The Shadow Crucible

by T. M. Lakomy

  The Maiden spoke first. “Children of the Goddess! Here we are gathered again before the edge of this new calamity. But take strength, for we are sowing the seeds of redemption. The Dancer in the Dark has eluded the clutches of Lucifer and of Samael and passed through to the Elder Folk. She is dead to the world and has shed her human mortality. Now she shall steward you all from the barges of the moon. Now is the time to prepare. We chose of our enemy a willing heart. He was touched by our chosen daughter, Tsura, and she broke the chains on his mind and brought him through tortuous paths to our secret heart. Remember his name and his new incarnation. Remember Mikhail the Templar!” Her echoing words rose like a tidal wave, drowning the doubts of the congregation.

  “We will remember your name,” came in unison the soft, echoing answer back.

  “He will die in the coming days, and it will be up to you to guide his wayward spirit through our Twilit pathways, to keep him safe till he finds where we might rewrite his name in the grand tapestry of creation. Watch over him, for he is the vessel of our will, and the depredations of the darkness shall chafe at his soul. Remember his name.”

  “We shall remember his name,” the congregation faithfully returned.

  “Pray for the Dancer! For the sinuous gossamer strands she dances threaten to break. One day her sight will be restored, and then the race will begin again, and her opened eyes bring her to the brink of infinity’s bosom, where light and dark dissect each other and become one and the same. Remember her name.” The congregation lifted their supplicating hands to the skies, and the stars responded with flared fires.

  “We remember your name, Tsura,” they vowed passionately.

  “Let him be reborn again, this Templar with no name. Nameless he entered the world and nameless he shall depart it. Then we will reclothe him in the garments of destiny.”

  “So be it, blessed be,” was the severe response. The crescent moon upon the Maiden’s brow brightened with blinding radiance.

  “So shall it be sealed and the weavers of fates, the divine Norns, shall hear the decree. What is done cannot be undone!” she proclaimed savagely, her burning eyes full of promise. Then the light darkened around her and she was enveloped in shadow.

  The Mother stepped forward, the great diamond flashing upon her brow, and the serpents upon her head took life and writhed. She lifted her staff to the waxing moon, and its opalescent light cascaded upon her.

  “I am promise itself, and I fulfill each of the promises I give,” she spoke. “Nothing shall take fruition that hasn’t had its ultimate end design in my heart, for however dark is the night, a little light binds its gloom forever. He shall be reborn a boy, and we shall watch over him. Until manhood no harm shall befall him. I see it and I decree it. He will grow to be a man, and he will challenge the one on the throne—the one who will kneel to Samael and dance before Lucifer, nothing but a tool for their games.

  “If all else fails I shall excoriate creation, for I have born you and I shall reject you. I can easily abort you from my womb and renew the world. I carry life and creation, and I watch each of you live and die and desecrate each other. Many times over have I lifted my staff and extinguished you from existence. Though the warring gods of the skies fight for dominion over puny matters, in the great end I shall choose, though already your world has been renewed many times, bleeding my strength. What is said cannot be unsaid, I am the Mother of all things, and I carry hope with me, and I birth it into being and deliver it to you for safekeeping. Be watchful!”

  “We shall be watchful, Holy Mother,” the congregation replied tenderly as they knelt before her.

  The Mother’s staff ignited with white flame, and for a moment her face was clear to all. She greeted them solemnly with a somber smile. Then she, too, faded into darkness, stepping back beside her sister.

  The last to speak was the Crone, and for a while she looked up to the waxing moon, studying it curiously. It seemed to dim beneath her gaze, and the light of the stars guttered as if fanned by an unseen breeze. Her thin, pale fingers clasped a basalt staff that was formed like a spindle whorl. She fixed her congregation with a brilliant white smile. A compelling chill had settled in, and the people shivered, but none dared to stir before her.

  “I, the Crone, stand before you, the Hag of many faces and many names, the witch of all witches that all hate and despise yet revere. I am wisdom beyond measure, and knowledge so heavy it crushes mortal spines. I am the womb of death, where I welcome you all in, my beautiful and ugly children.” Her brilliant white smile shone like a crescent moon in her pallid face.

  “I am the finality of all things and the last repose of industrious souls. I am the crumbling of all that men create, and I erode time itself and devour memory and erase growth. I am potent and deep, and those that have the courage to watch me spin shall be granted rebirth beyond death. This world is one of many, and I promise your immortal souls that I shall seize each and every one of you and weave you into the various dominions of the skies, if all fails. Your story shall never end here on earth. When the dread steps of doom sound I shall come for you, and your wounds I shall avenge. I give to you this gift.

  “Mikhail shall be reborn through me, through the threefold death. From my womb he shall struggle and be cast out, and from boyhood to manhood he shall thrive. Then he will banish Samael and challenge Lucifer. But now be gone, take these prophecies, and wait for a child to be born who shall disrupt the course of the planets and call down a fiery rain of meteors. Watch out for the chaos and the pursuit of the demons and shroud him! Hide him well, and remember in the end, death is nothing to fear, for I am your mother and my love for you surpasses all.”

  Clouds veiled the skies and all were plunged into darkness, still and calm. Some wept and some sighed, but there was a contented murmur that rippled throughout, as the gates of the dimensions were flung wide. And the people immortalized their memory and bided their time, waiting for the boy who would be born . . .

  32

  THE TAPESTRY OF CREATION

  The fields of waste are open, wide is my wound

  Vaster than the horizon I drink with avid eyes

  For there is nothing hollower than my chaos, my memory doomed

  The grave beneath shall be the dome of my skies

  It was never a dream, though Tsura could not recall how she had entered that place, stumbling into hidden chambers in a region she could not remember. The Twilit paths were hers to roam, and she wandered alone, seeking answers to things she had seen in her visions. There she discovered much she had never fathomed, for the elves wove their worlds from strands of thought and dreams. She had traveled down the golden pathways into radiant sunsets, to endless, shoreless seas that were lit as clouds of nebulae where wheeling stars burned in the motionless air.

  It was as if creation had never been finished and the seas never met the sunlight. And the seas’ depths withheld their habitual song, but echoed back the primordial notes that spoke it into being. The endless dusk touched the sky with a multitude of hues, from cerulean and malachite to amber and aquamarine. There were hidden halls beneath the mountains where muses sang and lured wanderers to banquets, and other halls led beneath the sea where ancient spirits with silvery eyes pined for the music before the throne. Unlike the elves, they were angels that had fallen in love with their creation and become a part of it.

  It was in these strange halls she had stumbled upon a hidden room which, unlike the others, seemed deserted. She could not remember what had hurried her steps, nor what kindled the eagerness in her spirit as she neared the heart of the mountain. But when she reached its core, she knew she had reached the destination her heart pined for. She was standing before a large, magnificent, gold-threaded tapestry. Woven within it were many planets and stars. It was a tapestry that encompassed all of creation and its history, from beginning to end. The first audience before the divine throne was depicted, where God wielded into being his voice, and the Fall and the angels’ sojourns on earth. It al
so contained the other worlds that humans knew nothing of, with their stories and trials, and the various races that ruled over them. They were all woven together, souls meshed with golden threads spun from the spindle whorl of existence into one great design. The souls that emanated from God’s throne chose the worlds their essence favored most, and the Norns threaded them into its existence.

  As Tsura stood before the tapestry, a smiling, golden-haired Norn with a magnificent pair of burnished bronze wings approached her, pointing to a sphere on the tapestry. The meaning of the sphere was alien to Tsura, but she did not dare speak, for she feared the vision would dissolve and the lights extinguish.

  “All human souls choose to incarnate on earth,” said the Norn. “You chose to come here, and we threaded you in. Where would you choose to be next, now that you approach the ending of your earthly journey?”

  The softness of her eyes and her warm smile inspired nothing but fear in Tsura, for she felt small and inconsequential and petty, unworthy to choose. Her heart was heavy with woe and bitterness for the grievances of the earth.

  “I want to be where the Elder Folk are,” Tsura replied, “and share their pain and destiny, wherever it leads.”

  The Norn smiled indulgently with a motherly kindness. “Then this is where you are choosing to be bound. Once your soul is woven in here, you can never sever from it, nor abdicate from the tribulations and trials that the race you incarnate into shall face. You shall not remember where you came from, and you will never know you had this choice. But if this is your last decision, then so be it.”

  Tsura weighed the words in her heart, looking back through her mind’s eye at her life on earth, and how puerile and lowly mortal life was.

  “My heart was never of them,” she said finally, “and I yearn to join with the Elders forever, and never look back on humans again.”

  The Norn smiled softly and pointed to a sphere in the tapestry. “This is where you shall be, and none of the souls you have loved on earth shall know you, nor follow you, and you shall find yourself another home in the heart of your people. Not many have your choice, and you have proven that you truly do renounce earth.”

  The Norn brandished a sharp knife and delicately approached the tapestry. Then she deftly selected a single golden thread that wove through the human sphere. “This is the end for you here, your chapter on earth. You may be lost in the ethereal paths before I weave you in again, clad in a different spirit. Till then your naked soul shall be lost erring in the wilderness of nonexistence.”

  Before Tsura could say anything the Norn slid the knife across the thread. Tsura felt her heart tear open and its vessels break. With a last, shocked cry of pain, she crumbled into a deeper oblivion.

  “WHETHER SHALL I turn when the world all does fail? The stars all burn out, heaven’s tears all cold, weep no rain but fire.” Antariel sang softly to himself as he sat on a rock in his woodland home. He was alone, completely and utterly, and even the spirits that haunted the woods were far afield, for they dreaded him and his vast sorrow. The usual whispers of the winds, which were once music to his ears, were now dull and devoid of harmony, fraying his patience.

  Antariel had never felt so alone, for he was born of fire and it burned steadily within him, yearning to be rejoined with his celestial home where once he had abided in peace. But his free will had led him astray, and still he lingered on earth, waiting for something to change or shift within him—for his spirit to ignite again and the distaste for earth to send him surging like the solar flare whipping the firmament apart in his quest to return. Or else for summons to swing open the gates of the sky and escort him back with welcome. But neither happened, and nothing could quell his brooding loneliness.

  For a long time he waited patiently for his reckoning. The days stretched by, and still he waited. One day, there was a change in the air, and he realized that his time had finally come. The angels that had long observed him from afar had made a decision and he had been summoned. Antariel bid farewell to the things he loved, the trees whose sleeping, drowsy spirits he used to converse with, as well as those he nurtured from seed to tree and encouraged with his music. Then he sought out the spirits that were once his friends, and though they feared him now they loved him still and mourned him.

  Casting one long glance at the place where he had sheltered his fallen pride, he turned away and waited for the sunrise. With his angelic gaze he watched the golden gates open in the east, and the divine countenance looked down on earth, and rain fell glittering like limpid silver. Already the chariot of the sun was proudly conquering the globe, engulfing the remaining moonlight in its blaze. But beyond it all at the radiant gates the greatest of heaven’s mighty sons, Zuriel, the rock of God, was surveying the earth, solemnly. Antariel extended his wings, forsaking earth and its possessions, and ascended into the sky.

  Zuriel beat the air mercilessly with his eight magnificent wings, sharp and bitter as a cluster of razorblades. They were brilliant and blindingly white like flashes of lightning. If one erred too close they would be sliced apart and thrown to the whistling winds. He held a calescent spear, the shaft burning like an unforgiving star, and before his piercing gaze no creature great or small could hope to elude him, for he was illuminated with God’s justice. He was severe, as one who had never strayed, and his eyes were filled with the fire that emanated from the throne. He was muscular with broad shoulders and raven hair so dark it was almost blue. His arms were covered with silver bands inscribed in the heavenly tongue, and his lips curled back in a haughty sneer as Antariel approached.

  “Welcome Antariel, son of the throne! May you be seen through the eye and pass through whole.”

  Antariel fixed Zuriel with his clear eyes and tinged his words with meekness. “I returned, as was permitted, and I am here, as was commanded. It seems I have completed the tasks I was assigned, though I may have failed in achieving the goals I was set.”

  “I know you were assiduous in your quests, and in that I hold you faultless,” said Zuriel. “But you have become weak, as weak as the clay that molded humans into flesh that breathes. I see you now, right through you, and your holy heart is corrupted and you have become almost like them. Though your essence is divine, you have cleaved to humans in all your ways.” Zuriel tossed his head scornfully, and beneath his lashes the swirling chaos of the cosmos stared back at Antariel. Unflinching, Antariel bent his knee and the streaming sunlight filled his eyes with warmth, and the pristine fragrant air filtered through his hair.

  “Many are those that fashioned this earth out of love and were brokenhearted to see it usurped from them. Would you say their hearts, too, had been dethroned from their lofty abodes?” Antariel asked. Zuriel observed for a moment, then lifted one hand and all stilled; the sun, the translucent layers of the skies, the flight of birds, and time itself withheld from drawing breath in its race with infinity.

  “Behold our power over all you say the angels created. It is feeble and weak, and all that is material is cursed to rot and ruination, for the mother of all things whose womb holds existence rejects it. Yet she suffers it, for she would not abort what she had created, evil as creation is. Come with us now and scorn the folly of your ways, for have you not tasted the bitterness of banishment?” boomed Zuriel’s tempestuous voice through the stillness between them.

  “I would not leave if I could never return,” said Antariel, shaking his head humbly, “for I have become fond of the things I have nurtured, and my place upon the chessboard has been etched in my heart, though God in his mercy has erased my sin.”

  Zuriel did not respond, but with an unworldly celerity, he gripped Antariel by the throat and lifted him up as if he were but a child’s puppet. There, suspended by the mighty arm of Zuriel, Antariel felt his divine spark throttled and singed by the contact with the hallowed being, and he lamented.

  “I could cast you down again and leave you less than you ever were, for that is the judgment for those who defy orders,” Zuriel said. “Yet
we foretold that your heart would turn away. Until all the things you cherish pass into memory, you shall abide there on earth, helpless to hinder the tide. You shall watch over the unfolding events before you, a statue of marble, and none may release you from your plight till those humans you pledge your love for pledge it back to you.”

  Far away in the distance a gong sounded, and the heavens reverberated with the sound of it. The silence that Zuriel upheld was broken, and the habitual noises of life resumed. Then Zuriel, with a grim smile of determination, his wings creating a hurricane of wind, lifted a foot clad in thunder and without a further word hurled Antariel down from the lofty station. Antariel fell in a ball of flames, the fires glistening off his fair plumage until he smote the ground. With a mighty groan the earth received him, beaten and bruised. The hurtling force of Zuriel was enough to crumble mountains, but not enough to shatter the sublime structure of Antariel’s bones.

  Antariel gathered himself up with pain, fighting to regain his composure. The world spun around him, and he braced himself for the crippling torment his body felt. When he managed to stand up and shake the dust from his wings, he cried out in excruciating agony; for as soon as he was standing, his feet began to root to the ground, and a dull ache settled in. Then he knew that Zuriel’s menacing decree was coming to be, and he was transforming into marble. He wept, unable to move as his legs became rigid and pale and took on the shade of white polished marble. Then the sensation died within them, and he felt his power bleed out of him.