Ages ago, in a time long past…
The world was young, for the gods were few and far between.
The world was old, for no one knew of its beginning.
The world was kind, for sunlight and water abounded to support all forms of life.
The world was cruel, for death lurked behind every corner.
In this young, old, kind, cruel world, there were a people who lived far in the north. Their corner of the world was unforgiving, and so the people themselves became without mercy, hardened and cold as the land upon which they lived.
Among these people, there was a woman, and she was the best of them. Her might could best any beast of the wilds. Her beard was lustrous, the red of fire. Her tusks were fine and deadly, beautiful beyond compare. Most importantly, her mind was sharp, the most lethal of weapons.
In that time, there was also a monster who took the shape of a man. It towered twenty feet tall, and half again as wide. Its skin it covered with impenetrable scales stolen from the rulers of the sea. Its weapon was a wicked sword, forged from the bone of its own father. Its army was ten thousand strong, and hungry for blood.
It called itself the Leviathan King, and one day, it visited the village the woman called home.
It could have destroyed the village immediately, but its hunger for conquest was surpassed only by its hunger for cruelty. It allowed the village an opportunity to be spared from destruction, if only to watch them squirm.
“Bring to me your greatest warrior and your lowliest criminal!” it demanded. “Strip and shave them bare, and remove from them their prized tusks! They shall fight for my entertainment while the rest of you flee for your lives! You may run until one kills the other, or they both succumb to the cold. When the entertainment is finished, all that remain within my sight shall be destroyed!”
The people despaired, for they knew that without the aid of furs and fire, none could brave the cold for long. They recognized the monster’s cruelty, and knew it wished only to see them be humiliated before it killed them all.
The only villager to resist despair was the woman, for she was the best of them, and braver than them all combined. To give her village any hope of escape, she knew what she must do.
From her neighbor’s home, she stole a single fishbone and presented it to the monster. From her shoulders, she removed her cloak sewn from the pelt of a dire bear, proof of her martial prowess.
“I am both the lowliest criminal and the greatest warrior,” she declared, “so I shall fight myself!”
The Leviathan King laughed, as did its army of ten thousand, thinking the woman’s words to be a joke. Still, the monster was intrigued, and so it allowed the woman her demand.
“Dance for me,” the monster commanded, “and when you falter, your village dies.”
And so her village stripped and shaved her bare, and removed from her her prized tusks. Any lesser warrior would have died immediately from the cold, but the woman was the best of them, and so she danced as her village fled.
The monster and its army watched as the woman danced first for a minute, then for an hour. She danced a day longer, and then a day beyond that, but still her dance did not end.
When the third day passed, the monster knew the villagers had fled too far to catch. It considered slaying the woman right then for the crime of letting its prey escape, but for once in its life, its cruelty was overcome by curiosity.
Once a week had passed, the monster spoke. “Why do you still dance?” it asked the woman, but the woman did not answer. “Your village is far away. I can not see them. You may now rest, for you have saved their lives. Dancing further shall only further your suffering, so tell me, why do you still dance?”
“I dance for those I can not see,” replied the woman. “So long as you are here, you are no where else. So long as I suffer, others do not.”
And so the Leviathan King quieted, and the woman continued her dance. She danced a week longer, and then a week beyond that, but still her dance did not end.
All this time, the monster watched, patiently waiting for the moment the woman would inevitably fail, but its army was not so content to remain still. They had long depleted the local lands and sea of its bounty, and so they grew hungry.
“Let us kill the woman so that we may be finished here,” requested a soldier of its king.
“You may go, but I shall stay,” the monster declared. “Travel far, and ravage the land. I shall stay here, awaiting the day this woman ends her dance. When that day comes, I shall gather you all again, and we shall continue my conquest.”
Dismissed, the monster’s army travelled in every direction, and they became the ten thousand beasts that plague the wilds to this very day.
As for the woman, her dance continued. Her weeks became a month, but still she danced. She danced a month longer, and then a month beyond that, but still her dance did not end.
“How do you still dance?” asked the monster. “I have watched you all this time. You neither eat nor drink, yet your flesh remains full, and your eyes focused. How?”
“The mountains do not eat, and the rivers do not drink,” replied the woman, “and yet tall they stand and fast they flow. I dance with nature, so though I suffer, I remain strong.”
Soon, her months became a year, but still she danced. She danced a year longer, and then a year beyond that, but still her dance did not end.
She danced, and danced, and danced, and danced…
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“Mormor, how does the story end?” prompted the child as his grandmother went quiet.
The grandmother looked left and right, as if checking for eavesdroppers. When she found none, she leaned forward and whispered into the boy’s ear conspiratorially. “If I tell you the ending, little barnbarn, you must promise me that you keep it a secret. You can never tell anyone else except for your own children, should you have them one day.”
The grandchild looked to his grandmother with stars in his eyes. “Is it really such a big secret?” he asked.
“The biggest secret in the whole world,” the grandmother replied, nodding sagely.
“I promise!” he said.
“Very well then, barnbarn. Listen close. This story actually has two endings. The first is the ending the world knows. If anyone ever asks you for this story, that is the ending you tell. The second, you save only for your closest of kin. Do you understand?”
“Yes!”
The grandmother nodded once more, and resumed the tale…
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She danced, and danced, and danced, and danced… and on she dances to this very day.
She dances somewhere out on the sea, for the land beneath her feet was long ago eaten by the waves. She does not sink, for her heart is pure, and she steps upon the waters as light as air.
She spins and spins, and with her spins the world. Such is her grace that the sea swirls around her, attempting to match her steps. Such is her dignity that the sky descends to meet her, that its winds might learn her bearing.
She dances up a storm, a storm mightier than any the world has ever known.
Somewhere out there, in a sea beyond our horizon, in the heart of a storm that never ends, she dances still, but she misses her home.
When the days are short, she grows sad, and she dances closer to the shore. Often, she ventures too close, and upon her homeland unleashes her storm.
When the days are long, she grows warm, and she dances further away. She stays at sea so that she might spare her people the curse of her presence.
This is from where the seasons come, the seasons of storm and the seasons of calm, and on the seasons will go until the end of time.
As for the monster, it watches her still, but it has not forgotten its cruelty. Every year, the woman tires, and one day, her dance will finally end.
A case of theft: this story is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.
When that time comes, the monster will kill her, and with its hunger born from uncountable years spent enthralled by her dance, it will consume the world, and all shall end.
When for seven years and seven days no storm visits the shores of our home, we will know her dance is done… so in the winter months when the tempest rages at your door and all seems bleak, rejoice, for you know the world will not soon end.
And so goes the tale of the woman and the monster, the oldest tale our people know… but I tell you, child…
This tale is a lie.
Listen close, and never repeat what I am to say where strangers may hear. The villagers who fled while the woman danced, we are their descendants, and so we know the truth:
The Leviathan King is dead.
She danced and danced and danced and danced… and after seven years and seven days, the monster spoke once more.
“Marry me,” it commanded the woman. “For seven years and seven days I have seen you dance. I grow enamored of your grace and covetous of your strength. Become mine, and stand beside me as I bring the world to its knees.”
“I will not,” replied the woman. “I am sworn to maidenhood, but even if I were not, I could never love a creature as vile as you.”
Now, the monster was a prideful thing and could not accept the woman’s rejection. It bared its teeth and raised its sword of bone. “If you will not be mine, then here you shall die!”
The monster attacked the woman, and by all rights, the woman should have died, but die she did not, for the world would not allow it.
The young, old, kind, cruel world stirred from its slumber. It had no eyes, but even in its sleep, it had watched her from the very beginning. It saw her dance, and knew her beauty. It saw her heart, and knew her resolve. It saw her strength, and knew her limits…
On that day, seven years and seven days from the moment she began — the very moment the woman was fated to die — Terra herself took pity on the woman, and so she whispered into the woman’s ear and asked her a question:
Would you like to dance forever?
The words resonated with the woman’s heart, and the steps of her dance became perfect. The woman was no longer a person dancing with the world, but an aspect of the world dancing within itself.
She learned the steps to the dance eternal, and with its power, she commanded nature.
Into a thousand spears of ice, she froze the sea. Into a cyclone of swords, she spun the air. Into a storm of bolts, she darkened the sky.
With all the power of Terra herself, the woman slew the monster, and with its soul forged herself a name worthy of a god, for a god she became.
Honor, for she never fled when she could stand.
Knowledge, for she learned the secrets of the world.
Criminal, for the mantle she bore to save her people.
War, for she led nature itself in the slaying of its greatest beast.
The name she forged is a name you know, for hers is the same as your god, for the woman and the god are one and the same.
But enough talk of the past, my child. For now, let us return to today.
Today, our world is young.
Today, our world is old.
Today, our world is kind.
Today, our world is cruel.
And one day, our world will end.
In our young, old, kind, cruel world, we shall thrive, and we shall struggle, and we shall sing, and we shall cry, but through it all, we shall dance.
Just as the woman danced for seven years and seven days, we shall dance every day for the rest of our lives. We may dance as the fisher, who casts their nets in time with the dawn. We may dance as the warrior, who steps to the pulse of blood. We may dance as the farmer, who spins with the spinning of the year.
As for you, dance, my child! Dance to the steps of the world, and know that on that day when your dance is done — just as the end of mine draws nearer by the day — we shall all meet again, somewhere in the land beyond.
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Teeth clenched in frustration, Treskur teleported away.
She didn’t care where she went. She just had to get out of there.
Idiot, she silently chastised herself. You knew you wouldn’t like what you’d hear, but still you listened. What else did you expect to happen?
The grandmother’s ‘true’ recounting had been more-or-less factually accurate — as a goddess of knowledge, Treskur could allow nothing less — but it fell short in terms of tone. The whole ‘life is a dance’ metaphor was a pleasant enough variation, one that had been growing in popularity these past few millennia, but that was precisely the problem — it was pleasant.
Remembering what the actual dance had felt like — dancing alone in the cold for so long that her beard had regrown, her feet bloodied from years without rest, her every extremity somehow both insufferably numb and in excruciating pain — it was anything but pleasant…
But who was she to complain?
She was a goddess now. Who was she to correct her people for being ‘tonally inaccurate?’ Who was she to say they were wrong to spin her tale as a tale of hope? How petty would she have to be to take that away from them?
Before she’d realized where she’d gone, Treskur found herself hovering over a featureless stretch of ocean a half-mile away from the nearest shore. The place was unremarkable, but Treskur knew exactly where she was.
It had been here, all those years ago, where her dance had begun. As the story said, the sea had long ago eaten the ground beneath her mortal home, but she knew this to be the place all the same.
She lowered herself to the surface of the water, and there, she knelt. She dipped a hand into the icy water and felt the chill of the current pass over her fingertips, cold as the blood of death… or at least that’s how she guessed her people’s poets might describe it.
As for Treskur, she no longer feared the cold. Her fingers simply registered that the water was indeed colder than normal — cold enough to doom a mortal within seconds — but to Treskur herself, goddess of the [Frigid North]? It would have made no difference if the water were boiling.
It would be unfair of her to expect her mortals to understand her. The only ones who could possibly relate to her now would be one of her fellow… one of her fellow…
Suddenly, it hit her.
She was alone.
And she might remain alone forever.
She let out an involuntary jolt of divinity, and the ocean froze at her touch. A glacier nearly large enough to touch the shore formed where her hand met the waves and a flood of brine exploded into the air as the freezing ice expelled its salt.
The enormous glacier shot from the sea as buoyant forces rocketed it almost entirely into the air. For long minutes, it bobbed up and down upon the shuddering sea, throwing wave after wave of turbulence in every direction.
Treskur stilled, horrified. She’d lost control of her emotions for but a moment, and this was the result.
“Too much divinity in the air,” she thought aloud. “I need to adapt. I need to control myself.”
First of all, she needed to accept the fact that she would be without equal for the rest of her life, and to be without equal meant to be alone.
She had her mortals, and though she loved them as deeply as they loved her, she could never be their friend. Worship precluded friendship, and as her people’s goddess, her status as their supreme being meant that there would always be that distance between them, an irreconcilable gap in status that could never be bridged.
It was the same reason she and Hadraniel could never become true friends. While dealing with one of his aspects might be pleasant enough, the real Hadraniel becoming her friend would be like her becoming friends with an ant. It just couldn’t be done.
Still… perhaps it was worth a shot?
“Hadraniel?” she called. She waited a minute, but received no answer.
The angel had certainly heard her, but he was probably too far away to respond. They hadn’t spoken in a month, so his aspect must have moved on to some other reality by now, and there was no telling when he would return.
Treskur shook her head. Hoping someone like Hadraniel would answer the call of a mere god? It’d been folly to even consider the possibility.
As for finding peers among fellow gods? There were none left, and there might never be any ever again.
Many millennia ago, back when Treskur herself had become a deity, there’d been no pantheon of majority, and that meant there was no one setting rules to dictate who could and could not become a deity. Sadly, that was no longer the case.
As things stood, the world was still technically ruled by the [Inter-Council Assembly], and that meant that the only path to ascension was through the procedures laid out within the [Inter-Council Accord]. Since none of the now-fallen deities had wanted competition back in the day, those procedures included the requirement that all new deities join the [Inter-Council Assembly]. Thanks to Aolyn’s newest addendums, however, that also meant every new deity would immediately lose all their godly powers and become a mortal.
That, or they ceased to exist altogether.
Unless Treskur was overlooking some critical loophole hidden amidst all the complexity, it was a paradox that meant no Terran could ascend to godhood ever again.
Perhaps someone could change that fact if they claimed the bounty on Melpomene’s head, but there was no telling what a mortal might wish for if given the chance. Besides, it was entirely possible a fallen deity killed Melpomene out of sheer spite for Aolyn, and then no one could claim the wish.
There was of course the option to just give into Luna’s demands. Treskur could declare victory over the [Inter-Council Assembly], thus invalidating the [Inter-Council Accords] and returning her former peers to power. She could probably even wring out some brutal concessions in the terms of surrender… but then what?
As soon as the fallen deities regained their powers, they could just immediately declare war once again and be freed of any restriction Treskur placed upon them. They would then undoubtedly seek revenge, and there was no way Treskur could fend off half a thousand pissed-off deities all by herself.
If she declared victory, she would lose… but if she never declared victory, she might be by herself for the rest of time.
Treskur would be alone at the top forever.
Letting out a heavy sigh, Treskur turned to leave…
But then she heard it.
It came to her, fainter than the ghost of a dream.
Far to the north, buried somewhere deep within the permafrost beyond even the lands of her people, a voice reached out to her, and it wrapped around her mind like the first rime of winter.
Treskur knew this voice, for it was the voice she’d heard all those millennia ago.
The voice whispered into her ear but a single question, and for the first time in ages, Treskur felt cold.
Would you like it all to—?
“Hey Treskur!”
“Gah!” Treskur snapped out of her trance and whirled around to find a familiar entity had appeared beside her.
Hadraniel raised a confused eyebrow, and his wizened face looked to her with some measure of worry. “I… surprised you?”
Indeed, the angel’s aspect had surprised her, but that shouldn’t have been possible. Not here.
“No, no, I just… wasn’t paying attention, I suppose.” She looked back toward the north but found she could no longer sense the something that’d been there only a moment before. “I was distracted.”
“That’s… understandable,” Hadraniel agreed, but he was obviously unconvinced. “Sorry that I took a while to get here, but Treskur, are you alright?”
The northern goddess winced. “Just getting used to the new way of things, I suppose. I know that I’m the one who called for you, but is it alright if we talk tomorrow instead? I have too much on my mind at the moment.”
The angel looked hesitant, but eventually, he nodded. “Okay, old friend. If that’s what you need. I’ll be sticking around for a while, so just call out, and I’ll be there.” Hadraniel gave Treskur one last meaningful look, but ultimately said no more. He stepped away, and was gone.
“‘Old friend,’ huh?” Treskur asked the air. If only that were true…
Treskur too turned to leave, but then she turned once more to the north. The voice was no longer there, but she knew what it had wanted to say, and the words echoed throughout her mind like the rumble of a storm.
Would you like it all to end?