Excerpt: In Good Faith

Larc wondered, briefly, what day it was. Monday, maybe; he wasn’t sure why he thought that, but he had a feeling. He scratched his beard, wondering when was the last time he’d shaved. Probably not yesterday.
“What day is it?” he said, glancing up at the sky. He didn’t know why he bothered. Force of habit, he supposed.
No answer. Not that he expected one. Bastard. Never a line when Larc wanted to talk, but when he needed something done? Then Larc couldn’t even hear himself think, there was so much shouting. What a crock.
It hadn’t taken long for the disillusionment to set in. He’d kept at it, he really had. Months of wandering, evading Mitula’s priests. Months of preaching to strangers who kept smiling at him in a calming fashion while they backed away slowly. Months of sleeping in ditches.
He’d had it.
“I guess this is goodbye,” he said. Larc waited, giving him a chance to reply, but there was nothing. Not that it surprised him. What a bastard.
“Well,” Larc said, looking down at the sword he wore. He’d never actually killed anyone, but you had to start somewhere.
Five minutes later, Larc had recovered enough from the pain to pull the sword out and stagger into an alleyway, bleeding all over the cobblestones.
“What the hell is this!?” he shouted, glaring at the sky, then at the wall when he felt silly about talking to the sky. “It doesn’t work like that! I should be dead! DEAD!”
Still nothing. Bastard.
“Don’t look, sweetie,” came a hushed voice from the street. Larc whipped around, turning his glare on the woman standing at the mouth of the alleyway, covering her young daughter’s eyes with one hand.
“What are you staring at!?” Larc snapped, taking a step forward. “What, am I bothering you? Am I just—“
The woman fled hoisted her child in her arms and fled. Larc slumped against the wall, panting.
He wondered if he should stop the bleeding. Would it matter? He’d stabbed himself through the heart, he should be dead by now. If a certain person would just take a hint and let him go already.
LARC, came a sudden booming voice in his mind. LARC, HEAR MY WORDS.
“Shut up!” Larc said, sliding to the ground. It smelled like urine and rotting food, and now also like blood. Fuck. What a day…
LARC, YOU MUST GO FORTH. IN THE NORTH YOU WILL FIND A TOWN…
“I don’t care!” Dammit, he was still bleeding.
HEED MY WORDS, LARC.
“Shut the hell up,” Larc mumbled. He waited another minute to see if the blood loss would start making him feel dizzy, but it didn’t, so he gave in. Holding his hands over the wound, he cast a spell of healing. A soft blue light cloaked his hands, and the blood flow dried up. The hole closed. He was fine…mostly.
He stood up, wincing; the spell never got rid of all the residual pain.
Leaving the alley, Larc took out his map and started looking for any nearby cliffs.
LARC, came the voice again, but he ignored it. He was done with this job. He would try every damn method of suicide ever invented if he had to—he was done.
-o-o-o-o-o-
It is difficult to say no to God. As they say, you can’t run from him—the old hymn tells it best. “Where can I run from your love? If I climb to the heavens you are there. If I fly to the sunrise, or sail beyond the sea, still I’d find you there.” That’s not love, that’s plain old stalking. But the point stands: there’s really no way to escape from God. He is, after all omniscient, at least in theory.
Give Larc some credit. It only took him a few years to give up trying to kill himself. Really, give him an A for effort. Not that it did him any good.
-o-o-o-o-o-
He didn’t know this town. Larc didn’t know most of the towns, really; once he’d been to one, there was pretty much no going back. There’d been less angry mobs lately, though. He’d convinced God to try a more subtle approach. ‘More’ being, of course, a relative term.
The road was muddy and he slid from side to side as he walked. The rain was blurring his vision, he thought. He hoped. There was a faint ringing in his ears.
Larc paused in the middle of the road. Where was it he was going? He couldn’t concentrate…
LARC, God was saying. YOU MUST WAIT HERE. I WILL SEND TO YOU THE ONE YOU HAVE SOUGHT AFTER FOR THESE TEN YEARS.
“That’s what I’ve been doing?” Larc mumbled. “What was the point of all that preaching?”
I THOUGHT WE SHOULD AT LEAST TRY.
“Fuck you,” Larc said, and it was in that moment of realization that he’d spent ten years killing time that he passed out.