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In a place long-forgotten, the gods crowded solemnly around a slumbering figure, cloaked in gore and golden ash, and wondered what to do with him.
This had never happened before. The thing that lay beneath them, illuminated by the bare dawn, had been mortal only hours before- but now, he was one of their own. Nobody had known that a mortal could kill a god- that through their consumption, their throne could be usurped- but the proof of it was unconscious below them; a creature of teeth and claws and shining, golden wings. The transformation had been gruelling; there were deep gouges clawed into their face, where they had clawed out their own eyes- the blood was still wet on their new claws, and their shed mortal teeth still glimmered in the new sunlight. And yet, they slept as peacefully as the god they had murdered, newly draped in melam and gold.
None of them dared touch him. In the end, it was the sun that stirred him. The awakening was wordless and solemn; the young god seemed startled to even be alive. Without eyes, he could not see the others as they surrounded him, but he could feel their mournful presence- he could taste their fear, rich and red as sacrificial wine. Everything ached like his body had just been plunged into glowing coals; but he was awake, and he was reborn, and he was feared. As it should’ve been. As he had sought for so long. Something burned through his veins, tightened in his chest- he stretched his new wings and almost smiled, tremulously.
Once, he had been a priest. Now he was a god. But what was the price?
The answer surrounded him- backed away as the new wings fluttered, strange and mothlike and still damp from the blood that had shed during their growth. The jury around him did not budge; simply stared down, mute with shock and rage at his mere existence. Finally, the greatest of them stepped forward; god of knowledge and water and creation, golden horned crown almost as grand as the new god’s wings. Two others- the god of air and storms and earth and the god of that which had no mortal names- pulled the newly born one to his feet and held his arms tightly to prevent his flight. The knowledge god stepped forward and stared silently into the new god’s empty pits, which still bled something wine-dark and speckled with embers and gold. He could not see the older god’s face. He didn’t need to. After all, he could already taste his fear- it burnt at the back of his throat, tasted like ash and fire and dust.
At last, the god of knowledge spoke. Tongues that the young god had never heard before- but he understood them completely.
“Do you know what you have done?”
Lost in the euphoria of it all, ignoring the tearing pains in his new throat and the way that his too-sharp teeth bit into his tongue, the young god smiled as he answered.
“Yes. I have ascended. I am as you are, now; what I was always destined to be. And I will no longer serve you; instead, I shall serve only myself.”
“And who are you?”
“I am Adaru. God of fear.”
And with that, the chamber fell silent again.The young god- Adaru, as he named himself so boldly- barely knew why he had chosen such a title for himself. But it felt… right. Finally, he felt like himself. At first, the god of knowledge stood still- staring at the young one with something between resoluteness and disbelief. Then, with heavy and stilted movements, he gestured for the others to step away and speak with him. The gods that held Adaru tight didn’t budge- and Adaru, too exhausted from his transfiguration, didn’t struggle. He only watched as they whispered and murmured, barely out of hearing range. The moments slipped away like sand- his heart was still pounding, and his new limbs still trembled uneasily as his blood began to dry.
Finally, there was a chorus of mumbles- some sort of agreement had been reached- and the gods began to leave the room. Adaru was dragged with them- back through the winding corridors and obscure angles of the temple, back into the blazing desert sun, and dragged in a direction vaguely westward. The sound of heavy feet against sand was replaced with the crunching of twigs and soil and grass beneath them. The air cooled around him, carrying with it the scent of cedar and the distant sound of birdsong. Finally, he was dropped against something- the base of a large, sturdy tree, which they guided his arm towards and forced him to grasp, rough bark abrasive against fresh and delicate claws.
The deities encircled it, and the god of knowledge spoke again.
“The murder of our kin cannot go unpunished. We cannot trust you to walk among our ranks, but we cannot kill you. Therefore, you will be bound to this tree- and with it, you will be bound to the earth, and to those who dwell upon it. As this tree withers and dies, so shall you; and when the world is barren and lifeless, and no mortal survives, neither shall you. If you are the god of fear, then you shall feast upon mortal fears- and once every mortal being is gone, you shall starve; and you shall never know our heavens, for you are not welcome there. Instead, let the forest be your domain- and let it fester and rot under your reign.”
And with that, the surface beneath his palm began to shudder. Vines squirmed out from the earth beneath him; thorns dug into his tender flesh, roots burying themselves into his arm and across his face. He wailed and tried to pull his arm away, but it was stuck fast; intertwining into his veins, merging bark and flesh in terrible, gruesome matrimony. All the while, the gods watched solemnly- there was no joy in the young god’s sentencing. Only the result of hubris; only the bitterness in losing the dead god. When it ended, Adaru sat slumped and whimpering against the tree, cradling his root-covered arm- and the gods left, leaving him to his agony.
That was the last thing they should’ve done.
Adaru was in pain- he was uncertain and foolish and prideful- but there was a reason he had managed to get this far. He was cunning. And as soon as he was left alone, ideas began to form in his head as tears of agony swelled where eyes should’ve been. There was a knife tied to his side- still stained with the golden ichor of the god he had murdered- and as he stumbled to his feet and traced the branches with his hands, he sensed an opportunity. A way to circumvent his sentence. Carefully, he took the knife in a still-shaking hand and severed part of the tree away- a sapling, large enough to grow into a new tree, but still with the same dripping, sweet sap as the first.
If he was to be bound to a tree, then he would plant its roots where-ever he went. And if he was to feed upon humanity’s fears, then he would give them reasons to be afraid. If he was going to be scorned by the greater gods, then he’d give them a reason to scorn him. He would not just rule over fear; he would become it.
Time passed, and drew him out of the dark cedar forests and through the sand dunes of places long forgotten. Soon, he found himself among mortals again- and for a time, the terrors he wrought and the nightmares he inflicted were all his work, and his work alone. No mortal would worship a god of fear- especially one so horrifying and ruthless as himself. For a time, he was fine with this arrangement; he drifted through great cities while they were asleep, and ensured every living soul there woke up screaming. But after a while, a hollowness began gnawing at him- the sound of screams no longer thrilled him, and blood alone no longer satisfied him. And he began to interfere left with their lives, instead passively watching as they lived and loved and fought and died- as they warred with each-other, tortured each-other, murdered and revenged and wept into blood-stained hands
He came to realise two things. The first was that he could never conceive of worse horrors than those which lurked within the human heart. The second was that he was completely alone. He thought for some time as to how he might remedy this- watched silently as humanity went on, paid attention to murderous, vengeful souls. And then, finally, he decided what he should do. He would choose five heralds, each representative of the things that dwelled in the darkest corners of human hearts and inspired the greatest cruelties: Chaos, Sacrifice, Vengeance, Death and Legend. And in return for their service and company, he would grant them his magic; powers beyond mortal boundaries, teeth that rend and claws that tore.
With his path set, he went off to find his heralds. The first was Sacrifice; an artist, passionate and fiery and of unparalleled beauty, whose tools were made of bone and whose paint was blood and gore- both their own and of those who were unlucky enough to come across them. The second, Death, was once a priest, whose fascination with burial rites and the spirits of the dead caused them to be banished from their temple and left to roam and murder to appease the spirits who followed them- and now for the god they served. Chaos was the third; a strange, cheerful wanderer who found joy in blood and disarray, and danced in the gore of both his friends and his foes. Then there was the scribe- Legend- whose works of violence and blasphemy left them scorned everywhere they went, and sparked panic and murder every time they recounted them. And the last of them- and far from the least- was Vengeance; she was a soldier, abandoned by her leader and left to fight and die out in the wasteland before Adaru found her.
And he blessed them with his attention and his marks; and wrapped his golden wings around them and pronounced them heralds. And this new era of gods and monsters began- once-lonely travellers now bound together by the worship of a new god. Everywhere they went, they spread horror and bloodshed and pandemonium- and in the blood-soaked soil, Adaru planted another sapling of the great horror tree, as if to mock the sentence that the greater gods put upon him. As the time between them grew, so did their bond; from allies to friends, to something even deeper and more profound- and the god and his heralds loved each-other deeply, as though they had finally found themselves in each-others arms.
But as their love grew, so did their marks.
Adaru was a young god; and with his relative youth and despite his bloodthirsty ways, he was naive. He did not realise that a god such as him did not work in blessings; instead, he worked with curses. Unknowingly, he had granted them power that twisted their mind even further- and soon, their bodies. It began with the marks slowly growing across their bodies- where it once covered their face, now it covered their chest and arms. Then came the nightmares- night terrors so terrible that they awoke screaming and clutching at the others, bleeding from their mouth and nose. At first, Adaru tried to calm them- tried to stop the magic from spreading any further- and for a little while, it worked.
And then it got worse.
One dreadful night, their fitful slumber was disrupted with more than just screaming. No- it was accompanied by the terrible splintering of bone and the warping of flesh and howls of uncomprehending, frightened pain. Their fear was bitter on his tongue- it stung his throat and made him sick. Not knowing what else to do, he rushed to their aid; tried desperately to use his magic to stop the horrible transformation- but it only sped them up. And before he knew it, he was completely helpless- and merely watched in mute grief as their bodies and mind contorted into torturous, unnatural shapes. As he cradled their shifting bodies with his arms and wings, what fell instead of tears was golden-red as the final sunset they had shared together.
For hours- days, perhaps- the scene played itself out- and by the end of it, Adaru was splattered with the red, corrupted hues of his first heralds, as they writhed and wept and finally fell unconscious in his arms. Not dead. No. They could not die, now- for that was a mercy that the curse would not grant them. Instead, they were trapped in these undulating, immortal forms- forever in pain, forever mindless, mere husks of what they once were. All Adaru could do was sit there in shock and watch their now-slumbering forms- and then a great shiver wracked his body, and the dam broke.
He wept for days- weeks- unable to bring himself to face what he had caused, he hid himself away in the cedar forest where his first sentence had been given. Grief reduced him to a shivering, wailing wreck; any pride that his godhood had granted him fell away with his tears. And through it all- unbeknownst to him- the gods had been watching his plight. They had watched as he and his servants had struck fear into every city and town and village they came across- as they drifted through great temples and left nothing but corpses in their wake- as he lost his heralds and fled away from them in shame and disgust at what he had done.
They felt no pity for him. No mercy. Only red and vengeful anger; red as the blood of the only family Adaru had ever truly known, now splattered on his robes and staining the dark green and gold with the colour of rust. And while he was lost in his grief, they came for him once more. Some of the more humane of them had hoped that being bound to the tree would be enough to tame his lust for glory- but no. There had to be another sentence. One that would keep him out of trouble for as long as their divine magic held out.
When they surrounded him, he tried to escape- bit and clawed and screamed bloody curses at them, tore his robes and cloak in his panic, tried to fly away with his wings. Instead, they tore them from him- the delicate scales dusted their hands as they were ripped off his back, leaving him howling in agony and at their absent mercy. One of the gods produced a lantern, and whispered to him in a low, cold voice.
“We were merciful when we bound you to the tree. We thought that would teach you your lesson. We were wrong, and we see that now. So we bring another sentence. Your prison will be this lantern, and you will only see sunlight again every 20th year- and when the season of your release is over, you shall be trapped again. And this cycle will repeat itself until the end of days- and when that time comes, you will be alone.”
And with that, they burned his body, and sealed the flames within the lantern- and Adaru woke to find himself in a small, cold chamber, back bleeding upon metallic floors. Again, he was alone. Again, he drowned in his grief- but now there was rage, too. Rage towards his prison. Rage towards the gods. But worst of all, rage towards himself- how could he be so foolish? So selfish and naive and short-sighted? This was all his fault. This would always be his fault. To let himself become attached to things so fragile- to let his love and lust for life and power lead him to become his own gaoler. And in his misery- in his anger and tears and agony- he clawed at his chest and arms and where-ever else he could reach. Symbols- tally marks- the amount of years he would spend here, trapped and alone.
A solemn vow, carved in his own flesh. It was the last remains of his humanity that led him here. His passion, his emotions, his sympathy for others. Therefore, he would rid himself of these pointless, stupid things. If they wanted a monster, they would have a monster. Let the cycles continue. Let them spiral downwards to eternity. Let hundreds of poor, tortured souls meet the same fate. Let humanity crumble, and let him starve. He would never weep again.
He would be Adaru, God of Fear- unbowed, unbroken- and nothing more.