Allegra snaps her head out of the water and gasps for air. The water is shallower than she remembers; three inches of water, and yet, she remembers feeling completely submerged when she first dove in. White marble lines all sides of the pool-- if you can even consider it one-- and all the walls surrounding it. The ceiling stretches on farther than her eyes can see.
“It’s nice to meet you, Helena,” a woman’s voice says. “Orien speaks of you in her prayers. You definitely look like the bold little sister she’s always describing to me.”
Allegra rakes her wet hair out of her face. She looks up at the woman’s copper skin, the shining armor, and the short brown hair framing her round, warm face. The same glow that surrounds the staff in her left hand surrounds her entire body, too. She’s at least seven feet tall, if not more. “Before you ask, no, you are not dead. Your friends all asked that the moment they woke up. I guess that’s what I get for making you all drop twenty feet into a hole in the ground.”
“Where are they?” she asks, taking Lumen’s hand.
“Here. All of you are briefly split off into separate timelines right now. A bit of a pain, I know, but we’ll put you back. You’re all safe from any harm in this realm.”
“We?”
She blinks. Before her stand two additional figures. Genus, with her white gown and golden crowning that surrounds her head, and Necros, with his heavy hood and tattooed shoulders. His eyes are quite different from his display at the altar; instead of two black eyes surrounding red irises, there is only one, and its iris is a pure, glowing white.
“Aren’t you supposed to have two dark eyes?” she mutters, careful not to overstep.
“What? No. It’s just the one. Ugh-- centuries of reign over this realm, and they still get my eyes wrong,” Necros answers. “I suppose man has worse shortcomings.”
“You have it easy. Some houses of worship still paint my beloved in a dress,” Genus responds.
Lumen sighs. “They kneel and ask for a blessing from a woman who looks nothing like me. I almost don’t give it to them.”
“Armor or not, you still look gorgeous. We don’t get to complain when our hands are the reason for mankind’s flaws.”
Allegra’s not sure what to make of the deities' casual banter. She’s not sure what to make of them, period. “Why am I here?”
Genus draws a circle or light with her two fingers, cutting it into four equal sections. “The life cycle. You are born, you live, you die, and you are reborn again. Currently, the cycle is broken for millions of souls. A creature is born, it lives, it dies, and it fails to reincarnate. It’s left wandering the world as a lost soul, bearing the qualities of whatever lifeform it lived as. In order to enter the life cycle again, it must attach itself to a body that will hopefully, successfully make it through.”
“We gave mankind the opportunity to bond with the life they shared the earth with,” Lumen continues. “Our hopes were that they’d show humility, wanting to change their own experience of life and give “lower” life forms a taste of it, as well. But we were wrong. This “next step in evolution”, as they called it— something humans longed for for centuries— they rejected it when it proved difficult to cooperate with more than one soul in their body.”
Despite Allegra’s pacing around, the deities never seem any closer or any father from her. Even if she’s completely in the dark about what this place is, physically, at least she knows it’s safe. It’s better than a hall of reality-warping mirrors. “But why do they fail to reincarnate?”
Genus raises her eyebrows. “I really thought we put the pieces on the table for you. I was expecting your first question to be about the elephant in the room-- or rather, the absence of an elephant entirely.” she says. Damn. I never thought having my intelligence insulted by a deity is something I’d experience in this lifetime, she thinks. Lumen elbows her reproachfully. “Chronum is guarding the threshold that souls are supposed to enter the life cycle through. The twins are our best hope of bringing him to his senses.” She steps back. “But I think the ‘why’ is a story better told by their father.”
“Genus and Lumen gave Chronum and I just one opportunity to construct life instead of ending it,” Necros says. “Damian and Jericho, ‘Chaos’ and ‘Calamity’. Two twin boys made in our image. They were our greatest creation-- our only one, really-- and our absolute joy. Chronum insisted on taking a mortal form and supervising the boys, but grew obsessive. Mankind is greedy and longs for material fulfillment, so he wanted to shelter our sons from that; but with time, he fell into avarice himself. He collected lost souls in his mortal form.
“He returned to me and insisted we give the boys the same. As the sons of deities, he believed they deserved to be a higher life form, something more like us. When I refused, he shut us out and took over the threshold. Banished us to this church, and now we stand before you.”
“That’s why you need the twins,” Allegra mutters. “To reason with him. That’s why Lumen asked my sister to bring Chaos here.”
“Chronum placed the crow soul between the twins in order to make sure they’d never split up,” Necros continues. “He stands at the threshold, waiting for Damian and Jericho to find him, to receive the ‘higher power’ he desperately wanted to give them.”
“Do you really think there’s hope for Chronum?”
“It is our job to give hope more than to have hope,” Genus answers. “That’s why these matters are in your hands. A god’s associates cannot bring him to his senses, but his creation is the one thing capable of overpowering him. You are all a product of Chronum’s handiwork, and you are worth saving. He cannot forget that.”
The rest of the group appears beside Allegra. They all seem relieved to know that, no matter how “real” this moment is, they’re all seeing the same thing.
“We can send you to the threshold at any point, but you have to be willing to do this,” Necros continues. “Without Chronum’s help, we’ve had to be very careful about timing. At any moment, we could’ve just thrown the twins at his doorstep, giving him exactly what he wants. So I needed all of you together under the same cause.” He kneels in front of the twins, gazing at them lovingly. “Damian and Jericho Erastos, ‘Chaos’ and ‘Calamity’. My divine sons. You are the only two with the capacity to negotiate with Chronum. I give you my blessing.”
“Esther Andrelus and Naira Xiadani, ‘Lynx’ and ‘Wendy’. When the right of rebirth was ripped from your lost souls, you stepped in and gave them a home. I give you my blessing,” Genus continues.
“Orien and Helena Lester. The two of you not only have a passion for life, but a vow to understand it in all its forms,” Lumen says. She taps her staff on the ground once. “I give you my blessing.”
“And to your werewolf friend,” Necros adds, “he needs not a blessing. He has strength in his body and good in his heart. Do not take that for granted.”
“I won’t,” Allegra says, “not again.”
“Ignorance is hardly the opposite of knowledge,” Lumen says. “Corruption is. But there is healing for those who seek it. Chronum has been merciful on the earth; even in his corruption, the string of time has no knots. But souls are suffering for his insolence. This realm needs his guidance. I know there is good in his heart.”
“How do you know we can bring it out in him?”
“How does any mortal know anything about a higher power?” Lumen kneels down, resting her glowing palm against Allegra’s cheek. “I have faith.”
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