tsvwords

[tsvwords]

I’ve been on this earth thirty-one years, and I never found a god I could love more than fear.

— Chapter 11: My Voice Cries Truths I Never Knew.

[tsvwords]

And as I stood there alone on the empty lawn, crying and sobbing with my hands clenching…that morning I looked down into the depths of our pond and I saw that the goldfish were dead.

Bobbing absurdly on the surface of the water, upon their sides. Their black rolling eyes staring upwards towards me. Shiny and still. Like five hallowed corpses floating in sealed cells.

And an inexplicable, smooth tide rolled out from the water’s heart, slopping over the sill of the pond and soaking my trainers.

The Silt Verses teach us that all rivers are one river. And all currents, sooner or later, find their way to the same silent garden beneath the waves.

This was the first miracle my god showed me. There have been more since, over the years.

But that moment…alone, in the grey dawn, before a pondful of dead fish, knowing that I was seen, and understanding that all things in this world were connected?

That was the first time in my life I knew what terror really was. The first time I truly believed in you, my river.

— Chapter 1: Let Me Speak First Of Revelations.

[tsvwords]

Well, it takes courage, changing anything. In the world or in ourselves. And you’ve always had courage. Ever since you were small. You were always brave enough to know what needed to change.

— Chapter 38: Shall Wither In Ruin And Rust.

[tsvwords]

By the time I get back up onto the cliffside, the little stone cairn has toppled onto its side. A single pebble remains, hung in defiance of gravity, softly spinning in odd concentric circles.

Something has happened out here. The waters of the torrent beneath my feet aren’t keeping their shape any longer; they twist and knot, turning in on themselves like the solid threads of some vast crimson tapestry. The scree is rolling downhill beneath my feet; occasionally, as if at a whim, it turns and begins to bounce back up. The god-winds have drifted further east.

The Peninsula’s hungry past is coming down out of the hills, looking for something to devour.

And as I stand there beside the altered currents and beneath an altered sky, I look out over the ruined landscape - cratered and bombed and erupted on all sides, pock-marked with vast circular scars - I can just make out the shape of one enormous willow tree, alone and half-uprooted, by the banks of the White Gull.

Its great tangled fronds are standing up on end like hairs on the arm of a frightened man, as if offering one final hallelujah before the darkness falls.

As if stretching up to grasp something that will forever be just out of reach.

— Chapter 45: Of Love, And Gods' Defeat.

[tsvwords]

HAYWARD: I mean, yes, but that would cause harm, and when you’re beginning a new life alone, the last thing you want to do is cause any harm. You can’t be reborn with that in your heart. No escape is truly clean, but at least once you’ve fled you don’t have to look at the mess.

CARPENTER: I don’t think you have any choice in the matter. When someone’s been that close to you, when you’ve been known so well and you’ve been loved so closely, when every wrinkle of you has picked out and exposed to another’s sight…they can’t be allowed to continue on. It’d be like losing your faith, but letting the lie of it keep standing.

— Chapter 5: My Song Is Long And Twisted.

[tsvwords]

All of you have worked hard to keep things running smoothly. All of you have played your part, just like they asked you to. None of you deserve to die.

And if we down tools tonight, we’ll die. Simple as that, there’s no getting around it. It won’t make much of a difference, either. Matter of fact, we might only make things worse.

They’ll find people to replace us who aren’t trained and don’t know the tools, and they’ll stretch them thinner and work them harder.

The current will flow. The signal will not cease. We won’t change anything past tonight.

— Chapter 37: And Even The Kings In Their Bowers Of Steel.

[tsvwords]

Begin with a balbis on its side. Within the two spaces, a circle marked by a single dot. Beneath this, a pair of concentric circles. Within the annulus, an ovoid with a slit - a staring eye. Under that, a lemniscate over a heptagram, and three parallel lines beneath. These are the marks of the Many Below. Use them, pass them on, do not forget the suffering that keeps the engines of this world turning, forget the name of your god and cherish the name of your neighbour that was swallowed up by it.

— Chapter 43: One Last Song of Revelations.

[tsvwords]

We stand there, uncertain of ourselves, gazing upwards…and then the leg comes through the roof.

A vast, pink, chitinous pincer, crashing down through the ceiling, splitting the tape recorder in two as it lands, the thing’s vast leg driving through the floorboards and making the entire bungalow shiver as it strikes the ground far below.

And then the leg rises up again, slowly retreating back through the roof and out of view, and as it ascends I can see the bristles of river-water glistening across its armour. Smaller, frenzied crabs swarming back and forth across its surface like workers.

The light from outside is eclipsed as a vast, ungainly head peers in through the window. It has its own eyes, set on stalks, but the twisted snouts and pleading stares of dogs can be seen here and there across its shell, picked out and flattened in speckled swirls and patterns.

It’s looking at us.

— Chapter 8: And Those I Love, It Rends.

[tsvwords]

Oh, the lawful gods won’t take my calls, Pray away, pray away, So I’ll find someone else to save my soul, And I’ll pray to the Damned Hysteria.

— Chapter 23: I'd Howl, I'd Scream, In Victory.

[tsvwords]

Somebody, somewhere up the chain, is afraid that people don’t want that any more. Maybe they saw a focus group survey that found she was 4% lower favourability than she should be, and, well, what if there’s another 4% drop next year?

So the decision’s been made. We’re giving her a pantheon, and in time we’ll phase the Saint herself out.

The Family Electric. So far we’ve announced the Meter Reader, the Soothing Flame - he’s only for premium customers - and Lil Lightbulb, who’s going to be the mascot. They've got a radio serial planned, a kind of family sitcom.

And eventually, they’re going to move her out of focus.

— Chapter 39: This Rotten World Shall Wheeze Its Last.

[tsvwords]

Trawler-man of Tide and Flesh. Father in the Water. You are the Mouth Devouring and the Mouth Returning, You stand tall at the High Tide and crawl on your belly at the Low Tide. Upon this day, we, your chosen faithful, offer you body and spirit In the hope of your mercy and your favour, In the hope of the bountiful catch, and the cleansing current. From the wellspring to the sea.

— Chapter 16: And the Current Flows On Without End.

[tsvwords]

And when the petrol gauge dims and the Petropater’s dripping face blinks its final warning at us from the dashboard, we park the car beneath an old willow tree that hangs alone in the empty fields.

We get out, and we walk onwards, through the rain. Gradually, the landscape obscures.

There comes a time when you can no longer see beyond the next hedgerow, the next stile, the next creeping outgrowth of stray forest overwhelming the burnt-out ruins. High above in the distance, the shapes of rusted military saints on their towering long legs or rolling tracks are just barely visible.

And as we enter deeper into the trailing mists, a familiar, wet scent enters the air. A cool, sticky damp lingers on our skin, making us drip. It’s river mist, I think. Somewhere out here, in the heart of the barren land, the waters have staked a claim for themselves.

And presently, we come to something strange. An endless line of warning tape, stretching out across the fields before us. Neon orange, once bright and now hopelessly muddied, staked into the ground at intervals, here and there flapping free. Old tyre tracks lie in the earth before it, pooling with water.

Someone has built a makeshift shrine to the Riddlespike, God of Boundaries; three crows, impaled upon iron railing-posts that have been driven into the ground. It looks somehow desperate.

The police were here. Clearly. And whatever they found beyond the tape, they didn’t feel the need to stick around.

They abandoned this place, almost as soon as they found it.

— Chapter 13: So Let Me Dwell Eternal.

[tsvwords]

May you come to know yourself better in my pain.

— Chapter 25: But We'll Never Be Rid Of Each Other.

[tsvwords]

It’s me. Hope you and the girls are settled in OK.

They said the houses should come with a pool, which is awesome. I think about all of you splashing about in the afternoons, and it makes me smile. And you’re safe down there. Which is the important thing. I’m safe too.

I know it doesn’t seem like things are going too well for us, but I just had my first CenSec meeting, and - the scientists, they’ve got some clever stuff up their sleeves! They’re going to surprise all of us, I think.

I may have been a little incautious today. It’s weighing on me. Ring me when you get this, OK? I’d like to hear your voice.

I’d like to be certain that I didn’t just dream you.

— Chapter 31: Its Gaze Shall Fall O’er Trembling Plains.

[tsvwords]

FAULKNER lies back and drifts in the water, breathing hard, cackling to himself - alone in the dark. Hysterical, elated, broken, and despairing all at once.

[tsvwords]

A freshly-woven robe of gold and green and white, waves lapping around the hem and the sleeves, is placed over my shoulders.

Because everyone knew that I went south to be formally acknowledged as a Katabasian of the faith, and now that I have returned, my people have absolutely no doubt that I have been recognised.

I deliver a blessing, something rote and well-worn from the first chapters of the Verses, that comes to me quickly and readily, and I think - I think my voice sounds reedy and tired and strained, but my people deliver the call-and-response back to me with such fervour and such joy that I wonder whether my self-doubt is merited.

Perhaps my voice sounds strong and certain. Perhaps I’m as all of them see me.

So yes, of course I’m happy, coming home like that. And if I am not happy, then perhaps this is what it means to lead. To be a vessel for the happiness of others.

Perhaps any guilt is the weight that all great men must bear.

And when the welcome is over, my retinue announce that I must be feeling tired from the journey, and I am led up through the twisting corridors of the Gulch to my chambers, and left there alone in my robe that is heavy and hot, amongst books and gifts and more food and drink than any one person could possibly need.

This is my life - now that I am a prophet, now that I am loved.

I am left alone with every comfort, for long hours at a time, because my people know that I am in direct communication with the Trawler-man himself, and so I need my solitude and my space to make communion with the Garden Below.

We have holy fools and hermits who sequester themselves away for years at a time, zealots who half-drown themselves daily in search of revelation or eat and drink only the thickest silt that the White Gull has to offer, and while a Katabasian has responsibilities, a prophet is holier still than all of these.

So they give me space, and they give me solitude, so that I may maintain my purity.

— Chapter 33: And Where Once Its Howling Forebears Walked.

[tsvwords]

Hey, Charity! Tell me more about your god! I want to know whose house I’ve wrecked!

— Chapter 4: Of Lovers, Gods and Beasts.