Of Gods and Warriors ✓

Chapter 68

A loudly uttered curse brought him back to reality. It was from Farren, of course. The illusion had shattered, and she was within his reach again.

Both Gods turned to her.

"Quite the gloomy ambience you've created," she said. "I see now what the Royal Sorcerer meant by this being not easy. A huge understatement, if you ask me."

In her clasped hands glimmered the Sacred Blade, shaking slightly. "Leave him alone," she said, her voice raspy. "I'm getting real sick of this ignoring game, y'hear me?"

Had it not been such a situation, Xenro would have laughed. A little dagger, against an ancient entity that fed off humankind's misfortunes?

Farren held her ground. "We have unfinished business."

"Do we?"Atruer's lip curled in annoyance, before he turned his gaze back to Xenro. "Anyway, let us not pay heed to some feeble mortal that would be dead before the turn of the century. Where were we?"

Xenro was having none of this. He stepped away at once. "We were not anywhere. This encounter has nothing to do with what I want. I have merely chosen to accompany her through this decision."

Atruer smiled wider and wider until he thought his jaws would crack. He threw a friendly arm over Xenro's shoulder. He flinched away, but the arm stretched and stretched, with bones popping and joints cracking most obscenely, until his shoulders slumped beneath it.

"Look," he said in a soft voice, gesturing from him to Farren. "I've seen this pattern before, and I don't like this at all. You're digging your own grave--figuratively of course--by getting attached to mortals like this. I won't lie, she, that Dresius lad, the whole cadre of armed fools who bear his name-- they're delightful playthings, but far too short-lived to be ...fun. How about you save yourself the pain and become the mighty God of War you truly are?"

Before him, Farren was shouting something, but Atruer's voice drowned out all else. She made to lunge at Atruer with her dagger. An invisible wall seemed to collide into her, throwing her back. A whirlwind of coiling smoke rose, only Xenro and Atruer at the centre.

"I am not like Rhilio, I can promise you that," said Atruer. "I will force upon you no such...unrealistic expectations like he. All I ask is that you just do what you're good at. Deliver the divine violence. Lay waste to this land. Bring the people to their knees before you. Why settle for a small cult when you deserve hundreds of thousands of worshippers?"

"And what benefits would that serve you?"

"Sweet bloodshed, dear boy, gives birth to more pain and misery. Souls weaken, and seek for...help. And I am that help in need."

Xenro looked down at his sword, thinking of all the lives he'd taken. It had been so easy. And to think, there once had been a time Father had been proud of him, enough to give him the position of the Commander of the Celestial Armies. He was no forsaken, nameless immortal back then, but a revered God.

What was he doing, whiling away drinking with some... mercenaries? Why was he going along with this play-pretend?

Farren banged her fists against the invisible wall, her words inaudible.

Bony fingers clasped his shoulder. Atruer sighed, eyes on her. "Don't waste your powers for someone--something so... temporary. This eternal life is yours. You choose whether to wallow in pain, or enjoy it as it comes."

Atruer looked at him reassuringly, certain that he had just earned himself a prey.

He was ever so wrong.

The one word he'd uttered, hit home.

Temporary, you say?

He looked at Farren, kicking and beating her fists and swinging her dagger against the resistance, screaming words which would not reach the God. What little mortal magic she possessed was no match for Atruer, a deity much more ancient than he, made strong by preying upon countless mortals such as her.