This begins a new series here: samples from books that we have published under the Eartherean Press imprint.
This sample is the first in a series of samples from the first book in the 4-book series The Doom-Quest of Ara-Karn: The Former King.
© 1981 by A. Adam Corby This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 License.
Goddess-Sun and dark God
I
And through the skies rides God, never stopping, ever roving in His chariot of Jade, called by some, Moon. He rises out of the Ocean of the Dead, soaring ever higher, until He begins to fall. He falls toward the dark horizon, swifter and brighter coming to His home; and in the end He passes once more into blackness, driven ever by the darkness of His Desire.
And He had laughed, and would have destroyed the first man and woman, but that His hand was stayed. Thereat He grew surly and jealous, and went to the darkness at the other end of the world, there to build a Fortress of Black Rock.
II
And above all lands shines Goddess. She never moves, but sits in Her throne of Golden Fire, called by some, Sun. And that is the reason men have light eternal and changeless, to grow their crops and warm their hearts.
And She had stayed His hand, because She loved the first man and woman. And She went to build Her throne of Golden Fire that men might have light and warmth.
III
Once the gods dwelt not in the skies, but laughingly upon the lands of earth in the forms of mortal man and maid. There were no folk then, and the lands were undivided and lush with ripening fruit. And then they held contest: and God created man, and Goddess woman, each after His or Her own form. And each looked on the creation of the other and desired it, though neither would admit the creation of the other was as good, for pride’s sake.
So they separated. But still does He desire Her, and so goes round in His chariot of Jade. Yet She loves men and will not go. And then is He consumed utterly by the darkness of His Desire, and invades the throne of Golden Fire, and ravishes Her. Then does Darkness fall across the lands of men. And She weakens and might go, surrendering pride for passion’s sake. And that is the moment most needful for prayers from Her worshipers on the wide bright shores to redeem Her and call Her back to us.
And woe to all men, if ever She should not heed!
