Noctifer didn’t bother to transform. He had wandered across the world in the form of a woman, dealt with all that came his way, and so racked up a small bounty amongst some of the military encampments as a 'she-devil’ and a ‘devourer’. Still, he finally found where the temple had been taking his devotees. They had been isolated in a small part of the country’s hub, a place called Ataea-Minor. It was too small a place for too many devotees. He was cheered by the fact that so many still held to the traditions, but disheartened by the circumstances he had found them in. His eye caught the shimmer of the temple’s structure over the walls of the city. The gleaming gold and silver details that marked it as separate were enough, and he would demand an explanation.
Walking into the slums of Ataea-Minor, he looked around. Despite the dread and the imminent promise of execution, many still sang. Mothers remained in cloistered groups, preparing vegetables for the evening meal. He was particularly angered when he saw a girl who had her hair recklessly shaved from her head. Another girl was busy shepherding the children, with two other boys flanking her. Despite these being his kin, Noctifer couldn’t look them in the eyes. The crying of a baby sent him deeper into his depressive anger, and he immediately broke the path to tend to it. Finding a mother trying to console her baby, he smiled gingerly and sat down next to her.
“May I nurse him?”
The mother, stricken with the suddenness of the question but also the seeming youth of the woman before her, nodded. Noctifer, smiling at the lady, pulled down the robe of his form and let the baby latch. He hissed a bit when they took, but he eventually let the child take from him what he would. He couldn’t determine the major effects; maybe the child would become a hero or champion in the future as he drank from a god. Noctifer would have to ask Sala about that if he returned to heaven, but his people needed him. He looked down at the face of the baby, alert to the milk and divine substance, and reminisced of the day in which he had cut his throat to feed his devoted. His mind wandered, eventually remembering when he had made a meal of his nail and blood, and the face of Solaris who looked on in disdain. He tried to hold himself, but his hands gripped tightly onto the shawl of the baby. He forced himself to calm down, to stop whatever emotion would affect him, but it came all too quickly.
The baby, having had its fill, fussed away from the nipple. The mother, grateful, took the child to her and smiled at Noctifer.
“May I please give you some food, or a drink, mistress?”
Noctifer looked on, seeing her and the world around her.
“No, thank you, Amma,” Noctifer denied tensely. The mother nodded and wrapped the shawl tightly around the baby before rocking it in her arms. Noctifer was suddenly hit with the depravity of the situation, of all these people and their cries. He turned to look at the roof of the temple, and he stood up defiantly. The red sun shone brightly over him, and the clouds threatened to bring rain, which would only bring more filth to the slums.
He trudged into a small alleyway, where a barrel stood under the constant maintenance of a rain gutter. There was enough water there, and he needed a change. The water was taken with a ladle and poured over his hands to wipe away the dirt. He then cupped some into his palm and washed down his face, willing himself towards another form.
So appeared another form of the deity, a widower. He chuckled at the archetypes that the gods seemed fond of. Most appeared as alluring youth, small children, or crooked elderly. He was no exception, considering that he was a woman with a round figure and a military bounty just a few moments prior. He never questioned it, but it seemed natural and unassuming. From the alley came the elderly Noctifer, with his stringy gray hair and leathery skin. He tried to make the gait of the elderly lady natural, but he also wanted to get to the temple as soon as possible. The desire to walk speedily with the otherwise unnatural shuffle created an unnatural and uncanny limp. He was looked at curiously, but one old man came to help him.
"Sorry, Amma, would you like some help?”
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Eventually, Noctifer dismissed the man with a kind smile, sure to remember his name and face for later. He was at the foot of the temple and had begun to amble up the stairs towards the main sanctum, where he would demand to speak to a priest. As he walked up, the sun only became hotter, and it was readily apparent that Solaris and his corresponding force were deeply imbalanced. He muttered to himself, trying to balance the guilt he felt for being, in part, the cause of this entire situation with the anger he felt at the same time.
This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there.
When he got to the top of the stairs, he walked towards the sanctum, nodding to the statues of the deities as he walked by. Soon, he was at the archway, and, directly across the room, was a statue of Solaris in gold and marble. He narrowed his eyes at the statue, then turned down to look at three priests at the base of it. The smell of incense was unmistakable.
Looking down, he wondered why he hadn’t taken the step into the room. Maybe it was because a nagging thought presumed him to be impure and that he would then burst into flames when entering the temple. He shushed it away angrily, stepping into the temple with his crooked foot. The lanterns around him flickered, and the incense immediately changed direction as he brought with him a gust of wind from the outside, and his ability.
The priests turned around, one looking shocked at the presence of such an elderly figure entering the temple.
“Amma, you should’ve asked for help on the stairs,” he said shakily, pushing something behind his back.
“I did not wish to disturb,” Noctifer croaked with a raised hand, “I have come to speak to a priest.”
The priests looked at each other confusedly, as if trying to discern who would deal with the haglike figure, or something else. Noctifer’s eyes flickered downwards, where he saw eight feet, and only three priests. He saw six clothed feet and the pair of a young child. Tapping his pinkie against his hand, he allowed himself to gain enough force to knock one of the flower vases off a nearby table. The loud cracking sound shook the priests, which, in turn, gave way for a young girl from the slums to rush out of their hands. Noctifer’s eyes widened when he saw her state. Her hair was short, as though it had only started growing from the scalp of her head. Her eyes were sunken, and her lips were marked with dried blood. A priest angrily reached out to grab her, pulling her back into the group. Her eyes darted to Noctifer, and she screamed:
“Abba!”
His blood had begun to boil, and his fingers twitched.
“May I ask about the little girl?”
“These heretics are being dealt with as per the will of the God Solaris and the King Reve.”
“Heretics, she is but a girl.”
"Therefore, she can be converted,” the priest continued coldly. He nodded to the other two priests, and they took their leave. They dragged the girl, and she once again turned over her shoulder and screamed out:
“Abba!”
“It is an old lady, you blind fool, call her ‘amma’,” spat the priest. This broke Noctifer, and he appeared behind the priest. The former turned, seeing how the diminutive old lady was now behind him, with a fearsome fire burning in her widened eyes and her flashing teeth.
From the aethyrs, Noctifer drew a blade. He cared not if anyone saw him, or had the nerve to wonder how such an old lady would become such a power, but he would not see injustice dealt with complacency. He grabbed the collar of the priest and threw him against the altar table. The two other priests, hearing the commotion, pushed the girl into a separate room and shut the door. One grabbed a censer and began chanting to exorcise the supposed widow-demon that was before him.
The altar was thrown back, and Solaris’ statue shook with the impact. The priest groaned on the floor but came to his fours, breathing, although his chest stung with the impact of the crone. Noctifer enraged, stepped forward, grabbed the locks of hair on the top of the priest’s head, and lifted it. He exposed the neck, and with a horrible screech that shook all of the heavens and earth, he brought down the blade repeatedly until he finally ripped the head of the man off. The blood dripped on the blade and marked the temple in a variety of directions. In anger, Noctifer raised the head and continued his war cry, before throwing the head at one of the priests.
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Solaris was in a state. His headache had not gotten any better, and he had begun to notice small things. His attendants were smaller in number. The halls were too quiet, and Sala hadn’t been present in the court for a few days now. Additionally, he had no report from Mere. It painted a very, very horrible image for him, one that threatened to throw him into a spiral of interrogation. The ones who were here, with the attendants, weren’t his main advisors. It was like a play set before him—a pretty curtain to hide an otherwise horrible outside. It annoyed him to no end, and he was on the path to writing a demand to Sala, but his papers and stamps had also gone missing, so he had to make do with another one he had found in the bottom of his drawer.
He was on a third stack of paperwork, entirely small and very concerning considering that its details were trivial affairs. One was a standard message about omens; it felt as though his work had been dropped everywhere else except his abode. Maybe he had misplaced the paperwork. This thought caused him to rub his eyes again, the entire affair of the past few days being one long, blurry memory. It was as though he was partially asleep, just constantly asleep and blundering through the halls of a home that was just outside of his memory and senses.
The headache, the entire way that the world distorts itself behind the glass pane of his perception—it was enough that he took a drink during his work. He reached out to the glass, grunting when he realized that it was empty again. His attempt to fill it only made him realize that the bottle was empty as well. Roaring, he threw the bottle to the floor and let it crack. The sound rushed into his head, piercing every single fiber of his being.
The floor began to shake first, followed by a tremor in the windows and the shelves. The jingling sound of the broken glass came, and then the air was broken by a shrill cry.
“Solaris!”
It sounded like an old lady but, when it broke through his perception, had the power of a god. He stood up from his desk, the chair falling back.
“Noctifer…”