Part I – What Happened to Pesties?
Chapter 6 – The Pact of Ramos
Location – The Serpent’s Embrace – Karmamesh, Ramos
Time: 44th Year, Winter
Gather close, for I must recount a tedious yet delectable morsel that took place during the winter doldrums while I was waiting for Aspus to return to me.
Call it a meeting of the gods. Imagine my surprise when I received an invitation to join Gwar and Inanna at the Goddess’s Pleasure Palace in her home kingdom of Ramos. It had been centuries since my last trip there, yet this time I doubted it would be as…enjoyable – especially with that meathead Gwar in attendance.
My suspicion turned out to be correct and there was nothing about my time in Ramos that turned out to be all that fun. Karkamesh was a decadent mix of domed roofs and coiled streets, its torchlight flickering like the eyes of a thousand mortals who slithered through the city – its air thin with the scent of a thousand sins. Not the raw, honest stench of mortal fear or the coppery tang of spilled blood that I’d so grown accustomed to back in my home at Nektar’s Cauldron. No, this was the sickly-sweet perfume of vanity and gluttony, of lust and unbridled hubris. The people of Ramos, Inanna’s chosen playthings, were truly a sight to behold, their faces flushed with a dizzying mix of adoration and debauchery.
Yet it was the goddess’ pleasure palace – The Serpent’s Embrace – that dominated all. Constructed of black marble and gold Inanna’s abode was perched atop a jagged bluff that overlooked the coastline of the jungle of Ramos – the mansion’s silhouette clawing at a sky that was still sunny despite the season in this equatorial locale looming as a testament to Inanna’s excess. I could see that the goddess had made some improvements since my last visit – for the palace’s façade was now a tangle of sculpted snakes, their gilded scales glinting in the sunset, their ruby eyes, though dead, still winking with malice. An over-ripe aura clung to the marble pillars of Inanna’s palace like a second skin, a testament to her particular brand of depravity.
This was going to be tedious – but then again a god’s business is never truly a pleasure cruise, is it? Especially when one must suffer the indignity of a political alliance with… well, with that lot.
I made my way through the labyrinthine corridors of The Serpent’s Embrace, past serpentine columns twisted toward a ceiling painted with tortured mortals locked in eternal debauchery, and all the while my tattered black robes doing a marvelous job of sweeping up the remnants of their pathetic revelries. The air pulsed with the distant moans of her devotees, a chorus seeping through walls adorned with tapestries of her conquests, their threads shimmering with an unnatural sheen.
The sheer audacity of these young upstarts, these godlings who thought they knew what power was, always amused me. Inanna with her siren-like beauty and a mind as sharp as a shard of glass. And Gwar… oh, Gwar. The God of Slaughter. A brute, really. All muscle and malice, not a single drop of subtlety in that ponderous frame of his frame – a buffoon if ever there was one.
I knew exactly where my colleagues were waiting for me, but I took my sweet time getting there. Eventually I found them. As I entered their room braziers hissed venom-green flames, casting shadows that slithered across a floor of polished obsidian veined with gold – this chamber, like all the rest, was a spectacle of excess. Silk banners depicting Inanna’s conquests hung from the ceiling. A colossal table of polished obsidian stood at the center, laden with exotic fruits and goblets of wine the color of fresh blood. The very air was humid, thick with a magic I recognized as Inanna’s own, a sticky, sensual force designed to disarm and distract. How quaint.
Inanna reclined on a velvet chaise lounge, here current chosen form featured golden hair that spilled like molten rivers over bare shoulders, her diaphanous gown clinging to curves that promised ruin, her eyes glinting with a predator’s hunger. She’d obviously put on her best show for me, for though I was no fool to her wiles, but I wasn’t in the mood to play the fool today, so I had no intention of falling into her traps (this time).
Gwar stood stiffly by the table, his posture as rigid as his wit. A massive, blood-stained axe was at his side, its surface etched with dark runes. He didn’t bother with the pleasantries of a chair, as if he were ever ready to leap into battle. How terribly gauche.
“Azazel, my dear,” Inanna purred, her voice a low, musical hum that sent a shiver of contempt down my spine. “How… delightful of you to join us. We were just discussing the delicious taste of mortal fear.”
“A flavor I savor more than most,” I replied, my own voice a whisper that wove its way through the rustle of their dead souls. “Though I confess, I prefer the more… substantial taste of their souls.”
Gwar grunted, a sound somewhere between a cough and a growl. “Less talk, more action, Skull Man. We have a world to conquer. Inanna has a proposal for you. You just listen.”
I allowed a slow, conniving smile to spread across my lips. “Patience, friends. Let me relax a bit.” And here I sat at the table, conjuring a goblet from a wisp of shadow and filled it with a bit of the Ramosian Wine. After taking a long, theatrical drink – my eyes never leaving theirs – at last I said, “Proceed.”
Inanna sighed as she reclined on her divan watching me. Peering at Gwar and I through veiled lids, she twirled a goblet of wine, its surface catching the green firelight, and her voice slithered forth, smooth as a serpent’s glide. “We three have our minions, but there are so many still begging for us to control them. Oh, they may not know it yet, but surely you can see how the mortals tire of their drab, pious gods—Mindos, El-Aba, that bitch Armaros, and all the rest. Let us tempt them to worship us. I offer you my altars – help me place them all around this flat earth and watch the sheep come to us – the pleasures I offer which their sanctimonious laws forbid will surely cause them to break their wills with my ecstasy.”
“I might have guessed as much.” I scoffed at the idea. “And yet I was hoping for something more…interesting.”
If she was offended by my remaks, Inanna didn’t show it. Instead her lips curved into a sly smile as she trailed a lazy finger between her bosom. “Azazel, my love. Why do you doubt me? And here I thought you were the smart one? Don’t you see – some of the tools I offer might help you with…other pursuits. ”
Although she didn’t say it, Dagaal’s name hung unspoken and Inanna’s smirk was an unexpected lash across my pride, but I pretended not to notice.
Meanwhile Gwar’s scarred face twisted into a sneer and his voice was a growl that rattled the air. “Play your harlot’s game, Inanna—lure all the mortals you want with your wiles. I’ll take the dregs you leave behind and forge a host to drown Terra in blood—Zebub will rejoice at my work.” He spat on the floor, a gobbet sizzling faintly on the obsidian, then turned his glare on me.
Play it cool, old boy. I told myself as I walked casually towards the balcony for some air. I lingered near a balcony’s edge, the wind whipping towards me, clawing at my cloak as I gazed out over Karkamesh’s writhing chaos. Below, a plaza pulsed with a festival—mortals swayed to drums, their shadows twisting with the serpentine dancers Inanna favored, their chants a dull hymn to her vanity. I turned back, feigning disinterest, my claw scraping a groove into the gold-flecked railing.
“A quaint conspiracy,” I drawled, voice steady as stone despite the tempest within. “Mortals do crave vice, and they’re delightfully flammable. But why spread your altars around the world when you can just invite them here? Let them become pilgrims to your shrines, Inanna, screaming your name in rapture, then turn on each other for Gwar’s amusement.”
Before either could reply I turned to face them. Sensing a chance to take control the meeting I continued explaining. “You both hunger for worship, do you not? You, Inanna, for adoration and devotion. You, Gwar, for the sweet sound of clashing steel and the prayers of warriors begging for your favor. But you are both so… limited. So confined to your little kingdoms and ideas. I, on the other hand, have the perfect plan to deliver you what you both want.”
[This was, of course, a ruse – I knew full well that Inanna couldn’t accomplish her goal by trying to bring the sheep to her. Then again I didn’t want her having all access to the entire world either – for surely that WOULD have spread her fame, and there was no way I was going to allow that.]
Seeing their interest peak, I sat down next to them, my voice dropping to a conspiratorial hush. “Imagine a pilgrimage, my dears. A journey to Karkamesh, to this very palace. Mortals the world over, lured here by whispers and promises of earthly delights, coming in droves to worship Inanna in a grand, spectacular ceremony. This would satiate your desire for worship, would it not, my dear?”
I guessed that Inanna wasn’t stupid enough to fall for my proposal, but she didn’t let her suspicions show. Instead she tilted her head, pretending intrigue. Yet Gwar growled, “What about me?”
I turned to the brute. “Ah, that’s where the fun begins. Once they are here, once they are filled with the spirit of devotion and have given their all for the love goddess, you can then begin to stir the pot -incite them to turn against their fellow mortals. To wage a holy war and destroy the world!”
The brute took the bait, salivating. “I care not who the mortals worship, only that they’ll bleed. I’ll march them to Terra’s heart—and force Mindos to choke on their corpses.” Yet before I could celebrate, Gwar added. “Your plan is good, Azazel, but not perfect.”
“What does it lack?” I asked, a bit surprised.
“Only this.” Gwar smiled. “If we dig up Lucifer’s little bone dagger, I’d happily carve some obedience into you, Death. You’d make a fine hound on a leash.” His laugh boomed, a thunderclap of contempt as my worst fears came true – the brute knew!
My heart stopped. Not just skipped a beat. It ceased to exist, replaced by a cold dread that seeped into my very core. I felt the familiar torment of a memory I had long tried to bury, but did my best to resist it. “I haven’t a clue what you’re talking about, friend.”
“Oh, I think you do,” Inanna’s smile turned sinister. “Dagaal. The weapon Lucifer himself from your own rib bone. A blade whose sole purpose of is to destroy you. It would appear you need our trust even more than we need yours.”
The air turned to ice. The pleasant, decadent veneer of the room shattered. So they knew. They actually knew about Dagaal, the one weapon that could end me forever. It wasn’t just a rumor; it was a cold, hard fact. They had their spies. They had their sources. My meticulous plans, my carefully constructed illusions, they were all hanging by a thread.
I forced a laugh. A brittle, hollow sound. “You’ve heard tall tales. A ridiculous fabrication designed to sow discord. I’m the God of Death, you fools. No one can kill me.”
“Perhaps,” Inanna purred. But then her persona changed again and Lust relaxed further into her divan as she smiled seductively at me. “So, Azazel – a worldwide pilgrimage? To honor me? I like it. Yet I’m surprised that you’d allow the mortals to worship me as THE Goddess so easily. What does that leave you?”
“I am The God of Death,” I recovered my cool, and eager to change the subject I explained. “The pilgrims will slaughter one another. Their souls will be ripe for the harvesting. And I will grow fat on the essence of their dying anguish, my own soul filling with the life force I crave. It is a win-win-win. You both gain worship and power, and I get to dine on the spoils. We all get what we desire.”
In the end an alliance was agreed upon – pleasant exchange of power, except for the undercurrent of tension that was so thick you could have strangled a god with it. We all knew this was a sham. A temporary cease-fire in a war of cosmic proportions. Inanna still craved my essence and power, as she had since the dawn of time. And Gwar, with his brash arrogance, was just another rival to be dealt with. We shook hands, of a sort, the air crackling with unspoken threats as we moved to the balcony together whilst the sounds of the city bespoke of a wild riot below – one that was anything but peaceful.
“Why not let them just destroy each other?” I sighed as we three watched the mass of humanity below. “A spectacle for us all—Karkamesh reborn in ash. After all untold millions of pilgrims will soon be coming here to replace them, right?”
Inanna wasted no time in replying, perhaps eager to please me to draw me into her trust. “Let it be as you say, Death. I’ve had my fill of this batch anyway.”
And so Karkemesh descended into hell that night – its mortals surged, torches flared across the city, painting the palace in hues of ruin as they stormed its shrines, then turned blades upon one another, a blood-soaked hymn to our unholy trinity.
We gods watched it all unfold from the balcony and I savored the moment as Inanna and Gwar traded barbs over the wreckage—hers a silken lash, his a bellowing storm. “Your fools die too fast,” War roared. “They’ll last longer screaming my name,” Lust retorted.
“I’ve had my fill,” I slipped away from the scene even as their voices fading into the city’s cacophony. I’d hoped my calm demeanor left them uncertain, yet I feared they might have seen it was naught but a brittle shell cracking under the threat of Dagaal’s weight—did either know its resting place? Had Lucifer betrayed me to them?
Let them trust in our fictitious pact, even though I know it would crumble under my unseen hand. They might think they got the better of me, but time would prove otherwise.
Wishing I’d never answered Inanna’s invite, I couldn’t wait to return to The Cauldron. Once home, I let the shell of my stoicism shatter. The volcano loomed around me – home – its maw spewing sulfurous plumes that stung the air, the ground quaking with its restless wrath. My lair sprawled within—a cavern of obsidian and bone, lit by veins of molten rock pulsing like arteries, the walls scarred with eons of my fury. “Out!” I bellowed, my voice a whip as Ogres and goblins scattered, their whimpers drowned by the chasm’s echo. Racing to the cellars I seized a cask of blood wine—crimson as a mortal’s last breath—and drank deep right from the barrel – the iron tang a futile salve for the dread clawing my core.
“Dagaal,” I spat, hurling the empty cask across the floor. “They know! And they dare wield it over me—me, Death incarnate!” Opening another barrel I gulped again, the wine spilling over maw and onto my robes as I paced. Fear gnawed me—had Lucifer whispered its secret to my rivals? Could they find it? “Let them try,” I roared, kicking a pile of bones that clattered like a dirge, “I’ll rend them to ash!”
I opened another barrel of wind – my mind a storm of frantic, desperate thoughts. I was not afraid of them, not of Inanna’s wiles or Gwar’s brute force. I was afraid of what they would do with that knowledge. They wouldn’t dare wield Dagaal themselves, but they would seek it out, and use it as a bargaining chip. And as for Lucifer… I shudder to think what he would do when he finds out my secret has been exposed.
The wine soon blurred my edges, but oblivion still mocked me—yet my godly frame was too stubborn to yield. Slumping into the corner, I glowered into the dark, the volcano’s rumble syncing with my storm.
But then, a flicker of hope. A small, desperate spark in the darkness as I thought, What happened to Pesties?
The answer was about to be mine – for surely Aspus had fetched the Grim, and with that magic blade, I’d soon crush my rivals.
There could be no doubt – for Azazel always wins!
The Apocrypha of Azazel 