Gate: Hades’ Coffin
I stepped through Lord Hades’ gate and stood in a world of dust bounded on all sides by darkness. In the skies above this barren place, giants made of stars fought each other with weapons made of madness or wrestled with their bare hands.
The sound of their perpetual struggle filled my mind and I covered my ears in an effort to block the excruciating noise. As I fell to my knees, I bit my lip and a drop of blood fell from my mouth to the dust of the ground. It washed away the surface dirt to reveal an etching of a badger.
As I traced this glyph with my fingertips, more blood fell and pain blossomed in my side. I cried out and clutched my abdomen, falling in a faint on the badger. All was darkness both within and outside of my spirit.
Then a voice came out of the void. “I’ve found her,” I heard. “Thank God, I’ve found her. Tell the others.” I felt someone lift my body from the ground and I opened my eyes to see Badger in his human form. I remained cocooned in pain with blood dripping from my side and mouth but I couldn’t help but be pleased to see my dearest friend.
“No, Badger,” I whispered. “I found you.”
Badger gave a distracted grin as he carried me through a dense jungle. “You’ve been missing for years, Heidi,” he said, ducking under some trailing vines. “It has been an all out effort to search the worlds for you. Everyone has played a part in the hunt. I thought the wolf pack was going to lose their minds; they went so far into the forgotten realms we were barely able to bring them back.” He stepped over a rotten log. “We even asked the Inner Child. Though she wasn’t much help, she did provide the key to the puzzle.”
“What’d she say?” I asked, wiping a bit of blood from my chin.
“The Child said to continue the search until all hope was lost,” Badger replied and pulled me closer to his chest. “I just told Odin this was to be my last attempt to find you and there you were. I still can’t believe you made your way here to the furthest edges of the jungles of the mind.” He moved aside more vines. “It is a godless and forsaken place where, they say, sanity abandons you and leaves you to wander in madness until your spirit is so fractured that there is no putting you back together again.”
“It is not so godless, Badger,” I whispered. “There are giants in the sky. They walk and fight for dominance above a plain filled with the dust of hopelessness. And you were there with me beneath the ground the whole time though I could not see you with my eyes, I felt you with my heart.”
Badger paused in his trek through the trees. “What did you say?” he said, bringing my mouth close to his ear. “I have to hear it from you, Heidi, or I won’t believe it’s true.”
“The giants walk and fight and dream in the sky,” I whispered and descended into the darkness of unconsciousness once more.
When I could see again, I was in the dark with searing pain in my side and a chain around my neck. “Help me,” I cried into the shadows and pulled on the end of the chain. There was a whimper and someone pulled back from the other end of the line. “Badger, where are you? Help me, please!”
“Stop fiddling with that thing,” called my Shadow as she gave a hiss of pain. “You’re the one who took us to this place so stop fighting it so hard.” Flashes of light surrounded Shadow’s body and blood made of tiny particles of pure being dripped from her side. Where I had been bleeding normal blood, now darkness and shadow spilled around my fingers from my own wound. “Our suffering should be over soon,” she said. “I hope.”
“What is happening to us?” I asked, as a bright light appeared over Shadow’s shoulder. “We are within Hades’ vision now and I do not know where he is leading us. Whatever this is really hurts.”
Shadow cried out and rolled over, light continuing to emerge from her body. “We’re birthing an idea,” she said. “But it has never been this painful. It must be an idea of Lord Hades and, perhaps, a big one.” Shadow’s Animus of light appeared over her shoulder and I felt the natural cold of my Animus approaching from the inky darkness behind me.
“And my children have always been made of darkness. The idea fighting for life now is a creature of light,” she said and groaned again in the struggle of it. “That’s unnatural. Lord of the Underworld’s visions aside, what have you been imagining or dreaming? I know you do both in your secret heart and you never speak to me of it.” Shadow looked at me accusingly.
“I’ve done nothing,” I said and paused as another wave of pain engulfed both of us. Animus wrapped his arms around me and pressed one hand to my heart center and the other to the increasing pain in my side. Shadow’s Animus did the same. “Nothing,” I gasped out. “I laid down in the coffin and I don’t know how much time has passed nor where I am now. The gates to the inner worlds behave differently for Hades than they ever did for me.”
“Animus, help us,” Shadow and I spoke at the same time.
Our male counterparts whispered into our ears in unison: “If the shadow gives birth to light then the light must give birth to shadow.”
I shook my head in denial as something began to move beneath my skin and the pain doubled. “I won’t allow it,” I said. As Shadow screamed again in pain, I saw something moving beneath her skin as well. A being made of light pushed and clawed at her from the inside, attempting to tear a way out.
“Heidi,” she whimpered. “Let Hades’ dream free or it will kill us both.”
“No,” I held tightly to Animus. “I will not consent. I may have entered his domain but another’s dream will not pass the gate of my heart. That gate belongs to you and me, Shadow, and none other.” As Shadow cried out again, I felt my spirit being pulled from my body and I entered another reality.
I looked down at myself laid out on a platform in the treetops of a jungle. Badger, in his animal form, cushioned my unconscious head with his body. Odin, the elf king Oberon and Dionysus stood at the foot of the bed, looking at me in concern.
In the corner of the platform, the Inner Child hummed to herself as she drew a picture. The High Priestess with her hair made of moths stood behind the child, watching every stroke of the child’s crayon as if they were revealing to her the secrets of the universe. After some time, the priestess left the child’s presence and drew close to Odin.
“She draws a picture of primordial creation and dreams,” the priestess said. “The wound on Heidi’s side must be related to that- her perpetual dream state as well.” One of the moths of the priestess hair alighted on my unconscious forehead. It fluttered its wings for a moment and then was still. The priestess’ eyes became distant as she began to perceive another reality.
“I hear screams in the dark,” she said. The rest of the moths in her hair moved their wings in unison and a perfect mimicry of Shadow’s scream of pain came from their motions. Badger wrapped himself more tightly around my body. “The male energy whispers…” said the priestess.
Again the moths flapped their wings and the disembodied voice of Shadow’s and my Animus spoke in the room: “If the shadow gives birth to light then the light must give birth to shadow.”
Odin shook his hooded head. “But what does it mean? Heidi is missing for years and the moment she returns to us, she falls into an enchanted sleep.” He pressed his fingers to the blanket over the injury in my side. They came away stained with blood. “This is the wound of the Horned King,” he said. “Has anyone made contact with him? Perhaps this is a simple echo of his anguish rather than something new.”
Badger shook his head. “We haven’t talked with that god for some moons. He’s half wild, completely mad, and wanders the forests far beyond the call of any of us.” He paused and continued, “But when we last saw the Horned King, Heidi took a dagger blade of Love to the heart in his stead.” He thought for a moment more and studied my sleeping form. “Where is Heidi’s ring? Long ago, when she returned Hades’ spear to his keeping, he gave her a treasure in return. He called it ‘a Dream of Death’ though Merlin called it by another name, ‘the Stone of Philosophers’. I don’t see it anywhere.”
“I have kept that treasure safe with me since we have been unable to awaken, Heidi,” said the High Priestess and she drew a thin circlet from a pouch at her waist. “I took it off of her hand and gave it a new setting.” Set within the metal, the large sapphire from Hades’ crown glimmered and shone with its own inner brilliance. She gently placed the crown upon my sleeping head. “Perhaps the stone will lend Heidi its strength in whatever world she now finds herself.”
“What other spiritual tools has Heidi gathered in her journeys?” Oberon asked. “Maybe they’ll provide some clues as to how we proceed.” He looked speculatively at Odin. “Where are your runes and dice?”
Odin pulled a bag from his robes. “Here’s everything she’s given me minus the Dice of Dreams,” the god said. He drew the drawstring of the bag apart and upended the contents over my sleeping form. The Dice of Impossibility landed on snake eyes in the center of my chest above my heart.
“That’s one of the call signs for the dragon Heidi named Dream,” Odin said. “I wanted to speak to him but we need the Dice of Dreams to do so. She left those on an island in the care of a pygmy tribe.”
“Then that is where we must go first,” Oberon said. “I think Dream may be important to awakening Heidi once more. In fact, now that I’ve spoken the words, I know in my heart that this is so.”
“Couldn’t you scry the path we must take in your pool?” Odin said. “It may save us some trouble and time.”
The elf king grimaced. “My cave has filled with the moon’s tears and my mother has turned her face from me,” he said. “I was hoping Heidi could help me discover how I offended the moon but, as you all know, she hasn’t vision walked in my realm or any other in some years and I despair at ever being in her conscious presence again.”
Dionysus took a swig from his vine-covered cup and offered it to Oberon in sympathy. “Surely you must have some idea how you earned the moon’s disfavor,” he said. “Mothers can be prickly but what if you shared a drink with her. Maybe that would break the ice and lead to a productive discussion without Love’s messenger present.”
Oberon drank deeply of Dionysus’ vintage. “I honestly have no idea what I did to upset the natural order,” he said, wiping his mouth with his cuff. “I sent Titania, my bride, to the Valley of the Sun and Moon to inquire but she hasn’t returned. I thought perhaps she was simply enjoying herself in that distant court but, with circumstances being what they are, I am now beginning to believe her absence means something else.”
As the moths in the High Priestess’ hair screamed again, she gathered up the runes and dice from the platform holding my sleeping form and carried them to the Inner Child. “You waste time chattering here and prolong their suffering,” she said. “Go to the Island of the Gargantua. Bring back the Dice of Dreams and we’ll summon her Dream to awaken Heidi.” The Priestess spread the runes on top of the child’s drawing. She frowned at their spread. “The runes portend disaster,” she said softly.
The Inner Child laughed and shuffled the pieces with her fingers as Oberon drew a doorway in reality with his hands. The gods Odin and Dionysus followed the elf through the door to another reality. My consciousness traveled with them, unseen from above.
Where the tribe of pygmies had once danced and sang to the ocean waves, a desolate wind now blew, stirring the ashes of fires long cold. A single statue of a pygmy with the markings of a dreamwalker stood on the beach, her sightless eyes gazing out over the seas of the subconscious. Her flesh gleamed with the shining black of obsidian stone.
Odin pulled a scroll from the pygmy’s hands which were outstretched in frozen entreaty. He unrolled it and squinted at its words in the fading light. “I can’t read it,” he said finally. “The words keep turning into smoke.”
“Give it to me,” Oberon said impatiently and pulled it from the god’s hands. He breathed over the page and the writing took on a solid quality. “It is the language of the Realm of Night,” the elf king explained. “When dealing with the denizens of that place, you have to sacrifice something to communicate or do much of anything.” He blew again on the scroll. “We’re lucky they accept breath as payment. The Gargantua are one of the more approachable groups of Night’s domain.”
Dionysus rolled his eyes. “I can think of better coin,” he said and took another drink. “For creatures of the night, they have very little imagination, don’t they.”
Oberon glanced at him and back at the scroll. “Shouldn’t you slow down on the drink until we settle this?” he said.
The god of the vine lazily shrugged. “The wine makes the solution to any problem clearer for me,” he said and drank again. “Maybe you haven’t had enough. I could change the vintage if that’s your objection.”
Oberon snorted and read from the scroll: “The giants walk and Love sleeps where the Night King soars through the sky. The harp, the queen, and cup have been claimed by the night. Fetch them if you dare but be prepared to roll the dice. The Night King is awake once more and Heidi must pay his price.”
Odin gazed at the scroll in the elf’s hands. “The cup must be the grail Heidi found in Castle Skye,” he said. “I wondered where it had hidden itself. She was always pulling the cup out of her heart when it was required. How do we summon it to our aid now?”
The blood drained from Oberon’s face as he considered the message once more. “My queen has gone missing,” he said. “You don’t think she’s been taken by the Night King?”
Dionysus sighed and drank yet again. “Venus,” he called, his voice slurring ever so slightly. “Show yourself, you meddling fiend. I sense that you’re near. You know you can’t hide from the intoxicated.”
The goddess of love appeared next to Dionysus and took god’s cup out of his hand. “In vino veritas,” she toasted and took one long drink. “You can’t blame me for this disaster,” she said, tossing the god back his goblet. “The Night King has no love in his heart, only thirst for control and power.”
“Power over what?” asked Oberon.
“The dreams and visions,” said Odin. “When Heidi found him, the Night King had so forgotten who he was he had literally melded with the stone of his castle. If only she had let him be, maybe he would have disappeared back into the ether where he belongs with the other dreams that have had their due time and place.”
“Who can say which archetypes or gods or dreams should walk and which should be forgotten,” Venus chided.
“Heidi can say,” Odin retorted. “And she’s trapped in some sort of nightmare realm, courtesy of the Night King, no doubt.” He eyed Venus suspiciously. “Or could it be a love-related delusion.”
“Love conquers all things,” Dionysus said and laughed in the goddess’ face. “But who controls the things once they’re conquered.”
“I am not about delusion or control,” Venus said. “I am about being. And perhaps you all have forgotten what condition my son’s lover, Psyche, was in when Heidi found her.” The goddess closed her eyes and took a deep breath. “Psyche had adopted the form of a golden harp in Misogyny’s Tower. This scroll speaks also of her.” The goddess raised a hand above her head in a motion reminiscent of a benediction. “I do not forget or abandon those I love and those who try to help others in my name. Eros, my son, I require you. Attend me.”
There was a whisper of wind and the winged god of love and desire alighted on the beach beside his mother. His dark curls framed a face of such beauty that Dionysus had to avert his gaze and drink to wash away the memory.
“What is it you require, my mother?” Eros said, frowning. “The Badger had me searching the length and breadth of the four winds for Heidi. I still have leagues more to go.”
“Nevermind that,” Venus said. “Our errant vision walker has been found but she’s trapped in an enchanted darkness with her shadow.” The goddess grasped Eros’ shoulder and looked deeply into his eyes. “Son, where did you last see your Psyche?”
Eros fidgeted, shifting his golden bow from one hand to another, avoiding his mother’s gaze. “When Heidi reunited us, my love and I flew to the highest mountain peak and were lost in bliss together for a time.” He paused, remembering. “But then, far too soon, I answered the Badger’s call and left her welcoming arms to assist in the search.”
An unnatural stillness came over the god and the corners of his mouth tightened. “Before I left, I asked my love to call for me on the wind in case she ever needed me or my protection,” he said. “But she never spoke my name from that time to this.” His fingers tightened on his bow until the string snapped and the end slapped Eros’ cheek, leaving a fine line like a tear made of blood. “Where is my Psyche?” he said. “Tell me right now what has happened to my love or I will never shoot another arrow for you and your lovers and celebrants will lose their fire.”
Venus gathered Eros in her arms. “My son, you must be calm now,” she said. “And patient though I know it isn’t in your nature to be either. Psyche has been taken by the Night King. We don’t know for how long or where. Heidi was found by Badger, as I said, but she’s fast asleep and the High Priestess says her dream is one made of nightmare.”
“And the dragon called Dream is missing,” Odin said. “Along with his dice.” He cleared his throat and glanced at Oberon. “We have reason to suspect Titania, the elf queen called Star Dancer, is there as well. I feel as if we are all cursed somehow though why remains to be seen.”
Oberon crushed the scroll into a ball and threw it into the waves. “The Night King shall pay for this transgression,” he said, anger making his voice shake. “And we know exactly where his floating castle can be found. Titania went to placate my mother and never returned. We shall find that night spawn and his domain in the Valley of the Sun and Moon.”
“That’s a place of imagination,” Dionysus observed. “We would do well to take Merlin with us. His myriad maps could be of use in the Night King’s twisting halls.”
Venus shook her head. “Merlin hasn’t been seen in some time,” the goddess said. She placed a calming hand on Oberon’s arm. “I last saw the wizard jump into the Pool of Destiny. He had a vague plan to wake the sleeper at the bottom of the lake and confront Nimue in a final apocalyptic battle for dominance over the maps.” The goddess looked troubled. “He is obsessed with that nymph.”
“As well he should be,” Eros said. “Nimue asked me to prick Merlin’s eyes with my arrow and traded a kiss for the favor.” Venus and Oberon exchanged an asking look. “I only did it once,” he confessed as Dionysus broke into laughter.
“So Love’s son has taken away our greatest chance to safely traverse the Night King’s halls. Love faltered when we needed to navigate the imagination,” he said, wiping wine-colored tears of laughter from his cheeks. “I find some humor in that.”
“I do not,” Oberon snapped, shaking off the goddess of love’s placating hand. “And I tire of your buffoonery. I leave for the Valley of the Sun and Moon this instant and, if you can sober up long enough to accompany me, you are welcome. If you cannot, then stay here and drink to the memories of happier times with that ghost love of yours.” Dionysus’ laughter ceased and a quiet anger began to take its place.
“If we do not wake Heidi from her stupor, we have lost more than my queen, Love’s cup and the Psyche.” Oberon’s voice dropped to a whisper. “I will fall into my flooded cave to drown forever in the tears of the moon, never again to dance with my queen or read the secrets contained in the stars.” He turned to Dionysus. “You will wander eternity drunk and gnashing your teeth in madness, forgetting everyone you have ever held dear,” the elf said solemnly.
Oberon then pointed at Odin. “You will be cursed to wander directionless for you know not what or even what your name may once have been, to dream forever of forgotten wisdom and a place to call your own.”
The elf king finally turned to Venus and Eros. “You both will lose a servant of love,” Oberon said with finality. “And you cannot tell me with the mortal world and the sorry state of those who dwell within it that those who value love above all things are easy to find.” He closed his eyes. “The Shadow will rule the inner realms and the Inner Child will cease to exist — a waking death for all the worlds.” In the silence following the elf’s prophecy, the desolate wind blew once more across the empty island and it carried one of Shadow’s screams. He raised his voice to speak over the agonized screech: “We will lose the dreamer and all of our voices will be silenced.”
When Oberon opened his eyes, the disembodied keening abruptly ceased. “That is what will happen if we fail,” he said. “So, we must not fail. Who will brave this shadow with me?”
The gods of Wisdom, Love, Desire, and Wine nodded their assent on that far sandy beach. “Then let’s away to where the giants walk and Love sleeps,” Oberon said. “And may the ancient ones in their hidden spaces have mercy upon us all.” With those words, the elf king drew a door into another reality. The moon shone through the gate and their shadows sprang into stark relief as they passed through the doorway into another world.
I went to follow my friends through the door but my consciousness was pulled back into Hades’ coffin and there my vision ended.
The Light Congress 