The Godgame (The Godgame, Book 1) (22 page)

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An award-winning writer of fantastic and disturbing fiction, Keith Deininger currently resides in the American Southwest with his wife, baby daughter Violet, and four dogs. He is the author of the following titles in order of publication:

Fevered Hills
(novella)

The New Flesh
(novel)

Marrow’s Pit
(novella)

Shadow Animals
(novella)

Ghosts of Eden
(novel)

The Hallow
(novella)

Within
(novel)

Buried Soldiers
(novella)

Marrow’s Legacy
(novella)

The Godgame
(novel)

The Blood of Talos
(novel)

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My deepest appreciation to my beta readers Shelley Milligan and Kimberly Yerina who have been advocates of my work from the very beginning; to Kari Sanders for her support, enthusiasm, and editing prowess; to John Sumrow for his excellent art direction and cover design; and, of course, to my incredible wife Amber, who believes in me more than I believe in myself.

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THE GODGAME: BOOK TWO

THE BLOOD OF TALO
S

~ ONE ~

CITY OF TALOS

ELI

Although wondrous to behold—a menagerie, such colors and sounds, the cometlight unlike anything he’d ever experienced—the City of Talos did not, despite the shouted promises of its vendors, prove hospitable to someone such as Eli, stumbling and starving, without knowledge of its cultures and customs.

He had, on that first day, taken his knees on a small hill covered in soft plant growth leading up to the City’s walls, and thanked the Machine for delivering him safely. A vast new world, like a sudden breach in reality, had opened up before him. He turned over and lay on his back, completely enthralled by the comet scorching the sky above. He stared at, but it hurt his eyes—black spots dancing before his vision—and found he couldn’t look at it directly. He basked in its light and in its warmth, having never before experienced such a sensation. Where he came from, the Maelstrom rained and stormed and the clouds were ceaseless, the land made of bleak and lifeless rocks, with only the confines of the Machine for protection.

For a moment, he forgot the grief and fear he now wore like an old coat. He slept.

He woke in pain, his skin sore and burning. He looked at the exposed skin on his arms and it was a deep red color. It itched, but it hurt when his touched it. He smiled, despite himself, despite how much it hurt to stretch the skin on his face, realizing the cometlight had marked him. The comet was glorious and powerful, like the Machine, and its rays had scorched him.

He lifted himself and looked around, and terror gripped his heart. Sudden vertigo overtook him and he nearly lost his footing.
It’s okay
, he told himself.
You’re fine. You’re not going to float away
. But it felt as if he might in all this open space. In his wonderment from the day before, his fear of open spaces had seemed remote, but now, upon waking, he felt stranded in the openness, as if it were water and he was drowning. He forced himself to take a deep, hitching, breath. He was accustomed to the safely enclosed confines of the Machine. He blinked and slowly regained control of himself.

He could see people walking along a black road that led to the City. A vehicle came through the gate and sped down the road. He hoisted the strap on his bag up over his shoulder and walked.

On shaky legs, he descended the hill, relishing its beauty despite himself, carpeted with green life, speckled with dashes of color. He blinked and tried to keep his gaze on the ground where he was walking.

When he came to the road, a wide, flattened strip made from a hard, black substance that smelled a little like the melting vats in the Machine, he turned toward the City and quickened his pace.

He began to feel better, excited even. He could feel the City, his destination and his purpose. The closer he got to the City, the more comfortable he felt.

He waved to the first people he came upon, a man and a woman riding a pair of strange animals. “Hello! Excuse me. Do you know where I can find Marrow?”

The man and the woman looked at him, but neither smiled. They shared a glance and then kicked their mounts into motion and were gone.

The next thing to come by was something with which Eli was a little more familiar. The motorized buggy swerved to avoid him, despite his shouts and frantic movements, and left him standing in an acrid cloud.

He shrugged and continued.

When he came upon a man driving a wheeled cart down the road, pulled by a ponderous, muscular animal, he tried again.

“Excuse me?”

The man nodded. “Good day.”

“Do you know where I can find Marrow?”

The man pulled on the reins, bringing the animal and his cart to a stop. The man looked at him suspiciously. “Now, why would you be asking someone like me about that?”

Eli shrugged. “I’m asking everyone.”

“You’re not from around here, are you?”

Eli shook his head. “I’m from the Machine.”

The man’s eyes narrowed. “Don’t know nothing about that.”

“Do you know about Marrow?”

“Heard of him.”

“What’s he like?”

The man shrugged. “He’s no good, I’d say. They say he travels the world helping people, but I’ve never heard of him actually doing anything. Stay away from him. If you need help, go to Galen.”

“Galen?”

“Oh, yeah,” the man said. “The prophet. He speaks the word of Awa.”

“Awa?”

For a moment, the man looked startled, staring at Eli with a mix of disbelief and suspicion. Then something else came to his eyes—fear. He whipped the reins on his cart and the animal began to move again. His head turned, his eyes never leaving Eli as the cart moved, as if he were afraid to look away, in case Eli meant to attack him.

“What’s this place called?” Eli called after the man.

He watched the man and then the cart—stacked high with canisters of some sort—leave him, until he was, once again, alone on the road.

~

It wasn’t until later that night, as he huddled in a dark alley, cold and hungry, that his grief and his fear came back to him. Before that, he was so in awe of the City—so completely enthralled by its spectacle—it was easy to forget the terrible events that had led him on this journey.

He approached the gate, still grinning, wondering if there would be guards or authority figures of some sort asking questions, but the large gates were raised and open. He simply walked and then he was in the City.

The road was wide and filled with people, but Eli ignored them for the moment, deciding it was best if he found someone of authority with whom he could ask his questions rather than random people on the streets. When he looked up, the City was like a spiraling mountain of structures, going up and around and up. He stopped for a moment, staring, feeling overwhelmed, but happy to once again be surrounded by structures, although the dense crowds of people made him uncomfortable. He imagined Marrow as a sort of benevolent ruler, somewhere in the upper-stories of one of these towers, looking down at his people and smiling.

The people, he noticed, were all rather sallow, too thin, their faces sunken and sick-looking, pallors almost greenish. Most of them were taller than him, giving him quick, disinterested glances as they passed around him.

Strange structures crowded either side of the road, with thatched roofs of organic material woven into domes. Trees grew among them, with drooping branches forming trembling overhangs, their canopies providing shade against the cometlight.

He walked, moving deeper into the City.

The crowds did not disperse, but the people changed. Gone were the sallow-faces, replaced by heartier shades—men with beards and women with sly smiles; rich, plum-colored hair; worn leathers stamped with sigils of all shapes and sizes (some, no doubt, of rank and station; others merely whimsical); hats of various colors and clothing made from the fluffy coats of animals; a grand diversity of people, swirling around him, his head spinning and his breath shallow.

Eli glanced from face to face. Everyone seemed to be talking at once. He’d thought he might stand out, but no one gave him more than a passing glance.

A woman bumped into him and he reeled, but she continued on her way without slowing.

He somehow had wandered into a market of sorts. Everywhere people shouted in his direction, flinging odd clothing and skewers of meat in his face. Vegetables and fruits were laid out in astonishing abundance. One man juggled green, fist-sized growths of some sort. Eli’s eyes were drawn to an intricate cart housing an array of small animals like a hive, things with fur and things with claws—a tiny, almost-human face peering from between bars—and a cacophony of chirps, colorful creatures with wings and…
feathers
. His mind snatched at the word, desperate to understand.
Feathers
. The creatures were known as birds. He’d seen pictures of them in books. He could remember only vague terms, but the title of the book was clear to him:
Extinct Species: an Overview
.

When he’d gotten on the trolley—the one that had sped him across the ocean, across the landscape, leaving the barren rock upon which sat the Machine and his home behind—it had been as if he’d travelled suddenly through some kind of gateway and into a world that surely could not be his own.

His eyes felt dry and itchy from staring, bulging in their sockets. His gaze flitted about, unable to focus on any one thing for very long before being drawn to the next amazing sight. A naked woman was sitting on a raised platform, her skin being painted by several men, who crouched about her as she smiled, enjoying herself. A puppet show was being performed for a small gathering of kids and their parents, squealing and clapping when one puppet stabbed the other and crimson ribbons burst forth. A shirtless and emaciated man whistled while he pulled a cart piled high with dead bodies. “Prison tours!” a woman in a flowing dress of black and gold called out to the crowd. “Witness the condemned!” Several people walked by wearing very tall black hats. He saw animals, a large beast with skin so glossy it looked wet; birds with large, orange beaks gobbling scraps off the ground, tearing at crinkled wrappers and unidentifiable chunks of flesh that stretched and snapped like rubber. A woman squatted over a brass pot, holding her hiked-up skirt with her hands, defecating, while a man looked on, “Are you sure this is going to work?”

A man and a woman held hands as they walked through the crowd, the man holding a device Eli had seen in the Machine: a camera. The man pointed the camera at various things and pushed the button on top. The device captured images, later to be developed into pictures on paper, like those in books. When a short man babbling in some sort of strange language ran up to the couple, lifted up the woman’s skirt, tongue wagging, and thrust his face into her crotch, the woman threw her head back and laughed while the man stood back snapping pictures of the event as fast as he could.

“We are all excrement!” an odd-looking priest said before a gathering congregation. “Only Awa can make us more!” People clapped and moaned.

“Awan or Awae?” one man asked the priest.

“Awan, of course,” the priest answered.

“Damn right.”

Creatures eviscerated, stretched and dried into grotesque banners hung from poles above the heads of the people. Someone pulled a grub from the back of his neck, shrugged, and then popped it into his mouth. Four individuals carried a platform upon their shoulders, a model depicting a battle scene complete with hills and ruined castles. As Eli watched, tiny animals of some sort dressed in opposing uniforms of crimson versus gray, fought each other lazily, using claws to tear open the scaled bellies, tongues flicking in and out of their mouths, greenish blood soaking into the scenery.

“Galens for sale!” a man called out. “Get your Galens here!”

Eli stopped before the man, who held identical figurine of a man with flowing blonde hair in each of his hands, a metal bucket filled with more of them at his feet.

“How about your very own Galen, sir?” the man asked him. “Special price. Only two knots.”

Eli stared at the man, at the dirty smudges on the man’s face. “Galen?” he asked, thinking of what the man outside of the City with the cart full of canisters had said to him. “Where can I find the real Galen?”

The man frowned, and then pointed one of his figurines at a large building across the street.

“Uh, thanks,” Eli said, but the man was already brandishing his wares at the next person.

Eli turned and gazed at the temple. He’d been so focused on the people he hadn’t noticed the structures towering to either side of the street. The temple was made from large stones; tall spires pointed into the bright and clear sky. Huge double doors at the top of circling steps were open wide.

As he crossed the street, threading his way through the throngs of people, Eli noticed the elongated shadows, the air beginning to darken. He began to ascend the steps, stopped about halfway up and turned to look out at the market.

He’d reached a park of some sort, an open square. At its center was a huge statue he recognized as Galen—a handsome man—smiling down at his people. On the pedestal beneath, there was a flat, black square, several feet high, which he recognized. There was an entire warehouse of similar objects in one of the subterranean sectors of the Machine, similarly blank, but he knew its purpose. David the Enlightened described it in the LibroMachina, a picture screen, used to project moving images.

I wonder if this one works
, Eli thought to himself, staring at it with awe.

After a minute of two, he turned back to the cathedral and climbed the steps.

~

Within, it took his eyes a moment to adjust to the dimness. The ceiling above was several stories high. Great columns of polished stone towered to either side of him. Other than the light that cascaded through the colorful glass windows, the pathway was lit by torches of flickering flame.