Giving the World Away - Part 2
A serialized, in-progess follow-up to Mirror Image.
Part 1 | Part 3
She opens her eyes, though she doesn't remember closing them.
For a moment, time seems to stand still as she sees him.
His skin is silver. Wind ruffles his hair, carrying with it the scent of sea salt, and revealing that the cracks at his temples on the statue below were no artistic liberty. He leans against a stone railing, and it looks wrong, he is marble, cold and hard, incapable of nonchalance.
The warm sunset spread out behind him only heightens what is missing in his blinding, whited-out eyes. It seems like it should hurt to look at, it's too bright, but she can't tear her eyes away. She is drowning in it, perhaps endlessly.
And then, she snaps.
"Oh, very good. How impressive." She closes the distance, pointing a finger. "Is that what your followers can hope to gain from their worship? Becoming fodder for your glory? You really are no different from the rest."
They're perfectly sound.
His mouth moves, but she feels rather than hears his voice, and it's too uncanny, the way it resonates in her memory.
He raises a hand and an image appears above it - the temple, with Shadowheart kneeling at his acolyte's side, performing some kind of restoration.
She scoffs and gestures to the scene, "No thanks to you."
Mortal self-sufficiency is to be encouraged.
"No no, that's Selûne's working. A true god." A weak return, inconsistent with her prior argument, petty and inelegant - but it seems to strike a nerve regardless. He turns away.
You shouldn't have come.
"Are you kidding me? You practically begged me to come find you. I was just fine, and you dropped this on me."
It was a gift, not an invitation.
"Then explain the fucking fireworks show. Why am I here?"
He looks back at her. You were always eager to recognize divine fallibility. Haven't I earned that same consideration?
"...You're saying that was just a fuckup?"
Growing pains. I know you are not unfamiliar.
She can't conceive of why he would reveal that. She's too rattled, and his eyes were always how she read him, and without them, he's inscrutable, she can't possibly piece together his intent.
So she'll just have to enact hers.
She lifts her jaw imperiously. "I want it gone."
You spent years working tirelessly for much less. Slaving away for party tricks, compared to what you could do with this blessing.
"I am not your fucking Chosen." Her voice trembles, almost, but not quite imperceptibly. "I won't do that."
I've asked nothing of you.
"For now. Am I supposed to just trust that you won't change your mind? With your track record?"
Is it truly so intolerable to have any kind of tether to me?
He steps towards her, and she holds her breath.
When was the last time you awoke shivering, Morelind Whisperwillow?
She had pictured a thousand times what it would be like when he could finally say her name. Had dreamed of the delight in his eyes, the reverence of his voice, so moved and honored to be able to finally know her completely.
This feels like she's been lit on fire.
"You...You've been watching me," she stutters out.
His mouth turns down, and a god shouldn't be able to pout, should never be etched with melancholy. Your life is immensely fragile, and all too temporary. Irreplaceable, and indescribably precious.
She buries her face in her hands.
It's true. She can't recall noticing the temperature once in the last month. And now that she's standing here before him, as she turns her attention inwards, she can feel it, this- whatever he is, whatever he's become; it is alive and thrumming inside her, called to full power by proximity to its nexus.
And now that she knows how it feels, she can never be unaware of it again.
A gentle hand settles on the top of her head, slowly stroking her hair, and the connection is such that she knows it before it even happens, doesn't even jolt.
She raises her head slowly, agonizing and inevitable, and sees warm brown eyes.
"Stop it," her words are hoarse. "You're not him."
His hand retreats, and his voice is hushed and intimate. "Of course I am. I'm as much myself as you are you."
"You can't do this to me, Gale." The tears spring forth, finally.
"The reason you're here," he tells her slowly, "is to say goodbye. We won't speak again."
"No." She pushes away from him, "No, you had your chance to do that, and you didn't. You don't get to do it now."
"There is nothing else to be done." He sounds affected for the first time, real frustration creeping in now that hadn't been present even while she'd been hurling insults at him. "I will not carry on a relationship with a mortal."
"Then sever this properly! Take away your 'gift'!"
"So you can return to isolation and mediocrity?" He answers coolly.
Her mind zeroes in on strategy, skipping over any emotional reaction. In an instant he has reminded her of the truth of the situation, of him.
She doesn't know what he wants. But he's revealed at least one thing he doesn't, and handed her leverage in doing so.
"You really ought to consider what I might do if you don't."
"You can hardly threaten me with my own power."
"No, of course not. You're not fragile and temporary."
She wouldn't do it. Not really. But he broke their covenant first, lying and false promises are fair game now. There's no worm in her brain to announce her deception.
"I give you the means to recover yourself, and you'd rather pursue your own destruction? When will it be enough?"
It takes her a moment to recall what she's lost, other than him.
Recall.
"Some magic can't be undone," she recites.
"No. But all magic can be modified, or replaced."
"You already tried this, and I already turned you down." She intones, but she can't stop herself from starting to consider the possibilities in her mind.
"This is no offer with which to bargain. It simply is."
"Why not?"
She says it without thinking, but as soon as she has, the wheels click into place. "All magic can be modified. Divine included."
"Only with divine effort."
"Then modify it. Change it to an agreement, with clear terms."
His eyes flash back to white.
"You want me to be your patron."
"It's that or nothing. I won't live like this. I can't." She holds his unearthly gaze defiantly. The desperation is entirely authentic.
Another endless moment passes.
"For every month that you do something that surprises me, you will wield this power."
She blinks, trying not to reveal her absolute shock at his acquiescence.
"None can name me as your Chosen." She gets her terms on the table in a rush, while she can.
"We will renegotiate the pact once every five years, and have no other contact."
She runs the conditions back in her head. Both parties are bound by their phrasing. He cannot alter her magic at will, and she must use it when she has it. He has no say in what she does with it, and neither can she make any entreaties to him.
No doubt it's a terrible idea. She extends her hand.
He reshifts into his godly form and takes it.
"We are thusly bound."
A tickling sensation traces over her palm in a circle as she is held in his iron grip. He lets go, and she feels the magic inside her shift in some intangible but undeniable way.
She turns over her palm and finds the symbol of the orb marked into it. His symbol now, it seems.
"Your first month is already assured."
"By what?"
"Our oath does not dictate such revelation. Tell Shadowheart it was good to see her once more."
"Supercilious prick, tell her-"
She reappears in the temple exactly as she left it, with her hand on the stranger's chest, her thumb right over the same spot as that tender bruise she'd circled countless times had been.
"Morel!"
She turns around and vomits.
"Ah, there it is."
She hears Shadowheart rummage in her bag. She passes Morel a cup and mumbles a few words over it, conjuring fresh water to fill it.
She takes the cup and wanders over to the wall opposite the statue and slides to the floor, leaning back. She regards it as she sips.
It is clarifying. Whoever she just made that deal with isn't Gale.
She slowly tunes back into the world around her. Efforts are already underway to put the place back in order. She feels a small flash of guilt for the servant scrubbing at the floor. She mistakenly makes eye contact with the merchant- he starts towards her, a pissed off Shadowheart staring daggers at his heels.
She gets to her feet.
He inclines his head in a short bow, and studies her with eerie hunger. "My Lady. Prophet, what did you see?"
Shadowheart angles to step in front of him. "Are you alright?"
Morel puts her hand on Shadowheart's arm and looks at the man. He is still marked by dark veins.
"No, prophets share visions from on high." She leans in and sneers, "I'm not telling you shit. Let's go."
She waits until they reach the threshold, then says lowly, "He said it was good to see you again."
"Generous of him."
"You could have told me he's fucking silver."
"You said you didn't want to know."
"I didn't. I don't." At the bottom of the steps, she looks back over her shoulder. "But now I do."
"As much as I enjoyed it, I'm not sure it was a good idea to antagonize a zealot at their holy site."
"Are they zealots?" She asks, with mild curiosity.
"I don't think they know what they are. But they're very eager to find out."
"Well," Morel sniffs, "if he lets me get murdered in his seat of power...Then frankly he'll deserve it."
Shadowheart scoffs. "And how about your unfortunate companion? Or you, for that matter?"
"Are you really afraid of them?"
"...No."
"Then I suggest we find the most expensive establishment in the city, and see if we can't generate a tab for them somehow."
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