#Constata Onare

[sunset-campaign]

Constata and the Body

Constata Onare let Neron’s Fang clatter to the ground. As she collapsed, the shocked mass of onlookers—come to see her Santed, for Primus’ sake—first stared in disbelief, then recoiled in horror.

She had come to the horrible conclusion slowly over the last decade. At first, like everyone, she held faith. He was smarter than she would ever be. He could see more. He was the Lord God.

Who was she? A nobody he had lifted to the highest heights.

Then she returned from the Holy War, her faith shaken as the mad Krayer attempted to convince her to “right a cosmic injustice,” pleaded with her to leave him to serve his mad old gods and, finally, begged her to spare his life.

The scene still haunted her months later, when she delivered her report to the Lord God.

Surely he had seen everything. The report was just a formality—a test to see what she might omit, perhaps. She had reported, as always, completely and factually.

“It must have felt good,” the Lord God mused, “to put down such a heretic and traitor. Truly, you are deserving of the honors to be bestowed upon you.”

She had thanked him, praised his name perfunctorily, and left when he indicated the audience was over.

The exchange had kept her awake that night. The Lord God couldn’t see her shaken faith, her pity for poor, mad Mikel Czern and his equally mad old gods.

The Lord God hadn’t even seen that Czern would come to serve his old enemies.

If he couldn’t see the hearts of his most favored servants, how could he see those with true evil in their hearts? How could he have a divine plan if he couldn’t even reliably predict what the pieces on his grand Tac-board might do?

She resolved to give her faith one final chance. The test was simple—Primus had trusted her to wield the only weapon that could possibly kill a god, in case Mikel had raised some ancient horror from the Well of Low Gods, and then the Lord God had given her reason after reason to doubt him.

So she would strike during the ceremony. If it had been a test of her faith, he would not die. She already knew Santhood was not for her—not with these thoughts in her head. Her life would be forfeit, but she would die knowing the world truly was in the hands of a just and wise deity.

Now, she crumpled before the body.

Her squire, Arkadi, fairly grinned as he ran to the divine corpse. He laughed as he propped it up and made it wave to the onlooking crowd. She had not expected to break his mind further, the poor fool.

She braced herself. When the crowd tore her apart, she would bend to their justice not for the sake of Primus Solerian, but for a broken stableboy named Arkadi Sidd.