by serotonin. » Mon May 14, 2018 8:40 am
Dust. Everywhere was dust, layered in thick sheets across every surface. Spans of white marble had been turned ashy by the unrelenting reach of the little particles. Nothing disturbed them, as nothing had entered the temple for a thousand years. Perhaps longer. Time left the place untouched. No weathering on the outside of the sanctuary. The stained glass and paintings remained preserved, the colors as vibrant as the day they were painted. The ages stood still, here. It was a sacred place, and the murals on the walls told many tales. From those of Baal Zebul, the Ancient of the Heavens, to Baal Keres, the Ancient of Misfortune. It’s the latter that has the only sign of destruction in the temple. Her statue, smashed. Her painting, vandalized. The act had gone on a millenia ago, and yet… A deep sense of negativity radiated from this place.
Baal Keres, at first, knew only loneliness. Living as almost an ethereal spirit, she lacked the ability to manifest herself. The most she could do was settle inside of a statue of her image, and speak to her followers and oracles through telepathy and dreamwalking. That was the strange thing about being a deity in those times-- Power came from how many believed in her, and her ways. How many offerings were laid out at her temples. For those who were forgotten about, those who lost all patronage, and who’s name faded from both the daily thoughts of their followers and from the etchings that spoke of their glories, became forgotten. Faded out of existence, with no real way to return. A terrifying fate for any of them, to be certain. Baal Keres was by no means in danger of being forgotten, however.
In this time, the Temple of the Ancients had been newly built. Statues ran the length of the room, depicting Viscets of all sorts, all known as Legends. Nameplates proclaimed who they were, and offering tables were set out before each of them. Some tables had only a few meager wildflowers, or a small loaf of hard bread. Some tables overflowed to the floor with gold, jewels, food, and drink. Fineries of every sort could be found flowing through the temple, and those Ancients with the most offerings seemed to radiate a power. They couldn’t manifest, instead they lived and breathed through their statues. The statues served as a host of their power, and they could only influence areas near it. No further than the edges of the surrounding city. Speaking through oracles and whatever other miracles they could perform. The might of their statue seemed to reflect the might of themselves.
Baal Keres was far from a forgotten Ancient. Her table overflowed to the floor with offerings, but a different sort than the kind her brethren often received. She brought misfortune and ill-will. In a few cases, she could cause severe illness, or for a fatal accident to happen. The offerings laid out to her were objects from people’s ordinary lives, stolen from a neighbor who had wronged them, or a rival who had harmed their family. Pocket watches, rings, jewelry. All small trinkets, all easily stolen. She had enough sway that she could usually enact her will, and misfortune often fell upon those who had wronged her followers. Death was the extreme limit of her powers, most often it was livestock falling ill, market prices falling or rising, sudden bankruptcy. Life-ruining, but not life-ending. She left the reaping to some of her more ambitious equals. She knew, though, that in some ways, she was different. Her capabilities were far beyond what she was aware. She had thoughts, feelings, true emotions. Her brethren did not, and they only accompanied the statue when someone was around. They were freed. She was locked in place, the only living soul in a temple that grew increasingly barren every day.
What Baal Keres could not see, however, was the carved Seal of Binding on her back. An intricate design, locking her spirit in place. She was powerful, too powerful, and during an age when Baal Keres’s power had been at its weakest, they were able to bind her to the statue. In doing so, it was rumored they had bound her to the mortal plane altogether, and that should she escape, there was no concern of her retribution.
It was Baal Zebul who first suggested the binding, having been given a small statue with the spirit of a bird trapped within. The rune on the forehead of the statue would never work. But one on the back? Perhaps. Through the capabilities of their dreamwalking and placing the ideas of thoughts into people’s minds, it wasn’t long before they uncovered a mage powerful enough to place the Mark. The mage, when summoned, agreed to his fateful task, unknowing at the time that it would likely end in his death. Baal Keres was hard to fool, and she was quick to anger. Should she catch the mage in the midst of applying the seal, it was more than likely he would end with a curse that would damn him to a life of suffering.
He was commanded to lie in wait behind the statue, and await her oracle’s arrival. He would have to be quick, and silent, to both cast the mark, and in the following days carve it into the stone to prevent it from wearing off. A Seal of Binding, one that would ensure her spirit was bound in the statue. Typically it was used to bind a spirit to a body, but certainly it would also work on stone. He set the mark against her back, and in the following days, began to carve it into the stone.
The Ancients had been promised it would never break, no matter what she did. They didn’t count on one of her followers tending to her statue every day. An oracle of hers, who had been made aware of the fact that her beloved Baal Keres was trapped. With a little chisel, and a little bit of strength and stealth, the stone was chipped away, piece by piece. At first, it was just dust, but as the stone got weaker, chips began to come off. A pile of gravel, swept up every day. Only from around the Mark, as there was no desire to destroy the statue, but something had to be done to free Baal Keres.
Ava Bellarmina, her most dedicated oracle, chosen from early childhood to serve the deity. Baal Keres was not known for her patience, but in this one endeavor, she had resolved herself to allow Ava all the time in the world. Baal Keres, once she learned of her Seal, desired nothing more than her freedom. The goal was only to scratch out the Seal, to ruin the magic it held. Neither of them counted on the stone being hollow, and a streak of blue and yellow being discovered beneath. The viscet had always been depicted as a solid blue, and so the yellow streaks came as a shock to Ava once she realized what had happened. Baal Keres is there. Truly in there. She needed to take no further action, though. Once the cool spring air hit the freshly exposed tufts of feathers on the back of Keres, the deity shifted.
Cracks spread across the stone, and it was only a moment before she was standing in the hollow remains of her stone prison. The mage, in all of his knowledge, had created a body for Keres of stone, and kept her trapped in her sarcophagus. Until now, that is. The Ancient stretched, turning narrowed green and gold eyes onto her follower.
“It is… time… for revenge. Do you… not agree?”
