Page 45 of Battle of Witches
“If Ezra answers that, they will blow your mind, and you won’t ever be the same. A few gods have tried to kick their ass over this,” Loki said.
Killian and I exchanged looks. Weneededour minds blown. This whole shit with Asfrid was a mind fuck, but something told me Ezra had fucked gods’ minds before, and now I needed all the details.
“Go on,” I said, getting comfortable.
“I’ll have to start from the beginning if we’re going to get to the loophole that prevented me from fetching Loki’s problem child and why I can’t do a damned thing about the poor ghosts that haunt these grounds.”
That had to be a big fucking loophole. I hadn’t really questioned why the God of Death let so many ghosts roam the planet, but now that they were here, I needed to know why Phillip was in my museum flavoring everyone’s tea with old dildos.
“So, the Aether isn’t sentient, nor is it capable of sustaining life. It’s not possible to build a spaceship and explore it. You can only find it if you’ve been there before, and you can become pure essence. I created my reapers to be able to do that because there are just too many people dying every day for me to do it myself.
“If the Aether isn’t sentient, then it’s not shitting out gods like my people like to brag about. I already confirmed this by hanging out there and waiting until a new god was created back when that was happening quite often. If the Aether didn’t create us, thensomeonedid like we did with our creations later.
“You have to understand. None of us know where we come from. The Aether thing started, and no one cared to challenge it. It became this whole thing where people were using it to make people feel like shit about themselves. Some of the other gods treated those born and not created like they were somehow inferior. The whole thing is stupid.
“Nearly every culture has some legend of the fates. Even now, everyone from humans to supernaturals alike talks about fate for all kinds of things. They weren’t there when the primordials were created. No god has ever met them, and some of us like to think they don’t exist. Some of us have big heads and like to think we are in control of everything.
“I’ve never personally met them, but I think the fatesdoexist, and they are the ones creating gods, not the Aether. They spin a thread, and there we are. Iknowwhen someone is supposed to die, and I know when that happens before it’s supposed to. I think that’s the Fates. They get so involved with the story unfolding with one person’s thread that everyone else is just collateral damage. There was a shifter that recently died because of Loki’s problem child, whoshouldhave died of old age. I think she made them curious.”
Mind officially fucked. We hadn’t even gotten to the big cosmic loophole yet. Supernaturals put a lot of stock in fate, but witches especially did. Ezra seemed like a curious god and the kind of nerd I could get along with. I wasn’t going to argue with them. They helped create the universe and had been doing their research for averylong time.
“I think Reyson and I are the only gods that agree with Ezra on this, but for different reasons. A lot of the other primordials do, too. Ezra has suggested schools for us to learn from each other, but everyone thinks they are special snowflakes and their powers are unique.”
“Some of them are,” Ezra said. “We all have a purpose and things that are unique to us, but I think on a base level, we are all capable of doing the same things. No one really wants to experiment and push the limits of what they can do.”
“Except me,” Loki said. “I figured out shapeshifting on my own, but Ezra came and hung out with me for a little while. We figured out we weren’t limited to animals. We could shapeshift into other people, but we could also shift just our auras to be like other supernaturals. It was how I fooled you when I first got here.”
“So, you’re to blame for that,” I said, throwing a Cheeto at Ezra.
Ezra calmly picked it off their shirt and popped it into their mouth.
“I’m not my brother’s keeper. We did that to blend in with the mortals when we needed to. Sometimes, we just wanted to go to the tavern in peace. It’s not really a punchline, but when two gods walk into a pub, people either want to start a fight, or they think we grant wishes. Sometimes, I just want to hang out and get drunk.”
“Where was I when this was going on?” Reyson asked.
“Sulking in the Aether,” Loki said. “You’d probably have fucked back off there to pout again when Ripley forced you back in your vessel, but you got intrigued when you saw her.”
“I regret nothing,” Reyson said, yanking my sister into his lap.
“So, what’s this big cosmic loophole? Why couldn’t you take Asfrid’s ghost before? A few ghosts at Ripley’s library acted up because they didn’t want to be ghosts anymore.”
“Ah, yes. Ghosts. It was a group effort when we created humans, but we chose not to give them magic. Humans have had all these elaborate rituals for their dead, depending on what era it is. They don’t really need them. Maybe you haven’t noticed there are no human ghosts out there?”
“Oh, my shit!” Killian yelled. “I can’t believe I died once, came back from the dead, and didn’t realize that.”
“How am I living surrounded by supernatural ghosts, but humans don’t end up that way?” I demanded.
“Cosmic loophole. The other gods started playing around with creation and adding magic to the mix. Everything dies. It’s different for gods. We experience a different kind of death. It’s more like the death of belief in us. When creations with magic started to die, I couldn’t take their essences to the Aether for some reason.
“I had my scholars working on it, and they came up with the rites. The other gods were against it at first. They’ve never been a big fan of mine. They all thought ghosts meant their creations had cheated death, but the spirits were clearly miserable. They still didn’t want to do anything because it was supposed to be this giant ‘fuck you’ to me, so I arranged it for the ghosts to haunt their fancy houses.”
IlikedEzra. I liked Loki and Reyson, too, but they could be a little extra sometimes. They both would have approached the ghost situation differently. It probably would have worked eventually, but they would have made a lot of enemies in the process. Ezra didn’t make a mess or threaten anyone. Instead, they weaponized the spirits until their creators did the right thing.
“You left out the best part aboutwhythe other gods don’t like you,” Loki said, gleefully clapping his hands.
“I’mshockedwe never got a time out,” Reyson said, conjuring his favorite snack of Oreos. “Ezra, try these.”
“I’m quite familiar with Earth food. Oreos are good, but there’s this little bakery in my realm with superior cookies. Anyway, I’ve had to yank a few gods from their vessels and put them in time out until they learn how to behave. Their vessels are safe in my realm, where no one could go without an invitation until Sleipnir, here, was born, and I’ll eventually give them back when they learn how not to be rapey megalomaniacs. They learned that just because youcandoesn’t mean youshould.”
