Short Story - I Name Thee

[lady_mab]

I stand on hallowed ground--petulant, the voices in my head say, defiant, I argue. Yet somehow completely insignificant in the minds of gods.

I am an ant, and they are a towering inferno. I don’t think they even stir at my presence.

They’ll wake when you take what is theirs. The wind picks up, humming around me as I tread light and careful. You’ll need to be quick. There is little I can do for you here. You are on your own.

That I am used to. I have been on my own far longer than I have played host to spirits.

I move on silent feet, the heat of the divine seeping in through the soles of my shoes.

Behind me, lost from sight, the entrance to this place waits between a thought and a dream. It has no name, at least not one that I am allowed to know. The language of the gods is old, almost completely lost. I am only here because I know the right words, and because of the spirits that share my body.

Distantly, I feel the low hum of supplication. The atmosphere is ripe with prayers and curses, and there is magic in those words that is as old as time. I pull that sound to me, tangling it with my unspoken intention to make a cowl of whispers.

There's a pulse in my chest that's not my own. It beats separately from my heart, a flutter of fear and unease.

They're afraid. We are in the house of the gods, their home, and they are afraid.

I am more amazed that you are not, Temil.

I cannot afford to dwell on my fear. If I do, then I will falter. My defenses will slip.

To be afraid is to be dead. And unlike you, O Voices in My Head, I cannot simply possess another and ask them to steal me a body.

A flutter, then a breath of wind against my cheek. No further reassurance or apology, but I accept their silence all the same.

If I’m successful, this benefits both of us. They will get a new form, and I will get mine back.

We’ll both be free.

An ember of light sparks to life as I pass through endless space, growing brighter and flickering off columns of stone. Half-formed shadows create mountains and valleys out of strangely human curves. I feel at once crowded and bereft. The world is heavy with sleep, yet I feel their attention on me. Picking me apart. Judging my very bones.

Focus, Temil.

I’m trying.

Try harder. These are not things that mortals are meant to see.

The idea of a cavern flits just out of my view, lingering in the corner of my eye. There are tears on my cheeks and I feel weightless, like I am floating in the ocean.

My feet propel me through thought and stars, mind running wild without something to anchor it. This very land is designed without anchor. The gods have no true form. Their house has no need to maintain a mortal singularity.

Ground yourself, or you’ll be lost.

I reach out, but nothing solid appears beneath my searching fingers. I cannot get a grasp on anything. The air is viscous, nearly tangible, teasing at a reality it won’t reveal to me.

I am trespassing, and Thought and Creation are waiting to see what happens.

The spirits sigh, and there’s a warmth on my arms, slowing me down. Name me. Claim me. You will get power over the winds. You will get power over a spirit of this domain.

I don’t want power over a child of the gods.

The warmth on my arms almost burns. Temil Jumoz. I have freed you from the hangman’s noose. One life for another. Name me. The words will keep you focused. The gods cannot steal my thief from me.

Their meaning is clear: I’m of no use if I am afraid. I cannot afford to be afraid.

Using the old language, the tongue that the gods used to shape the earth, I guide the words towards me. Calm, solid, slow. Each one a building block to form the root of my spell.

"I name thee Patience in the Face of Challenge, the Eastern Wind," I whisper, and the winds go still at the physicality of my voice. It has been almost a year since I have spoken out loud to address them. Why bother, when they are in my head and can read my thoughts.

Go on, they whisper, and for a moment, I can almost feel their lips against my ear. Go on.

The words for rain, the winds that buffet, the oceans that thrash at the constraints of the shore. The memory of salt water wets my lips as I say, "I name thee Raging Tempest on an Open Sea, the Southern Wind."

They might have laughed if the tension running through me didn't bind them as well.

There's a touch to my cheek, like the caress of a sun-kissed breeze. A familiarity that embraces me as an old friend tugs playfully at my hair. It slips down my arm to wend between my outstretched fingers. "I name thee Promise of a Swift Journey, the Western Wind."

Finally, a bite of cold. The promise of snow, of mountains towering overhead thick with silence. A chill that no fire can withstand. A strength no two legs can outlast. "I name thee Breath of Giants, the Northern Wind."

Relief and confidence rush through my chest, mingling as the last of the words falls from my tongue. We walk as one, now. I will answer to you if you ask.

My feet carry me one steady step in front of the last. Power over the winds has lent me strength here. The air burns my throat as I gulp down another breath.

Shadows flicker on the walls, distant flames breathe in time with some unseen beast. In and out. A guttural snore from monstrous lungs.

Focus, Temil.

Focus, Temil. Focus.

We are almost there.

A small part of my brain still hisses with the old fear. I know I am not in a cavern, but I see myself in one now.

I put force behind the image, sketching it a word at a time to bring it into existence--I am in a cavern, the ceiling overhead, the stone walls keeping in the warmth, columns stretching like ribs. It becomes more solid as I repeat the spell in my head. A cavern, a ceiling, walls, columns. I create a realm to respond to me.

The idea becomes prayer. Keeps me grounded. Holds me in the confines of the chest of this house of the gods.

My tongue is heavy, but I keep all the words there. Patience, Tempest, Promise, Breath. Focus, Temil. I am in a cavern. There is a ceiling. There are walls.

I inhale, and my lungs press against the cage of my ribs.

The weight of my tongue keeps my feet on the ground, and the illusion in place around me.

There's a touch on my hand, the pads of fingers giving a gentle squeeze, and I follow after it before it can pull away.

My foot scuffs against a stone, and I consider the pebbles beneath my shoes. I wonder if the body I am to steal will look the same as the old one.

Do you look the same when you get a new body?

I have only had one.

Unfortunate, they say, and this time they cannot hold in the laughter.

A headache starts to form behind my eyes the further I go. The pressure in the room stirs, draping across my shoulders my shoulders. My body is too heavy. Heavier than my spine can bear. Something is taking my words and adding to them.

A shiver traces down my spine in anticipation. They are waking up.

Belatedly, I realize that the hall is silent. The hums and whispers I’ve wrapped around me have vanished.

Careless. I’ve been careless.

My heart jumps to my throat, but its beat is sluggish. It is hard to focus. I reach for the shadows. I reach for the ground beneath my feet. I pick apart the words that they are made from and weave them into my own spell.

Shielding. Protection. Strength. Invisible.

Please don’t notice me.

I slow to a stop, despite the way the winds have picked up, tugging at my clothes, my hair, my hands--

We have to go. We have to be quick!

Breathing is a physical effort. My eyes dart around for something that could work for what we need.

Stone, fire, shadows. That is all that this space is made of. Earth is what I was asked to steal, dirt from beneath the feet of the gods.

The spirits flit anxiously, that second heartbeat struggling against my own. Forget the promise, Temil, we must--

I have named you Patience, and you will yield to me. Have faith. I can do this.

There’s a moment where they rage--a barely contained storm system that whirls around me and picks up tiny pebbles to toss in a fit.

Patience, I repeat, and I reach to touch my fingers to my lips.

The wind follows, twisting over my hand and tasting the name that I hold there. I trust you. Don’t make me regret this.

I will not fail. I cannot fail.

They fall silent, and for a second, I breathe in relief.

A wall of force slams into me, a tidal wave that catches me in its current and yanks my feet out from beneath me. Salt water fills my senses, burns in the back of my throat, tries to pull words from my tongue.

Someone is trying to undo my spell.

The gods have awoken. They know that we are here.

I am wrapped in a biting chill, and suddenly I can breathe again. I am back on solid ground, though I have to wonder if my feet even left.

One gulp of air, then another, and then the gods are standing before me. A column of fire, a flash of stardust, the first words spoken to bring life into being.

Thunder crowds the space, shaking the ceiling to rain dirt on my head. “Assoli,” they say, and the thing inside me shivers. The winds rise at the sound of their true name, the one I could never learn. The one they would never let me have. “Our child, home again.”

They shake so hard that I find myself shaking in concert. Their fear bleeds into me, scatters me amongst the corners of the universe, before reeling back in so sharply I almost collapse to one knee.

“How strangely wonderous to know your presence. We thought you dead.”

You thought? The winds beat useless fists against the idea of Time and Life itself. You thought?

“We thought,” they repeat, words thick and slow with intention, “we killed you.”

The spirits inside me flinch, and the force of it wrenches me back several steps. As they speak, I get flashes of thought and emotions, painting a picture in my head. Words filled with anger, not with magic. Scatter me to the winds, I had said. I did not think you to actually do it.

“We did not think you would become the breeze, child. We hoped your unruly spirit would be ripped to shreds before it could make it that far.” They lean down, and the axis of the earth tilts with the movement. I find myself staring at the floor, back through time, turned inside out and forced to look at my heart beating wildly. “And what a tiny thing you have brought here to die.”

“I can hear you, you know,” I manage through the sensation of cotton crammed into my cheeks. “I am not so small that I do not have ears.”

The spirits hiss, tying themselves into anxious knots. Do not mock them.

But the gods laugh, the sound turning to shrieks of a hundred thousand voices. Their form writhes and morphs, faces swimming to the surface before being swallowed back into the mass of shadows. “She amuses me. Her words have weight to them.”

The pressure eases, enough that I don’t have to struggle to remain standing.

“What is your name, Tiny One? Who are you to our child, beyond an unruly puppet?”

Don’t, they whisper, and for a moment, I can feel my voice being pulled from my throat. The wind is ice as it curls around my neck. Don’t don’t don’t tell them.

“Stop.” The word is barely audible, rasped against my tightening throat. I reach for a noose that isn’t there, my legs unable to support my weight. I thought I was no longer afraid of that moment. I thought I had left the hangman’s scaffold behind. “Please, stop.”

My knees hit the ground and still I cannot breathe. I gasp, struggling for any sort of words to construct a shield between me and whatever is stealing the air from my lungs. Heart thundering in my ears. I can’t focus, but I have to try anyway. Bitterness swells on my tongue. “Assoli, stop.”

The invisible hands vanish immediately. The tension in my chest eases. Shame and relief flood my limbs. I didn’t…

I know.

I’m sorry.

I know.

Towering over me, a lord observing a supplicant, the gods do nothing. Flames lick at their feet, the faces pressed against their skin have receded. Disappointment rolls off them in a tangible fog. “How abysmal. You can’t even kill her.”

My fingers dig into the dirt, reveling in the solidity of it. It turns to splinters of glass beneath my nails, but I curl my hands into fists and trap it there. My fingers bleed. Deep red turns dust to mud.

This has to be enough.

The spirits don’t respond, but I don’t expect them to.

“Child of mine, breath of my lungs. Would you like another chance?”

Again, they don’t respond, but their curiosity rises within me.

A hand that is at once vast enough to hold the night sky aloft and careful enough to pluck a rose from the vine reaches to where I am huddled on the ground. “Assoli, do you wish to come home? We will forgive you for your impudence, give you new form and new domain.”

Trembling, I push myself to my feet and ignore the way everything tilts wildly to one side. I extend a hand in a feeble reflection of the vastness confronting me, straining for someone that isn’t there. I struggle to regain my words, to taste the magic once again. “No--”

Don’t.

Never. The breath of wind is warm and reassuring.

“Do you not wish to regain your seat with the gods? With your kin?”

They flare indignantly, and I puff my chest out in response. You tried to kill me once. I will not give you the satisfaction of trying again.

“Assoli,” they say again, and lightning cracks over their surface. For a moment, their form twists into nothingness. The edge of the void, threatening to pull me under. “I am your creator. I am that which gave you breath. I call your name and you do as you are bid.”

The words the spirits offer me are not helpful ones. They come in a relentless stream until my mouth is too full with curses and pleas. Their true name is old, and despite the fact that I have claimed the four winds as my own, their creator still holds more sway. The force of their struggling makes me want to spit and scream, to cry and claw at the feet of the gods in search of forgiveness.

But I stand firm.

“A life for a life,” I say, and everything goes still. The dirt I clench in my sweaty grasp wriggles, trying to get free. Trying to return to the earth. It mixes with my blood, and I grip tighter.

A name for a name, the winds whisper.

I grin, and for the first time, the fires of creation flicker in fear.

The words spring to life as I exhale. They string into a line, a shape, a name. They contain the strength of storms and the caress of sunlight. “I name thee,” I begin, and the winds howl in response.