The Carried God

The Wise God’s left arm snapped loose in the Fourth priest’s hands with an audible crack. He nearly dropped the heavy limb. “You fool!” sputtered the venerable First priest, pushing the Fourth aside and trying to reattach the arm, only to discover that the joining peg had snapped off in the socket.

“The glue!” urged the Third, as a blast of horns sounded from outside.

“No time!” barked the Second. “The twine! Quick!”

The Third and Fourth priests ran to their packs, stacked in one corner of the high-ceilinged hall, and tore into them. The Fourth pulled out a thick ball of twine.

“Hurry!” wheezed the First as the Fourth rushed back with his prize.

They worked quickly, the First and Third holding the god’s arm tightly in place while the Second bound limb to torso. The Fourth muttered an apologetic prayer to the god as he watched, kneading the slim silver pendant he wore around his neck.

The god itself bore this indignity with patience, sitting cross-legged on its bier, scribe’s tablet cradled in its lap and golden stylus ready in its right hand.

The arm was soon secured with several yards of criss-crossed twine. The Fourth carefully spread the god’s gold-fringed shawl over its shoulders. They all stepped back to consider the makeshift repair. The Wise God gazed back at them serenely with its unblinking opal eyes.

“It must do,” said the First.

The horns sounded again. It was time for the Raising.

#

Heads high, resplendent in sky-blue robes, the priests carried the Wise God into the Great Court. The crowd surged forward with outstretched hands, hoping to touch holiness, but a cordon of guards in gilded armor held them back. The priests bore the god across the plaza towards the High Place, a great three-tiered pyramid blazing white under the noon sun.

As they neared the pyramid’s base, a robed herald stepped to the edge of the first tier, fifty feet above the court. “Devoted people!” he called out. “A god comes to prove itself! Hail the Wise God, Basaba the Knowing!”

“Basaba!” roared the crowd, as the Fourth gazed up at the immense pyramid. Two flights of steps ascended side by side to the first tier. From there two more flights, narrower and steeper, rose to the second tier a full hundred feet above the court. A final single stair climbed at a dizzying angle to the summit.

The priests lowered their god onto a waiting marble plinth. Then the horns blared again and they turned to watch their rival god enter the court.

The crowd parted for a towering bird-headed figure with a cruel curved beak, bulging eyes, and four outstretched arms, feathered and claw-tipped. The four priests carrying its bier were nearly naked, their bodies slathered with red and black paint and feathers pasted to their arms and shoulders.

“Devoted people!” cried the herald. “Another god comes to prove itself! Hail the Fierce God, Pamash the Taloned!” The people responded with a tepid cheer as the rival god made its way across the court. Pamash was not so well loved. When they reached the pyramid its priests set the Fierce God down at the base of the right-hand stair, just twenty feet from the Wise God.

The Fourth eyed the other team critically. They were younger and stronger than the Wise God’s priests. Their left-rear bearer, a youth with a wild shock of red hair, caught the Fourth’s eye and touched his hand to ears and mouth and heart in the ancient benediction, smiling uncertainly. The Fourth returned the gesture out of long habit, his face naturally easing into a smile until he caught himself. This was his god’s enemy.

Drums thundered. Everyone looked up as half a dozen robed attendants stepped to the edge of the pyramid’s second tier, flanking a man crowned with a platinum headdress that shone like a second sun. The High King himself. The crowd fell silent and bowed their heads in reverence.

“Honored people!” the High King called out in a voice like silken thunder. “Cherished guests! Today we witness the Raising of the Gods. Today we honor the god who will shepherd us through the seasons to come!” He raised his arms heavenward as the people erupted in cheers.

The priests lifted the Wise God in smooth unison and advanced to the base of the left-hand stairway. To their right their opponents did the same with the Fierce God. Both teams tensed, prepared for the arduous ascent.

The High King dropped his arms. Horns bellowed from above, and the priests began to climb.

#

“Left! Right! Left! Right!” The Wise God’s priests fell into a steady rhythm as the First called out their steps. In front the First and Second held their carrying poles at chest height, while behind them the Third and Fourth had to hold theirs at shoulder height to keep the god level as they climbed.

But their rivals rushed ahead of them, muscular legs propelling them upwards as their feathered leader shouted a brisk pace in their strange marshland dialect — “Tihu! Tahu! Tahi! Tuhi!”

“Faster!” hissed the Second. The First ignored him, sticking to the pace they had practiced during their drills. But this was no drill, and they were already losing.

The Fourth pushed these thoughts away and matched his stride to the count . . . rising, planting, pushing off. Then a cheer from the crowd broke his concentration. Looking up he saw that the Fierce God had already reached the pyramid’s first tier and its priests were hoisting it above their heads in the required salute. The High King, who now stood atop the pyramid’s very summit, raised his arms in recognition.

“Faster!” repeated the Second, and the First finally increased the tempo — “Left! Right! Left!” — pushing the team upward with renewed effort. A half-dozen more steps and they reached the broad first tier.

“Stop!” cried the First. The priests shifted their grips. “Up!” With difficulty they lifted the Wise God and held it above their heads, arms trembling, until the High King raised his own arms in response.

“Down!” They lowered the god and shifted their grips in preparation for the next ascent. The First renewed the count — “Right . . . Left . . .” — and they began climbing the leftmost of the two stairs that rose to the pyramid’s second tier. This stair was steeper, its steps higher, forcing the Third and Fourth to keep their poles above their heads to keep the god level.

Glancing up, the Fourth was surprised to see that their opponents weren’t far above them. The Fierce God’s feathered arms were tottering back and forth as its priests tried to coordinate their steps on the precipitous incline.

The First must have seen this too. He quickened their pace — “Left! Right! Left!” They pushed themselves upwards, relentless, gaining on their rivals. The Fourth’s arms and shoulders trembled and burned, but he fixed his eyes on the Second’s broad feet in front of him . . . rising . . . planting . . . pushing off . . . putting everything else out of his mind.

He barely noticed as they passed their opponents. Ascending like a divine machine, eight feet moving in practiced unison, they crested the second tier. “Stop!” Ahead loomed the final single flight of steps, just wide enough for the two gods to climb side-by-side.

“Up . . .” wheezed the First, and they raised their god in salute — or at least three of them did. But the First himself lagged, straining to lift his pole until his legs gave out and he crumpled to his knees. The Wise God tipped. The Fourth yanked on his own pole to steady it. Pain flared from his shoulder and sent sparks into his eyes. He clenched his jaw. He would not be the one to fail their god.

Bit by bit the First regained his footing and lifted his pole. Slowly — too slowly! — the agonizing pain in the Fourth’s shoulder ebbed as the Wise God rose unsteadily. The High King returned the salute as horns sounded and the crowd roared with excitement.

“Down!” cried the Second, taking on the role of caller. “Left! Right!” They started up the final, steepest, stair. The Fourth tried not to notice as another cheer marked the Fierce God’s arrival on the second tier. Head down, feet moving, shoulder burning.

But they hadn’t climbed more than ten steps before the sun blinked out. The Fourth looked up and saw the Fierce God blocking the sky, one eye glaring down at him. Feathers scraped against his arm as their front-left bearer elbowed his way past, panting his team’s paces — “Tihu! Tahu!”

The Second glanced back in alarm. “Rightward!” he shouted, steering the Wise God to cut off its rival. The others followed his lead — this, too, they had practiced — and they collided with their opponents.

“Push!” screamed the Second. The two teams shoved against each other, shoulder-to-shoulder and hip-to-hip, struggling to carry their gods up the last few steps. The Fourth drove his shoulder into the opposing rear-left bearer, his red-headed rival. Their feet tangled and the Fourth nearly lost his footing — but slipping now meant failure for his god.

Almost without thinking he kicked out at the other man’s ankle. The joint crunched. His rival screamed and faltered and the Fierce God swayed wildly as its priests scrambled to keep it upright.

But the Wise God surged upwards and past them — one step, two steps, and then the summit itself, where the High King waited with outstretched arms.

#

In a daze the four exhausted priests lowered the Wise God onto the waiting plinth. The Fourth felt almost weightless. Attendants in scented robes pressed around them and carefully arranged them in a line along the summit’s edge, presenting them to the city.

On the tier below the Fierce God lay on its side, two of its wing-arms broken under its body. Its priests were being driven down the pyramid by guards with whips. The red-headed youth looked up and caught the Fourth’s eyes, his face frozen with terror.

It was unfortunate, to be sure, but only one god could be Raised.

The High King stepped before the Fourth and leaned in to kiss his brow. “The gods deem thee worthy,” he said. Tongue-tied and heart full, the Fourth could only smile. The king moved on to bless the other victors. A ritual-priest stepped forward, chanting under his breath, and daubed the Fourth’s forehead with sweet-smelling ointment. Then he too moved down the line.

The Fourth gazed in wonder at the tens of thousands who filled the Great Court below and crowded the surrounding buildings — people packed onto every roof, gazing from every window, and all of them shouting his god’s name.

They had triumphed. The Wise God would take its place in the Highest Heaven, and they would be the most revered of its servants.

The High King, his blessings complete, strode to the summit’s edge and faced the jubilant city. “Hail Basaba!” he bellowed. The roar of the crowd rolled up from below like a holy wind, pushing the Fourth back into the arms of the two ritual-priests who stood behind him. Gently but firmly they grasped him by elbow and wrist.

The cord was wrapped around his throat by sure, quick hands. He would soon be at the Wise God’s side. A soothing voice whispered in his ear — “Serve your god well . . .” Twist by twist the cord tightened. His vision blurred as the crowd’s chant — “Basaba! Basaba!” — drowned out all else.

BIO: J.R. Cameron is a corporate worker bee metamorphosing into a writer of weird(ish) fiction, currently based in Charleston SC.

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