God-Post

I held that piece of flesh up before me, bitter distaste filling my mouth. If what my father and I had done before had been blasphemy, this was surely something far worse, to desecrate the body of a god in such a way.

And yet it was necessary. This war between gods and men should never have been begun in the first place, and this was the only way I knew to seek a truce.

I turned to the father-post and laid the flesh of the god-face over the face of my own father. Bile rose in my throat as I did so, but I forced it down. I pressed on the flesh, forming and shaping it to the face of my father, until the visage of the post was no longer that of the parent I knew but of the god we had destroyed.

And then I stepped back. And waited.

It took time, and the sun passed silently overhead as the hours passed. I began to fear I had mangled the ritual, that all this had been for naught.

But then the god-post opened its mouth and drew in a deep breath. A moment later, its eyes opened and the god looked directly at me.