Gate: A Turtle Shell
I stepped through the vision gate and saw a white rabbit being chased by a pack of ravenous wolves. The rabbit ran until it could go no further then it bolted down a hole that appeared in the ground. The wolves scrabbled and bit at the hole but the rabbit was safe, hidden away from their claws and teeth within the protective earth.
The wolf pack morphed and changed, drawing itself together into the shape of a woman and I saw the woman was me. The rabbit hole and I sat before a gate into a forbidding fortress.
I walked to the door and knocked three times, the sound echoing hollowly back at me. On the third knock, the door opened inwards under its own power and all was silent within. I entered the open gate without contest.
“Hello!” I called out as I walked through the entry hall. “Is anyone here?” The only response was my own voice echoing back at me from the depths of the structure.
The fortress was filled with dust and covered furniture. I pulled the covering off of a small chair. Its frame gleamed with gold and the seat itself was silk inlaid with precious gems. I covered the chair once more and continued moving through the forsaken place, seeking any sign of life.
I startled at the sound of wings flying overhead and an enormous owl crossed the room and disappeared down a long hallway. “Wait, friend owl, I need some guidance!” I called after the bird but it was gone. So I followed, continually calling for a guide to assist me further but none appeared.
However, someone must have heard my cry for the stone floor changed into the feathers of the owl and I began to glide forward without moving my feet as if I stood upon a magical conveyor belt. Eventually, the moving floor took me to a long, dark room filled with shadows.
At the far end, a spirit in the shape of a woman stood from her seat on the floor next to a fireplace that was much too small to heat the room. She was dressed in tattered rags with a kerchief wound about her eyes. The owl I had followed to this place sat on her shoulder and hooted musically as I entered the space. “Who is there?” the spirit asked, distress in her tones while wiping a tear from her cheek with a sooty palm.
“My name is Heidi, Great One. I’ve come to this world seeking your true nature. I won’t hurt you, I promise,” I said. “Who are you?”
“I am no one of any account,” she replied. “And do not merit the appellation of ‘great’. But this,” the spirit stroked the feathered breast of the owl gently with the back of her fingers, “is Archimedes. He is my guardian as well as my best friend.”
“Your clever owl brought me to your doorstep, Great One. Forgive me for my insistence but you live in this vast fortress and I do not believe that you are no one so I will continue to call you ‘great’,” I said. “I am sorry to report that your castle is a ruin and all have fled. What happened here?”
“A monster came in the dark of night,” the spirit whispered. “He took my eyes and my magic turtle so now I can neither see nor travel to visit my brother. My family lives and rules from a different realm of existence and I suffer with only sweet Archimedes for companionship.”
“What a horrific fate,” I said. “Perhaps this injustice may be remedied. Who is your brother and why did your family not come looking for you?”
“My favorite brother lives beneath the waves,” she said. “He is a god of the deep, hidden places in the ocean and prefers to remain there in his seat of power. The rest of my family roams so far into the other worlds that they are too busy to miss me. Without my turtle, I can’t get to them. Without my eyes, I cannot find my turtle. Will you help me? I cannot repay you at this time but if you return my turtle to me, I will ask my brother to grant you a boon.”
“You need only point me in the right direction, Great One. I require neither repayment nor gratitude for I serve the Creator of All wherever their healing presence is needed,” I said. “Badger and I will assist you, have no fear.” With those words, I called for Badger. Strangely, my friend didn’t appear.
“Who is Badger?” she asked. “There are wards about this fortress which protect me still from outside influences which were set in place long ago.”
“My Badger is as large as a horse, has black and white fur and brown eyes,” I said. “We have had many adventures together. Usually he goes wherever I go, despite boundaries or, in this instance, wards.”
“Oh, if you require a guide, you can do no better than my own Archimedes,” the spirit said. “He will direct your steps as surely as a map and compass. I recommend you start in the room where they stole my turtle.”
I consented to the spirit’s suggestion and her enormous owl fluttered from the blind goddess’ shoulder to my own. I went through the doorway she indicated and found an indoor lake filled with lily pads and gently croaking frogs. On the far side of the lake, there was a hole blasted into the wall of the room that contained the lake and led to a tunnel beyond that was filled with shadows.
“I suppose we go that way,” I said and the owl hooted softly. “Is that a yes?” I said and the owl hooted again. As I turned towards the tunnel, I found myself missing Badger’s encouraging conversation though Archimedes seemed a kind and mostly silent guide. The edges of the tunnel crumbled beneath my feet like ash and still smoked as if the hole through the wall had only recently been created. I crept forward carefully into the unknown.
The owl left my shoulder and flew ahead first this way then that, leading me through labyrinthian caves beyond the wall. After some time and searching through the shadows, at the junction of many tunnels, I found three goblins scrabbling and fighting over a large animal pelt. They scattered under the wings and sharp claws of the owl and I saw what they held was not a pelt at all but my beloved Badger.
“What have they done to you?” I exclaimed, drawing his large head into my lap. “What in heaven’s name has happened here?” Badger lay completely still, his beautiful fur matted and covered with blood. My tears fell onto his fur and, when they touched him, my friend came back to life.
“Heidi,” he whispered as I buried my face in his furry neck. “You came back for me.”
“I’m sorry I didn’t know you were under attack,” I said. “I should have known something was wrong when you didn’t respond to my call. It took far too long to find you again but I was so turned around with Archimedes as my guide. What were those creatures?”
“I was beset by ancient shadows. Their leader is called Misery,” said Badger, his voice growing stronger. “He travels with Anxiety and Anger. I was looking for you too, but I took a wrong turn.” The owl hooted above us and I was reminded of the task given to me by the blind goddess.
“Are you strong enough to come with me?” I asked. “We seek a spirit’s eyes and a turtle so that she may rejoin her family in another world. I suspect they lie ahead within this cursed fortress. Badger, I could really use your help. Archimedes could probably take me to my desired destination but he doesn’t lead with words and I’m having trouble following his directions.”
“Never let it be said an owl had more strength than a badger,” said my friend and he rose gingerly and trundled along with us, his vigor increasing with each step. “Look at the state of this place. When we’re done finding her lost eyes and turtle, maybe we should find this attendant spirit a broom.”
“Don’t be too hard on the blind goddess,” I said. “She told me she misses her loved ones terribly and I found her covered in soot before a fire that was too small to heat much of anything.”
“When you’re away from me for long periods of time, I forget what a soft heart you have, Heidi,” Badger said. “Forgive my unkind assessment. It’s hard to keep my opinions to myself when I see the touch of the shadow realm on reality.”
“I have problems with that too,” I said. “I just try to remind myself that I’m here to help others, not judge them. Maybe they will extend the same grace to us.”
“Maybe,” Badger said and we soldiered on in silence.
Through more ash and decay, we came to a cavern carved out of bedrock. To one side, sat an empty turtle shell that was as large as a house. On the other side of the cavern, a bright red dragon was coiled about himself, sleeping peacefully with smoke rising from his nostrils.
“Wake, fiend,” cried Badger. “We demand the return of the eyes you stole.”
The creature’s own eyes opened and he growled as he awakened. “I stole nothing,” said the dragon. “Who are you to come into my cave and accuse me?”
“Stolen eyes aside, my friends and I won’t leave your abode until we have recovered the missing turtle from that shell,” I said. “Did you eat it?”
The monster laughed. “Eat it? No,” he said when his mirth was spent. “I am the turtle.”
My companions and I absorbed this information for a moment. “I’ve never heard of a turtle becoming a dragon,” said Badger, breaking the silence.
“Either had I,” said the dragon. “But I tell you the truth of my life experience. And, because my words are absolutely true, there is no going back into the shell for me. I am a dragon now and a dragon I shall remain.”
“If you are the one who was once a turtle,” I said. “Then where are the eyes of Archimedes’ goddess?”
“They fly with you,” said the dragon and gestured at the owl with a single, razor sharp talon.
Archimedes gave one last gentle hoot and then fell apart, becoming a pile of dust. In his place in the dragon’s cave, two large eyes stared up from the ashes on the floor. A woman’s scream came from the tunnel behind us.
“And here comes their mistress to reclaim them,” said the red dragon with a yawn. In moments, the rag-dressed goddess flew into the cavern. She snatched up the eyes from the ashes and pushed them back into her own face.
“Where have you been, you lazy lizard? You will come home with me now,” she said to the dragon, rage evident upon her face. “I demand it. You were given to me by my husband to ferry me throughout the worlds but instead you disappeared to this hidden lair and sleep your days away, dreaming of happier times. You ran so far I couldn’t even find you. I am so angry with you that I could spit.”
“Spit away, goddess. I can no more fit into that shell than you can fit into your former life,” the dragon retorted. “Telling this seeker that I stole your eyes and ate your turtle was defamatory to say the least. Say what you want, I will not waste this lifetime staring into the flames of a dying hope, wishing for a change in our circumstances. At least in my own sphere of influence in this secret room, I have the peace and quiet which your constant demands for inter-world travel denied me.”
The spirit clenched her fists and her rags disintegrated to reveal a brown-haired shining goddess, dressed in Grecian robes. “You will come home,” the diamond-skinned being demanded, stomping her foot. “Immediately and without further comment.”
The former turtle yawned at her again and coiled his bulk in a passive but effective refusal. “You will not deny me my freedom,” the goddess said and began clawing at the beast’s brilliant scales but with little to no result. “I want to see my family. I want to go home!”
“This is painful to witness,” Badger said and I nodded my head, embarrassed at the ineffectual efforts of the goddess to make her will manifest.
“Let’s seek the essential nature of this place beyond the petty squabbling,” I said. Badger and I wandered away from the dramatic scene to the empty turtle shell. We passed through the open side of the shell into a room filled with mirrors. The moment my foot hit the floor of the space, the mirrors splintered, flying to pieces and forming themselves into the shape of the angry goddess and her consort.
I recognized the god in the mirror as the sky deity, Zeus. The pair’s unhappy domestic life unfolded before Badger’s and my eyes, reflected and held in the mirrored surface of the interior of the turtle shell. The unbound god of storms came and went from their place of power and marital home as he willed, leaving the goddess to keep their hearth sparkling and sanctified in his absence.
The shining goddess wanted to go with her husband on his many travels and adventures but he admonished his wife and his words came through the mirror to Badger and my ears’ as clearly as if we had been standing beside them.
“I will come back for you, Hera,” Zeus said. “But as you are mine, you will remain here, safe from the outside world and its dangerous shadows. Why trouble yourself with adventures when domestic responsibilities consume all your days? Be silent and obedient and all shall be as nature intended between us.”
“There is nothing natural about losing my freedom and becoming subservient to your will,” Hera said, the anger I had witnessed in the cave becoming manifest in her voice. “The birds of the sky do not confine one another to a nest and call it the natural order of things.”
“Yet someone must remain with the eggs. Someone must tend to the young,” the god replied. “Your metaphor only serves to further illustrate my point.”
“What children have you given me in eons, you philanderer, you rogue?” Hera said. “You speak of responsibilities that no longer exist. Any progeny of ours grew up ages ago. Where is my reward for serving as a mother to not only our children but your many bastards throughout creation?”
“What is it you desire of me, woman?” Zeus said. “Speak your mind and cease your prattle. Your words give me a headache.”
“I want to visit my brother,” Hera demanded. In response, Zeus gave her a turtle to take her to her favorite brother’s home beneath the waves. “I want to live in a palace,” she said next. Zeus dutifully fashioned a beautiful domain for her, made out of the dust of the fields and drops of his own blood. But these things, even as fantastic as they were, did not make the goddess happy because she could not forget nor forgive all that had come before and it ruined any prospect of her future happiness.
Then one day when her husband left her yet again to chase another beautiful mortal, I saw the goddess alone and asleep, and the three goblins made of shadows who had attempted to butcher my Badger whispered in her ear while she dreamed of the days before she ever met the god from the skies.
“If you pluck out your eyes,” they hissed. “Then you will be able to spy on him and know what he does without his knowing. Wouldn’t you like to know the truth of your bread winner’s actions? Then you may cause his favored ones to suffer and in this way take your well-deserved revenge upon him for stealing your life away with his whelps and forcing you into this hovel. What goddess travels upon a turtle? It is an insult disguised as a gift. You deserve better.”
And so it was. When Hera awoke with the goblins’ poisoned words echoing in her mind, the goddess took a knife and plunged it into her own face. As her eyes left her head, they turned into the owl Archimedes, who flew from the palace on the goddess’ whim and reported back to her on the god’s illicit activities.
Immeasurable years passed this way. The goddess dwelt in the crumbling palace that she had demanded, forgotten by her husband as he chased love and fought the world’s battles with his companions and secret lovers, with only Misery, Anxiety, and Anger for company.
And the turtle remained by her side. The turtle, to my mind, was the greatest gift of all. In the mirror, I watched him bear her beneath the waves, time and again, to Poseidon’s halls on the ocean floor. He joined the goddess as she sat at the underwater feasts, consuming the food of the gods at his mistress’ right hand. At first, the goddess’ turtle was small like the turtles from the world I knew, but he grew slowly and steadily throughout the ages and as he grew his intelligence and knowledge increased in relation to his size. His strength of will grew as well, changing him from a mere creature for transport to something else entirely.
After a very long time, I watched Hera’s turtle explode out of his shell and emerge as the red dragon who now slept in the outer room and continuously refused his goddess’ summons. The mirror, that revealed all this and more to Badger and I, splintered again and resettled as a liquid surface of flowing silver within the turtle shell.
A figure wreathed in shadows and dark robes appeared in the center of the shell upon the liquid mirror. “You come to this place, Heidi. You see all its secrets but you cannot give her what she wants,” he said. “I know because I tried and I have failed. She will never forgive me, not today, not tomorrow, not in a thousand years.”
“The Light Congress taught me that forgiveness is as real as failure, Great One,” I said. “You cannot give up the struggle against the shadows simply because you have never succeeded at it before. What does the goddess desire now? Perhaps I can help you find the solution to your domestic unhappiness.”
A finger made of solid bone came from the end of the sleeve and pointed at me. “Hera wants her husband back,” he said in a voice as distant as a whispered breath. “But he is gone. He is gone, I tell you, and as dead as me. The shadows made certain of it.”
“If you are not her husband, then who are you?” I said as Badger placed himself between me and the shadowy figure in a protective gesture.
“The ideal of what he was supposed to be,” the figure hissed and crumbled into dust and rags on the floor.
“This is awful,” I said. “Are all marriages like this? A continual struggle for dominance and the execution of desires?”
“I think it would be unfair to look at one failed union and then describe all such partnerships as such,” Badger said. “Just because Zeus and Hera are this way does not mean all of creation follows their pattern.”
“No, not all,” I said. “But they have a prominent place in the pantheon, being who they are. I can’t help but think their troubles extend beyond just the two of them. I mean look how she treats the dragon who was once her turtle. I’m sure he didn’t ask to be placed in the epicenter of warring gods and goddesses but there he is.”
“Suffering is a human condition,” said Badger. “Single or paired, people manage to find happiness or unhappiness depending on what they choose to focus on in their lives.”
I sighed at the tragedy of existence. “You speak the truth, Badger,” I said. “Let’s see if we can’t bring some measure of peace to this forgotten space and continue on our way to happier realms.”
Badger and I left the mirrored shell to find Hera still wrestling with her red dragon. “Great One,” I said and her powerful eyes rested on me and I felt her anger coming off of her like a wave of heat from an inferno. “I am sorry you have suffered, I really am. But I have returned your eyes to you as you desired and your turtle though neither was as you or I expected,” I said. “I have done all you asked of me and yet you are still unhappy.” I turned to leave the goddess to her struggle with the red dragon. “I suspect until you rid your halls of the shadow creatures who have taken up residence here, you will always be so.”
“What shadow creatures?” asked the dragon idly, raising his head from his protective coils for the first time since the goddess began her tirade.
“Three goblins made of shadow grievously injured my Badger,” I said. “They are called Misery, Anger, and Anxiety. They always travel together and tend to come at night, tormenting their victims with poisoned words about secret insecurities until the afflicted strike out against those around them, blaming the blameless for their sad existence.”
“I have legitimate reasons for my anger against Zeus,” Hera said. “I am not being manipulated by shadows.”
“Forgive me but it is not manipulation, Great One,” I said. “It is a war. The shadows take advantage of situations where unhappiness exists to drag those who could walk in the sun of the Creator of All and instead chain them in the dark of their hellish version of their reality, lending the shadows strength and the ability to walk where they will without challenge. I am sad to report it works more often than not. It is a genesis of suffering for many and I wish these goblins did not exist.”
“They sound like a tasty treat,” the dragon said and proceeded to unwind himself from the cavern’s depths. “Once upon a time, I devoured shadows like these for breakfast.” With a hiss and a gout of flame, the serpent was gone, prowling the halls of Hera’s castle for the intruding nightmares.
“Peerless Hera, what did you call your turtle before he became a dragon?” I said.
“His name was Hammer,” the goddess said. “I have no idea what to call him now.”
Then from far away within the fortress, a distant scream sounded three times and then all was silent. “Your Hammer is yet mighty, goddess,” Badger said. “Maybe his name can remain the same.”
Hera opened her mouth to speak but, when she did, the empty turtle shell exploded, coating everything in diamond dust from the many mirrors it had contained. Reality turned in upon itself and then changed into a long table filled with feasting gods and goddesses set among the clouds of the sky.
Badger, Hera, and I now stood together before Zeus and his feasting pantheon. “About time you got here,” he said, ripping the leg off of the carcass of a large bird. “We waited for you but feared you were lost to the shadows. Welcome home, wife.”
Hera brushed the mirror dust off of herself with dignity and grace. “You left me without a way to get here because my turtle became someone else,” she said and settled herself beside him. “I hope you saved me some food because I feel like I haven’t eaten in ages. What manner of bird are we eating tonight?”
“Owl,” said Zeus, filling his mouth with the feast once more. Then, he winked at me and the gods and Badger disappeared.
In their absence, I found myself in a hole in the ground and outside a pack of wolves fought and snarled to get to me. Though I was only a frightened white rabbit, scared by the noise outside as well as the shadows of my own home, I suddenly changed into a ferocious red dragon.
I exploded out of my hiding place because it could no longer hold me and, at my startling appearance from beneath the ground which frightened me as much as everyone else, the wolf pack scattered. I blew a breath of flame towards the forbidding gate like a kiss which cleared the watchful shadows about its towers then flew above Hera’s palace into the sky.
There my vision ended.
The Light Congress 