A Real Goddess Would Let Nobody Die

Menelyn's 9000th birthday, in 8036, was scheduled for Ezenta, and Izenakee's 8000th, in 8045, for Rokesha, to balance Izena's 8000th in Kanenn and the Goddesses' tendency to spend more time in Esto while Kennalaria was a child. It was 8036, and Menelyn was about to finish casting Her family's spells in the Temple of the Liberation, before the Goddesses exited the Dome to begin the festival at dawn.

Unusually, Izena was only combing Kennalaria's hair today, not braiding it. Kennalaria had asked to reproduce Her Mother's appearance as closely as possible for today's event, including Her perfectly straight, unadorned, unbraided, silver hair.

Menelyn and Izena wore mostly Izena's light-absorbent black mana nowadays as a means of preventing Menelyn's glow from being too overbearing. For today only, They had retrieved Menelyn's old clothing from the Benevin Temple's museum for the first time since depositing it there millennia ago, but not for Her. Kennalaria would be wearing it, as part of Her request. It was slightly snug on Her, since She was halfway between Her 'little cutie pie' Mother and Izenakee's low-end-of-normal petiteness, but the style was simple and loose enough that the minor difference did not matter that much.

It had never stopped amusing Kennalaria that the most powerful entities in the cosmos were always surrounded by towering Guards in bulky armor who made Them look like fragile children, if you disregarded that the weight of Their authority warped the world around Them both physically and metaphysically, and that They appeared to stand outside reality. Kennalaria Herself had this latter effect.

The Helpers at the Benevin museum had been awed by the whole affair. The fabric that had been in continuous contact with the White Goddess' body for millennia, from the Sacrifice until the end of the Renewal, was the most holy of artifacts. It had been so thoroughly imbued with Salvation's Essence for so long that it itself still glowed even today, still remained pristine after millennia on display, and kept its surroundings clean. Love's old tunic, immediately next to it, was maintained by its proximity, and itself still radiated a weaker version of its Owner's aura.

Kennalaria had needed to remove Menelyn's tunic from its exhibition room personally. The Helpers had believed that the footsteps and breath of any but the Goddesses would "profane the Incorruptible Altar," never mind someone touching the "Radiant Mantle" itself. Salvation's most devout followers never failed to discover new ways to make Her feel awkward, and Benevin attracted an extra special sort. But, She had long ago promised never to reject this treatment.

A little over 8036 years ago, Menelyn had been unable to find a meaningful difference between what She was and what She was believed to be, in Rokesha. Observing Her tunic and the effect it had on its surroundings, She felt the same way. Remarkably, the Helpers were actually correct. If any mortals entered the purified room, their imperfect health and cleanliness would slightly deplete the mana lingering in Her tunic, and what had leaked out of it into the surrounding area over the millennia. Any but a Goddess entering would detract very slightly but noticeably from the exhibit's appearance of sanctity, until Salvation 'restored' it.

Menelyn's old possessions seemed like sacred items that would be profaned by the touch of any but a Goddess because they were. Her Daughter could retrieve and wear Her Mother's old tunic without damaging its magical properties because She, too, was an impossibly clean and healthy immortal, saturated in Menelyn's mana. Salvation could only quibble over Her Helpers' verbiage; however, trying to argue that they were correct but should use different words would be counterproductive. So, She simply agreed, and Kennalaria entered the room alone, with the viewing chamber closed off.

Afterward, those same Helpers had seen Salvation's Daughter walk out while wearing the tunic, to make sure it fit, right next to murals depicting the White Goddess during Her Return. It was as if Menelyn had stepped out of the ancient paintings. Helpers were more habituated to the Goddesses than the general public, but the devout had their limits. Menelyn had been impressed with how well Kennalaria handled one of Her first experiences with unrestrained, heartfelt, fully religious worship directed specifically at Her and not the Goddesses generally, qualitatively different from the more superficial celebrity 'worship' She had previously received. Accept it, acknowledge it, understand its source, assure those who offer it that the love is mutual, and recommit to maintaining benevolence worthy of that level of faith: She had seen the Sisters do it often enough.

Menelyn noted with amusement that, in about a millennium, the Violet Goddess' sparkly wardrobe would assuredly be lining the walls of the room or something, reflecting the tunic's glow.

When originally asking if She could wear Her Mother's old outfit, Kennalaria had explained Her motivation.

"I want the focus to be on You on Your 9000th birthday. I don't want to be the Violet Goddess when the door opens, I want to be the White Goddess' Daughter. I want everyone to be reminded of what You did. I want them to be reminded that the very same Goddess from the myths is standing right in front of them, and has been giving all of Herself every day all this time, ever since. And," She looked off to the side, then the ground, "if I'm really, really honest, I'm just...so proud to be Your Daughter, that I, I want everyone to see Me that way. I want everyone to see how much of You is in Me. The 65-year-old Goddess of Luck and Joy and the Future was born from the 9000-year-old Goddess of Salvation and Hope and Peace. It was Her efforts that made Me and My world possible. I want to show everyone Who I came from."

Izena had replied with "at least one of You gets it"--making Menelyn accept that She did great things and should be proud of Herself was among Izena's highest, oldest priorities.

Looking at Kennalaria now, as They prepared to exit the Temple, Menelyn felt dopey from an overdose of warm syrup. It is well-known that daughters want their mothers' approval, but the reverse is just as true. Menelyn had never felt so proud of Herself as She did when the Temple doors opened to a city of pure white.

At every past festival, Menelyn had pushed through the butterflies, smiled as serenely as She could, and waved gently with Her right hand. Today, She was inspired. This time, She beamed and waved with both hands. It was embarrassingly out-of-character--publicly, Menelyn was pensive sobriety incarnate--but so what? Everyone loved it, Her family most of all.

----

Kennalaria was still holding Her mother's hand, for all the good it was doing her now. She had known this day was coming. It was not a shock to lose parents over 100 years old. She Herself was nearly seventy-four, but She hadn't aged in about forty-nine years. She had accepted that this day of isolation would come, when She signed up for immortality. None of this made it pleasant. Not even Joy Herself could find joy in this.

And now Keekee would feel bad about Her 8000th birthday in a few days.

"I'm sor--"

"Don't You dare finish that sentence," Izenakee warned. "I have had many birthdays and will have many more. You get one lifetime with Your parents. Believe Me, I know. We don't need to leave for Rokesha until tomorrow. Let's head to the Star Temple. There is no point in You standing here and waiting while trying to maintain appearances for the public."

Kennalaria shook Her head and released Her mother's hand. "There's no need to waste so much time. I'm fine."

"No, You aren't. You're numb, and need to grieve, before the Violet Goddess has a breakdown at a millennial birthday megafestival on live broadcast to billions. The best way for You to do that in the roughly twenty hours that We have available is to go stargazing privately with Your family. That gets You in the mood for emotional vulnerability. Please do not forget now of all times that I am an 8000-year-old Goddess of round-the-clock emotional support. I really do know what I'm talking about."

Menelyn walked over to Kennalaria and put Her Daughter's hand on Her shoulder, silently insisting that She jump Them to the elevator.

"And, Menelyn and Izena are not fine either. They are doing the same nonsensical guilt thing that They did when My parents died," Izenakee finished, as She copied Menelyn. "You need to lay next to each Other, say sappy stuff about stars, and cry a lot. Let's go."

----

Kennalaria's Mother was clinging to Her silently while 'casting the dusk spell' using such a wholly excessive flood of mana that Kennalaria couldn't actually see any stars. She knew that the real spell had ended a long time ago, and what had followed was just what Mom did when She didn't know what else to do. Her life experience and general philosophy was 'if My mana hasn't made it all better yet, I haven't used enough.' And, She wasn't wrong. A torrent of warm excitement sloshed around semi-randomly, shattering the numbness, so overwhelming that it forced Kennalaria to release everything else. The tears and snot were cleaned as soon as they appeared, and She was so uniformly bursting with energy that it paradoxically felt relaxing.

It helped that the Goddess of Love was scritching Her scalp, too.

"What exactly can You hear? From the stars?" Kennalaria murmured. She had never raised the subject, partly since it seemed to make Her family glum, partly since the details would only matter in thousands of years, but tonight She wanted to know. Who exactly was the Twilight Goddess going to be able to help?

Izenakee shook Her head. "Prayers for help to any Who can hear. I don't understand the words, of course, and the details are limited, completely absent for the more distant ones, but I can feel the emotions behind them. They face problems that only a benevolent deity could solve, so They call to Us, because if We do not exist, then there is no one who can help. As far as I can tell, the worlds are broadly similar to Ours. People living in cities and villages, but with prayers never answered."

"Can they hear You back?"

"To different degrees. On the nearest world with an organized society, I think We are already worshipped, or maybe only I am. It is difficult to tell, and I think I initially confused them by trying to show how Menelyn and Izena are in the same body. They thought We were all One Goddess with multiple aspects. But, I think recently they've started to understand that there are three Goddesses, three separate bodies, when I started showing You."

Izenakee smiled. "Don't worry, I've shown You as something similar to how You would appear if We meet them."

Kennalaria's Sisters really were Goddesses.

"I have tried to show that We intend to help, tried to explain that We are building Our strength until it is enough to punch through the divide between worlds, and urged them to hold on, even though it will take a very long time. I think they have interpreted this as Us, or Me, currently preparing to descend from the 'Sacred Realm of the Goddesses,' or something like that, and assume that time works differently here. They know that it will be a long time, they know they will keep suffering in the interim, but it gives them hope, and the will to endure. Ah, I should have started with this: My best interpretation of what I hear is that mages on this world have enslaved non-mages. After We came here for the first time, some of the slaves heard My reply to their prayers, and got the sense from it that a real Goddess, not a self-styled one, had finally heard them, and not only that, She vehemently disapproved of the situation. For more distant worlds, I can only send My Love, and I know even less about what is happening."

Twilight nodded to Herself, burrowed into Salvation, and drew in mana just beyond the pain threshold.

----

As the Violet Goddess stepped out of the Rokesha Temple to a city covered in red, She felt a change. She no longer had a personal relationship with any of the billions watching Her. Most had never known a world with fewer than four Goddesses--that there had been only three, and before that only two, was an answer to a question in history class. The children of this era no longer viewed the Goddess of Luck as Kennalaria, a Goddess just like them. She was from their grandparents' era, distinct mostly in that Her deification had been recorded, unlike those of Her elder Sisters, but She looked the same in that recording as She did if you went to see Her in a Temple today. She was as timeless as the rest of Them.

The Twilight Goddess was now fully an organ of society, standing in the Temple's doorway next to Day-and-Night, and Dawn-wearing-Dusk: Her only family, and the only people Who could maintain eye contact with Her without encouragement.

The Goddess of Omens turned to Her furiously blushing Sister, to support Her before She dropped to Her knees. Once She was convinced that Empathy would need no further help after enduring the initial empathic blow, Joy turned to the crowd unsteadily, giggling like an idiot and flushed from Her Sister's aura, and waved enthusiastically with both sparkling hands.

After all, She was the luckiest person ever born, and She always would be.