July 2016 Weather Forecast | Saraph's Summer Chill

“My pegasi grow stronger by both the day and night,” Roth boasted, sweeping his tail across the pool that served as a looking glass into the mortal world.  When the ripples had settled, images of Roth’s prized tiercels and beautiful hens, round with pregnancy, painted colorful images across the mirror’s canvas.  

From across the pool, a snort of amusement followed a pawed hoof being dragged across the pool which shifted the images from those of the fiery tiercel to lowly slaves laboring beneath the hot desert sun.

“One might argue, Roth, that it is not by their own sweat that their success is won.”

Having been engrossed in the image, the bronzed pegasus lifted his head in mock consternation that his lovely picture had been broken.

“Why Gaophos, whatever do you mean?”  He replied innocently, touching the pool again so that its surface brought to life gorey scenes of the fox-like god’s dedicated followers being swept up and consumed by the wind god’s very own pets.  “A life lived fully beneath the sun and its warm light is far better than one ended in the pits of an eagle’s belly…  Is it not?”  

Gaophos blistered, his earns pinning in anger.  Before he could retort, someone else interceded.

“Your arrogance threatens to best you, Roth.  Mind your tongue.”

The strange sound of the record keeper’s voice - strong in tone although weak in delivery - caused the rest of the gods to hush, their eyes turning in surprise to the dark coated god who so rarely conversed with more than a soft nod or shake of his regal head, let alone a full sentence.

“Ah, so you do remember how to speak.  I nearly thought you had forgotten.”

A gasp, audible above the now heavy silence, escaped the sister of the sun, her alabaster coat glimmering as she took a step toward her brother.

“Roth,” she said softly as she draped her maneless neck across his powerful, winged shoulders in wordless warning.  

Predictably, Roth would have nothing of it.

Shaking the bride of the night and her calming touch away from his skin, Roth stepped forward with a resolute flap of his six wings.  The sun god’s advance toward Actaeos caused most to shuffle out of the way, giving the two gods plenty of room when Roth’s voice boomed once more.

“If you have something to say to me, Actaeos, speak it when I can taste your breath against my tongue.”

Despite the fact that Roth had, by now, leaned in so close to the wolf-like head of the god of the Northern Storm’s face that they practically touched noses, Actaeos stared back into the pegasus’s golden eyes without emotion.  Roth’s heavy breathing was the only thing to break the silence now, until the hesitant click of Induala’s hooves against the heavenly floor they stood upon announced her approach.

“Roth, my brother,” she whispered, tentatively touching her nose against Roth’s broad neck, so hot to the touch from his inner flame, “Let it lie.”

A low growl erupted from the belly of Roth although, after a smirk and exaggerated snort directed into the face of the Keeper, the pegasus turned away.

“Sister, calm your arable recesses.  I will find no defiance here.”

As is to prove a point, the god flicked his tail across Actaeos’s refined muzzle.  Another sharp inhale from the other gods echoed in the godly hall but, when Roth turned his gaze back, he found that Actaeos’s expression had not faltered.  The sun god scoffed aloud.

“See,” he said with a laugh and nudge to his sister, the latter sending her stumbling to the side from its strength.  

Induala, appalled, lifted a hoof in dismay when she regained her balance as her starlit gaze danced worriedly back and forth between the silent Actaeos and her kin.  “Roth,” she pleaded.  “That I might make you understand the weight of your words!  Treat them as gold spent, not taken.”

“Bah,” he replied with a snort, sweeping past his sister with a dismissive brushing aside with one set of wings, “The mute has nothing to say even in the face of controversy.  If my words are gold, give a care I would not for their spending - as I do so now - for I could surely reclaim it without strain.”

“You would do well to listen to your sister, Roth.  May this be your last warning.”

Again, the strange voice - worn from the passing of endless days yet as fresh as morning dew - spoke.  Slowly, Roth turned, his irritation evident in the rigid splaying of his wings.  

“You would threaten me, Actaeos?”  The bronze god advanced, seemingly unaware of the moon goddess that had flung herself out of desperation in front of her brother.  But he pushed her back, far too interested in the sudden defiance shown by the Keeper.

“What can you do against me?  Of all of us, you should know better than to cross me.”

With a bellow, Roth lifted himself onto his hind legs and struck, his cloven hooves seeking purchase upon Actaeos’s coat.  But, where there should have been godly skin crunching beneath his powerful hooves a cloud of obsidian hued butterflies exploded toward him.  Up and around the pegasus they danced, kissing his skin gently with their tiny legs before lifting up and away before Roth could use his wings to beat them away.

However, Actaeos’s voice lingered where he had stood.

“Your people have become a spoiled one, no thanks to you.  Perhaps it is time they learned what it is like to live without your light.”

Roth scoffed, although by the patchy darkening of sweat upon his coat, it was evident that he held worry in his heart.

“You can do nothing to my pegasi while I watch over them.”

“Exactly.”

It was the last word that Actaeos spoke but, despite its simplicity, the weight of it hung across them all heavily.  With the confrontation seemingly settled, one by one the other gods lifted themselves away from the pool to return their gaze to their own people.  The last to linger were Roth and his sister, who pleaded with him.

“Please brother.  Ask for forgiveness from him.  You do not know that which he may have in store for you.”

Despite his worry, Roth could not bear to let his sister see more of it than she already did.  Brushing her aside, Roth flexed his wings.  

“It shall be me he asks for forgiveness from, sister.  Should he challenge me…  May he feel the wrath of my fire.  He, of all of us, should know its strength.”

With a sharp inhale of dismay, the moon goddess allowed her brother to take flight past her and exit the pool’s sanctuary.  Collapsing to her kneels beside it, the goddess blinked with uncertainty as she touched its surface to reveal the many stars of the night that were her own children.  

“Might Actaeos spare you from my brother’s consequence, little ones…”