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The Vile Church, despite the name, was a glorious work of art--made entirely from glossy black marble held together by strong magic, it towered above the village like an ominous shadow waiting to engulf the light of the sun. The glistening spires were topped with red jade, shot through with jagged streaks of gold, and just for the ceremony, had been draped with long trains of silk that billowed in the hot breeze. Around the edges of the doors, fenharrow wreaths had been placed, along with a deep, merlot flower that Lidya had no name for, though it resembled a destroyed rose.
All of the village had come to attend, and the church could not hold them all; the few that did get entrance into its holy halls were the families of the employees, priestesses, and anyone who had enough money to pad anyone's pockets for a century or more. Godling ceremonies were not a laughing matter, and everyone wanted to be up close and personal with the gods as they chose their warriors, to breathe the same air as them before they returned above, to the realm of the gods.
Lidya had no desire to breathe the same air as them, or even be in the vicinity of their rotting, botfly infested corpses. Her father had told her that they took the bodies of dead humans to communicate to the masses, supposedly to avoid killing them with their "beauty", but she didn't believe that excuse for one bit. If anything, it was more likely that they wanted the humans well away from them, and taking the form of dead bodies was the way to do it.
Her father had managed to get them in one of the middle rows that weren't stained so badly with blood. The outside of the church may have been beautiful and expensive, but the inside was horrible, made of rotting wood soaked through with blood, some metal that had long turned orange with rust, and altars of stone that were crumbling to pieces on the floor. There were no windows except for one situated right behind the altar, the room sweltering without fresh air. Flies buzzed around Lidya's head, crawling over her veil and dress, fat and bloated on blood and death.
"You're sweating to your death," her mother mumbled once she had touched the sleeve of Lidya's arm. The lace was completely soaked through, now gray instead of white, and tacky to the touch. "By the time mass is over and the ceremony begins, you'll be drowning in that gown."
"I'm well aware," she huffed in reply. The skin of her back felt like it was glued to the pew and she shifted uncomfortably to ease some of the stiffness in her spine. "Tell me again why this dress was necessary?"
Her mother glared daggers at her out of the corner of her eye, but didn't speak. They both knew why the dress was necessary.
Everyone who had managed to get a spot in the church spoke in low whispers, watching the priestesses shuffle around with giant wooden bowls in their hands, waiting for mass to begin. Something was clearly different, and when Lidya was about to open her mouth and ask her father why they had the bowls, one of the priestesses stepped forward.
Lidya didn't recognize her from her previous trips to the church, so she assumed she had replaced one of the other priestesses. This one was unlike the others; she was actually quite odd, with skin as white as snow and eyes as red as blood. No one could look that bizarre and not stick firmly to her memory. The priestess wore a black robe to clash against her features, embroidered with the symbols of the vile church at the hems, and had a sparkling gold chain wrapped around her wrists that connected to the collar at her throat.
"Good evening, children of the church," she spoke quietly. Like the other priestesses, she had a very soft tone and gentle vibe that soothed most of the villager's anxiety, if only for a moment. "Welcome. Today is a very special day; today, we get to host the godling ceremony, one of our very own."
As if on cue, the crowd started mumbling, whispering hushedly to their pew partners. Some were excited, some were not, and others were confused by the large bowls that the other priestesses were holding. While the priestess was waiting for the crowd to settle down, Lidya leaned closer to her father and decided to voice her question.
"What's in the bowls?" She asked quietly. "It can't be water..."
"No," he affirmed. He leaned a bit closer so that no one else could hear. "It's godsblood."
Godsblood. There were many different types of godsblood in the world; there was the kind that the beasts had, the kind that gave you the Beast Sickness; there was the blood that the godlings had that made them immune to sickness and a little bit of age, gold and white in color; then there was the true godsblood that came in all sorts of colors depending on which god had spilled it from their vein.
"Oh."
On one of the priestesses faces, she could see the glow of something bright and blue. The others didn't seem quite so vibrant as that one, but had their own reflective shades of pink, red, and green--colors that were unnatural to see in blood, but natural for godsblood on its own.
Once the church had settled into complete silence, the priestess raised a bronze cowbell, ringing it once, twice, three times. "One for the Vile Mother. One for the lost godling. One for the god who would see him returned."
Lidya repeated the words after her, as did her mother, father and the rest of the church.
"Blessed be the mother," the priestess finished.
"Blessed be the son," the mass chorused in reply.
These were the typical rites that were spoken on the day of Abretas. It felt normal to say them, but something was horribly, horribly off; Lidya could feel it in the marrow of her bones and the twisting of her stomach. She reached over and grabbed her mother's hand first, then her father's, squeezing them tightly; both of their palms were wet and clammy with sweat. They gripped hers just as fiercly, her mother's nails digging into her skin.
The priestess then turned to the crumbling altar, setting the cowbell aside. On the bigger pieces that had yet to fall, sat two objects: one was a candelebra made of an ore that was as black as night and had flecks of stars within it. The other was a golden chalice that had recently been filled with fresh blood. Flies poured over the rim as she picked it up, holding it aloft.
"The blood of the Vile Mother," she explained, as if they hadn't heard it thousands of times before. "May she bless us with her gifts and good fortune."
"May she bless us," Lidya mumbled along with the church.
One by one, starting with the first row, people came up to recieve the blessing. Lidya had only ever done so once before, but it was enough to know that the blood in the cup was just normal blood, not the blood of the Vile Mother. Many of the other women who had worn the same garb as she did lifted their veils to expose their foreheads so that the priestess could draw the symbol on the skin there.
All of it was routine. All of it was normal.
But as soon as Eisa, one of the key pieces of her father's plan, walked up on stage to recieve his own blessing, the air around him rippled like water. It took only a few moments before the priestess was upon him, taking a fistful of blood and smearing it down his face. Some invisible force kept him there, and the church had fallen silent in shock, watching him struggle against the phantom holding him down.
That was when the first god showed up.
Abretas.
He wore the skin of a young human boy, so young that Lidya didn't think he was any older than seven. He didn't seem to be rotting too badly, but the smell was still horrific, and her eyes watered behind the veil as he passed their pew. Their plan clearly wasn't going to work. There was no escaping it; it had been set up far too cleverly for her to just make a dash for it. Like they were expecting someone to run.
Behind him, three others appeared: Naicar, Molterr, and the ever elusive Vespen, goddess of wind. They each wore bodies that were in varying states of decay and varying states of dress. On some of them, you could tell that they had been attacked by beasts. Others seemed to be victims of homicide or suicide.
"Our first godling of the day." Abretas was the first to pick up one of the large bowls from the priestesses. It had to be his blood within it, because he didn't look as he forced the rim to Eisa's mouth, the other hand at the back of his head to keep him from pulling away. "Drink, boy."
Lidya watched in horror as Eisa swallowed the blood. Her parents' hands tightened around her own to the point that she couldn't feel her fingers. She watched as his shoulders shook and he made awful gagging noises, attempting to vomit or spit it up; but Abretas merely wrenched his head back and covered his mouth with a rotting hand.
"Swallow it, or your family will never see the light of day again."
That seemed to be enough incentive for him, because he swallowed, but not without gagging once he was finished. Abretas then removed the bowl swiftly, handing it back to the priestess. Lidya could see the girl was horrified, her eyes wide as she stared down the bowl in her hands.
None of them had ever witnessed a godling ceremony, or even knew how godlings were made. And now they did.
It was horrific.
Lian. Kale, the baker. Patricia, the seamstress. They were getting awfully close to Lidya's aisle, just one person away; she felt horrible for her thoughts, but she prayed that Roryn was chosen. He was young, but he was old enough to be chosen, and if he had to be picked in order to get her a free ticket out, so be it.
She could feel her mother's hands start to shake.
Choose him. Choose him. Choose him.
Choose him so I don't have to become a godling.
Everyone was silent as they watched him walk up the aisle. He was akward, tall for his age and bulky; prime godling material. If he was chosen, that meant no one else's children were going to be fed to the beasts before their thirtieth birthday.
Lidya held her breath, leaning into her mother just slightly. She didn't want to hope, but...
And then it happened. The air rippled, and he was brought to his knees in front of the gods and priestesses. Forced to drink the blood of Vespen, the last god that needed a new godling.
It was over.
The relief that was felt was unanimous. Her mother's hand stopped its death grip, and her father slid his hand out from hers to put it over his stomach, as if the entire ordeal made him ill.
"Please, come recieve your blessings, before the day is out, and congratulate these brave young children on their success."
Lidya did so gladly, being the next in line. The relief was palpable, her racing heart slowing to a crawl; she felt she could lay down and go to sleep right on the floor, she was so happy she wasn't a godling. And there was no chance of her becoming one again.
The priestess allowed her to lift her veil once she reached the altar. Her eyes were a more ruby red than a pale red up close, and Lidya stood still for the few moments she had to while she ran her finger down her forehead. It was a simple line, nothing more.
When she turned around to take her seat beside her mother, she gave them a smile as she approached... But then saw the horror pulling at their faces. Her heart flopped into her stomach as hands, clawed and sharp and certainly not rotting, came around her throat, pressing through the collar. Beads of blood welled up where the claws touched, and she held her breath once again, frozen in fear.
"You," one of the gods breathed. "Why are you here? This is a sacred ritual!"
The hands grew tighter as she was forced to turn around and face the altar once again. She got a good look at the gods and priestesses faces, and the new godlings; the gods looked agast, rotten faces resembling a form of shock. The priestesses looked pale and the godlings were just confused, like she was.
If all of the gods were there.... Then whose hands were around her neck?
"Why am I here?" The voice was rich and dark, just like she would expect a god's voice to be, not the rotted vocal chords of a long dead body. "I am here for my godling, of course."
No. No. No, please.
Abretas stepped forward. "You have no rights to a godling, foul one. Return to your home in the Void, before my temper is sparked."
"It's just one little human. I doubt she'll be dearly missed."
"You violate our laws, outsider!" Vespen stood in line with Abretas; she didn't even look at Lidya, but somewhere over her head, where the god was speaking. "Leave the human and return her!"
Naicar, however much she wished for him to agree, stepped out to the side. "One human can't hurt. It's one more godling to thin out the numbers of the beasts, one more to aid the search for the lost godling Paolgo."
Please, for the love of all that's holy, no.
"I must agree with my brother," Molterr said, as if it wasn't something to think about. "It would not be harmful to have another godling on the earth."
Lidya heard the sound of something wet sliding against teeth. She had to assume the god behind her was smiling, because if he wasn't, that meant he was going to devour her whole.
"Please!" Her mother's voice was a screech in the echoing church. Lidya tried to turn around and tell her to stop, that it was useless, but the god held her firmly in place. "She's my daughter, you can't take her! You have the godlings you asked for!"
And yet, she did not hear the voice she wanted to hear. She didn't hear her father speak up.
"Gaol!" There was a slapping sound. "Gaol, get up and defend her!"
Lidya closed her eyes. Tears burned her lashline.
She wouldn't be getting out of this.
"I see that you are going to be a problem, woman." The god tightened his grip. "Should I remove you from the equation? It seems you are not honored by the position I have chosen for your daughter."
"Outsider..." Abretas warned. "No further."
She couldn't speak. If she could have managed past the knot in her throat, she would have; but any attempts at speaking failed her, and sat ruminating in her lungs along with any air she had managed to breathe, because the god was strangling her.
"Let her go! You're choking her!" Lian was the first of the godlings to speak up, hand outstretched as if he could do something.
The hands released her and she collapsed to the floor, buried under a heap of skirts and her veil. Fresh, albeit hot and humid, air entered her lungs, and she gasped quietly on the floor until her body had gotten its fill. All energy left her, sapped from the effort it took to breathe, but she, at last, managed to get a look at the god's face.
Dark purple eyes stared her down as she cowered on the floor. He was in his true form, unlike the other gods, and had such a human face that she could have choked on her own spit, had she had enough of it. Wings, large and spanning from the floor to the points at the tips, framed his head like a wicked halo, as black as the marble on the church. Even she could see that the god was handsome, but the horns curling around his head erased that image and turned it into something malicious.
"You do look rather red," he hummed in agreement. "But I still wish to have her as my godling, brother... Be it by your hand, or another's."
She didn't know what he meant by that, but Abretas' rotten brow settled into an angry frown--angry, but resigned.
"No!" Her mother wailed, but it was muffled by the pounding in Lidya's ears.
"Very well." Abretas retrieved an empty bowl from one of the priestesses, holding it aloft and offering it to the god. "Do it as the ceremony requires."
Invisible hands seized her ankles and forearms, dragging her up into a kneeling pose. She was unable to hold herself up properly, her arms weak and her legs like limp noodles. She watched as the god breezed past her, feathers brushing against her face, and there was a brief moment of pain before she felt the warmth of blood trickle down her cheek. The feathers were sharp, then.
The god held his arm over the bowl and in one sharp movement, sliced his wrist open with a claw. Blood, as black as night and with the viscosity of ink, poured into the bowl. It flowed like water, it was so thin, unlike the other blood she had seen her former villagers ingest.
By the time the god had deemed it was enough, it was filled to the brim, and judging by the hateful gleam in Abretas' eyes, the god intended for her to drink all of it.
"Drink." He pressed it to her lips. The wood was as cold as ice. "I wouldn't want to kill your lovely mother."
And drink she did. The liquid was as cold as the wood. It tasted like the earth, of rainwater, of all the things imaginable, and it felt like forever. Each swallow was like swallowing a handful of glass, chased by salt, and it was all she could do not to puke it back up. Tears were streaming down her face by the time all of it had been ingested, and she was certain she could feel some crawling back up her throat.
"Very, very good." The god threw the bowl away. It cracked and splintered against the altar.
As her vision began to fade, all she could see was his purple eyes staring holes into her soul.
"You'll be the perfect little doll for me to play with, won't you?"
By the Vile Mother... help me.
Her mother's screams were the tune of her nightmares, and would be for the rest of her life.
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