The Brazen Altar

Overview

Welcome to the City, a place of peace and plenty with no disease, no suffering, and no want, where people find meaning in service to their gods

They know the gods were created by humans, of course. But the gods protect and provide for the people, so why wouldn't the people serve the gods? In a Utopian society, what better way to express service than through pleasure and faith? For Kheema and her seven fellow Potentials, that means entering the temple of the Sun God to undergo months of training and practice to determine which of them will be chosen as Sacrifice. On the day of the summer Solstice, the one chosen as Sacrifice must recite the entire litany from atop the temple, while enduring nonstop forced orgasms from dawn 'til dusk. For Terlyn, service means becoming part of the Garden, bound naked and asleep while worshippers help themselves to her body. Terlyn wakes in ecstasy over and over, only to fall asleep again. The experience changes her, and her relationship with her friend and lover Donvin, who visits her while she is part of the Garden. Ashi's service to the god known as the Wild entails competing with other worshippers in a forest that appears overnight to demonstrate her resilience and will, so that she might become part of a ritual involving an altar, a long row of cages, and the complete abandonment of the self. The three stories brush against each other, revealing the heart of the City, as the people of the City serve, or ask for enlightenment from, multiple gods at once.

Author Biography

Franklin Veaux is coauthor of the popular nonfiction relationship book More Than Two. He is an established author who writes fiction and nonfiction on topics as diverse as alternate history steampunk, computer security, and nontraditional relationships. He lives in Portland Oregon, where he is owned by a small white cat. Eunice Hung has a BA in creative writing from University of Leeds and has been published in the anthologies Purple Prose and Raconnaissance: An Anthology. She exercises her keen creativity in every aspect of her life, with a special interest in collaborative worldbuilding and freeform narrative gaming.