Delerium's Mistress: Tales of the Flat Earth Book 4 by Tanith Lee

Author:Tanith Lee
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Publisher: Immanion Press
Published: 2014-02-13T00:00:00+00:00

The first shard struck the sun. The second shard struck it. And the third. At each impact there came a surge of light and heat more dreadful than those which the sun already shot and flailed about itself. But when the third fire spasm guttered and died, there was only the flaming mass of the sun disk, terrible enough, but not more terrible than it had ever been.

And then. With a violence that caused the upper airs to judder in a skyquake, the sun disgorged. Once, twice, thrice, a torrent of scalding matter reared upward and soared over heaven in a roaring arc, led by a dot of brilliance unbearable to look on, if any had looked, a shooting star of cosmic arson—which, ending its flight suddenly in mid-ether, stopped still and hung there, slowly cooling moment by moment to a stab of diamond. Until:

They stood high up, between earth and heaven, like three stooping hawks, their feet upon the winds and their wide wings spread. They were the Malukhim, the Sun-Created. They were made to be the scourge of men, the warrior-priests of the gods, their messengers and envoys, the shining sheathless blade of that which had outgrown battle.

The first who sprang from the solar fire was Ebriel. He stood on the right hand, and he had been calcined to yellow-gold. His skin was the metal of a king’s goblet, and his eyes like topaz, and his hair was a lion’s mane of the hue of the tasseled wheat in the field. His garments were of that pale creaminess of the asphodel, and the sheen of his flesh shone through with a golden radiation. His breastplate was hammered gold gazing with blond citrines. His wings were whitely gold as those of a young eagle. He was like the spring sun at noon.

The second who sprang from the fire was Yabael, and he stood on the left hand, and he had been seethed for a greater while, and his was a gold dark as darkest bronze. So the metal of his skin, but his eyes were like tawny amethysts, and his hair a stallion’s mane the hue of the scorched rufous leaves of autumn oaks. His garments were fulvous, like honey in beer, and the burnish of his flesh burned through with a somber radiation. His breastplate was of hammered brazen gold wounded with copper zircons. His wings were shadowed gilt as those of a vulture. He was like the late-summer sun in thunder.

But foremost, and nearest to the world, with the solar disk behind his head, there stood Melqar, who had stayed within the fire until it seared him white. His skin was the fairest gold, the metal of a sacred chalice, and his eyes were kindled lamps, and his hair a sunburst. His garments dazzled white as all white things, the newborn snows, the bones within a child, and the sunshine of his bright golden flesh soaked through with the radiation of a torch. His breastplate of hammered white gold was sunned with golden beryls.

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