Lovis
I am made of
Memories
Whose was it? The idea to build the temple on the peak. 'To be closer to the gods', some might say. Did it not make more sense for a god to descend to a mortal?
As if punishing him for his sacrilegious thoughts the worn path crumbled beneath him. It cast the ungrateful man from its ever guiding hand.
He caught himself before the cliff took him. Should it have claimed Lovis his pulse would have returned. None that claimed his life kept it for long. Always it returned. However, to pain he was not immune and for its searing touch he was not a glutton. The rock that had bit into his skin tumbled down and out of sight. It was no more than a small shout by the time it reached an abrupt end to its fall.
Blood trailed down his foreleg; he imagined that it traced the path to the peak into his skin. For the gods mortal hands made temples. They made monuments. Mortal bodies sweat, bled, and broke themselves to gain the favor of the gods; and what a fickle due their favor was. Grimly Lovis pressed on.
Favor of the gods? A thing to scoff at. What was it truly to have a god's favor? Some would imply that Lovis was beloved by the gods. Lovis would make known that they were fools for thinking so. He was merely of use. Gods shape and twist mortal souls to their will.
Lovis had been reformed to Orien's want. A guard for the god's beloved land. Always Lovis had questioned why it was he who had been chosen, however it could be as simple as that Oriens had seen the devotion Lovis had for Delumine.
He would bleed himself dry to water her grasses. He would cast his body to the dirt to fertilize her soils. Over and over he would give whatever she asked of him. Never could she ask too much. The soul of his homeland, that was what Lovis found to be worthy of worship.
The first time that he had been pried from death had been a hard thing. His first sensation had been that of the sun caressing him. Her touch had woke him. What had followed was the stench her touch had wrought from the corpses of his friends. Those who had come to gather the bodies to deliver them to grieving families for burial called Lovis' awakening a miracle. A blessing from the gods. They had sobbed at the gift of being able to take a body still with pulse home.
Lovis had taken that joy from them. Without word he had turned his back to their marveling and he had tried to deliver himself back to the eager clutches of death.
Lovis had walked into the forest with no intent of stepping back out. He had not bothered to eat. He only drank whenever the rains pooled on his cracked lips.
In the forest Lovis watched the eggs of a mother robin hatch. He watched life begin anew. In the forest Lovis watched a father robin drop wriggling insects into the mouths of fledgling. In the forest Lovis watched life and death feud over what each would take as theirs. In the forest he had wished that life would soften her bruising grip on his shoulder.
Only whenever his breath wheezed from his chest and his body grew cold did he cry. Only then did he stumble back home. In the care of his family he had died the second time. But a god's command is not to be dismissed, not even by death itself. Life clutched Lovis to her breast again. And again. And again.
Lost in remembrance Lovis reached the peak. He saw the woman but did not acknowledge her. He saw her through a veil cast by memories. For him the present had grown dim and far.
He moved quietly past her to stand before Oriens. Lovis did not bow. He did not snivel. His eyes glinted almost accusingly at the carving. Had the one who had carved the visage ever even stood before the gods that they carved?
Tired of gazing into the statue's stony eye Lovis cast his own down. He watched an ant try to get around his hoof. He heard the woman's words. First faint and then once the spell of reminiscence had passed he heard her clear. Silence existed between them for long before he spoke out loud.
"To that creature," Lovis shuffled back to allow passing of the ant, "I am a god." He looked at her, "As are you." A quiet voice in him begged for him to quit talking. Begged for him to just leave her to her worship. The words that she had spoken had not been for his ears. He was the intruder. It was he that stepped out of line.
That quiet voice of reason did not have soft hands; no, it yanked on Lovis' chains. Its quiet demeanor was shed and it roared in his ears once it realized he did not intend to heed its warnings. If the woman were to speak he wondered if he would be able to hear her still over the roaring of his inner voice.
"It would probably be a surprise to that ant to learn that it has not experienced the mercy of a god." His smile was morose, "Perhaps it will build a statue of our visage." He sighed and warily eyed the statues that stared back at him.
On Oriens he lingered. To Oriens he stepped closer to. He pressed his own face into the statue of his patron god. There was no warmth. Lovis had shrunk from a man to a distraught child, seeking comfort from a distant parent.
Hair mussed, with Oriens still holding him on his feet, Lovis looked at the woman mournfully, "May you excuse my ramblings." He hesitated, "May you excuse what I say," he ached, "Never cast aside the knowledge that you have. Never forget that the gods, those of this land and any other, they are not infallible." Sometimes they too are wrong. Sometimes they burden mortal hearts with the weight of godly desires and under that sort of pressure a mortal heart would always break.
