sighed. “You made her see you as worthy, and not just a toy I brought along for my amusement. Now she knows you have value, and she covets valuable things. Pretty things, above all, but she’ll settle for value and use.

“No matter. We have two days before we reach Nasheth’s seat. Perhaps we can find an escape for you between now and then.”

And the Archon of Light fell into a drunken sleep with those as his final words.