Paia wakes in the crook of the God’s foreleg, curled against the hard wall of his chest. She wonders what time it is, how long she has been here with him. He has let a little air into the Sanctum, and a bit of light. Or maybe she is finally learning to see as he does, in the dark. His huge head is down beside her, resting on the bridge of his claws. His eyes, long and almond-shaped, are shut. He looks almost peaceful, as if he’s actually asleep. Paia hopes he is. It’s the only time she gets to observe him with any objectivity, when he is there in body but not in her mind.
The House Comp once gave her the God’s basic measurements, as if cold fact might somehow cool her ardor. He is thirty-one meters long from blunt nose to razor-tipped tail, and twelve meters tall when rampant. He has a wingspan of twenty-five meters when fully extended. His average skin temperature is 110 Fahrenheit degrees. Were it not for his heat, she’d think him made entirely of precious metals, crafted by artists of inspired genius and godlike patience. For despite his size, his detailing is exquisite and delicate. Every centimeter of him is a perfect design of color and line. Every surface is decorated. Each golden scale is incised with a pattern of leaf-veins in ruby red, as brilliant as the finest enamel. His smallish hooded ears, the only thing small about him, are lined with royal purple as if with shimmering panné velvet. His leathery wings are gilt-scaled on top and azure blue beneath, so that in flight they sometimes seem like chunks of sky caught beneath a golden shroud.
The smallest of his scales, no bigger than Paia’s hand, cluster around his eyes. There is something tender and vulnerable about them. Paia slides her still-damp body along the metallic smoothness of his arm to where she can trace the fine ruby veining with an adoring finger and press her lips, counting the kisses, to scale after scale. When he is like this, quiescent, having gifted her with the ecstasy of his holy worship, she cannot help but love him, almost more than life.
He stirs beneath her, a mountain shifting, geologic in scale, and lays his head a little to the side so that she can continue caressing him. At first she was surprised that her soft hands and mouth could transmit any sensation at all through so hard and polished a surface. But he seems to enjoy it. He will let her do it for hours, and sometimes when he’s angry but lets her come to him anyway, it even quiets him a little.
He says it’s her devotion that pleases him, that when the passion of her faith inspires her to surrender herself to the holy ecstasy, they are as one being and the ecstasy is shared. If this is so, Paia muses, it’s the only true sharing between them. The rest is all power games and posturing and her carrying out his bidding. Such as how she must immediately have a child.
He must be asleep. Otherwise she could never lie so close to him and have such thoughts. But no, he’s awake, for he stirs again and one long tip of his forked tongue flicks out and coils around her ankle. Instinctively she pulls away, but he holds her.
COME CLOSER, BELOVED.
Paia shudders with pleasure and terror. She is inches from his fangs. What is he up to now?
YOU HAVE BEEN DOUBTING ME LATELY.
“No, my lord. Why do you say so?”
YOUR THOUGHTS STRAY FROM YOUR DUTIES.
Is no part of her mind closed to him? Has she no privacy from him at all? But she knows how to deflect him.
“I miss you, my lord, when you are gone from us.”
OF COURSE YOU DO.
His tongue eases farther up her leg, silken heat winding around her thigh. Paia would like to stay conscious for this conversation, but only fear is keeping the ecstasy from overtaking her again.
“Where do you go? Can you tell me of the great sights you see?”
TOO MANY QUESTIONS. I NEED YOUR ABSOLUTE ATTENTION, BELOVED. MY ENEMIES ARE NEAR.
“Enemies? What enemies, my lord Fire? Is there a new heresy?”
AN OLD ONE, BELOVED. THE OLDEST ONE OF ALL.
This is the first she’s heard him speak of enemies, other than the usual heathen faithless that covet the Temple’s riches and livelihood.
“But who are they? What do they want?”
ANCIENT FOES, POWERFUL FOES. THEY WOULD DENY ME MY GODHEAD.
“They are coming here?”
I SENSE THEIR APPROACH, EVEN NOW. THROUGH THE VEIL OF YEARS THAT I HOPED WOULD CONCEAL ME FROM THEM.
His grip on her relaxes. He is distracted. Paia backs away a step and leans against his jaw. Instantly, she longs for his touch again, but fears what he will do if she invites it. “Will they attack the Temple?”
THEY WILL BE SUBTLER THAN THAT. THEY ARE SLY AND DEVIOUS.
“How will we know them?”
YOU WILL NOT NEED TO. I WILL RECOGNIZE THEM INSTANTLY.
“What will they do?”
THEY WILL TRY TO MAKE ALL THAT IS RIGHT SEEM WRONG. THEY WILL CHALLENGE THE DEVOTION OF THE FAITHFUL. EVEN YOURS, BELOVED.
“They will not succeed, my lord.”
THIS IS WHY I NEED YOUR ATTENTION, CONSTANT AND TOTAL, TO HELP ME DISCOVER THEM. TO HELP ME VANQUISH THEM.
“I am your servant always, my lord.” He’s sounding faintly sullen about all this, like he’s been taken by surprise, and Paia thinks it unwise to ask how it is that a God who knows everything does not know where his enemies are.
I AM PONDERING WAYS, BELOVED, THAT WE COULD BE CLOSER.
“Will you tell me, Lord Fire, when you know what they are?”
I WILL, WHEN I AM READY, AND I WILL CALL YOU TO ME.
But Paia is not fooled. Their closeness is no longer the foremost issue in his mind.