Acantha/WeepSweetOne
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Weep, Sweet One
I originally wrote this short story as a character piece and posted the first draft up for some friends to read. When it somehow managed to impress my friend Ed, who is probably the most creatively weird person I know (as well as capable of playing very cool, somewhat creepy, and dead-on Sidereals), I figured I had something. Then, White Wolf decided to start printing submissions in their eQuarterly. I jumped at that, and send in this revamped version of "Weep, Sweet One." It got selected, and was printed on the last page of their Fall 2006 eQuarterly. My gaming group was so proud of me that they started introducing me as "Our very own published author" during introductions at our RP club meetings.
I'm still not wholly satisfied with the title, but it works. It also gives me a good reason to name Jack of Hearts' starmetal tai chi sword Sweet One.
So, here you go.
Weep, Sweet One
I broke a goddess once.
She was a creature of diaphanous torment and sweet debauchery, the very essence of heartbreak given breath and bone. A runaway from the Celestial Bureau, she had, months before, set herself up in a corner of Great Forks, the city of the gods, and purloined from the surrounding temples a selection of nubile young worshippers that fawned and frolicked with her all hours of the day and night. She eluded capture a thousand different times, and the celestial censors were at a loss when they petitioned the Bureau of Destiny for a hunter to track down and bring to trial this errant goddess. They were surprised when a joint conclave of divisions chose me, a freshly promoted Chosen of the House of Leisure for the job.
I was younger then, but I pride myself in admitting I was no less jaded to the work of my fellows, as I am now. At the advice of my mentors, I crafted a disguise of Essence and star magic, tested it on a few unsuspecting gods in the ranker districts of Heaven, and satisfied I could make even the most hard-hearted creature melt, descended to her temple with a design fully formed in my mind.
She never suspected the disheveled, handsome youth that appeared in her shrine's doorway during an impromptu festival in her honor. I wove my way through her court like a ghost at first, allowing her only glimpses of my face or body through the swirling bodies of her supplicants. The magic caught her before her third glance, and she broke into the crowd to find me; yet, I was always a step ahead of her, never letting her touch more than a lock of my hair or the curve of my back. We danced in circles, round and round and round, and when she came face to face with me, I only smiled before melting back into the hot press of bodies. It was maddening, I’m sure.
Day after day, I waltzed in and out of her temple at my own whim, ignoring her demands to sit beside her, to comb her glowing hair or serve her dark wine and golden peaches. Every petulant defiance made her want me more, and each smile I gave her made her heart ache for me. She once made mortals beg for her aloof caresses; now, I watched as she succumbed to burning lust with just a thought of me and cried out my name in the night as others labored to please her. Soon she could not sleep, but tossed and turned, her dreams filled with the sound of my fading laughter or the faint touch of my hand.
When the time was auspicious, I brought the charade to an appropriate end.
She wandered the halls of her temple regularly now, unable to sleep for fear of fevered dreams she could not stop. There, I came to her like a shadow, leading her down darkened corridors, letting her chase me until she was breathless and yearning. Then, in a quiet courtyard under the stars that foretold her demise, I let her catch me and have me for one achingly brief moment. Her tongue tasted like sour wine made sweet with honey and rot; her undying, eternal devotions to my smooth and youthful flesh rang prosaic in my ears.
When I laughed and laughed and laughed, mirthless and uncaring, and she finally saw what hid beneath my veil of starlit lies, it broke her cold, jade heart in two.
I left her alone and desolate as the sun rose, a shadow once more. She made no attempt to flee when the censors came for her, and her trial was short and to the point. They sentenced her to death for her petty crimes, and her body plummeted from the heavens and fell in a last blaze of hollow beauty to Creation.
As a reward, my superiors at the Bureau gifted me with a fine blade, a sword forged with care and weighted with my own particular hand in mind. The tang is black and blue jade speckled with diamonds; the braid, sapphire thread woven around moonsilver spines. And the blade… the blade itself is the pinnacle of craftsmanship: Starmetal folded a thousand times, formed lovingly into an edge so sharp it could cut the air itself. In the right light, the whole creation shines like silver honey, thick and beautiful. It is, without doubt, one of the finest objects I own, a treasure above all others.
And sometimes, when the evening is quiet and cool, like that night in the courtyard with my fractured, disconsolate goddess, I hear it weeping.
