Cursed

Once I served the Emperor. Once, when I was whole, when I was worthy. Once, before I was cursed.

It was the day before I was to lose everything, though I was unaware of any impeding danger. The breeze brought the cool scent of salt from the ocean to mingle with the sweetness of the sliced pineapple and freshkin lying on the table. The Emperor of the Verdant Lands, Sultan of the Rael Ocean, a handsome, ebony-skinned man of about twenty-eight, dropped his ceremonial turban and scepter on the floor, flopped down on his cushioned divan, sighed, threw his head back and blew a raspberry.

“Quite so, your Majesty.” I murmured from the doorway, where I stood. “Shall I inscribe it on the doorways and lintels of the palaces so everyone might know your wise utterance?”

He sighed and ignored my comment. “You know, Amin, we wouldn’t have to go through all this round and round and round stuff with the priests if they actually believed I was god of the sun. I’d just toast them and when they were nicely crisped, I’d replace them with people too scared to disagree with me…Probably we wouldn’t have to go through all this round and round and round stuff if I believed I was god of the sun, either.”

He popped upright again, already moving past the exhaustion of four hours’ bureaucratic wrangling, reaching for a freshkin as he spoke. “If I don’t get the Temple of Wheat to reduce the sacrifices, the next poor harvest there is, the storehouses will be empty and we’ll have riots on our hands. People will riot against them, which is obviously not good for them, let alone me as the head of the religion! But because it's tradition—that’s who’s really king around here. I’m completely a slave to it. Look at the turban, the scepter—” he waved a hand at the discarded implements of his office, “They’re my great-great-great grandfather’s! I can’t even choose the clothes I wear, let alone reduce the temple sacrifices to prevent starvation!”

“But my Lord, you are the supreme sun god. You could just shine brighter, you know, change the weather, that type of thing.”

He sniffed. “And gods know I’ll never imagine myself a real deity with a sarcastic tongue like yours around.” He waved at me. “Put that spear down and pick up a pineapple already. You’re making my feet hurt standing at attention like that.”

“Let me check on that the door guards are in place first.” I said, dropping my bantering tone. Emperor Eliad was too lax about his personal safety in my opinion, and I didn’t hesitate to remind him of it. He made a face at me as I went out, where I found my men properly positioned, and the queen, waiting for admittance.

“Amin,” she said, smiling up at me and extending a small, olive-skinned hand. Where Eliad gushed forth words and enthusiasm, Queen Shillan shone with quiet, subdued beauty. I escorted her inside, and Eliad welcomed her with a brief kiss. She settled onto the divan beside him and he covered her hand with his own. “Now, Amin,” He said, with a grin. “Let’s get back to that game we were playing before the needs of the state interrupted us.”

I left at the changing of the guard. Shillan had fallen asleep an hour before, leaving Eliad and I to bicker over the state of our game. Eliad was a terrible loser, but I had him fairly well beaten by the end. I took my own shift watching at the door in the early morning hours; a time I reserved for myself because in my experience that was the time men fell asleep. Not that I’d think any of the men I hand picked for the Emperor’s personal guard to be likely to fall asleep. I hadn’t been there a full hour before there was a yell of fright from inside.

I slammed through the door, sword drawn, to find only Eliad, drenched in sweat, staggering out of the bedclothes and hyperventilating.

“What happened?!” I shouted, scanning the room.

“Amin,” he said, grabbing me by the collar. “Amin, I have seen a prophecy. A terrible prophecy! You must go to the temple of Sis and speak to the high priest at once to help me interpret this dream!”

I looked around. In the light of the torch Gael had brought in with us, I saw only the normal furnishings of the king’s room, flickering in the shadows. Shillan had gone to her own room. Gael had already begun methodically searching the corners and finding nothing.

“I—well, Eliad, are you sure?”

I should not have said it; it was dishonorable of me. It is only that Sis is the snake goddess and I hate snakes. Additionally my family has always supported Rael, goddess of the sea, and sworn enemy of Sis. And…I could see no threat. He had a bad dream.

He bared his teeth and drew himself up, as if he were wearing all his regal robes instead of a nightshirt, and it was the Emperor, not my friend Eliad who bellowed at me, “Do as I command!”

I bowed and said, “At once my lord.”

The air in the temple was thick with the smell of blood and spices. The polished granite stones that made up the floor stretched out past the colonnades into darkness and the silence was as heavy as the smell.

I halted, staring up into the endless reaches of the above me, looking for movement.

There is always a fire lit for Sis. Always. And there are always priests in the temple of Sis; sliding down from the great columns on ropes, imitating their loathsome snake god. But tonight—nothing.

“Priest of Sis! The Emperor has need of you!”

There was no answer.

And then, in the far recesses of the temple, a glow. Not the glow of firelight, but something bigger, something increasing in size, rushing towards me, filling the entire temple with an awful blaze of light. Even though my senses were overpowered and I was blinded, I knew there was a Presence in the room with me, scorching me with its brightness. I fell down, crushed with shame. I felt all my powerlessness, all my finite smallness and I could not bear to stand before the god.

I cried out in agony. “Oh great Sis!” I cried, “Be merciful!”

“I am not Sis.” It said, and its voice made my bones vibrate. “But I am the one who gave the dream to your Emperor. In one year there will be a great disaster. It will leave your country crippled and open to attack by your worst enemies. Eliad will lose his throne to the men of the North.”

“Great Lord,” I said, my face pressed into the stones, “Give me the chance to defend my country. Protect us from this disaster! I will do anything for my people and my king!”

There was a long silence. I was afraid to speak again, not understanding the silence as anger or deliberation. And then, finally, it spoke. “A gift I give to you, that you might change the fate of your friend.”

I have been in many battles and suffered many injuries but I have never felt that pain that tore into me then and never again have.

It tore me apart, wrung me to my soul, and yet—yet—still even in my agony I thought that surely the god was preparing me, perhaps changing me into something like the immortals, winged, victorious, a champion for my people.

Then the pain ended and the god was gone, and I was lying in a pool of my own blood, my left leg leaden and unmoving underneath me, my right arm, my sword arm—gone.