Secrets of Forgotten Gods

what if i told you a story and at the end you had to decide if that's all it was, or if i was telling the truth

                He’d been summoned, because in all reality that’s exactly what it had been, to one hell of a dive. It was a bar, or so it looked from the outside. The front of the building was paneled with- what the hell, was that driftwood? The sides were all mesh- or was that… chain link? Music and raucous laughter poured out of the open sides, and he could distinctly hear the sounds of at least one if not two pool tables. There were some rather glorious bikes parked up by the entrance, and some rather inglorious P.O.S-es parked down by the plywood “road sign”.

 The word “unsavory” kept floating around his mind the more he looked around. He shook his head and lit another cigarette, what in hell was she thinking?

                This wasn’t her usual scene; hell this was damn near the antithesis of her “usual” scene. The roughest place he’d ever seen her was their home town’s ice house down by the beach.  She talked a big game, hell she could talk s**t with the best of them, but this? This, this almost made him uncomfortable. He pushed the swinging doors open and waited for his eyes to adjust to the smoke and…gloom.

                The music was loud, with heavy base booming from one speaker in every corner, and at least two more mounted on the corners of the bar.  There were pool tables lined up by the east wall, four of them. All occupied- impressively so, there were lots of riding leathers in here. There were a couple of booths back behind the island bar, and some tables littered here and there. Okay, not so bad. A couple of waitresses circulated, carting pitchers of beer, bottles of the stuff, baskets of deep fried something, and the odd mixed drink or two.  He scanned the room again, and found her, cozied up to the bar very, very obviously chatting up the biker type pouring her some sort of golden drink. When he handed it to her, his fingers lingered a little longer than they should have.

                She smiled at him, a cold twist of those pretty lips; to anyone that knew her it was more than enough warning. He took a step towards her, intending to step in before things went too far. Her head turned suddenly and she saw him. That calculating coldness left her features, and was replaced with that look. The look that seemed to be reserved just for him, some mixture of joy, amusement, and heat. Dear god, the heat. The bartender started to say something, to draw her attention back to him, drink in hand she raised a single finger from her grip on the glass, and silenced him. An oddly imperious gesture in the center of this rough and tumble kind bar. She threw a ten down on the bar and tossed a wink over her shoulder at the spurned drink slinger.

                He met her half way, grinning, his hands stuffed in the pockets of his jeans. She smiled, and he drank her in, just like she wanted him to. Her ever present chuck-taylors and tee shirt were missing tonight. Replaced, instead, with some sort of black tank-top that he’d heard someone somewhere refer to as a “racer-back” that hugged every one of her very dangerous curves, and a pair of high-heeled boots that slunk up her denim covered calves and brushed at the top of her knees. She looked different somehow, and it wasn’t just the new hair, though she was seriously rocking the hell out of that coffee colour. It rippled down her back, unbound and… was that a feather tucked in there? Her storm cloud coloured eyes were rimmed with black liner that winged out at the outer corners, and shaded with smoke tinted shadow. This was a decidedly dark, almost sinister look for his bubbly librarian. She looked, like something out of a very dark wet dream.

“Hey,” she said simply, handing him the tumbler.

“Hey yourself, babe, the hell is this place?” he retorted taking a sip of what turned out to be an old fashioned.

Whiskey.

“This? This is…a thin place.” She smiled cryptically, leading him to the farthest booth in the most shadow filled corner.

“A ‘thin place’?” he repeated dumbly, watching the way her hips swayed, so different in the heels.

“Yup, don’t worry, I’ll explain it later. Probably.” She motioned for him to sit, and slid into the seat across him. She leaned back, watching him with hooded eyes. Usually, he could read her-and she him. But right now, her thoughts were a mystery, this was oddly new territory.

“So? What’s up.”

She chuckled, dipping a finger into his drink and sucking it dry- not a move meant to seduce, she just wanted a taste. At least that much he knew, some small familiar thing.

“What would you do, if I told you I wasn’t human?” she asked tipping her head to the side and watching him. Something about the tone, or the piercing regard she laid on him kept him from just all out laughing at her. But only just.

“Well, in light of my recent… hobby, I’d have to ask what you are... So, what are you?” He grinned, amused. So that’s what this was about. He’d recently taken up amateur paranormal investigation, just another subject that they both found fascinating. He’d asked her what she thought when he’d made the decision to actually start. She’d encouraged it.

“A whispered shadow of a memory.” She replied leaning forward, elbows on the table chin cradled in her palms. In the scant light her silver armband engraved with Celtic knot-work glittered.

“How do you figure?” he arched an eyebrow with his challenge.

“Being an idea, or maybe a hope of a people long dead- but certainly not forgotten.” She smiled softly, jerking her chin at him “this is the part when you take out your little note book and start taking notes Mulder.”

Obligingly, because why the hell not, he took out his little leather bound notebook “Pray do go on. If you can that is?”

“Certainly, provided you know in advance it’s a sad story I think, and probably a strange one for this day and age. Then again, given what new heights the occult has risen to perhaps not so fantastic.”

She’d lapsed into such a formal kind of speech he was impressed, and almost, almost, convinced.

“Well I do love a good story.”

“I know,” she sighed “Fair warning, this may very well change the way you look at me.” She gave that little lopsided smile, and shrugged.

He scoffed, “Really? The way I look at everything changes every damn day. But nothing is gonna change how I feel about you.” He waggled a finger at her then flicked condensation at her, a familiar game. She giggled and jerked away from the projectile liquid. Then sobered some.

“Once upon a time, is a good place to start I think, I was a very scary…being.”

“Being? Expound.”

“Well, you already know much of it, but maybe didn’t quite understand it completely.”

“Then enlighten me gorgeous, I’m all ears. You know me, I like a challenge.” The words were amused, but his tone wasn’t so sure anymore. How strange, he thought to himself still watching her.

“Well then, we’ll start with old gods, religious zealots, and more stupid than should ever exist.” Her tone was about as dry as the Mojave. We should have put a stop to it- but once the ball got rolling…well it was an awful lot like an avalanche… and I’m skipping ahead.”

“Well I’m not gonna interrupt, hell the stupid zealots sound entertaining.” He clapped his hands together, and grinned like a madman “Oh goody! Religion, my favorite!”

She snorted, chuckling despite her somber tones.

“We all had different names, in The Beginning. Though what they were we’ve- I’ve long since forgotten. We became what they needed, what you wanted. Generally speaking of course. There were so many of us, so, so many; once. And there you were, so new, so young huddling together against the dark all clustered together but so far flung. Shining with so much potential to be great.”

“By ‘you’ I assume you mean homo-sapiens yes?” he interjected scribbling quick notes.

“Yes, brand-shiny-new humans. We decided to help, to guard watch and keep you. So- we divided, some staying behind in The Cradle, the rest of us spreading out choosing this land or that to be ours.”

“A schism…sorta. I like, tell me more.” More hasty notes.

“We chose our ‘territories’ and those within it became our peoples. We loved them, or at least we did- they who would become my family, and my friends” a ghost of a very sad smile touched her lips, adding an entirely new element of foreboding to this little story she was determined to tell him.

“This matches a great number of early mythology, but I wouldn’t expect anything less  from you. Now this is where you have to sell it to me honey. I’m listening  blow my mind.”

She pinned him with a peeved look, it always made him itch, but tonight she’d turning the voltage up- his nose all but sizzled.

“Okay, shutting up.”

“Sure.” She grumbled, stealing a gulp of his watery drink and taking another deep breath.

“Okay. We helped, or we tried to. But in those very early days, we were…. Too much all at once. He, who would emerge as our leader, offered that a more- indirect approach would be better. After all it’s not exactly helpful when the very people you’re trying to help, to teach, run screaming in mingled terror and wonder….But mostly terror. So most of the first days were lots of trial and error.” She spread her hands wide ruefully shaking her head “With lots of error. But we began to learn from eachother.”

“Oh those weak minded humans, Eldritch beings, just rend their tiny little minds. On behalf of the human race, I apologize.” She kicked him under the table.

Worth it.

“We really aught to have expected it, you were such an infant species, just beginning, so strong and determined to survive. It’s really understandable that we weren’t embraced immediately.”

“That independent streak has fucked us more than once Sugar.”

“Don’t I know it. But that’s what makes you so fearsome! So wonderful! Yes, you’ve damn near destroyed yourselves in a fit of stubborn pride on multiple occasions actually- And in my defense I’ve always stood by those who’ve called on me win or lose. It was often hard when both sides called, but the wars that raged therein were glorious.”

“Jumping ahead.  Again.”

“Yeah, I know….”

“Eh, tell it how you want, I’m all ears.”

“So, we broke apart, took different territories, protected and taught different peoples. That was when it started, when WE started to become so different from our starting selves. We grew with you, and became more, as you developed and evolved, you named us. You came to each of us so differently, gave us new reason. They made us into each aspect of what their growing and learning culture needed. And so you grew from a terrified cluster of life into a people! A unit!”

“Children are always so difficult in the beginning”

“Difficult! That’s putting it mildly.” She laughed, her eyes gone soft with memory. “But I loved every moment of it. Some of my sisters guided hands to bring life, some of my brothers shepherded minds to bring justice and leadership! Still others, inspired minds to create songs, and poetry and bring destined lovers together. Agriculture,  animal husbandry, medicines, architecture all of it once you accepted us you learned so fast! You gave us such meaning and purpose, and love. Ah, such love.”

“I’m sensing a major ‘but’ in there.”

“Yeah, but only because it’s human nature, or perhaps even the nature of life really, but in the end it all boils down to one thing. Wanting more; Desiring it, needing it. Always more, but we didn’t begrudge you it. In fact I was among those that encouraged it, fueling that driving fire of need. ‘If you want it: take it! Some of my family…didn’t care for my aggressive views. But, would you not need to be strong, be powerful to keep yourselves safe? Yes, in the times ahead, you would need every ounce of strength you could muster.”

“Took it too far, did they?”

“Some, though it was through this that I was given my name and my purpose.  In the days that would follow I would be called upon before and aft. I would walk hand in hand with my brother-one of the keepers of the dead, through the fields. Those that would crave power would call on me time and time again. Though so very few could contain what I would give them.” She shrugged and then raised an eyebrow at him. He was staring at her, they both knew it. But for some damn reason or another he wanted to believe. Something about this just rang…right.

“And what was the name that rang out as terror and ecstasy in the minds of man?”

“You know me. You’ve always know me. Though I think you’re doubting your gut reaction.”

“I have a hunch”

She leaned back, her arms crossed and an almost sinister smile on her face. “I was often seen with two of my sisters, though it was never unusual for me to appear alone. And of we three, it was always I that spoke , and man never questioned my words. I was given domain of over the wars of men, foresight, and vengeance. My territory was not widely stretched, but my name and worshipers were. I was known to take four forms in the lands of men; a wolf, the crow, a cow, and and that of an eel. Though I will be honest, that last one was unpleasant and rare.”

He almost couldn’t believe it, she’d presented him with her version of a riddle. How she hated riddles! He wasn’t exactly fond of them either, but this- this some something so simple it almost stood to reason that it was too easy. But he knew her. Knew her better than most, knew that she had a mean streak buried deep, and rarely forgave and never forgot. She could be sly, and talk circles around anyone including him sometimes. Oh he knew who she was alright. Or rather who she was leading him to believe she was. After all, that was impossible.

God he hoped so.

“Well that’s understandable, nobody likes slimy things; not even slimy things.”

“You’re stalling. Tell me. Who was I.”

“Mor-Rioghain.”

“Bingo.”

“Quick, ask me who killed Kennedy”

“Oh please, please I’m positively aquiver with anticipation.”

“Aw, you’re no fun.”

“Mmhmm.”

“So, what happened next, o’ goddess mine.” He grinned.

“Our people, my people became fierce! Strong! They survived, and fought, and once you began to rediscover yourselves they would become a force to be reckoned with.”

“Oh, those wacky Celts.”

“Very much.”

“So what next?”

“Well this is the part that everyone knows.”

“Yeah, but I like a good story, and the story is in the telling of it, not the knowing of it.”

“How sage of you.” She flagged down one of the waitresses, and ordered something fruity. “Alright then, my people grew- becoming more and more, fighting, loving, growing, and living. And, for a while, you were alone and it as good. Then, it was inevitable, you began to branch out. Explore. You began to leave my territories, you ventured into places where I could not protect you, where I could not go with you. But you had such a thirst to know-so, you went. But you weren’t the only ones.”

“Ah, cultural collision it’s seldom pleasant, even for mere observers.” He said sympathetically.

“No, no not at all. You were an island race, or rather most of you were. So you were rather…secluded. So with the arrival of these new explorers, these new humans venturing out with a mind to gain more to conquer they brought with them their beliefs, their culture and their convictions. So it all began.” She rubbed the bridge of her now

“Ah, the Christians!”

“Yes,” she groaned “The Christians.”

“Hah! Yes, filthy little monsters; like rats with swords and spears and rhetoric. They add to their mindless conquering hordes with insidious half-truths and…and… cookies!”

She snorted, “Whatever you do, don’t drink the Kool-Aid. You begin to understand my…agitation that would grow in to outright rage. After all I hadn’t forgotten the others. But seeing what their people had become. Seeing how they were so different, so cruel. It was time to draw ourselves together again. We had vowed to protect you. To watch over you and keep you, not to turn you against each other like starving dogs.”

“Hmm, strife above to reflect the goings-on bellow I imagine”

“We knew we’d changed, we knew we’d grown and become beings altogether new. But when the conclave came, and we were together again, such differences. It was, fascinating.”  She shook her head, bemused. “There was literally nothing left of what we had begun as. Where once we could have joined together to hold council as a single mind we found we couldn’t any longer. And such things I saw. Such new and amazing beings my brothers and sisters had become.” She’d always had a habit of speaking with her hands, now they flew around as her excitement, or was it agitation, grew. “So, since we could no longer join as a single mind, we constructed a hall. A Great Hall, if you will. And when this was done we took our places by region. It came to our attention then, just how many gaping holes there were in our numbers. Then they came. They were the last of to arrive, those from The Cradle.”

“But wouldn’t they have been unchanged?”

“Would that it had been so, to this day I still don’t know what was greater. My rage, or my heart break.”

“Dude, what happened?”

“They were late-“

“Dicks.”

“When they finally did arrive,” she pinned him with a flat look. “They came with such pomp and pageantry, it was downright offensive.  We’d all arrived at the scheduled time, meeting grandly as equals, but when they came: they came as kings- No! as A king on the backs of slaves.” Her expression was one of mingled sorrow and hate. “One, one of us,” she spat the word. “had taken it upon himself to rise ‘above’ those in his care. To stand on the backs of my brothers and sisters, and proclaim himself supreme.” Venom dripped from her word, and he was only a hair’s breadth from believing her. Because if she was making this up, the woman deserved an Oscar.  She took a deep breath, to center herself perhaps,  and she looked at him. She seemed so, sad, so lost, he reached out and stroked a finger over the back of her hand.

“Tell me?”

“H-he demanded that we bow, and exalt ; to enfold ourselves into his glorious kingdom. That we renounce our claims upon you as your guardians and give over your care into his hands, as they were the only true hands for you to call upon.” She looked down at her hands then, like she’d never seen them. “I don’t think I need to tell you that this went over about as easily as a ton of lead.” She combed her fingers through her hair. It was a gesture he knew well, something she did when frustrated, or confused, or just about any kind of distressed really.

“Even among his own court there were rumbles of descent.”

“Bet I can guess who that narcissistic prick was? Is? How do I approach this sentence, its…odd.” That got her smile.

“And so the war began. We fought, made alliances, betrayed, and were betrayed. We fought tooth and nail right to the very last. But in the end, oh you stubborn glorious beasts, we were conquered. All of us.” She lay the statement out like an offering, it is what it is.

“By whom?”

“Who else? We were only as strong, only as powerful as you believed. It was your faith! Your devotion that gave us all we were. But as the tide of Christianity swept across the lands, swallowing everything in it’s path, it swept us away. We couldn’t protect you from yourselves, as we lost our followers-our children, we lost the war.”

“But, some of the old religions are still around, hell some of them have even grown stronger over the last century or so!” he interjected as she sipped delicately from her neon blue drink.

“True. Even now I can still hear the off whisper of a prayer sent my way. But it’s not the same. There is a very big difference between dropping the off word to a “dead” god, and true soul deep  devotion. Even if you were to sit there and “worship” me all night, without the deepest faith behind it, it would amount to very little other than what little blessing I can still give.” She smiled a bit then “Even in hiding I haven’t forgotten those that still call me.”

He scratched his chin, regarding her thoughtfully, “So where does that leave it all standing now?”

She stretched, rolling her shoulders, “Well, there are still a few of us…floating around, but so, so many of us are scattered far from our homelands, our seats of deep power. So we hide, because we escaped a worse fate, and living among you isn’t so bad.”

“But how,” he demanded, “if it was such  a thorough defeat how did any of you get away?”

“Some of us were lucky, when we were finally brought low, it was by a sympathizer, and we were smuggled away. Others were much smarter about it, and just….vanished into their lands, taking up human lives. So I guess we’ve all moved on. We may pass one another on the streets, but we dare not even blink too hard.” She shrugged, and for the first time he noticed how tired she appeared.

“Why?”

“We’re all supposed to be dead or integrated, to discover that there are still ‘old gods’ wandering free, well it’d start the whole damned war back up.”

“But would that really be so bad?” he asked, remembering his pen and notebook, suddenly, had he really been that enthralled?

She just looked at him, “Maybe, but that would be so much needless death; so much more bloodshed on ground that’s still saturated from the last flood. And honestly I suspect that there aren’t nearly enough of us left for it to even be a weak rebellion. More like lining up for wanton slaughter.”

“But-”

“But nothing, do you have any idea what was lost in the first war? There are entire races of people that don’t exist anymore, continents that were destroyed- Atlantis existed you know, and it was beautiful. Now where is it? Obliterated.” She hissed, her eyes flashing silver at him. “Once I could gift any one of my chosen with a lock of my hair- or a feather from my mantle and they couldn’t be touched on the battle field! Now-“ she snorted, tossing that dark hair over her shoulder and staring moodily at the ice in her glass. “now I’m lucky, or unlucky depending on how the day falls, if I dream in prophecy. The old gods have fallen.” Her sigh was the most world weary thing he’d ever heard, but when she looked up at him her eyes had warmed to a softer gray than that of a war ready sword.

“But it’s not all doom and gloom down here, not really.”

“H-“ He cleared a suddenly tight throat, “How so?”

“Look at you! Look at everything you’ve accomplished in the last hundred years, and think! Really think about the thousands of years that we had you under our wings. Now look at you! We let you go, and watch you soar! I won’t lie, watching you treat each other so terribly is heart rending, and sometimes it’s massively difficult NOT to lay the smite down on you. But as a whole, im impressed. Speaking as a proud parent that’s been there since the beginning mind you, so I might be a touch biased.” She chuckled.

“So, what stops you?”  he inquired rapidly scribbling notes.

“From what?”

“Smiting!”

“Oh, well, just because you can, doesn’t mean you should. I could tell you of things that ride on the night winds that would make even your toes curl, but I won’t. Some things should just be left unknown. I mean I may not be able to shadow-walk anymore, but by thunder I can still summon an army of shades in an emergency.”

The statement struck him so sideways, he had to ask. “And what could a mistress of war possibly consider an emergency situation?”

She leveled him with the most serious look he’d ever seen, he waited pen poised breathing lightly actually anticipating the answer,

“I am utterly, and completely hopeless at changing a tire. Seriously, I’m just incapable.”

The laugh started somewhere at the very base of his spine, and worked it’s way up, until it was the kind of laugh that leaves you red in the face, your head pounding, tears in your eyes, and your fist stinging from where you’d been pounding it on the table. That was the most absurd thing he’d ever heard. But then again, he’d been with her on multiple occasions of flats. Damsel in distress was an understatement.

Once he’d gotten himself back under control: “Well then, I imagine that would be an interesting sight to drive by…”

She grinned, “Luckily that D.P.S officer just kept driving.

“That the hell was he going to do? Arrest you for being super human? That’s NOT illegal.” He scoffed.

“Not technically.” She muttered.

“So!” he rebutted “What could he have possibly done to you!?”

Her grey eyes flew wide with a sudden smile, “You have a point, in the event of capture, I likely would have just jumped.”

“Jumped?”

“Oh, be reborn, change bodies ect.”

“Well now, that’s something. You can do that?”

“Yeah, what you think I want to be static for the rest of ever?” she raised an eyebrow at him.

“Clearly there’s nothing you can do to hold a being only loosely tied to consensual reality” he retorted dryly. She laughed. “So now what?”

She sobered, and drew a deep breath. “Now you have a choice. You can either believe me, and we play this particularly new adventure by ear. Or, you can choose not to, and I scramble your memories of tonight into you meeting me here, getting seriously shitfaced, and you go home and have some interesting dreams. That’s my gift to you: the choice.” She held her hands up to him, palms up with what might have been a glimmer of hope in her eyes.

“So what’s it going to be? The red pill, or the blue pill. Your choice.”

 

 

 

 

Author's Note

be nice it's been a while