The Temple of Deone was modest. It was tucked away near the market district, its walls polished stone with terracotta roofing; squat, square, vaguely resembling a small bank’s idea of ancient majesty than a palace or grand cathedral. The entry way was between two columns, both looking largely decorative, topped in painted gold. That gold was the only reason it stood out; the rest of the district was painted white and an aqua blue, colors of the sea that surrounded the city’s harbor.
Phyfe the Elder dipped his gnarled hands into a water basil near the sacrificial alter and watched the blood swirl and wash away. His eyes, watery and brown as they were, were dull. For a man who had just given a God his deepest prayer and slit the throat of a lamb to show his seriousness, Phyfe the Elder’s eyes were curiously dispassionate. A slave slipped behind him and took away the lamb while Phyfe himself lifted hefted the clay water bowl from the altar, took it out from a hidden back way and poured it out into the dirt. The man’s expression never changed throughout the ritual, his eyes never shown with a light of faith or the sense that, indeed, his God walked with him, by his side.
Moreover, Deone examined, for all the strength of his sacrificial prayer, Phyfe himself….
Deone was invisible, intangible, watching Phyfe the Elder’s procession and was puzzled. Phyfe the strongest prayer, that much Deone knew. But he could sense something was… off. He could feel a bright light of faith blazing while Phyfe himself seemed… dim and dull and… distracting. Deone felt himself pulled somewhere else, somewhere not far away….
As Phyfe the Elder refilled the sacramental bowl from the wall, Deone left him and wandered further into the strange city-state that housed his temple and its many followers.
Deone wandered past the far edges of the market district, which sat empty with the night sky overhead, into a darker, dirtier section of the city. Most of the clay and brick of the housing was marred with mud, dirt and crude markings; while the markets were still lit with hung lantern flame, the only light in this place was from a single building where men stumbled about or sat huddled just around back, hidden from prying eyes.
Overshadowing that dim light, Deone could see a blaze of Faith shining. Shining, he saw, from a back alley, where a group of men crouched around a dirt pit as one of their number, a larger, bald and heavily bearded man with large arms, skinny legs and an immense gut was rolling dice from a clay cup.
When the dice fell, tumbled and settled, the big man roared in job and pointed a fat finger as a smaller, sharp eyed, frowning man. “Triples! That’s done and I’ve won them, you sour faced rat. You owe the double.”
Sharp eyed man spat, rising to his feet. “Triple or nothing. It’s only fair.”
“Only fair,” shouted the large man, folding his arms. “You lost to me twice. Twice! The first, I gave you an out and let you double. You fucked it. The second, I let you go again and here, now, you’ve fucked it twice. And you want me to give you a third?”
“It’s only fair.”
“Nothing’s fair in this, boyo, when you lose and lose again, only to keep making new promises. You owe me, Geoffon, and you will pay me.”
The sharp eyed man’s eyes never shifted but he broke into a sudden smile nonetheless. “Aye, I made that bet twice but… I can’t quite pay, just now.”
“Can’t… quite… pay….” The large man said, cracking his neck. The rest of the men in their circle began to glance at one another, rising to their feet. “That sounds to me like a broken promise, friend. Are you breaking a promise? To me?”
Geoffon had, before that moment, seemed calm but watchful. At the word promise, he seemed to have slowly had his nerve sapped away; his hands trembled slightly and his smile grew nervous. “Look, I can’t pay just now but it doesn’t mean I can’t pay…”
“Just not now, eh, Geoffon?”
“Just not now.”
“Well, that’s fine that, isn’t it, Geoffon my old friend.”
“Is it?” Geoffon said, taking a slow step backwards.
“Oh, aye, it’s fine and dandy, friend. You can’t pay today then you can pay tomorrow or the next, am I right in thinking?”
“Oh, very right in thinking.”
“Well, then, good. Today, tomorrow, the next,” the large man said, nodding to himself. “Today, you owe me 5 coin… tomorrow, you’ll owe 7. And if the day after, you’ll owe no coin at all… you’ll owe five lambs, two chickens and a suckling calf. After that, hmmmm….” He said, stroking his beard, “after that, it’ll be one of your daughters, and not the old and ugly one, mind you, Geoffon. The clever one with the bosoms.”
Geoffon stopped stepping away, suddenly still, his hands no longer shaking. “You can’t be serious.”
“Oh I am, friend,” the big man said, stepping forward and crackling his knuckles. “Today, tomorrow or the day after but you will pay me what you owe or you’ll see your cock slit off with a dull knife, oiled in asp venom and sacrificed to Petra’s poisonous cunt. And then I’ll fuck you with it. I’ll fuck you with your very sanctified cock, fill you with serpents get and midwife the bloody lizards from your shit-stained arse and damn every boy child Geoffon the Thief, after your very fucking name, friend.
The giant of a man leaned forward, towering over his debtor, grabbed a handful of his tunic, and whispered, “And after I’m done fucking you with your own shriveled, venom tinged prick and pumped you full of scaled spunk, I’ll show up at your wife’s downstair and still get what you fucking owe me, won’t I, then, friend?”
When the sharp-eyed man said nothing, the large man repeated himself. “Won’t I? Friend?”
The smaller man pulled a knife and stabbed at the larger one in a single motion but for all his size, the foul-mouthed gambler still caught the smaller man’s wrist easily, twisted until there was a snap and watched as the dagger fell into the dirt. Two swift punched doubled the little man over and the larger man threw him bodily against the wall of the lit noisy, dimly lit building whose alley they were playing dice behind.
“I was settling for lambs and a suckling calf but we could go with your farm, your wife and all you kin as slaves if it please you, Geoffon. And your corpse as an offering to Deone, of course.”
The little man vomited in the dirt a moment while the larger man watched, watching curiously.
“What say you, then, gecko fucker? Give me coins or kin, means nothing to me.”
“Coins,” the man choked out. “Coins, Wes damn you to the deep.”
“Aye, I appreciate coins better than cunt myself, thank you. I’d best see you before tomorrow’s tomorrow then.”
The smaller man stumbled away and, after a moment, the rest of the circle closely closed in on the pit once more as another of their number took up the dice and the group quietly called bets to one another. The large man, for the moment, did not join them. He leaned back, watching Geoffon wandered away, arms folded and nodding to himself.
“No one breaks a debt to Black-Tongue Phyfe.”
“Black-Tongue Phyfe,” Deone muttered, amazed at the amount of golden light flaming out from his skin. “Behold, my most faithful servant.”
Deone watched as Phyfe continued to gamble into the night and watched as he stumbled back into what seemed to be a tavern, ordering himself a cup of heavy wine; he followed silently as he made loud overtures to the serving women and lorded himself over a particular malnourished and vulnerable slave woman who cared for the stable of donkeys, none of which Phyfe seemed to own. He watched Phyfe threaten smaller men, witnessed as he spit into drunkards cups when they weren’t watchful and listen as he spat every foul, disgusting thought in his bulbous bald head from darkness to near dusk.
This, Deone thought in bewilderment, was his mouth faithful, most pious servant? This drunken monster?
For a moment, he wondered if the game itself was broken but knew, deeply, innately, that was simply wasn’t possible.
This disgusting man was, more or less, Deone’s high priest.
Black-Tongue Phyfe was such a devoted gambler, he kept three dice in a bagged cord around his neck. Phyfe had finished his drinking and games, as the sun began to rise, and stumbled away from the tavern, rolling the dice in his meaty palms. Phyfe watched the bone die with the avidness of a drunk who couldn’t focus on anything else besides his ability to walk.
And that focus, that intoxication, left Deone’s most faithful open to the Revelation.
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“Look upon me, Phyfe, son of Phyfe, and tremble, for I am your God.”
At Deone’s Awe level, combined with his perk, his voice thundered in Phyfe’s skull, causing him stumble and look about in fear. Phyfe could not locate the source of the voice for a moment, until he looked down at his palm and saw that the dice in his hand was lit in heatless flame.
From those flames, Deone spoke once more. “Do you know the voice of God, Phyfe? Do you know me?”
“Yes,” Phyfe cried out, dropping the dice that settled to all 3s facing skyward; though Deone had not known, all 3s were a sign of fortune in the game but, like how his tone and diction seemed to manifest to Phyfe as powerful, echoing and dignified, it was his Awe that controlled most of how Phyfe experienced a visitation from God.
For his part, Deone was simply touching the dice to focus his manifestation and speaking completely normally.
“Do you know me, Phyfe?” Deone repeated. Again, to his servant, Deone’s voice rumbled like distant thunder.
“I know you! You are Deone, the God of Oaths, the God of Curses, the God of Gambling! I know you and I worship you!”
“And how, exactly, do you worship me? You don’t much look like a priest. You definitely don’t sound like one.”
Whatever portentous and holy words Phyfe heard Deone speak, his answers were plain enough. “I never break a oath, my God! Not once in my life! My word, my oath, is unshakable! I roll the dice every day and offer you a prayer every time.”
“Of course,” Deone said, drolling; he stood, arms folded, over Phyfe’s shoulder as the man dropped to his knees and seemed to be kneeling to his dice. “You gamble and you pray for me to bless your winnings.”
“No, my lord, highest of highs!” Phyfe cried out. “I pray in thanks for the stones it takes to risk it all on a dice roll. You are the God of risk and winnings and losses! I pray thanks to you for the stomach to lose everything for a chance at winning anything!”
Deone blinked. He had… not quite considered his domain that way.
“Go on,” Deone said. “Uhh… keep going. I’m not quite getting this….”
“Of course, my God! I praise you as the God of promises, the God of Oaths and true faith! None are more honorable than you!
“That makes a backwards kind of sense, I suppose,” Deone muttered to himself, idly wondering how Awe would translate his confusion. “Guess I’ll work with what I got.
“Phyfe,” Deone said, severely. “Rise and look upon me.”
Phyfe did what he was told, rose and look down at the dice worshipfully.
“Phyfe, I need you to help me.”
“Anything, my God. I am yours to command, your number one believer!”
“Well, the best available, anyway,” Deone said with a shrug. “Phyfe, I need you to answer a few questions for me. And then, I have a task for you.”
“Ask me anything. On my Oath, I’ll tell no lies to you, my God, or may my tongue spill from my head, become a slug and crawl back up into my insides to lay a thousand eggs!”
And like that, a Contract made, bound and glowing in his sachet, Deone knew that Phyfe truly did keep faith with his aspect. Deone also knew that Phyfe’s tongue would not turn into a slug. He wondered, briefly, if he himself could make the curse true but it didn’t matter, as the Word is Bond made truth Phyfe’s compulsion. Deone had really misunderstood and underestimated how his aspects translated in the Mortal Realm.
“Good, Phyfe. First question… where are we?”
Phyfe was momentarily confused but answered quickly. “We’re in Spear’s Bay, Lord, second oldest of the Bay’s Deep cities.”
“Bay’s Deep. That’s a country?”
“It is no empire, no, my God. More like… each city has a senate and they send a senator to the council for four, between Spear’s Bay, Everrain, Midpoint and Orso, in times of war or trade, but otherwise stay out of eachother’s way. ”
“And am I the only God worshipped here, Phyfe?”
“Well… no, Lord. Far from it. There are a few Gods here, though there are plenty of Deonites in my father’s temples.”
“Your father?”
“Aye, Lord. Phyfe the Elder, the high priest. Do you… not know him, Lord of Oaths?”
“No, no,” Deone stumbled out, “I know your father. His prayers are what called me here. Originally, at least. Tell me about him.”
“Yes, Lord. My father has been your high priest for over 20 years, himself an apprentice to his uncle, Toklar, who himself was apprentice to Simon, who himself was….”
“Yes, yes, I get it, a long line of priests. He doesn’t seem to have as much faith as you, Phyfe. Not to mention, he’s not a drunken gambler.”
Again, Deone had no idea what Awe translated his words to his follower into but Phyfe seemed to take them as praise. “Yes, my Lord,” Phyfe said, “I have tried all my life to live to your aspects. My father taught me but he… had not been the same since his wife, my mother, died ten years back. His second wife tries but there has long been an emptiness to my father since that day. Still,” Phyfe was quick to say, “he’s upkept the temple and kept to all your sacraments. He sacrifices lambs to you regularly and gathers coin in your name.”
“Yeah. I appreciate the lambs. Still…”
“I’m sorry, my God,” Phyfe grumbled to himself, looking humbled despite his giant size. “My father is a good man and does all things good men do. He just could not understand why you did not answer his prayers. His acts have faith where his heart does not.”
Deone did not answer Phyfe the Elder’s prayers because Deone had not yet entered the game. Frankly, he may not have even been able to answer those prayers even if he were. It was a bitter pill to know that, even before the game begun, there were choices, mistakes and suffering Deone could have done nothing about.
“Her soul is… safe, Phyfe. Just know that. Now, tell me about the other Gods in this place… Spear’s Bay.”
“Yes, my God. Well,” Phyfe leaned back, scratching his dirty brown beard thoughtfully. “The sailors and traders, they mostly pray to Wes the Spear-Fisher, who cut the Bay with his spear-point while hunting the Night Whale.”
“Uh, right, yes. Of course. The Night Whale. What about Ze? Or Ayaan? Are they worshipped here?”
“Ze? No one worships the Trickster, unless you want to call his attention on your head. It’s bad luck. As for Ayaan, many hold little shrines for little God, to bless them with a visionless sleep. It’s said that if you don’t have a little shrine to Ayaan above your bed, he will visit you while you rest at night and spill madness from a jar into your ears. You’ll never know yourself again.”
“That sounds about right. Who are the other major Gods worshipped here?"
“The largest temple is to Petra, as she is worshipped by the wealthy and the farmers alike. Farmer tend to pray so’s her children won’t dig into their crops or lay their den in their houses and kill them all in their sleep. The wealthy pray to make their souls more like hers, cold and poisonous and better at politics. Their high priests sleep with an armored-asp in their beds, letting it bite them through the night. It’s sad that no one can poison a high priest of Petra.
“How very… Petra. Who else?”
“A few pray to the Sun Goddess, keeping the old ways. Word is that most of the barbarians, the goat fuckers of the steppes, all worship Khadijah. And everyone keeps a spare coin for the Death God, whose name we never speak. Yours, Petra and Wes are the largest faiths in Spear’s Bay and most of Bay’s Deep.”
“Excellent! Thank you,” Deone said, then paused, remembering his most potentially potent rivals. “What about Timely, Phyfe? Or Wen? Or the Goddess Songbird?”
“Most don’t really worship Timely, high holy, not even the seasonal garrisons. Spear’s Bay trains all boys with the Spear and Shield and expect all men to fight when war is called for but we’re a trading, sailing and fishing people. We’ll pray to War for help when it’s time but pray for Peace in any other.”
“Wisely put, Phyfe. And Wen?”
“I’m not sure that Wen is a God to be worshipped, my lord. He’s famed for stealing Fire from Khadijah’s womb, giving birth to Zuzu and gifting the secret of making a wife of her to the first King, Orso, but beyond that he’s not known to be very strong. Just clever.”
Stole Zuzu from Khadijah’s womb? Deone could barely keep himself from giggling.
“And aye, there’s a few nutters out in the bluffs, in the caves, who worship Songbird. We call them Dirt Chewers. Disgusting lot, constantly chewing their lime and charcoal, making cave paintings with their spit. There’s better ways to make paint but those nutters act like aquamarine is a offensive to their Goddess. We avoid them for the smell, holy one.”
“Right. Excelllent, Phyfe. You have been a good and faithful servant. And now, my task.”
“Anything, my Lord! Anything!”
“I need my temple to be bigger. Much bigger. Grander, even.”
“I’m not a builder, Oath binder.”
“Oath binder? I quite like that… No, you’re not a builder but you can hire builders. So, first, I need you to make coin for the temple. Gather followers. Preach my faith, especially among the traders.” Deone paused a moment. “Wait, do the people here all know how to write?”
“The Deonite’s do, of course, since you invented writing. And most others have some writing, except the farmers and the slaves, of course.”
“Slaves, yes. Right.” Deone found it distasteful but also knew this was the major economic basis for cultures at the current level of development. “Go to the traders. Tell them that Faith in the God of Contracts will bring wealth to their houses.”
“I… yes, I will do this. But how will you bring wealth to their houses?”
“I haven’t quite got the details ironed out but I’m working on it. Do you have all that, Phyfe? You will build up my temple. You will preach to the traders and increase my faith among them. You will raise to the place of High Priest, in the place of your father, and you will be a Great Man. When you are the man I need you to be and the Temple of Deone is great, I will visit you once more with a contract in hand. A contract I want all of my people to sign.”
“Yes, my God! I understand! And I will give you my Oath on this, Lord.”
“Good.”
“Except you haven’t said what’s in it for me.”
“I.. wait, what?” Deone said, stumbling. “Are you joking?”
“You are the God of Honor and Fairness,” Phyfe said to the dice with solemn humility. “You are the Oath Binder. You shun unbalanced deals. So, what’s in it for me?”
“Isn’t being raised to High Priest of your God’s faith and leading the entirety of your tribe enough?”
“I’d rather be gambling and drinking wine,” Phyfe said, brushing off his tunic and starting to walk away from the discarded holy dice. “If it’s all the same to you.”
“Fine, Phyfe,” Deone sighed. Phyfe stopped in his sandaled tracks. “What is it that you want of me, to do this task, Phyfe?”
“Well, Oath binder, if you could… I would ask that bring a message back from the land of the dead, a message to give comfort to my father. I would ask that you bring a message back from my mother, to let my father know she still waits for him in the after-life.”
Deone felt a pang for Phyfe, for all that the man was large his wish felt like that of a child’s. It felt appropriate. Deone would grant Phyfe the Elder’s prayer to raise up his son to greatness, grant Black-Tongue Phyfe’s prayer to give his father some relief and maybe make up for the prayers Deone wasn’t there for.
“Yes, Phyfe. Go build me a bigger temple and I will bring word from your mother. Now make your oath to me that you will do as I asked.”
“Thank you, most honorable God,” Phyfe said, grinning fiercely, staring at the flaming dice with a gaze that matched their intensity. “I, Phyfe son of Phyfe, give you my Oath that I will build you a great Temple in this city, I will bring you followers from among the sailors and that I will raise myself to be the High Priest of your blessed people. I will praise you and raise your honor up high, my lord God!”
“Great, excellent,” Deone said with a clap, abruptly dismissing Phyfe's hallucination; and none-too-soon, Deone noticed, as the sun was up, people were milling about and the drunken stupor Deone was taking advantage of was starting to segue into sobriety.
Phyfe scooped up his dice and ambled back towards the temple, shouting that he had been visited by the God of Oaths, Curses and the game of Cups, scaring himself a wide path.
Deone had a few items on his to-do list. The first, he could do in the Mortal Realm. While Phyfe was hurrying back to Deone’s squat, modest little temple Deone himself decided it was time to find a temple of Wes the Ocean God, and see if they might strike a deal….