Moe Lane

Back to it!

Gregor looked at the amulet again. It was golden – no, it was gold. He could barely make out on its central disc the outlines of a budding tree, just like from the altar, which made sense. What he wasn’t feeling was any kind of power. God-items had a greasy feel to them, no matter the god. Besides, if you got close enough to one, you could feel its regard. The priests all said that the gods were always watching through their special items, and Gregor had been an onlooker to enough bad experiences to half-believe it.

There was nothing like that here. The gold was warm to the touch, but there was no queasiness, or half-tangible reek of curdled regard. He breathed in. No smell at all, in fact. Certainly there wasn’t anything godly to block out the simple fragrance of sun and wind, filtered through the leaves of a living forest. Maybe it’s not god-touched, he thought. Or it once was, and when the god died, nothing was left behind. That thought was oddly sad, but Gregor shrugged it off. Dead gods weren’t his problem. Making a living was. 

He looked over at the pile of books he had pulled from the temple. On quick glance they looked like scriptures and hymns, which is why he had grabbed them. Gods never minded if you walked off with those. Gregor thought that they’d be worth reselling, since they were in the Old Speech and thus snooty, but now he had another idea. One that might prove more than a little profitable.