“But you were to admit the servants of another god?”
Ponce shook his head. “Not as such. I asked Endurance for guidance.”
Since my experience in the temple this morning with the ox god’s wordless will, I could better understand how Chowdry and this young man were so willing and able to take direction from their mute deity. “I would visit Blackblood soon, I think.” It seemed the right path now, and action was better than hiding in this temple. “The visit will be better made in full daylight. Will Chowdry return this morning?”
The young man shrugged. “I should depart whenever I was ready, were I you.”
“Yes. I will.”
He paused, something else clearly on his mind. “A worry, for you, if you please, Mother Green.”
“Just Green,” I said firmly, my free hand straying to my belly.
“It is long past now, but there have been… attacks… in the Temple Quarter.”
That seemed almost silly. “I am hardly concerned about street thugs.”
“Not on women. On their gods.” He withdrew from my attitude. Later I regretted that I had spoken so dismissively, for I might have learned more sooner.
Dressed as a boy, I went forth, keeping my chin tucked down and my hat tilted forward. The Street of Horizons was familiar enough. Odd, clever architecture and a sense of vanishing perspective. Whatever long-dead architect had first laid out the Temple Quarter had been inspired, at the least.
The area was busy, though with a liveliness that took me some time to unravel. The great iron pots that lined the street were in better repair than on my last visit here. People seemed to throng rather than scurry. Choybalsan’s fall had lent renewed, healthy energy to this place that had been little more than an open-air tomb during the days of the Duke.
Gods had not been so popular in a city ruled by an immortal with stolen magic.
Yet there was a tension in the air. Not the furtiveness of the old days. More like nervousness. As if a thousand people on the street at once could be mugged together. Ponce had mentioned attacks, but on the gods themselves? Who would dare? Who could dare?
It was a staggering thought, even to one such as I, who had brought down a god on the streets of this very city.
In any event, something poisoned the air just enough for discomfort, like water from a well in which a dog has drowned long ago. The city worried, through the collective fears of its people.
The Algeficic Temple was familiar as ever. Faced in black tile, its tall metal doors were still bent where the god’s avatar Skinless had forced them closed, trapping the last of Blackblood’s previous generation of scheming priests within. Clearly they had been opened since, but not repaired. On the right rose a very old building, blocky and tan fronted by squat pillars. On the left, a white stucco temple topped with a gold-colored pediment. Though I knew the names and histories of most of the gods here, much as with the families of wealth and power, I did not know their houses.
Even while I worried a bit about how Blackblood’s renewed priesthood would welcome me, this was not a day for skulking caution. I had been bidden, I was arrived.
I marched up the uncomfortable steps and pushed into the darkness beyond.
The hall within was as silent and dusty as I remembered, though there seemed to be new stains on the floor besides the ones I’d caused on my last pass through this place. Perhaps a crisis of succession, argued in the most pointed manner? Dark banners still hung from the clerestory thirty feet above. The mercury pool quivered in the center of the space. A living scrying mirror, though such things had never spoken to me.
I had slain here, and nearly been slain myself. Death and healing, and the touch of Skinless, that horrific avatar of the pain god, had all taken place in this hall.
Five men in familiar dark robes stepped out of the shadows toward me. Each wore a woven leather mask. Ambush! I thought, and palmed one of my short knives. Then the priest at the center raised his hands cautiously.
“Please, Mistress Green, we beg you not to strike us down.”
Straightening from the fighting crouch into which I’d dropped unthinking, I declared loudly, “I intend to strike no one. And come only at invitation.” I couldn’t stop myself from adding, “I believe I have meddled enough already in your priestly affairs. Don’t you?”
From the way their robes shuffled and their masks were cast down, these priests did not find my little joke to be so funny.
“The god has spoken for you,” the leader continued. “I am Pater Primus.” At the expression that crossed my face, he swiftly amended himself. “The new Pater Primus. It is as much a title as a name.”
“An ill-favored title, if you ask me,” I grumbled, but I understood that I was being graceless. This awkward banter covered a bad case of nerves on both our parts.
“As may b-be.” The priest turned to his fellows. “She is exempt from our practices.”
“We will not challenge,” muttered one of them.
“And I will not challenge you,” I replied. “But where shall I approach the god? I have been down in his basements before, and do not long for another visit.”
“Best you stand before our altar at the back of this hall.”
“I will not be taken up,” I warned him.
The Pater Primus’ voice was pained. “No one here would be foolish enough to try to make a sacrifice of you, Mistress.”
Not now, at any rate.
I took that as all the permission I needed, and pushed past them toward the god’s fane.
Much of my prior experience here had been confused or worse. I’d passed through this temple twice, for different reasons, but never by simply walking in the front door and looking around. Once through the basements and once by dropping in from the roof. As I walked among the narrow pillars toward the recessed sanctuary at the back of the great hall, I wondered what kind of god abided without worshippers. There were no benches or pews, no prayer rugs, no stalls.
Just empty, silent space draped in deepest shadow.
Except, of course, Blackblood was a pain god. He had worshippers everywhere, in every moment. He didn’t need them to gather together and sing praises.
At the rear of the great hall three doorways granted access to the altar in the next room. I had no notion of the ritual use of each, and the priests were so frightened of me that there seemed little point in asking them. I strode through the central door and stood before the altar.
In a room of grave dust and death shadows, a slab of black marble drank up what little light there was. A table, really, made of a stony darkness. Here the suffering was taken up from the most desperate of Blackblood’s appellants. Behind the table rose a carved wooden screen that appeared to be ebony, as best I could judge. Above them both loomed an empty throne with shackles at the arms and pediment, as if to bind the god close. Restraint in devotion?
For the first time, it occurred to me to wonder what price the pain god paid for his role in the lives of his followers. Did taking the pain up cost him pain of his own? Was that sort of balance required of all gods? The Lily Goddess had been worshipped through prayer, song, observance-all the trappings of a service-but mostly through the dedication of the lives of hundreds of women. Blackblood was worshipped through the dedication of the suffering of boys and men.
Women were not so welcome in this temple. Not even me.
“I am here.” My voice fell flat, curiously without echo. The darkness seemed ready to grow teeth and devour me. I stood firm. “You asked and I came. Do not expect such consideration routinely.”