WHO: Hecate, Qebhet WHEN: Friday WHERE: The underworld, and the Western Funeral Home WHAT: Crossing back over to life WARNINGS: Talk of death
The was a deep comfort in the soft darkness of the underworld; of all the places in this world, beneath and below this world, it was the place that had changed the least over the long and ever-turning seasons. Though it was a shadow of its former self (and Hecate did think of places as though they had distinct personalities, ‘self’ was a concept that could be held by more than just people, especially as places as ancient and full of stories as this) she was at home in shadows; she was at home down here.
Separated from life and the living, removed from worldly duties, she was unbound from the feelings that were deeply and intricately tied to her mortal body. Worry and anger and pain, these things waited for her to return, somewhere in another world.
Persephone came to her, and she greeted her girl, her queen, her friend, with a long hug. Yes, she understood what had happened to her, yes, thanks to Hecuba, she had found those who had done it. And yes, she did have a lot of snakes twisted around her at the moment, didn’t she? As freshly dead as she was, the barrier between the underworld and the upperworld was impenetrably thick, and her mortal cares barely transversed it.
Later – and time was a funny idea down here, moving in all directions, but she knew it was later because she could feel the gradual thinning of the barrier – she walked the underworld on her own, brushing up against familiar souls, those she had met in lives past. Some nearly as ancient as she, others not nearly so old.
One girl, Beatrice, was freshly arrived only ninety or so years ago. Hecate had found her deep in the Dust Bowl, a howling and wounded spirit, and they’d walked the world together through the long, dry years. Beatrice greeted her like they’d parted only this morning, and while a while they walked together again.
At another time, Hecate tested the barrier with her hand, or something like the hand she’d become accustomed to, except hand met barrier only in her mind. The resistance against her urged her gently not to try again, not yet. But if she lifted her torch, she could see life playing out into the shadows her flames cast on the walls. Qebhet, brushing Hecate’s hair, Luna, brushing Serene’s. Side by side with them were Beatrice’s sisters, calling out. All visions as vivid and present as each other.
The borderline grew thinner, and thoughts and memories wound their way back to her. Her tarot reading: the card that warned her of events centered around a homecoming – Hecate found she had enough of a connection to life to laugh, ironically. Alright, yes, homecoming, she could see that now.
Life tugged at her, as though the beat of it was the moon and she was the ocean. Hecate readied herself as best she could for the inevitable return journey, and said a farewell in her heart to the restfulness of this place.
Boundaries and liminal spaces were her domain, and she was at home during the crossing over as she was in the underworld, working her way back toward life with her torch high and bright to light the way.
Returning was not the issue. Being returned – that was where the difficulty lay. The physicality of having a body again hit her hard, the awareness of every nerve ending in her body – even those endings that had not suffered any fatal trauma recently – was enough to make her cry out. Stripped of the peace of death, life was a raw and staggering experience.
She found herself on her hands and knees, feeling as though she had tried to more somewhere and failed quite spectacularly, her limbs, suffering from a poverty of live blood, refused to listen to signals from her sluggish, shocked brain. Her dark hair – the only thing that wasn’t overwhelming her with sensation - fell about her face, brushing the floor, and across one outstretched hand slithered a heavy black snake. Another coiled around her arm like the supportive hand of an old friend, and the weight across one of her calves, she suspected, was a third.
Her arms quivered under her weight, and slowly she lowered herself to her elbows, pressing her forehead against the cool, smooth floor. Just as slowly (for the sake of the snakes) she let her hips tilt till she lay completely on the ground. Her lungs, breath by overwhelming breath, gradually remembering what it was to breathe again.