Marce, goddess of the World Tower, the Empress Oracle, burst out into tears,
burying her face in her hands as she wept.
Moving to her side, Kari knelt and put her arm around the small, weeping
goddess. “I’m so very sorry.”
“My people,” Marce sobbed. “My beautiful, wonderful, precious people. Who
will look after them when I am gone? Who will make the land fertile and keep the unbroken peace? Oh, my poor, poor people. How could they have let themselves be led astray so easily?”
“We’ll take you with us,” Kari said. “We’ll take you away from this tower and the army until things blow over. We’ll protect you from the Apostle.”
“No,” Marce cried. “No! I can’t leave. If I stray very far from this tower the land will begin to die again. If I were to run away, those that are still faithful to me will suffer with the unfaithful. So long as even one person believes in me, I must stay. Even though they have turned against me, I cannot leave them to the destruction that will follow my departure. I love them too much. Even if I die for it, I cannot leave. I must give them as much time as I am able. Can you understand how much I love them? It is not their fault that they were misled. I can’t let them rot in their mistakes just to save myself. Long ago, I gave my life and happiness that they might have a chance to survive.
I will stay until they find a way in and kill me, because I wish them to survive for as long as is possible.”
Marce began sobbing so hard that whatever more she had to say was
unintelligible. Kari held her tightly, rocking her back and forth, doing what she could to comfort her in her anguish.
“How could anyone be so evil, selfish and ungrateful as to want to kill this
selfless, caring child,” Michael said in an odd way, as if he wanted every syllable to be heard perfectly by everyone in the room. “Anyone that thinks to kill her because some stranger showed up and told them she is a false goddess should be ashamed of
themselves. She has given them everything that they have. She has imprisoned herself here just so that they can have peace and happiness, and this is how they repay her for it?
How could anyone possibly want to kill her?”
Kari gave him a quizzical look and he shot her an exaggerated wink and a broad, toothy grin.
“Mistress,” Markus cried from where he’d seated himself at a computer. “The
army! It’s dispersing!”
Marce choked off in mid sob, rigid in Kari’s arms with shock.
“W-what,” she managed.
“They’re all packing up and leaving,” Markus cried triumphantly.
“Oops,” Michael said with an extremely satisfied look on his face. “So that’s what that button does. I seem to have broadcast our entire conversation to the army camping on your doorstep. Clumsy me.”
Marce wiped at her eyes and nose with her sleeve and stood, a look of disbelief on her face.
“But my vision,” she said uncomprehendingly. “I saw my death. Nothing could
avert it. Markus, I need to see!”
An image of the base of the tower appeared in the air before them. All of the people, mostly farmers by their clothing and improvised weapons of pitchforks and axes, were picking up their things, taking down tents, and leaving in a slow trickle. A figure in a hooded black cloak and mask ran around wildly waving his arms, trying to make them stay.
“Looks like the Apostle just lost any sway he had over your people,” Michael
said. “The least I could do for such a pretty little goddess as yourself.”
Marce stood, looking at the image with utter disbelief on her face. “But I saw the end of the world. It was so certain.”
“If there’s one thing we’ve learned living with the greatest seer in the universe,”
Jonathan said, “it’s that you can never get away with any sort of prank around him. If there’s two things we’ve learned, it’s that no matter how certain a future may seem, nothing’s ever set in stone. You make the future, not your visions.”
“Oh thank you,” Marce cried. She ran to Michael and threw her arms around his waist, hugging him tightly.
Michael patted Marce’s back comfortingly and shot a grin at Kari. “Tell me I did good, little sister.”
“Oh you did more than good,” Kari said with a grin of her own. “You were brilliant! How did you even think to do that?”
Michael shrugged. “When you’ve spent as long as I have learning how best to
annoy people and make trouble, it just comes naturally.”
“Amen to that,” Jonathan agreed, looking slightly put out that he hadn’t thought of it first.
“Look at him,” Michael said with a laugh. “Poor little Apostle. Lost all his friends.”
Alone at the base of the tower, the black cloaked figure hunched over and hugged himself. Kari couldn’t tell for sure, but she thought that he might be crying, or at least shaking with rage. Straightening, he kicked at the ground, throwing what looked like one hell of a tantrum.
Ruffling Marce’s hair, Michael smiled warmly down at her. “The tears of a
goddess wash away all false teachings from the minds of her people. No one as selfless as you deserves to die. I think your people will remember what their goddess does for them for a very long time now.”
“But I’m not a goddess. I just got caught in an accident.”
“You don’t need to be born in divinity to find it somewhere along the way. You are a goddess to these people, so don’t you forget it.”
“I can never repay you for this.”
“Let’s see that beautiful smile of yours. That’s payment enough.”
And Marce did smile at that, beaming up at him, her entire countenance seeming to shine with it.
*****
The Apostle of Cain marched twenty paces, turned on her heel and marched back.
Words could not express the anger and frustration that filled her. After the life she’d led, one might expect her to have more patience, but her temper had always been very short.
She’d been so close! This world had technology to bore holes through space and, more importantly, time. That was exactly what she needed. How could people who believed so fervently in Cain possibly turn on her after just a few words from their false goddess?
It was so ridiculously improbable that she wanted to scream.
The strong space-time anomaly that sustained the life of this world was exactly what the Apostle needed. If she’d just been able to kill the false goddess and take it for her own, the ability to travel through time, as well as space, would have been hers. With that, she could go back to the time before the Council made her slaughter the other Subjects, and slaughter them instead.
Everything had all been so easy. The power granted her as Cain’s Apostle had
twisted the hearts of all that heard her words. How could everything have gone so wrong!
Recovering this world would be impossible. She knew that she was beaten, and
would have to start again on a different world. Though trained for centuries to do battle, the Apostle did not harbor any delusions of being able to storm that tower alone. Who knew what sort of security systems it had on the inside. The thought of exercising her newly earned powers again sent a thrill through her that was not quite enough to dampen her rage at how easily she’d been foiled.