for there are many ways to kill a man they say

There’s no mystery as to why Wessex is here: she missed out on the last patrol and wants to make up for it. So the obvious solution is to head there herself, all alone, because she’s a big girl and can take care of herself. God, bone monster, and black altar be damned.

She is, perhaps, a little too eager to return to the site of the reveal, having left it alone since she’d hauled Tiamat’s ass out of there. To be honest, Wessex is rather unfamiliar with the way ‘Gods’ work: sure, she’s seen the Spark get his panties in a twist about the Basin disappointing him (how? It was their fault the newly appointed Lady went MIA?),  but that was about it. Her homeland didn’t have deities or magic (it might still be standing if it had), and in her wanderings, she’s never stayed in one place long enough to develop an affinity for a ‘higher being.’ She’d met priests and priestesses, those who swore on their own version of the Most High, but they’d never been able to sway her opinion about the whole matter.

While her eyes must concede that Gods are real, her mind cannot take the proverbial leap and have such blind faith. Wessex needs evidence of things - cold, hard facts - or else she must fall back on single-minded self-reliance. No one is going to take care of her, so why should she bother expending energy in worship?

Spirited steps bring her to the western marshland, the dead lands ripe with rotting plant matter, but not the tell-tale sign of a body’s decay. The summer’s heat has dried up some of the water, but not much, and her legs are soon spattered with mud, her hooves carrying a thin layer of much. The black obelisk is easy to find, and the altar that sprang from bones and now stands silent (so she thinks). Two mares are there, inspecting it - both of whom are unfamiliar. Which isn’t saying much, as Wessex’s working knowledge of Helovians is rather limited. One is even taller than she, adorned in horns and wings and a skull mask. The other is smaller, but neither seem to be threatening. Nevertheless, she hails the pair with a deep voice and draws up on the opposite side of the stone. “Don’t mind me if I’m intruding on something. Just here to take a look at the big-ass rock.”

Defiant sacrilege just drips from her tongue, betraying her opinion on the matter without having to say anything at all.  

I am Iron and I Forge Myself