Auaatia was exhausted. It was currently a few hours after midnight, and the first opportunity she had had for sleep in five days.
Outside the night was beautiful, towards the horizon the first light of the dawn gently licked the waves in just the same manner as did the gentle breeze, and down below the many white buildings of Seacastle almost seemed to sparkle. And there, dominating the sky, was that thing:
Image: The moon as seen from Seacastle on the spring of 1004 nok. Auaatia turned her gaze away form the dark spot in the sky whit a feeling of unease, slithering back into her Arch senatorial cambers. They were a bit to extravagant for her tastes really, an open floor plan with sculptures by old Artew masters, furniture made in Tenryuubito style from rare kinds of wood, ancient invaluable tapestries on the walls, a hundred lights both magical and otherwise, and other such things that could according to her could have been put to much better use sold or put in the museum further down in the lighthouse building. She missed the simplicity of the countryside; she was a Rural Middle, not cut for the hectic life of the city or endless arguing of the senate. Many might envy her for her position, but she was only there because she was the one who could get the job done the best.
The last few days had been especially hectic, ever since that thing in the sky first appeared; the agronomists and astrologist had a million theories, the one told to the public was that it was a comet, but nobody in the know really gave a halfsweight of lead for that idea. The only thing most theories had in common was that it had something to do with the moon: the Lunarians said so, it was in the spot on the sky astronomers said was called the moondark, and it seemed to fit somewhat with the Tenryuubito legend… But the moon was supposed to be a disk, not a circle. And besides, it was the MOON? That was something for children’s tale and crazy Lunarian religion; it couldn’t just appear, just like that, could it?
She shook her head and rolled up in the bed under a heavy covering of expensive furs. Then there was the reanimated larva. One could only assume they had been caused by the thing in the sky. The ones that had been seen hadn’t caused any damage, or even crawl out of the compostiton landfill, at least not in Seacastle, but she couldn’t help but worry about what had happened in the cities with a less developed waste handling infrastructure, or with the larva dumped at sea. Auaatias last thought as she drifted asleep was about the formulation of the explanatory letters they were to send to the leaders of all the federate city-states.
The guard yanked up from his half slumber; something was happening, the light from a window some thirty stories up in the lighthouse was looking strange. It was the arch senator’s window. First, the light in the room seemed to increase until it was impossibly strong, then quickly dismissed. It was probably only one of the magic lights malfunctioning again, but they had never looked quite like that, so he reported it. A message was sent to the senatorial guard, and a team of guards dispatched towards Auaatias cambers.
Auaatia was trapped in a large wooden building, and desperately searching for something, suddenly, there was a red light, and then everything was on fire. She was panicking, the building collapsing around her! A burning support beam fell from the roof, hitting her in the head and breaking her spine as well as burning her badly. She couldn’t move, she tried calling for help but couldn’t do that either, a stable boy was trying to save her: "Wake up!", but she couldn’t move. She was buried under a think layer of expensive furs, completely unharmed.
“Wake up, mistress of the Scana" Sounded a voice sweet as nectar and powerful as a thousand horns and drums.
She threw the furs away, sitting up and blinking against the light.
“What-? Who-? How did you get in here?” she said,”Have you booked an appointment?"
Then she saw who awoke her.
It was a Hitengu. Tall, his skin shimmering like layered liquid multicoloured light, clad from top to toe in golden armour, of Hitengu design and glowing red with heat. She noticed that the heated metal heated the entire room.
“oh, lucid dream”, she drew the obvious conclusion.
"I am sorry to wake you at that hour, but the matter is something of high importance. I am Tomoshibi, god of the sun, and I come to you, with an invitation." The Hitengu man spoke. Yup, this was a dream is she ever saw one.
He withdrew from somewhere a thin golden plate, and placed it on a nearby low table, ruining the irreplaceable piece of furniture in the process. Auaatia blinked and looked around the room, besides the strange Hitengu it looked as when she went to sleep. A realization slowly started to dawn on her as she became more and more awake.
"If this is a dream… Why are you still standing and talking like that?" She questioned.
"This is not a dream, I can assure you. In a way, it is more of a nightmare." Spoke the god, whereupon he vanished in a blinding flash, leaving behind nothing but a sharp stinging in Auaatias eyes that lasted several minutes, and the gold plate.
While her eyes recovered the guards entered the room, at which point the plate was examined and found to contain a detailed world map marked at the coordinates of a mountaintop to the northwest and with the date “first of Sew, 1007 nok” noted as well. She then went back to sleep when she noticed she had only gotten an hour before being interrupted.
The following days were filled with many meetings, multiple accountings of the events with the god, endless arguing with annoying experts, and a thought examination of the magical security staff of the lighthouse, as well as many other things.
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Topic: Battle of the Gods VI (cancelled, it sucked) (Read 5691 times)