Once upon a time, a child… a human child was born. A wholly unremarkable day except for the fact that a boy was born. It was a day that would later be known as a Tuesday. This Tuesday a boy with an intricate and detailed fate was born. A boy with no name at birth, but would later be known as Shadow.

Shadow’s mother went into labor three months early at the temple of the sun god. She was escorted by her husband who later forbid her from raising her son. Shadow was claimed by the priests of the sun god and was raised to be High Priest. A title of which Shadow claimed at the age of eight. The age at which he was given his name.

Eight years old, raised by priests, he was dubbed Shadow because of his affinity for staying within shadows. He said, at eight years old, “I can speak with our god only when he is not busy.”

A god, he thought, only because I don’t have the heart to tell the other priests that our god is a really a goddess. He, indeed, was the only one who knew that he was a she. Shadow was the only one who could actually communicate with her. He was the only one who had actually seen the realm of the gods as they knew it. Shadow was the only priest who knew the sun goddess on a personal level.

IIIIIII

“Ra’ap,” he said, because he was the only human who knew her true name and true form. “How are you fairing this day, my love?”

He was kneeling, and the goddess beckoned him to stand. “I am well. And you?”

“My brother priest praise me as the promised one,” he stood reveling in awe at her beauty. “I tire of it. They make me take lives as sacrifice to you. The taste of death blood sickens me. I weary of it.”

“As do I. Only a few more years, my love,” she said stroking Shadow’s cheek. “Then you may end your life and when your soul flees your body I will claim you as my god consort.”

“Why, again, must I wait a few more years,” he asked while pressing her hand against his own cheek.

“Because, my little priest, when you die your form will stay true. I wish you to be of a mature human sixteen years.”

“But, my love,” he exclaimed, “I want to hold my celestial body against yours now.”

“A few more years,” a tear leaked down the goddess’ cheek, “and we will be together. Just go about your prayers and worship for a little while longer and then we will be together eternally. When your immortal these few more years will feel like seconds.”

IIIIIII

Shadow stood in the shadow of a pillar. He leaned against it and was regarded by the cool touch of stone. He could hear the throngs of gatherers below him begging for blood. He, however, was the only one who had to look that man that was about to die in the eye. He just had, and it made him want to weep.

“Steel my will,” Shadow pleaded to his beloved goddess. It was only two weeks till his sixteenth birthday. He had only two more weeks of mortal torture to endure before his suicide and the eternal loving embrace of his goddess.

“Anything, my love,” Ra’ap answered. A beam of sunlight warmed his cheek as she stroked it with her palm. “Anything, nay, everything you’ve ever wanted I will give you.”

He traced his symbol with a mixture of wax and ash on his brow. His symbol was a circle with a vertical line through it center, a horizontal line passing from the vertical to the edge of the circle toward the left. Then he traced his god’s symbol on each cheek, it was the same as his except that the vertical line ran to the right. He squared his shoulders and straightened his headdress. Then after a moment’s thought drew the goddess’ symbol over his heart to show to that it belonged to her.

He began his descent down the stone steps toward the alter. He saw his sacrifice” a man with his head held high, a smug grin, and bound by two burly alter men. He stared down at the gatherers all anxiously awaiting the man’s death. Shadow was overcome with disgust.

He knelt on one side of the alter and the other priests forced the sacrifice down onto his knees. Shadow and the man who was about to die locked gazes.

“You’ll be cursed for this,” the sacrifice said matter-of-factly.

“I’m cursed to be alive. The sun god will bless me…” he almost said ‘soon’, but thought better of voicing his self immolation, and said, “Someday.”

“If you do this you’ll never be blessed, cursed for all eternity.”

“Do you think yourself a god?” Shadow was furious. He thought himself cursed to drink the blood of men in a ritual that even the god detested.

The man looked taken aback. “No…” he stuttered, “I’m not.”

“Please, you poor fool, give me your name so I can pray for your soul after you die,” Shadow pleaded.

The man laughed, not a sound often heard before death, “you, little human, cannot kill me.”

“I’ve killed one man a week for almost eight years. I can assure you that it will not be difficult. Nor, I assure you, will it be unnecessarily painful for yourself. Please, your name.”

“Death.”

“Fine. I wish you a pleasant trip to the other realm.”

Shadow nodded and the priests held the man’s head down. Another placed a pounded gold bowl beneath the man’s neck, and another handed Shadow the ceremonial knife.

Shadow heard Death chanting and he leaned down to hear the man’s last words. “By my blood, never to see the light of day. By my blood, always to taste nothing but the blood of man. By my blood, to be cast out by the god’s themselves. By my blood, cursed forever.”

The man started his chant anew. Shadow shook his head and with practiced ease brought the knife to the man’s neck. “By my blood.” Shadow brought the knife across the man’s neck. Blood poured down into the bowl.

While the man was bleeding dry, Shadow retraced his symbols in the man’s blood. He almost forgot the one over his heart. Thinking it’d be less blood he’d actually have to drink he traced that one too. Shadow placed the tips of his fingers over his heart, kissed them, and then held them toward the sun.

Shadow raised the bowl to his lips and sipped the horrid drink of his destruction. He gulped at it, wishing it was done with. He resisted the urge to vomit. From experience he knew he’d have to repeat the rite if he did. Shadow finished, purposefully spilling it down the front of him so he’d have to drink less.

“By my blood, you are doomed,” the man said.

Shadow stared in horror as Death rocked up to sit on his heels. “How on Earth do you still live?”

“Simple, my cursed one, I am not of this planet.” The man, who was supposed to be dead, smiled his smug smile again.

Shadow’s stomach was gripped with pain. Where is Ra’ap, he thought, she always takes away my pain. Shadow looked up as one of the other priests raised a sword to decapitate Death. “Don’t,” Shadow said. “The man survived the ritual. Let him live and tend to his wound.”

“But,” the priest started.

Shadow cut him off. “Do as I say.” He looked at the man in disbelief. The wound was tending to itself. It had stopped bleeding and it looked as if the shallow edges were mending.

Shadow knew he would vomit soon. He held his head toward the sun but it was scorching his skin and only upsetting his stomach worse. He stood and made his way quickly to the shadow of a pillar. “Ra’ap help me.”

Unbeknownst to Shadow, Ra’ap was screaming in fury. She was unable to communicate with the love of her life. She was unable to ease his pain. She had to hide herself behind a cloud to keep from scorching his skin. She knew that when she set that night he would never again be able to behold her countenance.

Shadow was on his knees begging to Ra’ap. He felt ill all over. His body was sticky with sweat and blood. His skin felt on fire, while inside he froze, and his stomach beckoned to be purged. “Help me.”

Someone took his arm and helped him up. It was Death. A name Shadow was beginning to believe was true. “What did you do to me?”

“I cursed you,” Death said. “I informed you I would.”

“I can’t hear Ra’ap,” Shadow slipped with the god’s real name, but prayed Death would mistake it as sick babble.

“Ah, so you do know the goddess by her real name.” Death patted Shadow’s back. “I don’t know why you’d think this is something she’d like. You humans are a strange ilk.”

“I know she doesn’t like the sacrifices,” Shadow said, and ignored the man’s ramble about humans. It was too much for him to take. “But the temple makes me do it. Now, sir, what did you do to me?”

“I cursed you. Although I think I may have done it improperly. You seem to have become Imorali.”

“Immortal,” Shadow shrieked. “I can’t be immortal. I have to die so I can marry Ra’ap.”

“Not immortal, son, Imorali. Common misunderstanding. Though to a once human like yourself, I suppose it would seem that way.” Death helped Shadow to a darker place within the temple’s confines. “Tough luck as to becoming Ra’ap’s husband though. I doubt you’ll ever see the sun again.”

“No,” Shadow pleaded. Tears leaked down his face to wash rivulets of the man’s blood away. “Undo what you’ve done.”

“It’s not as simple as all that. You’re a cursed man now, and you’d best come to terms with that.” Death went about wiping his own blood off of Shadow’s face in a perfectly calm manner regarding the circumstances.

“You said you messed up your spell. What was it supposed to do?”

“Kill your body, but keep your soul alive and trapped in limbo so you’d never see the sun and never have another taste in your mouth beyond blood. But as you can see you’re still very much alive.”

“Well fix it. Ra’ap can save me from limbo. I know she will. Kill me friend, I beg of you.”

“I can’t, my undead friend.”

Shadow regarded Death for a second. “What were you going on about blood for when you were cursing me?”

“Well… Imorali blood is the strongest magical catalyst around. You ever heard of Asalia?” Death gave Shadow a half-second to answer, then remembered who, and what, he was talking to. “Of course you haven’t. Asalia is a plant that takes Imorali blood, only blood spilled in malice, mind you, and the earth’s magic and grows the most beautiful flower ever. Dig the flower up and you find a bulb beneath it, crush that up in a pint of water and you get the most powerful weapon against Imorali. It causes paralyses for a day’s and night’s time, with excruciating pain that makes you want to flail but you are unable to. The smell of it is toxic to humans. The same blood that has the power to harm also keeps our injuries healing more rapidly than humans. A single drop of Imorali blood can heal a death-dealing injury a human has. You see what I mean about Imorali blood though don’t you? If little Imorali blood and a little dirt can make poison, then a bowl full of Imorali blood and a well-worded curse can make fellow such as yourself not like you once were.”

Shadow had always been a quick learner and one able to accept things as they were. “Well… you can’t unmake the curse,” Shadow told Death. Death gave Shadow a strange look which made Shadow remember that he’d just restated his companion without continuing his train of thought. “Can you spill more blood and fashion a new curse that could turn me back into human?”

Death looked rather stricken. He’d come to rather like the boy he had cursed. Insult to injury, Death had to tell Shadow that he couldn’t fix what he done. “There is nothing I can do for you. Perhaps a god could lift your curse. But, Shadow, the curse I laid into to your body has left you forsaken from all the gods. I’m sorry. Now you better watch the sun set for I fear you’ll never be able to again.”