Samothes doesnât need to sleep, strictly speaking. When he built the sun, he did not rest for the duration of that long night, tireless hands aglow in the rich red-dark for uncountable hours. He predates the clock and its regimens. But he is familiar with the concept, of course, and these days, he sleeps to dream. To dream of Hieron and its people and things that could be, fresh new things sparking white with young light in the forge or in the callused berth of his hands, delicate machines unspooled into eons of golden thread and steam and the crackle of old magic. Wires suspended in the blackness, in Nothing. Some of his most precious creations have come to him first like this, as maps of potential laid out behind closed eyes.
This time, he dreams of falling.
He is the sun, or he is something adjacent to it, his body and spirit a blaze of impossible heat suspended in the thin blue-black of the sky where it meets the edge of creation. And he is plummeting. His arms are wings of fire thrown out to break his fall, find purchase in the roar of air as it surges past him, but as he falls he is growing cool - searing white skin gone red, then a lustrous silvery black. He is improbably heavy, iron-boned. Colder, colder still. It starts at his extremities and curls inward like ice through wintry lakes, shooting veins of frost through his blood and stilling his heart in a smothering grasp until he is only dead metal. Falling, falling. Around him, the air goes white and thick with snow, and then quite dark. Some membranous stratum of cloud pierces, then, and he is a frigid thing plunged into roiling heat, burning up. Disappearing. He watches as the last scraps of himself dissolve like iron filings set alight.
When he awakens, he is not in Hieron.
He knows this, because he knows Hieron, and he knows his own handiwork. This is not it. It takes him a moment of blinking the dullness of sleep from his eyes to recognize it, but as soon as the room around him registers, the realization hits him with inexorable slow-moving force, like the roll of mountains forming. He finds himself lying on a comfortable but modest bed in a well-lit, wood-furnished room, green-tinted sunlighted streaming in dappled rays through the window. There is a sun here, too, then, although this one is ruddier than he remembers. The decor is simple, but sleek, every component slotted together with pleasing harmony. He is not above a moment of cautious appreciation before turning over in his bed (his bed? it is the bed that he slept in, so he supposes that is a fine assumption) and getting to his bare, curiously chilly feet.
Beside the bed, he finds a neatly folded change of robe and pants, along with his crown and a small tablet of some sort. He takes his crown - reassuringly, it remains hot to the touch - then the tablet, turning it over delicately in his hands. Itâs a thin, glossy object, apparently constructed from glass and metal, and when he brushes its surface with his fingertips it flickers to life, casting a pallid glow. Fascinating. It doesnât feel magical, doesnât thrum against his skin or push against the lower echelons of his consciousness the way magical things do, but it must be, from the way it animates and rearranges, text and images dancing nimbly across its surface at the slightest touch. This certainly isnât his handiwork. Heâd remember it.
The object is captivating in its elegance, but after several momentsâ appraisal Samothes remains unsure of its significance. It seems to contain an index of lore - the history of this place, perhaps - and a good deal of names, organized under symbols he doesnât recognize. Heâll return to that later, when he can dissect the device properly. Itâs an unfamiliar feeling, encountering a design he doesnât intuitively know, canât mentally disassemble and reassemble down to the intricate details, and it grates on him, an insistent itch under his collarbone. Unsettles him, too, if heâs honest. He feels that as a leery clamminess settling in his stomach. But itâs unhelpful, presently, for him to dwell on the discomfort. He decides to be simply annoyed, and continues his investigation.
Thereâs something unusual about himself, too, Samothes realizes. Some inner quiet to him, a stillness. His toes are cold on the wood floor. He feels... truncated, or perhaps dissociated, as though there is a good deal of empty space between the parts of him, eerily inert. There is nothing immediate to be done about that, either, so he files it away for future observation.
The more he sees, the more certain he becomes that he does not know this place, nor whatever gods must have wrought it. The earth outside his room, and the building that encapsulates it, is lush and teeming with soft green life, at once gnarled with time and tender with shoots of new growth, but it is not his earth, not the earth that bore him. Samol is absent here. Samothes knows it with a strange, steely certainty. He feels it, as instinctively as he recognizes the lines of his forebearerâs face, in every thrust and give of mossy knoll underfoot and chatter of alien birdsong overhead. Itâs a lonely feeling. A dim ache that surges and then recedes like a crest of surf.
He takes his time exploring. The craftsmanship of the building is certainly impressive, although it stirs a faint coil of something like envy in his chest. The greenhouse and elevator are particularly enthralling. He reminds himself not to dwell too long tracing the seams of them, the loving minutiae. Outside, wooden walkways sprawl arterial through the trees, and he follows them without particular direction. The people here are as strange as everything else, a race of great shaggy creatures resembling Severeaâs own bears, with blocky snouts and beady, intelligent eyes. He smiles at them politely as he passes.
Eventually, Samothes comes to a hub of sorts, a convergence of walkways upon a structure embedded in the trunks of several massive trees that bustles quietly with what he recognizes as the movement of everyday life. There is a station here, and a track, extending polished rails that weave through the forest into the impenetrable distance. Several people wait patiently on the platform that flanks the track. Bear-people, but others, too, of sorts he both does and doesnât recognize. Samothes tilts his head a fraction, a little crease forming between his brows. This is some kind of machinery, no doubt, but again, it rings foreign to him, has the touch of someone elseâs hands. The work of whatever god or gods built this place. Curious, he crosses the platform in slow strides, scanning the place as though scrutinizing his own blueprints, penciling in details.
âStrange,â he breathes, a low rumble in his chest. âStrange indeed.â
