Are You There, Old Gods?

Are You There, Old Gods?

by Evan Williamson

Copyright

Are You There, Old Gods?

by Evan Williamson

Copyright 2014 Evan Williamson

All Rights Reserved

Cover Design by Evan Williamson

Smashwords Edition February 2014

This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, trademarked products, events, and locations are fictitious or are used fictitiously. Any resemblances to actual events or persons, living or dead, are entirely coincidental.

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Table of Contents

Title Page

Copyright

Table of Contents

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Chapter 21

Chapter 22

Chapter 23

Chapter 24

Chapter 25

Chapter 1

Are you there, Gezi, God of Travelers? It is I, Kan. I have been chosen to leave the College today. I fear nothing specific, simply change. I have known no other path but that of the College. What if I hate the new, smaller cloister? What if the other mages hate me? May you see us well.

I have left with my elder blood pack the day after the Harvest Moon. Sanguine started the day by coating herself in salve to keep her spells from crusting. I do not use the salve, for my spells have yet to appear on my flesh. Maybe soon the fire or the wind or the earth or even the water become mine, but not yet.

I returned from the summer holding camp and Sanguine said I was now to live in the Pit. Another blood pack with a mage about my size and shape had already claimed our room and my bunk and my desk, and I watched him as he moved in and took over my space.

After I asked my elders about our relocation, Sanguine told me, The Fire Island was engulfed in a volcano storm, the Land West Beyond was too costly to travel, and the Connecting Land unsure by man or beast.

I am to go to the Pit, where The Drinker could still return to the College as needed, where I could learn from senior blood mages, and where Sanguine could find helpers in gathering her materials for the coming Destruction. I never understood Sanguine’s fascination with Destruction. An ancient myth lost to most but the obscure, the End as it is also called is ignored by most as a superstition. Diviners like Sanguine, though, see it in every casting of runes.

Our hole in the Pit is made of mud and a brown brick with bright red stripes, the flap some type of scaled leather from a beast I do recognize. Most holes in our row are the same, hollowed out of the rock and dirt in succession and handed down as their tenants moved on or died.

The Drinker and Sanguine have brought me here because of the Librarian. I have no doubt. She had begun to teach me the arts, the flesh rending, my place in the holding camp paid by her or under her instruction. The Librarian doling out the books and gold as needed. I have the cloak she gave me with the inscription in the pocket, FOR YOUR BLOOD.

The gifts, teachings, and gold are not because of poverty. We have bread and bowls, knives and letting tools and runes to spare. I am the only apprentice of The Drinker and Sanguine. Others of our kind have many apprentices of comparable skill, but I alone lasted my rituals over The Drinker and Sanguine’s watchful eyes.

The Librarian is full of fire, but feeble and old. Passing the desert to the Pit to attempt to educate me would surely cause her death. I shall miss our talks, except when she asks if I have a blood partner yet and if they are Pure. I have no prospects to make a blood pack and Purity makes no difference to the blood as I have seen it.

Chapter 2

My elders and I had not situated ourselves when the flap was torn aside. A naked female entered.

Hello, said she. I am Ichor. We were told of your arrival. You are Kan, of the sixth level like me. I cannot abide the heat in these tunnels.

Yes, I said, feeling the weight of my own robes around me. She towered over me, her breasts small and hair curly.

Do you wish to come to my hole? We have a letting table that can relieve your stress, she said.

Wait here.

All right.

I found Sanguine in a small room with a caged goat. She was sliding a large metal pan under the cage.

Sanguine, may I accompany this girl to her hole to participate in their letting?

You may, Sanguine said.

I shall need my dagger and pan, I said.

The move is not yet complete. Many of your items are in transit.

I returned to Ichor and said, I have no dagger for letting at the moment.

You may use of my dagger, she said.

One moment, I said, and walked back to Sanguine. The goat’s blood was filling the tray.

"She has a dagger I may borrow. Is this acceptable?

Acceptable? Sanguine said, wiping blood from her dagger. What is this female’s name?

Ichor. Another blood mage. She claims sixth level.

Very well, Sanguine said. Be wary of her and do not go where she does not give guest rites.

Ichor and her elders live in the lower levels of the pit. Her hole is dug much like mine, yet the flap across the entrance has no scales, instead tanned leather with black spots.

Enter, Ichor said, giving me the rights of a guest. The invitation implies no harm will come.

She lead the way to her room, everything tidy and just so. A human heart sat on a table in the corner.

I lusted after the heart and the table. Sanguine would never allow it in our hole.

When is your birthday? Ichor said as she looked through her things.

Near Spring Moon, I said.

Hmmm. We shall be in cloister together. The cloisters are arranged by moons. I am of the Rain Moon.

I am unsure of the cloister, but it is in Dungeon Six. The scrolls had that number inscribed on them.

I am right, for I am in Dungeon Six, too. Here, a clean knife, unpolluted so says my elder, Vein. Although you may cleanse it if you wish. I understand, she said, holding a dagger.

I took the dagger and said, I’m sure that will not be necessary. Where shall we do the letting?

Ichor eyed me and said, What is wrong with right here?

Nothing, I said, and removed my clothing. I felt Ichor’s eyes on me as I stripped from my robe and under clothes. I turned my back to her as I lifted my undershirt over my chest.

You have no marks, she said.

None, I said.

I have several, she said. I turned and she pointed to her arm and said, In a few years I shall look like the Tome of Elders itself.

I was unsure. The runes upon her flesh looked like chicken scratchings. The Drinker’s copy of the Tome of Elders held runes dark and potent, not like the marks on Ichor’s arm. True spells came with blood and pain and left their marks deep. Ichor’s were fake, or pale imitations. A small sacrifice that lead to nothing, the childish cuttings that could be fixed by a Healer with a hand wave.

Shall I tie your arm? she said.

Okay.

Coming from The City of Pain, I felt you would be more acquainted. Have you ever shared your blood with another?

As in mingle past the letting? Free the vein? I said.

Of course, Ichor said.

No, I said.

Ichor let out a breath that smelled of copper and said, Nor have I.

A fire bloomed in my chest. My experience equaled hers. My footing as steady.

I practice, she said.

Practice? I said.

She pointed to the heart on the table. For a moment I thought it pulsed with a promise of dark life. Ichor walked to it, dragging her dagger across her arm to add to the chicken scratch runes. She held it to the heart and the thing pulsed in her hand as she squeezed, sucking at her wound. She let it go and the heart fell back to the table with a plop. Most important is to know the art, to allow the blood to pass. By practice, my blood partner will be blessed with me. Do you wish to see more?

I could not take my eyes from the naked blood mage and her heart table. She opened a drawer and said, Look here.

I looked and saw small jars and bottles, each containing small insects and other creatures. More totems and bait than Sanguine had as a full blood mage. I said, What is this for?

Experiments. To do the art to my best ability. So when my spells come in full I shall be ready, She opened a jar and pulled a bright pink worm from it, smearing it with blood from her arm until it writhed with pain. What do you think?

I have no experience with live animals. Should it be in such pain?

Ichor looked at the worm and the heart, Yes. She crushed the worm in one hand. The elder would kill me if she found this. ‘Eighth level, too early’ Vein would say. I will be strong enough then for them at eighth level and they will think twice about stopping me.

Ichor pulled a small dropper from the desk and began to collect the blood still leaking from her arm. She set it aside. Your hair is up.

I felt the bone pin that