Kore'aka

Before time began, Kore'aka was. When he participated in the formation of the cosmos, still he was. He was a benevolent god, or so he liked to think. All he asked for was worship, a devoted high priest, and a new girl every year. Kore'aka liked girls. He thought they were his finest creation. Well, creations. There are quite a lot of them. Not infants though. He might have been a rather odd god, but nobody should be that odd. He liked them between 18 and 23 years old, opinionated, strong willed, but pliable enough to bend to the will of a deity. Oh, and they had to be virgins. No self-respecting god would accept a girl who wasn't a virgin. And they had to be absolutely gorgeous to be his. Anything less than exquisite was an affront.

Mahaela was an outcast. His father had deserted during the war, and had been duly slaughtered to appease Bakhti, Kore'aka's belligerent son, who doubled as a very willing god of conflict. Mahaela was an only child, and everyone in the township shunned him for his father's cowardice. His mother had died, presumably of shame, when her husband had been killed, and many wondered why Mahaela hadn't done the decent thing and died too, even though he'd been an infant when it had happened.

Mahaela was quite popular, although such popularity isn't necessarily a good thing. It wasn't that anyone hated him on an individual level, but people round here get superstitious, and it's best not to tempt the gods, especially when they're as cantankerous and fight-itchy as Bakhti. He lived in a hut on the edge of town (Mahaela that is, not Bakhti - gods don't live in huts), all twenty-five years of him. People generally thought him good-looking and intelligent. In their secret hearts many must have admired the ease with which he slung his giraffe-skin bag across his shoulder when he left school of an evening, the clean, even teeth that broke his face in the most beautiful way when he smiled, or the loping gait of his run, but humans are proud, irrational creatures so we'll never know. He taught lessons at the village school, supervised by a priest so he would never spread his father’s seditious views and abominable cowardice. After school he worked on farms, usually for a pittance. The few adults that deigned to talk to him often asked him why he didn't just up and leave.

"This is all I know," he'd reply.

Arithea was the chief's niece and had grown up around the palace. It was widely speculated that she'd been created by Kore'aka specially to be his bride as soon as she came to maturity, which - as such interesting times are the kick off points of all good stories - she had just gotten around to. She was at the entrance to the temple with her uncle and her cousins, listening to the chief priest pronounce Kore'aka's virgin for the year. Of course she thought Kore'aka was an old fraud, but she was resigned to the inevitable, which duly happened. What wasn't due was the primal scream that ripped through the air and silenced the relieved applause that broke out as soon as her name was read. Everyone turned and stared at Mahaela, for it was he who had screamed. There were tears in his eyes.

"It's not right, it's just not right.”

He kept repeating that over and over with slight modifications to the exact words, words not fit to grace the pages of such tomes as this, anguish etched into his youthful face. The chief priest walked up to him, a mocking smile on his face.

"What is not right, child?" he asked.

"She needn't be sacrificed to fulfil the caprice of a god who hasn't been heard from in centuries."

A horrified gasp went up from the crowd. It's amazing how people get so uncomfortable when other people give voice to their doubts.

"Would you have him speak to you? Would you have him reveal his majesty to your unworthy, coward-spawned eyes?" The chief priest was smirking.

"Leave him alone," said a soft but clear voice in the crowd. "Let him speak his mind. Kore'aka will judge who's worthy or brave enough to see him"

A small cheer went up, from the same previously horrified crowd. The chief priest's smile faded.

Kore'aka watched events unfold with great interest. It takes guts to disagree with the edicts of the gods. This boy, Mahaela, he had guts - guts enough to make Kore'aka nervous. And what was worse, Arithea - his Arithea, had spoken up for him. He gave it a moment’s thought and decided it was of no consequence. She would be his, the boy would be stoned, and order would be restored.

Or would it?

Kore'aka began to have the beginnings of a rather amusing plan. He liked the boy - he was much more honest than most of his followers. Kore'aka began immediately to put his plan into action.

Back on the mortal plane, Mahaela had been bound and dragged off to a tiny cell. Arithea wasn't far away, in a cell of her own, albeit not many people in the town could boast of such luxury. There was gold and ivory in every direction, velvet curtains draped across the floor length windows, intricately woven rugs, plush enough to sink her pretty feet into; and dark, moody onyx embedded in almost every solid item. She was the highest profile Kore'a-kayane for a century, ever since the wise and honourable Chief Edda's beloved was chosen mere days to the pronouncement of their engagement.

She was waited on hand and foot, night and day by meerans, young women who had lost their virginity before maturity and were therefore only fit to appease the lusts of the priests. Kore'aka wasn't one of those selfish gods who wouldn't let his subjects enjoy the pleasures of the flesh. He felt pity for the women. Families often disowned women who had sex before their nuptials. Men somehow avoided this fate – a fate that often meant not just shame, but exile.

Arithea got up and asked to see the other prisoner.

"Other prisoner?" asked Miranda, the eldest of the meerans and the chief priest's favourite consort. She was a foreigner, a prisoner of war. Her gorgeous dark skin had driven many wild with desire in her youth, and many had given into their lust until a concupiscent priestling had laid eyes on her and given her sanctuary – at a cost. She had wheedled her way into the priest's good books by watching – speaking only when words of wisdom were required. Now he was Chief Priest, and the priestlings called her mother.

She assured Arithea that she was no prisoner, and she was free to come and go as she saw fit, but she should mind to be back before the cleansing started each evening.

Arithea walked through the temple. It was different on the inside. Opulence replaced the piety the people saw - until she got to the dungeons. They weren't much used anymore, seeing as the wars had been over for many a year. They were dingy, to say the least. Spiders fled along their thin webs as her torch lit up the dank passageway. She would have been afraid if she'd been alone, but she was accompanied by a temple guard; large, muscular, emasculated. He didn't speak as he led her on, and he remained silent as he opened the door to Mahaela's cell.

Mahaela had been busy bemoaning his sorry lot, his mind going over the events of the previous day repeatedly, trying to figure out just what he'd done wrong. He'd spoken out against what he viewed as a ridiculous practice. He leapt up from the floor as Arithea entered. His face clouded over from shame at his dishevelled, near nude appearance in front of a woman so beautiful. He didn't speak until she addressed him.

"Why did you speak up out there?" she asked him. Her voice was quiet but full of authority.

"Kore'a-kayane, I know not. All I remember is feeling a great and powerful darkness enveloping me, making me take leave of common sense and act totally irrationally." His voice was flat, every word perfectly intoned, as though he had taken his time to rehearse his story beforehand. Arithea smiled and moved closer to him. Her voice dropped low, becoming irresistibly seductive yet unmistakably venomous.

"I thought you were a better man than your father. I see no reason why you should live up to his reputation. But I guess the cowardice runs deep within your blood"

Mahaela stiffened but said nothing. She was baiting him, and he wasn't about to be drawn. He hoped.

“I do not wish to be the cause of any more trouble for anyone in the kingdom. I am content to serve my time here and go back to teach in the village.”

His quiet determination irritated Arithea, but also impressed her somewhat. She did not get to see the smile Kore’aka had heard the young women in the village speak of in hushed toned behind his back, but she was aware of his comeliness.

“I will request that you spend an hour of each day with me.”

She wasn’t sure why she thought this was a good idea, but it felt right, so she went with it.

“If the priests agree, it shall be as you wish.”

“Hmmmph.”

Arithea returned to her chamber and told Miranda of her intention. Miranda told the chief priest, and as night followed day as Mahaela began to spend time with Arithea.

Kore’aka spent time observing. He allowed, nay encouraged the friendship that inevitably blossomed between the two captives. For a few weeks, a moment in god time, he enjoyed watching Arithea learn about the natural world, about mechanics and agriculture and medicine. He relished the loss of innocence the outcast went through as Arithea spoke of politics and history and governance and royalty.

In one week, the chief priest would guide Arithea through the undying flood and Kore’aka would claim his Kore’a-kayane, his consort for the next cycle.

Miranda was astride the chief priest when Kore’aka put the next idea in his head.

“We should have the outcast cleansed if he is to spend this last week with the Kore’a-kayane,” he said suddenly.

“Hold on.”

So he did.

A peal of thunder rang out over the kingdom as Kore’aka chuckled.

“So,” Miranda said after she’d got a couple glasses of honey filtered water, “you want Mahaela to go through the cleansing. Where is this coming from?”

“We all go through the cleansing to attend to the Kore’a-kayane, and if he’s to be around her he should go through it too.”

“It’s unwise to have him around her this close to the Walk. They’ve become very fond of one another, and there is danger there.”

Another thunderbolt rang out.

“Yeah, I’m going to have to overrule you on this one, my love. Kore’aka himself is deciding this.”

“The gods play the most ridiculous games,” Miranda said as she swung a thigh nonchalantly over the chief priest’s waist.

Neither Mahaela nor Arithea would have been able to tell you how they ended up in the cleansing bath together, but both would have told you it was Arithea’s idea. They would both have been wrong, but that’s not important right now.

Mahaela was engrossed, taking in the luxury of the cleansing room. Twelve midnight blue marble pillars held up the intricately carved ceilings. Gods and humans interacted in marvellous, over the top ways across time and space, depicted in spectacular detail. It was lavish in ways he couldn’t reconcile with his upbringing. He’d heard about politics and the corruption that follows it from Arithea, but this was something else entirely, and he was dumbstruck.

He was brought back to the present by the sound of breathing up close to him. He turned suddenly and almost hit Arithea. He was pleased that he just about evaded her, but also instantly mortified, as she had discarded her the strips of cloth that had bound her breasts, and he did not know where to look.

"Would you not look upon my form?"

Somehow, he managed to stay in control.

"I could not possibly be so presumptuous, my lady"

In the heavens Kore'aka heaved a sigh of relief. This little game had been fun, but it was good to know at least one of them knew his place. He wondered whether he should replace Arithea. She obviously liked the boy, even if she wasn't able to see it that way yet. He decided against it though. She was his.

"Leave." Arithea's voice was authoritative again, uncompromising. Mahaela didn't need to be asked twice. He stepped out of the pool and walked through the chamber before picking up a towel and wrapping it back around his waist. It was a futile effort. Arithea eyed him unabashedly even as she ordered him out. Mahaela walked to his cell in a puzzled daze, myriad thoughts juxtaposing themselves over one another. He was both horrified and exhilarated. Arithea belonged to Kore'aka, even if he wasn't real. The feelings overtaking his mind were very, very real – and they horrified him.

Mahaela wasn't the only confused one though. Arithea lay in her lavish bed tormented. She fantasized, her mind creating scenario after scenario, each one involving Mahaela doing things to her that had never been done before, things she previously would have laughed off as utter nonsense. It didn't help that she also thought Kore’aka an old fraud. She didn't want to be consort to some dead myth, she wanted flesh and blood and sweat... She wanted Mahaela. And she would have him.

The chief priest still lay with Miranda. She was his favourite not only because of her effortless sensuality and voracious appetite, but because she was incredibly intelligent. A wise man leans on wise people, and Miranda was the wisest person he knew. Wiser still, than the chief.

"Arithea is a problem," she said.

"Well she's not my problem. All I have to do is keep her here for the next three days and push her through the undying flood."

"She won't go, you know?"

"Has she said so?" He paused. He knew better than to question Miranda's assertions. She was good at knowing. He asked her instead why she thought so.

"She likes the outcast. She will have him for her consort." The chief priest thought for a while, and realised he didn't really care. Kore'aka hadn't been heard from in decades, and people’s faith had worn thin. Even he, the chief priest of Kore'aka's temple, didn't set much store by his existence.

Kore'aka seethed, and on a distant island a volcano spewed forth a torrent of lava. The ash cloud covered the kingdom, and people bowed and prayed. The chief priest immediately regretted his laissez-faire attitude, and had Mahaela moved out of the temple that very evening, to a nearly deserted military outpost not too distant from his own hut on the outskirts of town. He went without complaining, and was allowed to resume his teaching, on condition that he returned under supervision to his confinement each evening.

Three days passed very quickly. The chief priest hoped that he'd done enough to keep a god he was struggling to believe in appeased. Arithea wondered about the beautiful man she had almost known – and his strange mix of timidity and boldness. The beautiful man in question taught, and tried not to dwell on memories when he was confined to his quarters. Kore’aka schemed, as all knowledgeable gods did.

The day of assumption was the one day each cycle where citizens got to rub shoulders with the priesthood. The excitement was palpable, the sense of occasion infectious. Mahaela was allowed to attend, flanked by guards, a baggy, brown prisoner’s tunic his only attire. He towered over his guards, and yet they spoke freely to him. It was that sort of day.

The area around the temple was absolutely packed. A junior priest announced the commencement of the ceremony, and a hearty cheer went up. Everybody loves a spectacle. And what a spectacle it was. Where there had been a rather ornate set of double doors, there was a fountain that emerged from the ground and rose into the lintel in a smooth golden sheet. No one knew what it was made of, but every cycle it was a magnificent sight. Flanking the undying flood were two fires lit upon intricately designed altars that depicted every description of Kore’aka that had ever been made.

The Chief Priest came around the left fire and addressed the awed throng. There were junior priests describing the events to the blind, signing the speech to the deaf, escorting the lame to prime positions where they could see without being trampled upon, making sure everyone was part of it. The chief priest’s speech was a beautiful one, a hopeful one, praising Kore’aka for his graciousness, beseeching him to accept their humble offering, praying that he would bless them as they served him faithfully.

Mahaela was caught up in it all. He did not believe in Kore’aka, but he found himself enjoying the spectacle nevertheless. He spoke less to the guards now, trying to take in what was going on.

“Come.”

He turned around, looking for the source of the command. It wasn’t one of the guards, that much he knew. He assumed it was someone else who’d been summoned, and turned his attention back to the ceremony.

“Mahaela, come with me.”

“Who…?”

“Hush. Don’t speak. The guards will not know you’ve left, and by the time they do it will not matter.”

“But who are you?”

Kore’aka laughed. He was in Mahaela’s head, and he was quite enjoying the discomfiture he was causing.

“You… You’re in my head? Who are you?” Mahaela was afraid now.

“Walk. I will direct you. And I will show you who I am.”

In the minutes it took to get from his vantage point to the foot of the right altar, Mahaela’s mind had been opened to a truth that was almost too much for him to handle. He had seen the dawn of the gods, the division of the worlds, the rise of man, the wars that had been fought because gods had refused to accept their lots, the various rebellions that gods had been forced to put down, the faces of every Kore’a-kayane that had ever passed through the undying flood, his father’s desertion and punishment, his own growth into a man, his encounter with Arithea…

“I swear it was never my intention to offend you.”

“Who would you swear by,” Kore’aka asked, laughing. Mahaela fell silent.

“You cannot intend to offend someone you don’t believe in, Mahaela,” the god assured him. “If I had taken offence, you would be dead. But that doesn’t matter.”

“I did not even…” Mahaela didn’t get to finish his sentence, for at that moment Arithea emerged from behind the left altar. She looked angelic. Her dark brown hair had been teased into an elaborate shape, her face coloured with motifs indicating both undying flood and eternal flame. Her body had been squeezed into a robe that accentuated her subtle curvature and made his blood rush in spite of himself. He swallowed.

Kore’aka laughed.

“She’s mine, you know.”

Mahaela could not speak. He didn’t have to, because Kore’aka could read his every thought.

“You want her, don’t you?” It was a rhetorical question, but Mahaela nodded anyway.

“I have a proposition for you, young man. I'm going to make you the same offer I made your father.”

“My what?”

“Your father.”

Mahaela looked over as he listened to the god speak. The Chief Priest was rounding up his speech, and Arithea was nearly ready to go through the Undying Flood.

“If I accept this offer, can I make a speech?”

“Of course. As my Chief Priest, you're supposed to make speeches. And it will be you, not this pot-bellied charlatan, that will guide Arithea to me. If I cannot have the father, I will have the son.”

“I accept.”

The god grinned. Mahaela walked over to the altars and raised his hands. The chief priest and guards did not understand how it was that they could not move, could not even speak. Arithea rolled her eyes, but did not look away for a second as he began to speak.

You could tell he was a teacher, and a good one. He spoke about the history of their people, about the great wars that they had fought, about how Kore’aka had made them prosperous. The god relaxed in the knowledge that he had chosen well, and kept the chief priest still. But Mahaela went on speaking. He told the assembled crowd how he had communed with Kore’aka, and about how the god was powerful indeed, and knowledgeable and generally awesome. The crowd oohed and ahhed and hollered at the careful ministrations of the outcast teacher.

He told the people about how Kore’aka, in his wisdom, had made sure that his father would not live to be anything other than Chief Priest, how the man had only wanted to fight for the land, but how Kore’aka, upset at being scorned, had appeared to accede to the acolyte’s wishes only to fill him with fear at the sound of battle and point him out to Bakhti, the war god – all but assuring his death. The crowd started to murmur at this. The teacher continued to tell them, layering his disdain with flattery, delicately turning the people against the god.

“Every Korea’kayane has been a caprice, a beauty to be tossed aside as soon as they enter into Kore’aka’s dwelling. Is it not time, my people, to cast off the yoke of the gods and create our own destinies?”

The silence was palpable. Kore’aka considered striking him down at that moment, but that would only make him a martyr, and his comfortable kingdom would be stirred with voices of dissent. And anyway, the people weren’t foolish enough to be swayed by one man.

“Yes, the gods themselves will oppose us, and it might be the end of comfort as we know it, but we will forge a future where our lands are not subject to the whimsy of deities who only offer help when it suits their purposes, where our maidens are not thrown to a licentious being, or to one of his cronies, where our sons are not forced to slave under the thumb of a religious system that offers next to nothing in return.”

He was tugging at individual heartstrings, and he was striking a chord that, although dissonant, was busy creating new harmonies. A cheer went up, and then another. Guards were struck down where they stood, and a cluster of people at the front made a collective beeline for the high priest, who Kore’aka had released from his bondage in his ire. He was carried away, stripped of his splendour, and beaten.

In the tumult, Arithea found Mahaela. She kissed him, a soul numbing, world stopping kiss. They walked away from the rabid crowd and into the temple, items of clothing being cast aside as they did.

The god’s anger was terrible, his judgement swift. The volcanoes that had served in the past as a first line of defence for the kingdom now turned their attention inward. They went off, all seven of them, flooding the kingdom with lava and ash, obliterating everything in their path. Within minutes all that remained was a vast glowing pool, seething and steaming, and the higher reaches of the temple.

Kore’aka sent down the rain, his anger sated. He gazed upon his kingdom. There were two people alive in the highest chamber of the temple.

“Well, they didn’t wait long to start repopulating,” he muttered to himself, laughing in exasperation.