Day 6.5 Trickery - THE RED Anonymous

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Eris concludes the story with a pleased flourish. She leans against the marble stand, resting her chin on both her fists. "Of course, if they ever make it there in time, she'll see I already took her brother or would have if he was real. That would have been an even more delicious trick."

"Presuming he had enough to capture your attention, Cousin." Hermes pops up alongside her, an impish grin on his face.

"Please." Eris rolls her eyes. But she tweaks Hermes's ear affectionately. "Mortals of all races are so easy to refashion. Sometimes it has nothing to do with any of it. One day you'll understand."

"Hermes," the leader intones. "You are out of order. You must await your turn."

"How are they related?" you whisper. "Just because they're Greek –"

I thrust my finger against your lips. Some of the viewers below begin to look around.

Hermes huffs, blowing his loose dark curls out of his face. "I have a story to give anyway."

"Return to your place," the leader says.

Eris flutters her fingers at Hermes and then returns her focus to the robed leader as he skulks back with an exaggerated pout. "My story is acceptable," she says, not as a question, but a statement. "You accept it."

"It is acceptable." The leader draws at the book, and it slides through the air into the robe with the others. A final burst of dry air and bold blue light explodes and then fades. "Come now, Set. What have you brought to us?"

Set rises. Despite being a trickster, he carries himself with perfect dignity. Not surprisingly, it's something of a ruse. Given the right circumstances, he is as apt to pull a prank or tell a joke as any of them, but he takes the process of story curation quite seriously. He now wears his elaborate wesekh collar on the outside of his robe, creating a strong contrast. This is the special one that he wears only at these gatherings, sapphire, tourmaline, gold, emerald, amber, carnelian, feldspar, turquoise, and lapis all layered in a stunning design.

"I have brought this tale that I found among the minds of the restless and the wanderers," Set says. He reaches into his robe and removes a jade green book. As soon as the pages flutter, an odd scent of decay, copper, and iron wafts out. It is carried through the dry air.

"From whose mind did you pluck this tale?" the leader asks.

"One whose name I will not reveal," Set says in a tone that brooks no challenge. "It's rather a strange story, but I like it. Odd as it is. So listen and reflect."

The Red – Anonymous

Both men liked red. That was one of the few things they shared other than a thirst for her. Araujo wore red lipstick because she liked it as well, not for them, not even for herself. Just because.

She twisted the tube down with a sharp click and then slipped it in her bag, a silk bag woven three hundred years ago at a rickety, child-run loom. Too bad that in three hundred years slavery had only gotten worse, but the world sucked. It always had, it always would. What was to be done was all a matter of perspective.

That was true about pretty much anything. Take her face, for instance. Head on, her face was too flat, her hair clung too close to her skull. But to the side, slightly angled, she was more. So much more. Better. Beautiful. Red.

And that was the one thing she knew. Nothing else really mattered, not since the accident. Let the world burn and all the people in it, she was on fire now, and they'd soon catch her, so why not be damned and just try to stick it?

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