The 7th of Elembiuos, the Revelry, long have I waited for this day. Many would have complained about the remote post I have been assigned, a squalid little mountain village called Maledor, but it does have one advantage, it borders the Balseraph empire.
The Revelry is celebrated in all cultures. Lanun ships moor themselves together into large floating islands where the wine and rum flow freely, the Hippus hold races and the Bannor are said to be able to come to their post up to 15 minutes late. But none of the festivals compare to the Balseraphs.
The Balseraphs celebration lasts several days and foreigners often slip over into Balseraph cities to enjoy it. Disputes and wars are forgotten, most countries make it illegal to go, and most religions call it immoral. So foreigners have taken to wearing masks and elaborate costumes to keep from being recognized by fellow citizens and members of their local parish. Most importantly it keeps them from being recognized when they partake in the debauchery that they intended only to witness, but after an evening of vapors and vinum they are no doubt enjoying at a more personal level.
In an hour I have seen more than in a lifetime watching village travelers. Goblins, elves, a hulking golem thundered by with a dwarf riding in a basket on its back. A jester with a puppet on his head followed the golem in mock pursuit. Actors on a stage with a black background enacted a tale where Esus was played by a man with half of his body in white, and half in black. When he turned to the right he was clearly visible in all his actions, but when he turned to the left he was invisible against the black of the stage. Various other actors played the roles of gods and men and were routinely outwitted by the disappearing god.[PARAGRAPH:1]If I was a wise man I would have stopped there, but behind the safety of my porcelain mask I dropped a few coins into the hands of a pigeon faced Imp and entered a tent draped in black and reds.
Inside so many locusts hung on the canvas walls that little of the material could be seen. They buzzed and pushed against each other, filling the room with an odd clicking that made my skin crawl. Shorts chains hung from the ceiling like wind chimes, and they swayed and pulled to some unfelt breeze, often in opposite directions.
The floor of the room was clear but for a straw mat, a small table and a withered man in drab brown robes.
"Kneel" he said motioning toward the straw mat.
"The sign promised prophetic visions, is that possible?" I knelt on the mat as I spoke, more nervous that I had wasted my money than that any harm would come to me. After seeing a small demon serving as doorman and making change a tent full of obedient bugs and disobedient chains wasn't that impressive.
"Prophecy is easy, I would have only to show you leaving this tent, eating another meal or going to sleep in a bed to fulfill that obligation. There is a prophet on every corner, believing they serve some useful purpose by warning us of one overblown apocalypse or another. Death, plague, famine, war, these have always been, will always be, it takes no art to predict that."
He picked up a thin gold needle from the table an inserted a tiny candle in its tapered end. He then felt along the base of my skull and down along my neck until he found the spot he wanted and inserted the needle deep into my skin.[PARAGRAPH:1]He continued to talk as he worked.
"You will learn your future, you will see that which is and that which will be. You will leave here a new man."
After inserting dozens of these golden needles he began to light the tiny candles within them. Slowly the wax melted, flowed down the hollow shaft and into my blood. I stared at the locusts shifting back and forth on the walls, listened to the chains hitting against each other above me but these senses drifted farther and farther away. I felt the weight of my body drop from me and I floated there in the tent in the haze of euphoria.
Looking around the tent I noticed other people were here too. Strange grey people who were hooked to the chains that hung from the ceiling. A young woman writhed and pulled against her chain, stretching out from it before being pulled back. But most of the others, and there were dozens of others, simply floated around the tent staring at me with a look of sadness and concern.
Such was the power of my euphoria that even the vision of these ghostly watchers didn't bother me. But when I looked down I saw my own body beneath me. Needles poked out of a dozen locations and continued to burn. The withered man moved around my body, making sure it remained kneeling and at rest. Then he looked up at where I floated above my body, looked into my drowsy eyes.
This was the first moment I realized something was wrong. I tried to float back down to my body, flailing in the air but I didn't move. The withered man looked annoyed by my thrashing. He reached for an unused chain and then grabbed me out of the air and hooked me on it. My weightlessness was gone, instead the chain was my new world and all of my weight seemed to fall upon it.
Held by the chain I could only watch as the withered man walked over to the wall and plucked one of the locusts off of it. Then he walked back to my kneeling body in the center of the room, opened my mouth and allowed the locust to crawl into it. I could vaguely feel the tiny scratches of locust feet on my tongue, the creature's hard shell pushing against the back of my mouth and down my throat, and then sudden and intense pain.
I screamed, and in that moment the world was destroyed. Every person, place and object I had ever seen or imagined was gone and for a brief second I was alone in a world of perfect emptiness. Then everything was remade, piece by clumsy piece they came back together until creation was restored and I was back floating on the chain at the top of the tent.
Beneath me my body stood talking to the withered man, but the expression on my face was not my own. It was a dark look without compassion. I could do nothing but watch as this new version of me picked up my porcelain mask, covered my face and left the tent.
is not affected by roads, so the Techs to enable cheaper road travel will not play into it.
