The Mysteries, A Novel of Ancient Eleusis

by David Sheppard

CHAPTER 8: Entering the Underworld

  Melaina had only seen the sacred grotto, the Gates of Hades, from outside. Even her mother had never been inside. This was where Earth had yawned a thousand years before, allowing Hades to surface, kidnap Kore, and take her to the Underworld where he married her, thereby making her Mistress of the Dead.

  The slaves who'd stayed behind to help load the mother's and daughter's belongings were brought in to assist in the ritual, and they trembled on the sidelines. The Hierophant bid one, a trusted old man with a propensity for worrying, to retrieve a black ewe and a black ram from the sacred holding pen. "The finest we have," the Hierophant said.

  "Lord Zeus, help me!" the old man replied, hurrying off.

  The gates to the Underworld, set deeply into the east side of the mountain, were already shrouded in shadow. In the orange glow of sunset, the Hierophant said a prayer in the ancient tongue, inserted the large temple key, turned it, and swung aside the grotto doors, while the slaves whispered and cowered in the background. Myrrhine, now in the long robe of the priestess of Demeter and carrying a basket, entered after the Hierophant and was followed by Kallias, who'd donned the raiment of the Dadouchos. He carried the torch and led the black ram. Melaina came last, carrying the temple key and leading the black ewe.

  Melaina had complained to her grandfather after seeing the ewe the slave had selected. "I raised her," she'd said. "Please don't make me slaughter her. She's pregnant."

  "We always sacrifice the most precious when asking for divine gifts," he told her. "We give so that they give in return."

  Inside, a small moss-eaten altar drank torchlight. Dark stone lining the walls of the cave held back the crumbling mountainside. At the far end in the darkest corner, Melaina saw a small door that was barely visible in the dim light, looking even more ancient than the stone walls. The Dadouchos placed the torch in a holder just inside the entrance and brought the ram forward to the altar, where the Hierophant had already assumed his position and taken the basket from Myrrhine. From within it, the Hierophant drew forth a long bronze blade that glinted in the torchlight. Just outside the door, the slaves made ready the fire.

  The Hierophant accepted the black ram and placed its front feet at the edge of the blood drain that emptied into a hole. The other three joined him, supplicating themselves, then rising to circle the altar. The Hierophant sprinkled the ram with chilled holy water, and, after it trembled its assent, he prayed.

  "O Unseen One, lord of the blurred and breathless dead, imperious Hades, whose heart knows no mercy, I summon you on a matter of great urgency. All Hellas overflows with the arrogance of Xerxes, who calls himself King of Kings and blasphemes against the gods. His dark forces swarm our fields and burn your temples. We respect your solitude and ask only council with the dark goddess of your house. Call her from the misty depths of Tartarus."

  As he spoke the last words, he slit the black ram's throat with a single swift stroke, and the women screamed as was the custom. The ram labored on the altar and stumbled while the Hierophant guided the blood-gushing neck to the hole. Melaina looked away as the ram's life drained in red runnels.

  The Hierophant chanted, then carved the carcass and set the white thighbones, covered with glistening fat, to roast for the gods on the roaring flames. He cut and served a crisp portion to each of them. Until now, Melaina hadn't realized she was so hungry. After the ritual repast, the Hierophant poured red wine over the flames and turned to Melaina, his demeanor now formal.

  "Granddaughter of tender years," he said, "now guised in the raiment of the priestess of Kore, your turn has come. The rest of us must retire to the Telesterion: the Dadouchos to spread the purifying Fleece of Zeus and prepare the pathway for the great light, the priestess of Demeter to summon the goddess to mourning for her kidnapped daughter, and myself to the Anaktoron, where I will summon Kore for her return to earth. When I summon her," he said to Melaina, "you must converse with her for a sign. No one has ever done what you are attempting, so your inexperience is no disadvantage. But be precise in executing the few instructions I do give you. The fate of us all may weigh in the balance.

  He took a smaller temple key from the wall and handed it to her. "My instructions are these," he said. "Use the key to open the door at the back of the cave, which has not been entered even in my father's lifetime. You must open it and lead the ewe inside. Word from the ancients tells us little about what lies beyond. As far as I know, only dark sacrificial earth. You are to take the basket with you. Once inside, use the tip of the bronze blade to cut a gaping wound in Earth and pour libations from each of the cups. Then say a prayer to Kore and sacrifice the ewe, allowing its blood to flow into Earth's wound."

  Melaina remembered Kynthia's death a Brauron and the uncertain fate of her friends. "No," she whispered, "after Brauron, I cannot take a life, particularly these two lives I've nurtured."

  "I told you, Melaina hasn't recovered," said Myrrhine.

  The old Hierophant dropped to one knee before Melaina, his eyes sparkling with excitement. "We must perform the grim rituals for the gods," he said, "even when they bring pain and take loved ones from us. If I had a choice, I would not leave you alone to perform this terrible rite. Be brave, little one, and reap great reward from it."

  Melaina said nothing. Somehow, it seemed a step beyond what she could withstand right now. She felt her mother hug her, and then they left, flames outside casting a faint flickering light against the door she was to enter.

  Melaina took a deep breath and approached the door, her footsteps echoing on the stones as if she were already inside a great chamber. Darkness enveloped her. She paused, thinking what a mistake she'd made to believe she could perform a ritual involving the dead. But then she scolded herself. If Odysseus could sail to the ends of the world to find his way home, surely she could perform a ritual just inside this small door to save all Greece.

  She inserted the bronze temple key, a round bar as long as her forearm but with two crooks, forced a partial rotation and heard the grating of metal on metal. She clutched the cold handle and pulled, but nothing happened. She tried again, but it still would not budge. She was about to call the Hierophant to tell him she couldn't do it, when she thought perhaps a few words to the lord of this chamber would be appropriate. She didn't like the name Hades and decided to use his other, more agreeable name.

  "Plouton, host of many and bringer of bountiful wealth, release the latch on the door to your realm so I may enter."

  She tried the door again, gave it a jerk. It groaned and gradually swung open, setting free a gust of cold, musty air. At first, she thought it wasn't dark inside at all, but then realized she wasn't seeing blackness. She was peering into nothingness. She sat the basket on the ground before the void and, taking the bronze blade from the basket, she raised it high over her head and with both hands clasped about the hilt, drove it deep into Earth. She then pulled it toward her to cut the votive pit. She poured libations from the cups one by one around it: sweet milk, honey, wine and clear water. Then she scattered barley in a circle, encompassing all.

  She brought the ewe forward, but still resented her grandfather's order. She'd raised the ewe from a lamb, had seen it frolic in the field and had looked forward to watching it bear her own lambs. Now as it reached the threshold of motherhood, she was to take its life. Already the ewe's sides swelled with pregnancy. She would be taking two lives. Tears of fear and anger welled up within her. She spoke to ease her escalating terror. "Grim daughter of Zeus, giver of life and death to drudging mortals, come forth from within the womb of Earth to hear my plea."

  She put her arm around the ewe's neck and held it to her bosom, running her fingers along the furry face and down until she found the loose-skinned throat. She brushed aside the tears and raised the deadly blade to her fingertips, found the ewe's most vulnerable spot and drew the sharp edge quickly across. She screamed. The ewe bolted but Melaina held on tight so that the black blood could find Earth's wound. The life-holdi
ng broth poured from one laceration into the other. She squeezed the ewe to her so its death might seep deep into her own living flesh. She bowed her head and cried painful tears into her dying companion's soft fleece. She was so lost in grief she didn't realize she was again praying. The dark goddess' forbidden name escaped her lips unbidden and unnoticed, and thus without fear.

  "O dear mother of the Netherworld, Persephone, dark one who lights the Elysian Fields, take this beloved soul into your warm embrace and grant the sign needed so badly for our own earthly salvation. Grant this request that we might work a great redemption. Send us word, O Dark One."

  Dread filled her as she felt the fading life release the limbs of the ewe, her only companion in that dark chamber. The two of them slumped to the ground together, and Melaina felt as though she had fallen into a deep sleep. She saw a dark shore round which the river Styx flowed nine times, and where the grumpy ferryman, Charon, ferried dead to the Underworld.

  A great sadness overcame her, and she saw an apparition of a man coming toward her, one she didn't recognize. Some dreaded god, she thought. "Not so," the shape told her. "Simply a long-dead father, come to gaze one last time upon his beloved daughter." She reached out, longing for her father, but her hand went sifting through him. Ethereal as a shadow, he was. "Remember your promise," he said, "and don't fear even the most fearful. Also remember that not all burdens are a curse and that a short life is the more glorious." She wished to question him about this, but he vanished as quickly as he'd come.

  A delicately featured maiden, hardly older than Melaina, now stood in his place, amidst a dazzling light. She wore a peplos drawn over a white chiton. A stephane woven of autumn pickings from the fields wound about her head, and her long hair fell in masses over her shoulders. In her right hand she held two torches, and in her left, several ears of grain. Melaina was buoyed by the feeling of love and friendliness radiating from this divine presence, expressed by just the suggestion of a smile.

  The lady turned, and with a sweep of her arm flung the two torches into the darkness, unveiling a bronze fence beyond, crowned above by roots of dark Earth. Two iron gates slowly swung open to expose a new blackness: grim, dank, and loathsome. From within issued thousands of spirits led by gentle, clever Hermes. Fell, they were, spirits of murder and madness. They squeaked like bats wakened from a cavern wall, flitting about, their gibbering punctuated with faint cries of "Iakchos, Iakchos." They trailed after the guiding, lighthearted bringer of dreams.