A Goddess Descends
Awareness came slowly to Syffox. His neck and muscles were sore, and he could only look about slowly with blurred vision. He gradually became aware he was in a dim room. It was a comfortable room, a recognizable room. It was Vantaiga’s room in her mountain keep.
He shifted over stiffly to find Vantaiga sitting next to him. She smiled kindly. “Good morning.”
Syffox smiled back as he tried to piece together his fragmented memory. His voice broke as he struggled to speak. “Good morning, Goddess.” His smile faded as some of the pieces of memory began to fit into place. He slid closer and wrapped a pained arm over her. “I had a bad dream.”
Vantaiga stroked his hair while trying to hold back a sudden burst of sadness. “Me too.”
“What happened?”
Vantaiga sighed. “I don’t know. I think I got lost.”
Syffox pulled in closer and bit back a pain in his heart. “No, what happened before I was here?”
Vantaiga’s head snapped up. “Oh, that. You were in some kind of battle, and Hydar struck you down.”
“Hydar? Why did he do that?”
She leaned over him to enjoy the feeling of him next to her while she pushed back the dread of what questions he might ask next. “Hydar… isn’t our friend anymore.”
Secretly, Syffox was glad to hear it, but that also meant trouble for the forest. He replied without looking up, “That isn’t very good.” He wasn’t ready yet to look her in the eye.
She kissed the top of his head with a sigh. “No, it isn’t, but it doesn’t matter.”
“What now, then?”
Vantaiga lost herself in thought before finally replying, “Nothing. I’m not going anywhere anymore. I need to get the forest back in order.” She broke into a teary laugh. “And besides, every time I leave, you get yourself killed.”
“Oh, don’t worry about that. I’m getting used to it.” He stretched out his hand and examined it, partly wanting to change the subject. “You made me younger?”
“Yes, you were really letting yourself go there. All you need to do now is cut your hair.”
Syffox pulled a clump of his now long, curled, and fully red hair around so he could see it. “What? Cut this? My hair hasn’t been this red in ages. Why would I cut it now?”
Vantaiga only murmured an unimpressed, “Hmm.”
Syffox listened to her heartbeat for a moment. He used to love listening to her heartbeat. How long had it been since he’d last heard it? Somehow, though, it didn’t seem the same. “Why do you give yourself a heartbeat, Goddess?”
“My heartbeat? It makes the world seem more real when you have a heartbeat. You don’t realise how much it’s there in the background until you don’t have one.”
Syffox smirked. “I’ll have to check for that next time I die.”
She squeezed him playfully. “Don’t talk like that. I’m not letting you die ever again. And besides, they don’t have heartbeats. I don’t want to be like them. My place is down here in the forest where it’s warm and cosy, not up in the heavens where it’s cold and empty.”
Syffox wrapped himself around her as much as he could with stiff limbs. “I’m glad you’re back.” A sudden surge of sadness filled him as it occurred to him he’d lost track of how long they had been apart. He sucked in a shuddered breath and clenched her tightly. “Why did you leave, Goddess?”
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Vantaiga stayed motionless as the question bit into her mind. She hadn’t prepared an answer for that question, nor any of the other questions she was expecting. There was a long silence. “I was afraid… I was afraid they would take my forest.” A tear escaped her control and trickled off her chin. “I was afraid they would take you. They said it was necessary to keep the forest safe, to keep you safe. I thought it was the best thing to do. They told me it was the best thing to do.”
“I heard your forest isn’t very safe anymore.”
Vantaiga sighed. “Yes, I have a big mess to clean up. They said if my people were happy and healthy, we would become like Hubris and Avarice. So, I made everyone suffer in my forest just like in the rest of the world. I didn’t mean to stay away so long, but as I saw the hurt I was causing, it became easier to stay away, easier to look away. It became easier to be like them.” A renewed sense of guilt pressed on her from the abandonment of her duty. “So, I made a big mess of things.”
Syffox struggled to find the rare words of confrontation. “So… now you’re back… What has changed?”
Vantaiga drew in a stuttering breath and slowly exhaled to compose herself. “My forest wasn’t safe. My followers weren’t safe. You weren’t safe. I grew the forest for people to be happy. I grew the forest to be with you. In the end, all I had was the forest and none of the reasons why I wanted it.” She laughed ruefully. “Even Hydar’s promise to not let you be killed was a lie.”
She took a moment to gain control of a wave of emotion that swelled over her. “It was all just a trick to get me to sit on his lap to make him look big in front of the other gods—to make me his puppet.” She drew in a long breath. “To make me his fool.”
There was a long silence between the two as Syffox struggled to absorb her words. A tear escaped his eye and fell onto the milkweed-silk gown Vantaiga covered herself with. “I waited for you.” He sniffed trying to force back his tears. “I couldn’t wait in the forest, but I was waiting.”
He let his memories pull himself into the past. “At first, I was not far from the forest, always close enough to be able to tell if you were there or not. And if I ever ventured further, I would always check to see if you had returned when I came back.” He chuckled at the distant memory. “It seemed like all I was ever doing was checking for you. I’d stop for a drink, and then I’d check for you. I’d talk to someone, and I’d check for you. I would fall asleep wondering if you would be back, and in the morning, the first thing I would do was check to see if you were there.”
Syffox blinked away more tears. “But you were never there, so I travelled further away and checked less often, but I would still check. And I wasn’t checking to see that everything would be back to the way it used to be. I know you, and I know what Festor meant. I just wanted to talk and let you know there were other solutions. And I don’t mean joining together; I can still wait for that. I just wanted to tell you there were other ways to deal with this without you running away.”
Vantaiga tried to find her words over the crowded rush of thoughts in her head, the ache in her heart, and the growing damp patch on her gown from his tears. When her words finally came to her, she didn’t like them. They were hollow and pointless, and she wasn’t sure they were even worth what little strength she had to say them. But they were true all the same. “I’m sorry, but you know I don’t talk about these things.”
Syffox sighed. “I know, but you should have. I deserved a chance to try.” He took a long moment to let the tightness in his throat ease before speaking again. “I am very glad you’re back, Goddess, and you mean everything to me, but if you leave like that again and return to find me dead, don’t bring me back. I’m too old and tired for this.”
Vantaiga closed her eyes and tried to shut out the overwhelming pain within her. All things considered, she found being a Goddess more a burden than a benefit. She leaned in to Syffox and clasped him tightly while tears silently rolled down her face.
*** bonus scene ***
The Grand council of the gods convened at the World Table. Rarely did every god attend the council, and this day was no exception. However, of all the vacant thrones attention was being particularly paid to one empty seat.
Coronus fixed the Rain God with a stern stare and spoke with the voice of a roaring fire, “Are we to never see your plaything again Hydar?”
Hydar sat brooding at his throne, now a broiling turbulent storm cloud that seethed with an internal tempest; an occasional flash of lightening within illuminated the cloud with a hauntingly beautiful glow. He stared angrily at the sprawling green on the World Table before him and only answered, “I don’t know.”
“You wanted to see what this woman, this child would become. Do you now know?”
Hydar ground his teeth as he spoke, “Yes.”
“I think we have all indulged you long enough with this distraction. Can we now set the world right?”
Hydar could not find words to speak through his outrage and humiliation and only managed another, “Yes.”
Coronus then turned to the god of the desert, “Aridus, can you fix this?”
Aridus examined the World Table and the large swath of green that radiated out from Vantaiga’s throne. “It will be difficult.” He gave a disapproving scowl to Hydar, “Someone has gifted her forest with the ability to make its own rain. It grows with little attention from her. I can hold its progress but I cannot remove it without help.”
Coronus returned his withering gaze to Hydar, “Will you help remove this stain from our world Hydar?”
The words hit the god with an unaccustomed sting. He wiped a tear from his eye before speaking yet another shuddered, “yes.”
“Very well then. Let’s clean up this mess and restore the world to the way it should be.”