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epilogue
IP: 82.14.67.140
Posted on September 10, 2012 at 02:42:21 AM by georgia

Epilogue Dragonbone Moor, Shaman The rain was relentless, and had been since the announcement of Aura's death. It was patchy, occasionally shrinking to harass smaller areas, but generally covering most of Shaman. Flooding had become a problem in some of the territories, particularly the low-lands, but the careful employment of magic had protected most of the crops and homes. Grey rainclouds rolled in on the wind, plunging the world into an oppressive darkness. To find the cause, one had only to find the source; Tsi respectfully waited a week before he set out to follow the rain. Dragonbone Moor, as the locals had begun to call the previously renamed Ily Moor, spanned for as far as the eye could see on a clear day when one stood at the border. Visibility had been significantly reduced by the rain, and Tsi shuddered to think of a nine year-old child out here alone in this cold, wet, bleak landscape. Moors were dangerous places even in the best of conditions, and the natural weather was so strong and changeable that even a weather manipulator could be caught unawares. It was clear he wasn’t going to find anything with the elements against him, so he ignited a spark of divinity and dematerialised, trusting in magic to guide him where he needed to be. Almost instantaneously, he reappeared in a valley with a thin river snaking between two tors. A small, slight boy was sitting by the river’s edge with the lower part of his legs dangling into the water, his shoulders hunched and his face turned away. As Tsi approached, he glanced around and eyed him in a slightly defensive way. As the Acting Chairman sat down beside him, Thoth sighed heavily. “Back to try again, Tsi?” “I gave you some time to think. I’m here now to see if you’ve made a decision.” Thoth regarded him with unnervingly serious eyes. With his indeterminate hair colour and brown eyes he didn’t look at all like his mother on first glance, but the penetrating intensity of his eyes was the same. Thoth would like to have been able to say that he hadn’t needed to think and that his answer was obvious, but that would be a lie. He’d dreamt of going to Earth for as long as he could remember, and now Tsi was offering him not only that, but a chance to better understand the life his mother had led before creating Shaman. The wonders of a world fuelled by science and technology, committed to enhancing knowledge and learning, the home of the gods… he must think of Earth in the same way the ancient Greeks thought of Olympus. But every time his imagination swept him away, images of his life here on Shaman would bring him hurtling back to reality. He couldn’t go. It wasn’t right. Perhaps Tsi sensed the potential for indecision, because he gently but persuasively repeated his arguments from their previous conversation. “The situation on Earth is extremely difficult. Mallos is talented, but he’s only one man and there’s no way he can succeed in calming the entire planet alone – especially when three quarters of the fairies there don’t acknowledge his religious authority. The only thing which will placate them is Aura – or someone universally acknowledged as her representative… and successor. You are the only possible candidate. A few months should be enough, and then you can come back here.” There was a long silence. “Do you know a man named Joel, Tsi?” “Can’t say I’ve heard of him.” “My mother named him my guardian for the times when her role prevented her from caring for me. He’s strong, an excellent fighter, loyal to his family, willing to take me in and more than able to defend me against any threat this world may offer. Can you think of another man like that?” Tsi thought for a moment. “King Arthur.” “Precisely,” Thoth agreed. “King Arthur has a son my age for me to play with. Under his care I would have learned the same lessons: discipline, politics, literature, self-defence and diplomacy. Instead, my mother sent me to Joel, who is a carpenter. Do you know why that was?” Tsi shook his head. The gravity in the young boy’s voice amazed him. “I know what power is,” he answered. “I’ve grown up with gods and princes. But, more importantly, my mother taught me about the true meaning of the originals. I can differentiate between myth and fact better than the finest fairy historians; I know about every one of the original fairies and almost everything about the council; I understand about godly duties. Instead of sending me to live with the king, where I would have filled in the gaps of my upper class knowledge and learned to become the perfect courtier, my mother sent me to learn the skills and life of the working man. I didn’t understand why for a long time, but when I saw you all together in the castle I realised what my mother had meant about gods and mortals being out of one other’s reach. You don’t understand each other… but I understand both of you.” It took Tsi a minute to realise what Thoth was saying. He walked the line between the mortal world and the immortal, with a foot in each world. Growing up under those conditions couldn’t have been easy, but it had armed him with a unique power: the power of understanding. This child, though young and inexperienced, knew how to sympathise with gods and mortals alike. “That, surely,” the Chairman began, “makes you perfect for the job – ” “No,” Thoth interrupted, gently but firmly. “It makes me perfect for another job.” He’d been absently rummaging around in a rucksack as he’d been speaking; now he extracted a book held it up for Tsi to see. The rain folded around it as if it were protected by a force-field, so Tsi could see it clearly and it was protected from the water. Spanning across the two pages was an image which would be familiar with most semi-educated Earthlings, since its fame was widely acknowledged. Towards the right, a human was being presented by an ibis-headed man to a kinglike figure seated on a throne with two women standing beside him. To the left, a sinister crocodile-headed creature waited on the other side of a pair of scales containing a heart and a feather. A tiny baboon sat between the scales. The scene of the weighing of the heart from the Book of the Dead was the most famous depiction of Egyptian art in the western world: it showed the deceased being judged before the gods. “This is Thoth, my namesake,” the boy pointed to the ibis-headed figure. “I thought for a long time that I was named for him because he was a pagan god of science and valued the pursuit for knowledge, but I don’t believe that anymore. This, here, is also Thoth.” He pointed to the baboon seated beside the centre of the scales. “He guarded the balance between life and death, god and mortal. It was his job to ensure that every man received a fair trial from the gods, and that no man attempted to deceive the gods. “When you ended the war, you made Mallos the guardian of the balance on Shaman. It was an appropriate choice, especially since you took his magic from him and forced him to live as a mortal: Mallos understands mortals better than most deities. But now he is gone, and the slot is vacant.” Tsi started to say something, but Thoth held up his hand. The simple gesture was enough to silence the Chairman of the Council of Originals. “I am the guardian of the balance,” he said calmly. “I am the one who stands between the people of Shaman and the gods you have decided to bring here, not you.” He snapped the book shut and stood up, his coffee-coloured eyes daring the god to challenge him. Tsi stood up more slowly, trying to process everything he’d heard. “You’re very young,” he replied cautiously, “perhaps if you were to train with Khasekhemwy for a while, or even Allianah…” “I trained with Aura,” Thoth answered in a tone which reminded Tsi of her. “And later Mallos. Is that inadequate?” “Er – no – I suppose…” Although he’d faced raging deities, ancient enemies and monsters beyond human comprehension, Tsi had never felt as helpless as he did now, standing in front of an undersized nine year-old. “We’ll – er – we’ll need to get you a communications device…” “Got one.” Thoth reached into his pocket and held up a pendant cut into the same star symbol as Aura’s had been. Unlike his mother’s, this one didn’t have the faint blue glow which identified it as a divine pendant. “Please inform the necessary authorities that they can contact me this way. I’m polylingual, so I can read the ancient language. Just final thing,” Thoth tucked the pendant back into his pocket, ignoring his companion’s stunned expression. “Please ask the other deities to stop referring to me as ‘son of Aura’. I am not her successor; I am Thoth, an individual in my own right.” He gave a stiff nod of dismissal which Tsi’s limbs automatically obeyed. He wasn’t entirely sure what had just happened but, as he walked away, Tsi was left with the odd feeling that Aura had never really died at all.

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