365 Creative Writing Prompts: Dancing

There are overgods and there are undergods.

The overgods live above Earth in the clouds, where they can look down on the doings of mortals and shower them with praise and criticism as necessary. They dispense wisdom and grant wishes and occasionally exact punishment, but do not be fooled into thinking the overgods keep the world running.

That responsibility belongs to the undergods, the forgotten deities who dwell miles below our feet in a realm of dust and coal. They churn the world's core and feed the world's roots and hold the mountains and the seas in place. Without them, everything would fall apart: forests would collapse, rivers would dry up, even the clouds graced by the overgods' golden sandals would cease to be. Yes, without the undergods, we would have no overgods.

Those dirty, damp beings are essential, so why don't the mortals give thanks to the undergods? No one offers sacrifices to the Under-Dweller. No one praises Gnash the Mountain-Maker or Rootma of the Oak Trees or the Darc Who Hides. No one utters prayers to Carol the Queen of Bats. With the brilliant and flashy overgods to focus on, no one remembers the rest, the unbeautiful, the ungraceful.

 But they will regret that mistake.

If only the surface-dwellers would have remembered Constance the Dancer. Constance, whose eternal dance was the only thing holding back the hordes of demons bristling to overthrow the Earth. Constance, whose tapping toes shut the floodgates of molten iron in the beginning of the world, whose rapid rhythm tormented the hellhounds as they strained on their chains, whose brittle hair swung to and fro to the sound of peace. For thousands of years, Constance's dance kept at bay the forces that thirsted for the golden blood of the overgods and the meaty flesh of mortals.

If only the Dancer had been thanked, she would not have slowed, would not have wearied. The signs were clear, but the end was inevitable. It is too late for prayers now.

There were overgods and there were undergods.

Constance stopped dancing last night.