Kos Everburning’s Story So Far
Some of this is adapted from other essays, some is brand new. Enjoy!
Kos Everburning, fire god of Alt Coulumb, sets off the series by being (seemingly) murdered. Whilst we don’t hear from Him as directly as His resurrected love, Seril, we get a unique perspective through His living saint Abelard. Kos has remained neutral in past conflicts, but will he ride to war against the skazzerai?
As we approach the publication of Dead Hand Rule, let’s take a look at Kos Everburning’s story so far.
Kos before the series
Kos is a god, and an old one at that. When told about how gods are born and how they grow, we learn that they develop alongside their people.
“In the unrecorded mists of prehistory, when mankind prowled the savannah and the swamps, their gods hunted with them, little more than shadows on a cave wall, the gleam in a hunter’s eye, a mammoth’s death roar, primitive as the men they ruled. As men grew in size, complexity, and might, the gods grew with them.”
So, Kos is extremely old and grew with his worshippers. As a god of fire, one can imagine his origins with people seeking protection against the cold and dark way back when - but we don’t know how Kos began, or the exact people who believed in Him. In fact, we don’t know for sure whether he is a ‘native’ god to Northern Kath. Alt Coulumb, like many of the real world cities it is inspired by, are multicultural cities of immigrants. Many citizens of Alt Coulumb are white and of Craft!European heritage, while Northern Kath is a cognate for North America with similar indigenous peoples.
Conveniently for this essay, Gladstone answered a relevant question in our recent Reddit AMA! When asked “Are all white people on the continent descended from Old World immigrants, like with the Americas, or is the setup less analogous?”, he told us:
“This is a part of the series I haven’t explored deeply on the page, so regard this as a bit of a sketchbook answer: the existence of the Archipelago (which used to be a larger landmass) changes the technological difficulty of trans-Atlantic-ish migration, allowing it to happen earlier, at least in a population-diffusion island-hopping kind of way—the sea’s not navigable enough to allow Old World powers to do any force projection in Kath until relatively recent history, though, kind of like how Rome doesn’t make it to China or India in any durable way. So while Kath does have a rough equivalent of the pre-Columbian era there was population-level contact, trade, and mutual exchange before the (ill-named) Contact Wars—part of the reason there were no equivalents of the Columbian plagues (though also the setting has magical healing, which helps). Many of the white folks in Northern Kath are recent (last 3-400 years) migrants, but they joined a pre-existing cosmopolitan multicultural society. Kos and Seril go way back.””
Both Kos and Seril, therefore, might have developed on the ground in Northern Kath, or have been brought by Old World migrants over the past three to four thousand years. Either way, they’ve been in the place that became Alt Coulumb for a long time.
The two gods are intimately connected. They are lovers, in liturgy and in fact (remember that words and belief shape reality). Perhaps they developed together in the old days of Northern Kath, or perhaps multiple groups with different belief systems joined and merged their respective religions. I quite like this latter idea, as it seems to be how many of our real world religions have developed over time - see, for example, evidence that origin stories in the Hebrew Bible and Old Testament represent different origin stories from different religious groups who united millennia ago.
Either way, Kos and Seril are partners ruling over Alt Coulumb. When learning about Seril (at this time thought to be dead), Tara tells us “A pair of gods ruling together, one for day, the other for night, one creating, another ordering. Bonds of love between opposites were powerful, stable yet dynamic. No wonder Alt Coulumb had stood for so long and grown so vast.” They remained separate religions, however, unlike the Quechal pantheon. The Church of Kos is not the Church of Seril, though historically each included the other in their liturgy.
Everything changed in the God Wars.
Seril and her gargoyles went to do battle, while Kos remained neutral in the Wars and stayed in Alt Coulumb. She was slain by the King in Red at the Crack in the World, and barely survived in Her children - a fact known by few until the modern day.
Kos, throughout His long millennia of life, was now alone. His city turned against his dead lover and Her children, many of whom had gone mad at her death and caused havoc in the city. His priests turned against the gargoyles and revised the Kosite theology to better represent a fire god alone. And they set up a circle of Craft around the Sanctum that housed their god to prevent a weakened Seril from making contact.
And then, forty years or so after Her death, Kos hears a strange prayer.
Big gods like Kos are rarely able to communicate with their faithful, as we see in more depth in Four Roads Cross. He relies on his priesthood as intercessors and translators, but he does experience all of Alt Coulumb and all of its prayers. I recommend taking a look at chapter 30 of Four Roads Cross for a formatting visual of how this works, as experienced by Abelard.
Kos does, however, manage to zoom in on this particular prayer. David Cabot, recently returned to the city, prayed about his discovery that Seril lived. We read that “I prayed when I returned to Alt Coulumb. Lord Kos visited by dreams at night, and saw my soul. I led Him to the Guardians, and He began to visit their dreams as well.”
Over the ensuing four months, Kos contacted David’s father, a judge in the city. Now deeply suspicious of his own clergy, he worked with Judge Cabot to transfer power to Seril, moving power into a pair of Concerns late at night, when few were awake to notice. Unfortunately, someone did notice something was wrong, and contacted Alexander Denovo to help sort it out. He figured out the issue, and set a plan in place to not only prevent Kos from restoring Seril, but to kill Kos and take power for himself.
Which brings us to Three Parts Dead.
Three Parts Dead
Kos is going about His usual godly business in the middle of the night, when He is abruptly called upon to provide firepower against pirates in Iskar. This is a standard contract that shouldn’t be sufficient to hurt Him, but unfortunately He is considerably weaker than normal because of his off-book dealings with Seril. The contract drains Him, and he is pulled between obligations to the point that He really should be killed.
At the last moment, he flees into the faith of the young priest at the graveyard shift worshipping His eternal flame, Abelard. To the world, He appears dead - but He is sheltered within Abelard and the flame of his cigarette. I have an essay about this here.
His clergy call up Craftsfolk, and Elayne Kevarian arrives in Alt Coulumb with new associate Tara Abernathy. They speak to Abelard, and Kos - though barely conscious - feels the gaze of Ms Kevarian on Him within the cigarette ember, and he flees from her eyes.
Kos probably doesn’t know much about what happens over the rest of the book. We are told that gods can survive like this, but in great pain, barely holding on. However, He fills Abelard with His flame as Abelard is slowly killed by Ms Kevarian (in her attempt to prove Kos’ continued existence), and gives Abelard increased senses and abilities when he comes up against a Craft monster left behind by Denovo.
Everything is revealed in a dramatic court case slash fight in the Temple of Justice, and Elayne Kevarian draws a resurrection circle in her own blood to resurrect Kos (and Abelard? Or Kos resurrects Abelard? Unclear) and Kos roars back to life.
“The fire was his God.
A faint remnant of his logical mind remembered that for some reason, though he had smoke constantly since his Lord’s death, in three days he had not once used a lighter or a match. Always he passed flame from one cigarette to the next.
He surrendered to God. Every breath of smoke lingering in his lungs, every trace of fire that calmed him in his hours of need, he gave them forth freely.
Brilliant and new as a phoenix, Kos the Everburning rose from the ember at the tip of Abelard’s cigarette.”
Kos has returned. Over the next year, Kos becomes increasingly reliant on His new saint, Abelard, while his senior clergy are slowly revising the liturgy to bring Seril and Her children back into the fold. Yet this is slow work and they’re running out of time before world learns Seril is back and supported by Kos. Tara Abernathy is now in-house counsel for the Church of Kos and is trying to rebuild Seril’s support in time to protect both Seril and Kos.
Which brings us to Four Roads Cross.
Four Roads Cross
A year after his almost-death, Kos is still hiding behind Abelard, inspiring senior priests to invite him into meetings so Kos can watch more directly, and translate what’s happening through Abelard. Abelard has been fairly unaware of Kos’ role in this, bless, but starts to understand it after speaking to Tara.
“Kos had been betrayed by Cardinals before, and if traitors were to strike again, now was the time. But gods made poor detectives, their perspectives unmoored from time. Who better to be Kos’s spy than Abelard? So He whispered to the Cardianlds and folded the young Technician in their confidence.
Because He was afraid.
But He was wrong.
…
You’re micromanaging, Abelard prayed, because you’re scared.”
And that’s it. Kos, great and powerful god that He is, is scared. Abelard realises that the other priests know that their Lord doesn’t trust them, and are trying to prove worthy of His love and trust. Abelard reassures Kos of their faith, that He can rely on them.
In the midst of all this, Craftswoman Madeline Ramp shows up to serve suit against Kos for His off-book relationship with Seril, and consequent undisclosed liabilities. As part of this plot, Seril and Her children are attacked above the skies of Alt Coulumb. Kos shows Abelard the city through His eyes, shows Abelard the tangled web of obligations and prayer and decisions in which He exists, and asks for guidance. Should He force Seril and Her children to stand alone? Or should He help, thus risking His own power?
Abelard asks Kos to intervene. Demons fall to fire in the night sky.
And there’s the proof Ramp needed: Kos has undeclared interest in Seril. She presses suit, and Tara calls a Council of War.
Tara needs to head off to Dresediel Lex on a longshot plan, and thus gets Craftsperson Ashleigh Wakefield to represent Kos in the forthcoming suit. Kos Himself is powerless here, and must rely on the clergy in whom He has lost trust to defend Him. He inspires Abelard to go out among the people to spread Kos’ word in support of Seril.
And then the court case begins. Ramp and Wakefield go head to head - but Wakefield only represents Kos, and thus must step aside when Seril is brought in. With Tara stuck in Dresediel Lex, Seril is undefended. Aev and the gargoyles come to try and defend Seril in Tara’s stead.
Kos is furious that He can’t join in to support His lover, but if He did He would lose the case and risk His power and life - and Seril.
Finally, Tara appears, and shows she has gained Seril’s rights to the skies of Alt Coulumb. With some more battling-against-demons, they win. Seril, newly powered up, is finally able to properly reunite Kos. Kos, via Abelard, asks for some privacy. See, gods are people too! Kinda…
We don’t see much from Kos or his adherents for a couple of books, but He shows up with His saint in Wicked Problems.
Wicked Problems
Kos first shows up acting as a short of long-distance phone call, when the gargoyles realise Tara is sneaking out of the city and get Seril to speak to Kos to speak to Abelard and get him where he needs to be. The humorous side of the Craft Sequence is often underrated, and I for one appreciate it.
Abelard spends a lot of time thinking about Kos in this book. Kos’ actions are fairly limited here, other than powering Abelard (and, later, Caleb), so I want to focus more on how Abelard reflects on Kos in this book, as it gives us insight into what might come next in the series. If you want the specifics of Kos working through Abelard, check out this essay here.
Abelard and Caleb spend most of the book together, and have very different outlooks on gods. The gods Caleb was dedicated to by his father were bloodthirsty, and Caleb has seen them cause nothing but death and destruction. He is an unwilling priest to a pantheon that is largely dead, and that he is glad is dead. The remaining gods want to use him, and he’s constantly fighting against it.
Abelard, on the other hand, is dedicated to Kos by choice, and has the luck of being priest to a seemingly gentle god in peacetime. To Abelard, Kos’ fire represents warmth and life, rather than brutality and death. He thinks about this when confronted with the Serpents’ fire at Tlaloc Observatory.
“This was not his fire.
He knew the Everburning Lord in many guises, as altar flame and sacred light, as incense ember, as hearth flame and fertile ash, as the transcendence of matter. Lord Kos was no mere aesthetic spirit, fire in abstract, fire in concept. There were great furies in the Sanctum’s boiler room, pressures beyond pressure, furnaces that even with Seril’s cooling touch upon them were hot enough to sublime base metal. Through His grace and awful power, Lord Kos moved the city of Alt Coulumb and, through that city, the world.
But Lord Kos, while hungry, was not a God of hunger. Lord Kos had never appeared to him in such ravenous aspect, with this mindless and consuming passion. Lord Kos had never shown Himself with the all-consuming radiance of this cupful of sun.”
Caleb points out that Abelard has never seen a warrior side of Kos, and Abelard is troubled by this reminder. He doesn’t want to believe it, but gradually comes to accept that his understanding of Kos is indeed limited by circumstance.
However, he also changes Caleb’s perspective too. Caleb can, after all, channel all sorts of godly and Craftwork power, not simply the power of the Quechal pantheon - Abelard called him a sort of general-purpose saint, a standardised connector. From this, and having seen Abelard use Kos’ power, Caleb reaches out to Kos in the climactic final battle against the grey men attacking the Twin Serpents.
When at the end of the book, Abelard confronts the godfire at the end of the book, he brings new understanding of Kos to the fight. Abelard realises the truth both Caleb and the godfire were trying to tell him:
“The altar of Kos in the holiest of holies was the altar of the defiant, its throne a cage. The Everburning Lord sustained, but He was rage, too, and struggle, though Abelard had never felt rage so pure as this, even in the fury of His resurrection.
…
You’re right.
My god and master is the Lord of Change, is He who dances and consumes. But I have thought of Him as comforter alone, He who speeds the train and burns in the belly of the ship at sea—a blessing against the cold winds of winter, the might of the sustaining arm. This was the voice that called to me, this the face I named beautiful, the will I pledged myself to serve.
But it was not all of Him. How could I compass such immensity? He showed me only the face that I was prepared to see. I rejected Him, the parts of Him I did not and could not understand.
…
You are right: I do not know you, and I do not know my God. But I must learn. For a great darkness comes, and we all must know one another, and draw close around the efire if we hope to make it through the night.
…
The shadow of God lay upon his soul. It moved his heart with love and forbidding. God’s address to His faithful plumbed depths beyond language, but if Abelard had been pressed to render that Voice in human tongue, He might have said something like:
“Are you sure about this?”
By opening himself up to Kos’ fury, Abelard is able to channel a different facet of His god. Through this, we also see a different side to Kos. Across the series so far, we have been shown Kos as a good, kind god, a different kind of deity than the ones Craftsfolk rose up to fight against. Kos is an example of how Craftspeople and gods can work together, we read.
But they never had to fight Him.
Will they, in the future of the Craft Wars series?
Kos is ready to fight alongside Craftsfolk, but will they be willing to fight alongside Him? If their pet tame god, contained in Alt Coulumb’s Sanctum, roars into the world as combatant, will they stand alongside him against the threat from the skazzerai, or seek to neuter Him as they did Seril?
We don’t know for now, and neither does Kos.
We shall see in the next books. But for now, that is Kos’ story so far.
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