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Crinkles on the aged yet youthful face of the God deepen as he smiles at Midas, his words being considered so admirably by the young painted boy. It had been ages since Father Earth had been a young stallion, and it escapes his memory whether or not he had grown from the body of a colt - even the deity cannot remember so far back in time. Still, the trouble of the youth had not changed much, and the God of the Earth is almost tickled to know that the heart is a predictable thing. It beats in the presence of your beloved with such fervor you fear it may fall from your chest cavity unto the ground at their hooves. In the presence of an enemy, it grows cold and distant, and even your pulse feels faint in your body. Malice and love, so very connected yet so distant in their effects. Just how close were the two feelings? They were both spurned by passion, but one was the ugly sibling while one revered with such high authority that many lived their life in search of it.
Even he, bearded God and second son of Helovia, had grown fond of the thought of love. Instead of reverence, the deity had grown a humble respect. Love is what bound him to the mortals, and it was a powerful tie. Even here, laying close to his beloved son Midas, the God of the Earth was tied by the emotion. Breaking down the walls between mortal and immortal, love made the Earth and his follower nothing but family.
A strong, potent thing.
Yet, so was hate.
The great bay considers the words of the young stallion carefully. His sister, lady of the Moon, had betrayed her own followers by giving careless or perhaps too objective of advice. Here, the God of the Earth would have to speak with the utmost clarity and confidence, to avoid sending Midas in the direction that would lead to the destruction of himself or another. Gentle features are drawn in heavy thought, preponderance, of this difficult question. Was there ever a correct moment to take the life of another? Self defense? Defense of another? Who weighs one life as meaning more than another? The corrupted souls, are they worth less than the brilliant clean spirits? Today, his crown of ram horns felt heavy.
"Eventually, the life of all comes to an end," he says, his voice deep and serious in this moment, rumbling like a quiet earthquake. "Who are you to decide when their end comes?" He takes pause, giving Midas a very serious look with his emerald eyes that flickered with the light of spring. "Hatred is easy. Brutality is easy. Arrogance is easy. It is the option of modesty, forgiveness, and mercy - that is the difficult one. Deciding to kill comes quickly, but it is deciding when to spare a life that seems to challenge my children." He lets out a heavy sigh, his eyes turning away from the golden, seamless eyes of Midas for a moment. "You treat him as you would any stranger on the field of battle. Placing him in an area reserved for revenge is flattery. He becomes special to you when you harbor these dark feelings, my son. The only souls who should be so special are those who you would protect from him."
"Be the stronger of the two, Midas. Choose life instead of death," the deity says, his voice warm like the summer sun. "The only thing that awaits you down the path of hatred is a cold, empty darkness."
[ Apologies for the wait. ]
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On the brink of failure (earth god, open)
