False Gods
"So, why don't you ever worship when we do?" Lynka asked, trotting along next to her friend. Torch looked away uneasily, but then looked her friend in the eyes. "That... that statue, of D- um, Pangaea, I... Gosh, I've never told anyone this..." Torch had come to a stop now, and Lynka stopped beside her. "Look, Ly, Pangaea isn't as good as you think he is. Have you ever wondered where I was before I joined all of you?" Lynka looked starstruck at the information that her god was flawed, but nodded along. She wanted to hear this.
Lynka walks with Torch, listening to her story.
"Pangaea, he stole me. He took me away from my mother and raised me. I asked him one day who my mother was, and he threw me out. I went to find her, and... She had died. All that was left were bones. I had to run, I had to find somebody, I was so young. But he didn't make it easy. He pitted the entire world against me, threw me to the dogs, left me for dead. I finally found you all, and everyone expects me to bow down and pray to him, to the man who destroyed my life? No. I refuse. He can punish me in death if he pleases, but I will not pray to a false god who does the things he did."
At this point she turns away from Lynka. Lynka kind of reaches after her, wanting to help her, but she knows she can't. She pulls back from her friend.
"Torch, if you really feel that way, maybe it's best you leave to go live with like-minded people. Worship brings us together, and this is just forcing us apart."
Torch looks back at her with eyes that both burn a hole in her heart and freeze over her soul.
Torch just kind of... frowns. The only way to tell how she feels is her eyes, and right now Lynka just cant look at that part of her face.
Torch starts crying. Not sobbing, not wailing, just. Crying. Tears slipping from her eyes in stunned silence.
Feelings hit both of them like trucks. Anger, betrayal, despair. Torch turns away again, and at this point Lynka can see shadows at the corner of her vision.
"Maybe I will."
As Torch flies off, darkness seals itself like an envelope around her former home. Her rage keeps it fastened there, forbidding anything to grow, thickening the air until it is too hard to breathe.
Talk about a false god.