Objects of Worship (10 page)

“Put him in the water again” — his mother’s voice,
pleading.

Coro yells, “No! Not again! Never again! It’s useless. And
it hurts. It hurts so much.”

The old acolyte runs her hand through Coro’s hair, and
he flinches at her touch. “Don’t worry. We won’t submerge
you again.”

Turning to Coro’s mother, she continues, “Your son
would only suffer. It’s never an easy process, and he is too
weak to withstand another healing. He’s been immersed in
the Godpool too often in too short a period already.”

Coro knows the Godwater is essentially dangerous. The
prayers of the acolytes help guide it toward the desired
results, otherwise both body and mind could be altered or
damaged in unpredictable ways. Every village has a handful
of now-misshapen fools who had unwisely engaged in
unmediated contact with the God. Like old Urst, headless,
with mouths on the palms of his hands. Or Caralla, who
whispers to plants in a language no-one else understands
and is otherwise oblivious to anyone around her.

And even the acolytes can’t guarantee the desired
results, as the pain in his gnarled leg reminds him.
The Moon rises from the bottomless pit at the centre of
the world and blots out the light of the Sun. For a brief
moment, from a perch on a mountain ledge, Coro the lame
espies stars in the firmament, but quickly, blanketing the
night sky, hordes of nightmares spew from that same abyss
in which the Moon rests daily: the domain of their master,
Yamesh-Lot.

Instantly, the strident battle cry of the Shifpan-Shap
thunders from the sky. The warriors of the Green Blue and
Brown God have come out of the fabled city of Shifpan-Ur — as they do every night — their luxuriant wings carrying
them to battle against Yamesh-Lot’s nightmare minions.

Wielding their fireswords and their Godmaces, the
Shifpan-Shap hold the nightmares back, keeping the
world safe from the would-be invaders, those wraithlike
nightmares who would otherwise slip down to Earth and
infiltrate the dreams of the people of the Green Blue and
Brown God.

Sparks of fire and Godlight flare up in the sky as the
Shifpan-Shap strike at the nightmares. Coro cheers at the
dark wraiths’ anguished shrieks.

Eventually the Moon begins to smoulder, and it retreats
back into the pit before the Sun’s fire can consume it. The
remaining nightmares flee from the newly revealed light
and scurry back to the realm of their master.

Coro watches the Shifpan-Shap as they head back to the
great city of Shifpan-Ur, admiring their powerful grace,
envious of the awesome wings that allow them to fly. Once
again the sound of their voices booms from the sky; this
time it is their cry of victory. Coro tries to imitate it, but his
voice is unequal to the task.

As far back as Coro can remember, all he’s ever wanted
was to feel his feet leave the ground. He dreams of soaring
alongside his heroes, the glorious Shifpan-Shap. He yearns
to have wings of his own, to battle at their side against the
nightmares who hide the stars and who threaten to invade
the dreams of mortals.

In the sky, his gimp leg would not matter.

He is old enough to take care of himself now. He knows
he is nothing but a burden to his mother. Without a word
to anyone, he decides to set out on his own, to finally fulfill
his dreams.

Shielding his eyes from the reborn sunlight, Coro limps
down the other side of the mountain, away from his home
and toward his ultimate goal: faraway Shifpan-Ur, where
he will ask the Shifpan-Shap to give him wings of his own,
to teach him the art of flying.

Only a few days out, and Coro’s belly grumbles. He’s been
foraging, picking berries, unearthing grubs. But it’s not
enough.

Tonight, he approaches a cultivated field. He salivates at
the thought of lettuce, cucumbers, carrots, tomatoes.

In the sky above, the nightly struggle rages on.

The field appears unguarded, so he ventures into it. He
picks a slightly unripe tomato and bites into it; its juice
runs down his neck and chest.

A dog barks.

Coro runs. But his gnarled leg slows him down. He finds
an old tree thick with branches and leaves to hide in. Coro
climbs it rapidly before the dog’s jaws can snap at him.

The dog snarls at him from the base of the tree.

Coro stays in the tree for an entire night and day, before
he climbs down and resumes his journey.

From now on, he will stay away from tended fields.

Coro the lame is no longer a young man; he is not old, not
yet, but his youth is behind him. It is a long trek to Shifpan-Ur, longer than he had anticipated; but the desire to reach
the fabled city of the God’s warriors has overwhelmed
his life. So on he goes, swimming across rivers, climbing
mountains, walking through deserts — heading in the same
direction as do the Shifpan-Shap at the conclusion of their
nightly battles against Yamesh-Lot’s demonic nightmares.

Coro was born with a twisted leg. As a boy, he tried to rise
into the sky with every step, paying no heed to the ground
underfoot. He jumped from cliffs, flapping his arms. Or
he climbed atop whatever he could, trying to levitate into
the sky by force of will. But he always failed. Always fell
and hurt himself. Many called him a fool because of his
frequent injuries, so he kept his dreams of flight to himself,
not wanting to add fuel to the taunts.

With every fresh injury, his mother dragged him down
through the tunnels, to the acolytes, but the Godpool’s
waters never fully mended his infirmity.

On his seemingly endless journey — the horizon still
betrays no hint of Shifpan-Ur — he avoids all company,
detouring around any settlement or village or city, so that
his thoughts never stray from his goal.

His leg hurts. But it always does, and always has.

One morning, for the first time, Coro, now a mature man
nearing old age, sees the Shifpan-Shap descend at the end
their journey back to Shifpan-Ur. He cannot see the city
itself — not yet — but he rejoices at the first evidence that
his destination is attainable.

He briefly wishes he could share his newfound joy, but
he has not spoken to anyone since leaving the village of his
birth, and he cannot remember the last time he even saw a
settlement of any kind. But it was long, long ago.

He walks on, with renewed vigour.

Coro, now an old man, finally reaches Shifpan-Ur, and
he despairs. Coro can barely grasp the glorious city’s
dimensions. The city lies atop a high mesa with sheer,
unscalable sides. Even if he weren’t lame, Coro could
never hope to reach even the foot of the wall. Right and
left, the mesa stretches out nearly into infinity before it
subtly curves back on itself. The impregnably tall city walls
are decorated with giant, intricately detailed carvings of
legendary Shifpan-Sho warriors of past ages. These high
reliefs glow with Godlight.

For one hundred days and nights, Coro wails at the foot
of the great mesa. When, in the splendour of the reborn
sunlight, the Shifpan-Shap return from their nightly war,
he yells to them, yearning to be noticed, but even if his
meek voice could carry so high as to reach the ears of the
God’s mighty warriors it would be drowned out by their
cries of victory and by the deafening flurry of their wings
flapping against the wind.

Coro dries his tears and refuses to give up. He gets up
and resumes walking, following the nearly imperceptible
curve of the cliff’s base. There must be a door, or stairs, or
an opening of some kind, somewhere. The whole city can’t
be walled off like this. It must not be.

Coro loses track of the number of days and nights. Both
the mesa and the great city of Shifpan-Ur atop it remain
unbreachable. As Coro keeps limping along in a circle
around the city of his dreams, despair steadily gnaws at the
remains of his aspirations, until eventually only despair is
left. Until he turns away from Shifpan-Ur.

This is not a conscious act. Coro is no longer capable of
such. His mind is now blank as he wanders across the endless
landscape of the flat Earth, without hope or purpose.

Coro’s parched, leathery skin is taut against his aged and
brittle bones. The hair has long vanished from his sunburnt
scalp. He has not used his voice since that last morning, long
ago, when he cried out in vain for the Shifpan-Shap to take
heed of him. If he takes nourishment or refreshment, it is
only because his body compels him to. Conscious thought is
a habit he has discarded, along with the last vestiges of his
hopes and dreams, when he wandered away from the foot
of the inaccessible city of Shifpan-Ur.

Coro takes a step, and, as it did so often in his youth,
his foot fails to find purchase. He falls — into Godwater. He
sinks until he is completely submerged. His mind refuses to
acknowledge the pain that comes with the transformations
provoked by the Godwater.

Automatically, still mindless, he swims. He reaches the
farther shore and emerges onto dry land. He stands up and
holds still; his mind stirs as, stunned, he takes notice of his
new body. As the Sun dries the Godwater from his skin, he
marvels at his youthful, muscular frame. He is now taller
by more than a head, his strong limbs easily twice their
previous girth, including his crippled leg, fully restored to
health. To better than health.

Dry, and imbued with a newfound serenity, Coro looks
to the sky as he boldly, buoyantly, takes a step forward. And
another. He has taken only a handful of steps when his foot
fails to land on anything solid — or anything at all.

Coro falls into darkness. And falls. And falls — until he
lands on a soft surface. It yields subtly under his weight,
but its touch chills him.

He cannot see anything. Something slithers on his
cheek, and thin tendrils penetrate his ears, his mouth, his
nose. Godlight explodes around his head, and the tendrils
tear themselves away from his orifices. He is dropped — by
whatever it was that was holding him — and he thuds onto
a dusty surface. He wonders why he is not hurt, and then he
recalls his new body.

He is assailed by whispers buzzing in his ears. As the
whispers fill up his mind, his own thoughts and memories
are gradually crowded out.

Slowly,
his
eyes
adjust — or,
rather,
learn
to
see
differently. There are dark shapes radiating a black
luminosity, an anti-light, darker by far than a mere absence
of light. These radiating shapes, such as the whispering,
skittish wraiths besetting him, contrast with the inert
matter of the pit’s walls and various outcroppings, allowing
him to distinguish his surroundings.

Coro, confused yet calm, gets up and walks, surprising
himself with the purposefulness of his gait. The whispers
are guiding him, wordlessly teaching him to understand
what he sees.

Gigantic dark tendrils slither menacingly throughout
this strange area, all seeming to emanate from the same
source, a source that Coro cannot fully fathom or perceive.
But the whispers soothe his fears.

Coro moves on.

He reaches an enormous globe, resting on an earthen
cupule. The Moon.

He sees human shapes, their eyes glowing darkly,
labouring on its surface. Many of them are missing a
limb or two. They smell of decay, and bone shows through
their rotting flesh. Some of these reanimated corpses dig
enormous holes, leading into the bowels of the Moon.
Others climb down into those holes, then emerge from
them, bringing forth a dark substance.

One of the slithering tendrils surges toward the Moon
and gathers dark matter from a number of workers. It also
grabs one of the workers. Coro hears bone shatter as the
tendril crushes together the dark Moon matter and the
remains of the worker.

Coro wobbles as the wraiths leave his side. They circle
the tendril that has enwrapped the dark matter of the
Moon and the worker. The tendril molds itself in the
shape of a funnel, and they are sucked in.

The tendril flattens so tightly that it almost folds upon
itself; sparks of dark anti-light explode from the pressure.

Coro reflexively shields his eyes, but he quickly resumes
watching.

The tendril approaches, unfolding in front of him,
presenting him with a sword, a darkly luminescent weapon
nearly as long as he is tall. Coro picks it up. The hilt burns
his flesh and fuses with the bones of his hand. The pain
makes him want to scream, but the weapon whispers to
him and he is comforted by its now familiar voices.

He cannot make out their words, but he grasps what the
nightmares embedded in the moonsword are telling him:
he must plunge his weapon into the body of a slumbering
mortal, so that the nightmares may flow from the sword
and into the land of dreams forevermore, to claim it for
their master, Yamesh-Lot.

The Moon rises. Coro watches it make its way up through
the dark pit until it vanishes from his sight.

For a time, nothing happens. And then there’s a flurry
of movement, as all the other wraiths whoosh up from the
pit, following the Moon.

Yamesh-Lot wraps one of his tendrils around Coro,
enfolding his arms and the sword.

Coro is dizzied by the speed with which he is carried
upward. In no time they breach the mouth of the pit.
Surrounding the dark abyss is a moat of Godwater — the
body of water into which he had fallen before entering
Yamesh-Lot’s domain; its sparkling luminescence forces
him to momentarily close his eyes.

The tendril continues its rapid journey. It rises high in
the sky and then crosses above the Godmoat. As soon as
it does so, a geyser erupts from the Godmoat, soaking the
tendril.

Coro is dropped as the tendril jerks violently, but he is
prepared and lands on his feet.

Where it crosses above the Godmoat, the gargantuan
tendril that sprouts from the dark abyss is severed from
Yamesh-Lot himself and drops onto the barren soil just
beyond the ring of holy water. A deafening roar escapes
from the pit. The limb catches fire, writhes, and burns to
cinders.