I Met the Gods

12th Day of Autumn

767 Karloman’s Peace

‘Sounds crazy to me,’ Florentin said jovially.

Ekkehard shook his head and ran his fingers through his wet hair. Letting out a sigh, he replied, ‘I know how it sounds, Florentin, but it’s what happened.’

‘You walked up a mountain, entered a mystical cave and the Father gave you a magic book,’ Florentin mocked.

Ekkehard sucked his teeth and thought of arguing further but bit his tongue.

He couldn’t really blame his brothers for their scepticism or their mockery. Their doubts frustrated him, but they were understandable. Ekkehard had relayed the tale of his adventure the night before and he knew, had the Red Angel not been with him, they would have thought him completely mad.

Yet, despite the mystical being that stood sentinel at his back, they were not convinced

He, Florentin, and Gerwald had managed to locate the small pond in the forest where Ekkehard had mused the previous night. While it had been a majestic oasis of contemplation for Ekkehard the night before, now it seemed much more mundane.

It was larger than Ekkehard had realised, and much of the water was covered in thick algae and other foliage.

Where the water was clearer, the brothers had gathered to bathe for the first time since they had fled the city of Werth. Although the waters were less than ideal, it was the first real form of self-care they had been afforded in some time.

Gerwald and Florentin had both stripped off and floated in the deepest parts of the water as they tended to their bodies. Ekkehard, however, had dipped himself into the pond, climbed out, and sat naked, legs dangling off the large rock that cut into the pool.

Ekkehard’s Red Shadow waited at the pool's edge.

‘I don’t really get it,’ Gerwald said after dunking his head into the water and re-emerging.

‘What do you mean you don’t get it?’ Florentin asked, rolling his eyes.

‘The meaning,’ Gerwald explained, ‘what does it mean, Ekkehard’s story? I don’t get it.’

‘What?’ Florentin exclaimed, ‘it doesn’t mean anything. Well, other than our brother is mad, that is.’

‘But don’t they all mean something?’

‘All what?’ Florentin asked.

‘The stories, they all have meanings, don’t they,’ Gerwald said, ‘Ekkehard, you would always go on about the meanings. But I don’t get this one. What’s it mean?’

Florentin tutted, and Ekkehard shook his head and they both realised what Gerwald meant.

‘It’s not an allegory brother,’ Ekkehard clarified, ‘I’m saying this really happened.’

‘And I am saying it didn’t,’ Florentin added.

Ekkehard sighed again. He knew how his story sounded, and he understood his brother’s reluctance to believe it. It was fanciful after all. The kind of thing that might have been embellished in holy scrolls that recanted fables from hundreds of years ago. Yet, he knew every word was true, and he knew every word was important.

Florentin had never really had much faith in the words of doctrine. Ekkehard recalled how even when they were young Florentin was critical of the texts, pointing out inconsistencies and contradictions and mocking them. Gerwald, on the other hand, had listened with naive rapture, although his understanding of the words had never been anything more than superficial.

Expecting the two of them to believe his tale and understand the significance of it was a big ask. Nonetheless, he needed them to.

‘I’m telling you, brothers, I met the gods that night,’ Ekkehard reaffirmed to his siblings, a hint of desperation in his tone.

‘Fine, let’s say for a moment we believe you. Why?’ Florentin quizzed him, his tone exasperated. ‘Why did they come to you? What did they want?’

‘To reveal to me a truth, little brother. A truth that will shake the very foundations of this empire,’ Ekkehard explained eagerly.

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‘What truth?’ Gerwald asked.

‘That they are false,’ Ekkehard explained, ‘that our faith is a lie. That we have been deceived.’

‘Ekkehard, do you not hear how that sounds?’ Florentin questioned him further. ‘Why would the gods appear to you just to tell you they didn’t exist? That makes no sense.’

‘I’m not quite sure,’ Ekkehard admitted. ‘I think,’ he continued hesitantly, ‘I think they feel guilty. I think the gods are dead and they want us to know the truth of what they were. I think they want the truth to set us free.’

‘Okay, but if the gods are dead, tell me, brother, what is that?’ Gerwald asked, pointing to the Red Angel at their backs.

Ekkehard looked his guardian up and down. Its perplexing visage was still uncomfortable to look at, but he was getting used to it. The spectrum of the colours its body shifted through remained on the cooler side of the palette, the fire beneath its surface low and quiet.

It waited patiently as his brothers bathed and argued, static without complaint or even notable motion. It made Ekkehard wonder if the being even had thoughts. Did it have desires or wishes? Did it even get bored just standing there? Or was it simply a subservient non-autonomous being, unable to do anything beyond what its master commanded?

He looked back to his brother and said, ‘I don’t entirely know what he is.’

‘He?’ Florentin interjected.

Ekkehard looked back at the Angel and then to his brother. ‘I suppose, seems like a he, doesn’t he?’

Both Florentin and Gerwald shrugged.

‘Anyway, I don’t know what he is,’ Ekkehard continued, ‘but I think he is to the gods what a sword is to us. A weapon and a tool. I don’t think the gods fought like we do. I think they create things to do that fighting for them. I think that is what he is.’

His brothers seemed to muse on Ekkehard's words, and he thought perhaps they were understanding. That thought was proven false when Gerwald spoke again.

‘What do they sound like?’ he asked.

‘What?’ Ekkehard replied with a snigger.

‘The gods?’ Gerwald explained, ‘you spoke with them. What did they sound like? Do they have northern accents or southern?’

‘They… I mean I don’t know,’ Ekkehard tried to answer, ‘they didn’t really use words.’

‘So, the gods spoke to you, but you didn’t hear their voices?’ Florentin asked doubtfully.

‘It wasn’t a conversation,’ Ekkehard sighed. He rubbed the palms of his hands into his eyes. His ears were turning warm, and his throat was dry, and this stupid conversation was annoying him. None of his brothers understood religion as well as he did, so the fact they would try and argue this frustrated him.

‘Then how did they talk to you,’ Florentin asked, outright laughing as he did.

Ekkehard thought for a moment and then said, ‘it was more like a shared experience. Like watching someone else’s memory. They showed me what they wanted me to see and in it, there was understanding.’

Florentin and Gerwald looked to one another. Florentin shrugged his shoulders and gave Ekkehard an expression that suggested he was willing to listen. Ekkehard thought that this was the best chance he had to convince his brothers of his cause. He wanted to get them onside so that they would go with him on another journey.

One unlike any other.

‘I think the gods are dead,’ Ekkehard stated.

He let the words hang for a moment and then continued, ‘I think they have been dead a long time. I think they were never really gods, they were just powerful men. I don’t even think they liked people calling them gods and I think they left behind their message, the angel and that book, so that one day, someone could understand what they were.’

Both his brothers seemed to be listening.

‘I think,’ Ekkehard said, ‘that someone used the gods' power, or the threat of it, and they weaved the greatest lie ever told. They twisted the truth and enslaved mankind under a fallacy of protection. I think the Karloman family are liars. I don’t think their royal blood protects the world from the malevolent as the Doctrine claims. I think they are the malevolence. I think for nearly eight hundred years, all of mankind has been slaves.’

‘Okay,’ Florentin replied, musing on the words as he nodded along, ‘but why you? Why give you this message, this knowledge?’

Ekkehard paused and thought about the question. He had wondered himself but had yet to come to any conclusion. Florentin needed to hear one, however, and so Ekkehard thought of the best explanation he could.

‘Because I would listen,’ Ekkehard answered. ‘I turned my back on the faith and was branded a heretic. Everything I have ever loved has been taken from me because of that decision. I think the gods knew I’d listen, and I’d understand.’

‘And what are you meant to do with it?’ Florentin asked.

Ekkehard looked his brother directly in the eyes. This was the moment. If Florentin believed him now, their crusade would begin.

Ekkehard spoke with all the conviction he could muster.

‘Their truth has set me free,’ Ekkehard stated, ‘if you accept it, it will set you free as well, my brothers, and together, armed with that truth, we will free all of mankind.’

Florentin looked to Gerwald and the two of them shrugged at one another again.

‘Okay,’ Florentin answered, ‘let's see how that goes.’

It wasn’t the most enthusiastic of agreements, Ekkehard thought to himself, but it was an agreement nonetheless.

His brothers went back to bathing and Ekkehard turned to the book that rested beside him.

He hadn’t opened the Book of Heaven since he descended the mountain. He stroked his fingers across the metallic surface of its elaborate cover and then down its spine. He was eager to flip through the pages again. Despite the exhaustion it had made him feel, the knowledge that was kept within was to tantalising. More importantly, those brief moments where he had read the book were the most profound of his life.

It was as if for his whole life he had never really connected with the world, but through the books pages, he was interlinked with the entirety of the universe and beyond.

With the book closed he felt cold.

He felt alone.

‘Hey Ekkehard,’ Gerwald said, breaking Ekkehard’s remorse, ‘I don’t suppose that guy can go get us something good for breakfast, can he? I’m starving.’

Ekkehard chuckled. He too was hungry he realised, and his stomach panged.

He turned and looked at the Red Angel. ‘Go find us a deer or something,’ he commanded.

The Angel turned and marched into the dense foliage of the forest.

‘We eat and then we go back to the city,’ Ekkehard informed his brothers.

‘There are still men hunting us,’ Florentin reminded him.

‘I am not worried about them,’ Ekkehard stated unperturbed.