Then in the center of heaven
He called forth
A city with towers of gold,
streets with music for cobblestones,
And banners which flew without wind.
There, He dwelled, waiting
To see the wonders
His children would create
Theonides
A blue light burned atop a long buried, but still attended altar. It was lit, in great secret, every dusk; doused, in equally great secrecy upon sunrise. Not even the acolytes knew of this, for the mystery of the true faith needed to be jealously guarded. The High Priest alone carried the burden of knowledge, and was sworn, upon pain of eternal torment in the afterlife to only reveal that it was him, and not his absent God who maintained the watch of night on his deathbed.
The High Priest was thus alone in the forgotten, ruined hall; he was an old man, so old that he'd forgotten the actual count of his winters and summers – he'd not yet forgotten this secret that was his alone to keep, though, and still had enough of a healthy mind in his desiccated, skeletal looking head to begin wondering the why of it all, and not reveal that he was doing so.
Ah, if he had told the others, the old man lamented, nonetheless kneeling beneath the dead eyes of a dragon statue, if he had told them that all his long years of devotion had only made him realise faith was ritual alone! That, after a while, he could not remember how long, the ritual became the religion! And what for? he wondered, raising his hands to the dragon, in pointless, narrow imploration – he had no fear of such thoughts in the presence of his God's statue. He tried to remember whether he'd ever had the fear of them, and thought he must have, once…who knew how many winters and summers before? He didn't.
Horae quidem cedunt, et diǣs, et menses, et anni1…
His body moved on its own, the ritual of supplication guiding it, while his mind was not in prayer; why would it have been? The eyes of the Watchman of Night only sparkled to life because he lit them. They only dulled because he extinguished them. That was all; that was faith – secret and ritual and nothing.
His lips moved on their own, too, speaking un-thought of words, un-felt thanks for the night spent in safety, for the sweet work of lovers, for the undisturbed rest of babes, for the hours of rest of the mind that turned sour thoughts gentle. Indeed, all that may or may not have come to pass during the dark hours of night, but the Watchman had long stopped watching. Safety was granted by men's swords; the making of love and its advent was in the nature of the bodies of men and women; a babe's rest depended far more on the dinner the woman who offered the breast, in abandon, than on any God; the wisdom of night was naught but men's wisdom.
Long gone were the days when he had prayed for the Watchman of Night to return and speak even a word, even a whisper. Now, when he spoke the words, he knew, oh, knew that all Gods' works were merely the work of men; no fear of Lusacan ran through his bones, for had men not killed Gods? An altar to seven dragons, of which only two were even attended. Men carrying a plague had killed five of them with their steel and their magic, and men did not need steel and magic to slay Gods, they simply needed time.
Once, centuries past, those who came to these hidden halls brought sacrifices and sincere prayers. The blood of the slave nation had once filled the circles carved beneath the dragon statues. Once, the rare trees of defeated Arlathan had lit the fires. He'd not been alive during that time – the only blood he'd seen offered was that of a chicken or goat. Maybe, one time, a horse? As for wood, well, even the acolytes had regarded the one man who had once offered rosewood from his garden as slightly eccentric.
And so, and so, hours and days; and so, and so, months and years. Acolytes were fewer as sacrifices were poorer; the fewer the acolytes, the poorer the sacrifices, it all wound further and further down, and it was so that fear of the Gods was replaced by fear of men, and men only.
The High Priest of the Watchman lit the flame of the Watchman at dusk and extinguished it at dawn, not for the God, but for himself. If he spoke the thoughts he held, out loud, it would be steel to bring him to his deathbed – or magic, or poison – or…It did not much matter. If he spoke, one of them, or all of them would end him, and force him to cast the curse of the faithless ritual on another man.
The High Priest of the Watchman did not know whether he was a good man or a bad one, but he knew he was a coward, as the mere notion of passing his burden on frightened him more than death itself. This hour would pass too, he thought, when all the words were said and all the gestures were done.
The day would pass, if men could not read his mind, he thought, lifting himself on his worn knees and putting his hands about the blue flame. The month would pass, if his man's body would last it. He'd not pass the lie on sooner than he had to.
He closed his hands about the flame to stifle it; it did not go out, though. His fingers, gnarled by old age let in too much air, the priest thought, before he realised the flame was hot and actually burning his skin. He persisted though. The pain was in his imagination, he told himself; it was arthritis, it was…His mind knew what it was. The God he was kneeling before was dead, and he'd been dead long before his High Priest had killed him by forgetting to fear him.
Before his eyes, however, the thin skin on his hands reddened and blistered. The pain was unlike anything else he'd ever felt, thus, he actually looked upon his fingers only to find the blue flame had fully engulfed them, licking as far as his elbows, crawling up his flesh, but not his robes – he screamed, then, screamed again, and howled, he tried to stand away, but could not. His right leg gave in, his bones hollow as his faith had been – the man who'd forgotten his summers and winters, who now felt pain beyond pain was truly a coward. His howls summoned many, many who'd see the lie he carried but who were suddenly unimportant. He needed to get away from the flame, he needed to save his miserable existence, he needed to use his arms, and not his legs, he looked up, up to the statue of his God, looking for something materially to cling to, a stone claw, a chiselled talon, a wing thinned to perfection, something he could reach for to pull himself up.
The statue of the Watchman was watching, its eyes alive.
Acolytes flocked behind the burning man, their collective gasps all but drowning the High Priest's screams. The earth itself shuddered under their hurried steps, their stampede so heavy and mad to shake the forgotten temple, and shatter the paper thin, painfully laboured on wings of the dragon statue.
'Now…Now, you answer…' the old man gasped.
His screams, as his pain, abruptly stopped.
'Because now I am watching,' Lusacan replied; the gaze of the statue rolled over the hall, counting the acolytes and finding their numbers lacking.
'Manaveris Dracona!' tens of voices shouted, whispered and sighed; acolytes dropped to their knees. 'Manaveris Dracona!'
The High Priest was oblivious to the fact that the blue flame was murderously kissing his face, and causing his tendons to dry and snap, because there was no pain, only bliss, pure and unadulterated.
The earth shook with it.
The statue's eyes watched a man old enough to forget all his summers and winters burn to a husk, a lifetime of ritual suddenly overcome by the blind bliss of faith.
'Manaveris Dracona!' the voices of the acolytes cried, and the earth shook harder.
An old man was dead by flame in his untouched robes.
The Hundred Pillars crumbled, and, short of an hour later, Minrathous saw the wings of a sapphire dragon – first, stealing its midday sunlight by flying over the city, then beheld the dragon as it landed and rested upon the shoulders of the two juggernauts which held its gates, a living statue reclaiming its rightful place.
'Manaveris Dracona,' the city cried, some feeling avenged, some thinking of what they could pack fastest.
'Maker's breath,' Cassandra whispered, looking out the window of the Pavus mansion; Leliana simply crossed her hands behind her back.
The dragon, ten times the size of any dragon seen or heard of by scientists in the Imperium or Orlais nestled its spiked head under its wings and cuddled to comfortable sleep.
Radonis approached it, sweat on his brow from the many steps he'd gone up on, fear in his heart and Blade of Mercy in hand.
The sapphire dragon awoke displeased, looked at the Archon, yawned a yawn wide enough to swallow him whole, with the blade that had ended the torment of the Maker's Bride, and his entire ten-main suite. He then set his eyes on Magister Cassius, for no reason any onlooker could discern.
'Thou have made a grand mess of our gift, yes?' the dragon asked, of no one in particular.
Radonis did not know what to answer, so the dragon sniffed at him, then, slowly turned his tail to the Archon, his Magisters and their borrowed Imperium, and went back to sleep.
1 Hours pass, then days, and months and years. Cicero, Correspondence.
Hello, Lusacan, Watcher of Night :)
Thanks for reading.