| THE LORELEI SIGNAL |
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| Written by Ripley Patton / Artwork by Marge Simon |
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| Sister of the Benevolent Gods |
When one is young, mortality seems tremendously
romantic. I left the Mountain of the Gods, having just
come of age, filled with youthful wanderlust and good
deal of desire to thumb my nose at my family, though
the true reasons behind it eluded me then. I wasn't a
goddess yet, though most humans equate immortality
with godhood. In my family, men are born gods and
the women who marry them become goddesses. It
wasn't till much later, after I married a human I loved
and began to age, that I questioned the wisdom of my
defection. Now, after sixty human years, mortality
looms, woeful and inadequate. Petr, the love of my life,
knows my dilemma even though I have not voiced a
word of it. He knows, as I pack my small satchel with
a favorite brush, a pair of comfortable slippers, a bit of
parchment and a well-worn quill, that I may not come
back.
"Do you have a gift?" he asks, knowing I rarely think
of such things. I was raised with the gods, and we
don't give gifts; we are the gift. Old habits die hard.
"I hadn't thought of one yet. He's a god and she'll be a
goddess. What could they possibly need?"
"It's not what they need. It's what would please them."
"I don't even know them. How would I know what
would please them?"
"What pleased you, when we got married?" He smiles,
a twinkle in his dark brown eyes. In human reckoning, Petr is fifteen years my junior and as spunky as the day he
first lay his wonderful hands on me.
"I can't give them that." I almost laugh, but I stop myself short. I can't think of such things, of love, of Petr and I
young together, or I might not leave. And I have to go. I have to find out if what I've chosen is still the right choice. I
have to be sure.
Petr crosses to the trunk at the end of our bed and opens it, taking out a pristine sheepskin, white as a goose feather
and just as soft. He hands it to me saying, "Give them this." It is just like the rug at the foot of our bedroom hearth,
except we've lain on that one countless times, the fire warming our naked bodies; us, in turn, warming each other. It
has been a few years. My old bones, especially my aching hips, feel the hard wood floor through the fleece too
much these days.
"It won't fit in my pack," I protest, but he rolls the skin expertly and ties it on the outside of my satchel with a
rawhide cinch. I put the pack on my back. He follows me to the doorway but we do not touch.
"I'll miss you, Adelpha," he says, trying to hide the fear in his voice.
"It's just a wedding. A week with my family and I'll be running down the mountain back to you." But it could be a
lie. What will be only a few days for me in the Realm of the Gods will be a year's waiting for Petr. I walk away,
through the upper pasture, and the sheep follow me to the gate, snuffling my hands for the nuts they hope I'm hiding.
I look up at the Mountain of the Gods rising before me into the clouds. I've lived in its shadow all my life. I start to
climb. By the time I reach the high meadow, just below tree line, I feel ten years younger and I don't stop to see if
Petr is still watching me. But I know he is.
#
"You didn't bring your humans," my younger brother, Math, says, biting into a huge leg of lamb, the glistening fat
running down his square chin. It is the eve of the first feast and the God of Reason is already fairly drunk. We are
seated at the end of the family table, almost to the place where the young mothers and their rowdy godlings must sit.
We aren't children but we might as well be; I've forsaken immortality and Math isn't married yet.
"My children are grown, Math. They've moved far away from the mountain. Petr and I decided I'd make this trip
alone."
"So you're finally coming back to us for good," he says, grinning. It's what he always says when I visit because it’s
the only reasonable thing for me to do. This time it makes me angry, though, because I'm considering it.
"Math, I'm not coming back. I'm happy with my humanity. I like who I am down there."
"Yeah, but you're so old, Addie. You won't last much longer as a human. And you've got to miss all this." He
gestures, his great greasy hand indicating the piles of food on twelve long banquet tables, the flawless beauty of my
seven brothers, their wives and children, as they gorge and laugh, getting drunker and drunker. But my eyes stray
past all that to the valley itself, a perfect bowl of lush greenery, fertile and warm, where wildflowers dot the grass
year round, and the fruit trees I planted as a girl always bear fruit. Beyond the orchard, somewhere in the tangle of
overgrown gardens, part of me still dwells. Math sees my glance.
"Your apple trees need pruning. No one takes care of the valley quite like you did, Addie."
A trumpet sounds, indicating the arrival of the wedding couple. My nephew, Kratus, steps out from a billowing
curtain at the head of the table where two empty thrones await him and his bride-to-be. He stands there chiseled
and radiant, the perfect specimen of manly physique, taking even this old woman's breath away. His right hand
remains behind the veil, tugging at some resistance, and he yanks, forgetting his own strength, causing his bride to fly
from behind the curtain and crash into the back of one of the bejeweled chairs. He gathers her up, concerned and
embarrassed, and she hides her face in her hands. When she finally looks up the herald announces them.
"Kratus, the God of Strength, and his betrothed, Berdina."
I choke mid-sip, nearly spewing my wine. I know her. She lives in the village on the mountain where Petr and I go
to trade wool and mutton. She is human and she has no idea what she is about to marry into. Math puts most of his
fingers in his mouth and whistles at her like a schoolboy.
"Stop it," I say, hurling the rest of my wine in his face. He only laughs as I get up and storm off into the orchard.
I have to come up with a plan to help Berdina, before it's too late.
#
On the fourth day's feast, I finally gain audience with Chrysostom, the Golden-Mouthed. He is my brother too, but
ages older. Unlike Math, we didn't grow up side by side at our mother's skirts. When I was born Chrys already
reigned under my father, in line to be God of all Gods. But he doesn't intimidate me. I remember when his wife, the
goddess Cenobia, left him for his best friend and Chrys came to our father, weeping and asking for advice on how
to win her back. They sat on the celestial staircase together, talking low and long into the night, while I
eavesdropped from my bedroom balcony. Once you've seen a god with his heart broken, it's much harder to
conjure up a proper fear of him.
"Addie, how wonderful to see you," he says, coming off his throne and crossing the tiled courtyard to take my tiny
hands in his. "You've grown up to be quite a lady." It's his sort of compliment. "I'm sorry I haven't seen you sooner
but I'm running this whole wedding. It's quite a task, and of course, I'm performing the ceremony. What was it you
needed? Math hinted you might stay with us this time. Of course, I can arrange it."
"I didn't know it needed arranging," I snap, my hackles already up. I take a deep breath and start again. "That isn't
why I wanted to see you. It's about Berdina."
"She's lovely, isn't she? I brought her to the mountain years ago, you know, all the way from the Carpain Desert.
Her family worships me, of course, but they're dirt poor. Berdina is the first of them to have any schooling. I
arranged for the best. When I first laid eyes on her I knew she was a diamond in the rough. Now that I've cut her
rough edges and scoured her clean, my son can reap the benefits of the gem I've fashioned."
My mouth works open and closed like a fish, but no words come out. I shouldn't be surprised by what my brother
says. It is exactly how I was raised to think. But now, thinking of Berdina, of Petr and myself, thinking like a human,
it suddenly seems such twisted kindness.
"Addie, what is it? I really don't have time." Chrysostom begins to turn away to several important-looking gods who
have entered behind me.
"Chrys, she's human." I grab the long fold of his sleeve, a sign of supplication, though I hope only to hold his
attention a little longer. "She doesn't even understand she has a choice. How could she say no to this, even if she
doesn't want it?"
Chrys looks at my wrinkled human hand on his golden, embroidered robe. "Who wouldn't want to marry the son of
the god who saved her?" he asks, his voice gone rough, like stone.
"Why didn't Kratus choose an immortal, someone his equal? Wouldn't that be better for him?" I try another angle,
scrambling.
"Addie, we're benevolent gods. I've taught my son well. He is thinking of her, not himself." He smiles, removing my
grip from his sleeve and putting something in my hand. "If you decide to stay, just eat this, seeds and all, while you're
here. Good day, dear sister." The Golden-Mouthed One excuses me, leaving me holding an apple from my favorite
tree as he turns to those waiting. I planted the seedling years ago. I'm the only one who has ever tended the fruit and
yet my brother has managed to make this apple a gift, from him to me. I undid my immortality all by myself. It isn't
his gift, to be given back. I take a snarling bite of crisp, sweet, apple flesh and walk away.
#
I pull back the flap of the bride's red tent, and enter the dark, luxurious insides where Berdina waits for all her
female kin (or kin-to-be) to give her counsel. It is the sixth day of the wedding and tomorrow she will become the
goddess Berdina, if nothing is done; if I can't convince her otherwise.
She looks up and her dark beauty confronts me. Her hair is long, kinked and black as the deepest moonless night.
Her skin is chocolate brown, her body a perfect hourglass sheathed in voluminous silk. Her fingers are long and thin
like the branches of a madrone tree. The few times I saw her in the village, she was pretty enough. After basking in
the ambiance of the Mountain of the Gods for almost a week, she is radiant. My brother has done his work well. I
already worship her.
Standing gracefully, she begins to greet me but stops, her eyes startled and blurts, "You're the sheep-herder's
woman."
"I'm his wife," I fire back, the spell definitely broken.
"But I didn't invite you. You are no kin of mine. Why have you come?"
"I am aunt to the groom."
"You? You're a goddess?" Understanding dawns in her eyes and she falls to the ground, kissing the tops of my
slippers. "Goddess, forgive me. You have been in disguise, to test my humility, my true disposition, and I have failed.
Please, I beg you, don't tell Kratus. I can learn. I'll do anything."
"Berdina, stop it. Get up." She obeys promptly, wiping her tears and her nose with the back of her hand. "I have
never been a goddess; I didn't marry a god. I am human like you. I gave up my immortality." We both sit and she
stares at me, bewildered, her schooling apparently having lacked proper etiquette for entertaining ex-immortals. "I
have not come to test you. Just to give you advice. I know you are in awe of my family, that you feel you owe
Chrysostom your very life."
"May his name be praised," she says, raising her hands in worship.
"Yes, well, you are very devout. But Berdina, do you love Kratus, like a woman loves the man she will marry, or
are you simply trying to please your god?"
"Kratus has chosen me above all human and immortal women. It is the greatest honor I could imagine."
"Yes, I know. But I grew up with the gods, Berdina. They are powerful and beautiful and impressive but they aren't
perfect. Their flaws are as big as they are. A husband and wife need a mutual relationship. If Kratus mistreated you,
would you point it out to him, would you stand up for yourself?"
"Kratus would never mistreat me. To suggest so is sacrilege." Berdina peers around the tent, frightened the gods can
hear her every word, poor thing.
"What if I told you the gods have mistreated me?"
"Then you must have deserved it," she says in a whisper. Now I know my cause is hopeless, that Berdina will never
escape of her own free will. And I am prepared for that. I stomp on her right foot as hard as I can, at the same time
pulling a moonflower from within my robes. When she gasps at the unexpected pain, the dainty white trumpet is
already at her face, the iridescent pollen shimmering up her nostrils. She sputters a moment and then keels over onto
the soft velvet cover of her day bed.
After I bundle her up in some furs, I roll her off the bed to the back of the tent. Lifting the canvas edge, I shove her
out the back and under a magnificent star fuchsia I planted when I was only a girl. The bridal tent backs right up to
the edge of the garden, where I can reach her and no one will see.
On my way out I tell those still waiting to see the bride that she has requested an hour's beauty rest; they will have to
come back later. They quickly disperse at my bidding. I am the sister of the benevolent gods, and not to be trifled
with.
#
I carry Berdina with an ease that surprises me. Slinging her over my shoulder, I make my way deep into the garden
past the orchard and the scrambling roses, through a towering conifer stand and around the lily pond, to the
entrance of a labyrinth of laurel I designed and planted long ago, my first ambitious attempt at gardening. Then the
small shrubs had been knee-high and scrawny, their light green fingers barely touching. Now they make a
passageway twelve feet tall, glossy, dark and so overgrown the gnarled branches snag Berdina's dress, nearly
disrobing her as we pass through, as if even they wish to see every inch of her beauty. I take turn after turn, my
confidence in my plan only growing. It appears no one has set foot this way since I left and that means no one has
disturbed the pool. They won't look for me right away. I have time to set things in motion so they can't be undone.
At last, the final hedge opens before me and I step out into the center of the maze, a meadow of low silver grass
with a tranquil rectangular reflecting pool in the middle. I cross the clearing, Berdina suddenly gone heavy on my
back, and climb the three steps to lay her limp form onto the wide lip of raised stone. One of her arms begins to flop
and I snatch it back across her chest, away from the perfectly smooth sheen of liquid green. It is silly. After all, I am
going to put her in. I am going to immerse her completely in the memories of my life among the gods, the feelings I
horded years ago in fallen tears, in understandings distilled daily like dew gathered on the leaves of lady's mantle.
Who we are comes to us in miniscule increments, one drop at a time, and we never really see the whole. But I had
wrung my childhood out, day by day, drop by drop, storing its secrets away, amassing this body of water in which I
now intend to drown Berdina. I don't actually know anymore how I became such a different creature than my
brothers. But the pool remembers, the good and the bad, and it will inform her. Let her make her choice with full
knowledge of what it means. That is my plan.
I push her, sliding her closer to the edge. Her shoulder goes over, and then her arm, her leg, her head, all sinking
soundlessly, her body sliding serenely away from me. She settles on the bottom, about four feet down, and little
bubbles rise from her mouth and nose, teasing the surface. The bubbles stop and her full lips open just barely.
Berdina sips my past, like a whimper or a sigh, and her eyes roll under their glittering, painted lids, dreaming my life,
imbibing it.
I sit back on a step and pull out the apple Chrysostom gave me, eating it all but the seeds. I don't eat it because I've
decided to stay or because I believe it has some hidden power to give me back what I chose to give away. I eat it
because it is mine. I eat it to spite my brothers and to lend me strength for the conflict that is coming. They will find
me before long.
Night falls, like the curtain of a stage let down. Far off trumpets blare, accompanied by the shrill crying of goddesses
in distress. Just when the fireflies begin their off-and-on dance, the air in the middle of the meadow explodes like a
crash of thunder and Chrysostom appears, followed shortly by Kratus, Math, Orin, Leski, Boreas, Daemon and
Takis. They hurt my eyes, filling the peaceful darkness with their shining presence, blotting out the stars.
I rise, standing between them and Berdina's sunken form.
"Addie, what are you doing?" Chrys demands, looking over my shoulder into the water, at the same time that
Kratus barks, "Have you killed her?"
"I'm saving her." I point at them, waggling my finger. "I haven't hurt a hair on her head but I'm saving her from all of
you." I feel a little drunk though I've had no wine.
"Saving her from what?" Kratus asks, dumbfounded. He is only a boy. He doesn't know there is something else, a
world where humanity bites and kicks and howls against the goads. Where men and women alike decide who they
are, and what they need, without the binding benevolence of so many gods.
"Saving her from your goodness. Your kindnesses that kills all choice. I'm saving her from thinking, for the rest of
her life, that she's nothing compared to all of you." My words slur, the images of my brother's running together like
mud and water. Chrys swims toward me saying, "I told you. She ate the apple. She's going down." I fall over then,
my face bouncing off the soft moss that grows thick at the foot of the pool's stairs. I hate my brothers. Everything
goes dark.
#
I wake up in The Cave of Mirrors, alone. My mother is bending over me, making me sip warm mead. I see her on
the ceiling, on the walls, on every reflective panel a hundred times over, and I feel the honeyed liquid sooth my
throat but she isn't beside me. The drink isn't real.
"Stop it." I yell, sitting up, and mother looks at me from all her distant faces, appalled.
"Adelpha, be still," she says, as if I am a child, reaching out to me with two hundred arms that can no longer extend
beyond their planes of glass.
"You can't touch me. Stop trying."
"You're being a fool," she frowns, all pretense of motherly comfort gone.
"Maybe," I concede, finally seeing my own reflection, standing beside her. I am young, all my wrinkles gone. My
back is straight and my hair deep brown. I have a waistline again and my breasts are actually above it. I look down
at myself, away from the mirror and my mother's images to see if the reflection is true. And it is.
"What did Chrys do?" But I already know.
"He gave you an apple, dear, and told you what would happen if you ate it."
"But I planted those apples. They don't bestow immortality. They're just apples. And I didn't eat the seeds," I finish
lamely. I am truly their fool.
"A minor detail," my mother says with a wave of her hand.
"I'm immortal?"
"Irrevocably."
"What does that mean?"
"Well, the way you just tossed if off the last time, the family was concerned. Everyone could see you weren't making
wise choices, Addie. You were going to die, and we couldn't have that, could we? How would that make us look,
the gods letting one of their own just come to an end. We all agreed it was time for some kind of intervention so
Chrys doctored one of your precious apples. You're immortal now, dear, and it can't be undone. It's all for your
own good. I think you'll thank us, eventually."
"Get father."
"Addie."
"Get my father!"
She disappears from the mirror, slipping fully back into the place beyond, but I can hear them arguing, their voices
muffled and heated. My father is retired, from godhood, from the family and life in general. He doesn't want to get
involved but I am his only little girl. If there is a chink in the unity of benevolent gods for me, it is him.
They both come into the closest mirror, arm in arm, she wearing a smirk that I ignore. The sight of him, the shiny
dome of his head, the great grey beard, the eyes full of wisdom, surrounded by wrinkles of deep thought, makes me
little again. I fling myself against the image of him, cold and hard, and weep, my hands sliding against the painted
glass.
"Papa, help me. They've made me immortal. I want to go home. I can't stay here. My Petr-- he won't know they
made me. He'll die without me. I can't live without him. Don't you see?"
"I'm sorry, Addie. It is out of my hands." And I know he grieves for me but he has no more power. He is literally a
reflection of what he once was.
I grab the edges of the mirror, digging my fingers into the rock of the cave wall, feeling my nails bend back, then
snap, searing with pain and seeping blood.
"Addie, what are you doing?" My mother's voice rises in fear but my father holds her arm firmly in his, so she can't
flee or multiply herself again. I look straight into his eyes, and yank with all my immortal strength. The mirror comes
away from the wall, cracking at the upper right corner and leaving a triangular piece behind, still reflecting a bit of my
mother's golden hair. The mirror is heavy, and my father stands where he is, eyes sad, but my mother breaks free
from his hold and runs to the back of the mirror, bumping into some invisible barrier there that throws her flat on her
back. They can't get back to the realm beyond. My parents are my hostages.
"I'm sorry, Father." I say. I heft the mirror, finding a way to balance it on my head, and walk the long, dark corridor
out of the cave. Chrys hasn't posted any guards. He has done a good deed and against such things, there is no need
of law. That is, until now.
#
I bang my parent's mirror through the doors of Chrysostom's throne room, and charge toward the dais, making it
only halfway down the aisle before I see the bowing backs of the bride and groom, my oldest brother blessing their
union with a wave of his hand. I stumble and halt. Chrysostom freezes mid-wave, and the guests murmur, row upon
row, then fall utterly silent. How can this be? Did the pool not work? Did they pull her out before the fullness of
knowledge had come to her? It can't be, yet here she is, still marrying Kratus. They must be forcing her.
"Berdina!" I scream, and she turns slowly, moving in her white dress like a rigid angel. Her dark eyes latch onto
mine, two dark pools rippling with recognition, love and complete understanding. She knows everything. She has
taken in my life, my hurt, my realization. Berdina has been me and she is still choosing to marry Kratus. I don't know
why. I don't understand her at all. I would never make this choice. I chose to leave them all, to live and die rather
than submit my life to their pompous, self-perpetuating hierarchy. I turn away from her, betrayer of self, and look
into Chrysostom's smug face. He thinks he has me. I bring the mirror down in front of me like a shield but mostly so
he can see what it is and shock flits across his face, quickly masked.
"I will throw it down. I will break this family apart, piece by piece, if you do not return me to the way I was, the way
I chose to be." My voice rings clear and firm but Chrysostom, unused to being commanded to do anything, attempts
to save face in front of all these witnesses.
"Addie, be reasonable. We're in the middle of my son's wedding. Let us finish and then I will tend to your needs, of
course."
"I don't want your tending, Chrys. You can't meet my needs." I scream and cry now, heedless of my words. "I don't
want anything from you. That is what you can't stand. I disown you as my god." The crowd gasps, but it doesn't
matter. "You are simply my brother, a puffed up man filled with the air of lording your goodness over others."
He flicks his wrist, his scepter flashing, and I know I've gone too far. The throne room fills with white light that
swallows all noise. My teeth tingle and buzz as the lightning streaks toward the only part of me not behind the
mirror, my head. The inside of my face burns and smoke curls out of my nostrils rising in front of the eye that can still
see. Something falls and shatters before I black out completely.
#
I wake, lying in Berdina's own red tent with her sitting next to me. I can only open my left eye and I raise my hand to
the right one, feeling thick bandages there.
"It will not see again," she says, taking my hand away and pulling it into her lap to hold it in her own. My hand, now
as young as hers, is pale in comparison to her brown beauty. She knows what I'm thinking. She knows me
perfectly. "Your immortality cannot be undone, not by these gods, at least. They say that they cannot. Perhaps it is
only that they will not. I do not know. Did you not put it off before, by the force of your will?"
"It just fell away." I hate to admit, even to her, that it was no strength of mine. "But I think it will be different this
time, harder, with the might of the whole family behind it."
"But you will try." It isn't a question. She glows and the ring on her finger sports a diamond the size of an acorn.
"How could you knowingly choose them?" I ask. "I showed you everything. You know what it will be like." All my
anger at her betrayal is drained away with only curiosity left.
"To understand that, you will have to find my pool. I wasn't an empty husk, you know. I had a will, and a life of my
own to add to your soup." She smiles down at me lovingly, softening the impact of what she says, but it is all there
for me to finally understand. I am no different than my brothers, believing I know best for others, that without me
they are nothing; thinking they will surely choose what I choose and if they don't, they only need a little help to see
the light. She sees this new pain.
"Don't cry sister."
"Are my parents -- did the mirror break?" I ask, looking away.
"It shattered when you fell but Kratus is piecing it together. He believes it will mend."
"What have they planned for me?" I think now I deserve some awful punishment.
"They don't know. It has put the heavens in quite a whirl. Chrysostom wants you imprisoned forever but there are
other voices, whispering in his ear, for a softer approach. Your brothers fished me out of your pool and although
they didn't drink you in, like I did, they got wet enough. Given time, certain things will soak in. Many people heard
you disown the Golden-Mouthed One, and here you still are. It has made many of the lesser gods and goddesses
strangely brave. The Realm of the Gods will not remain unchanged when you leave us."
"When I leave you? They're not going to let me leave, that's for sure."
"But I am," Berdina says, putting my hand back on my own chest, and pulling Petr's sheepskin present from under
the bed. She lays it on my chest, over my folded arms, and tucks it in all around me, her dark hands ruffling the
fleece, smoothing it down again, working some kind of magic.
"But it is a gift," I protest as she begins to fade from view. "You're going to get in trouble with them, right from the
start."
"It's the trouble I choose then. That was your gift, Addie." I can't see her anymore. In her place there is a glimmer, a
glow and then a fire. A log snaps and a spark leaps toward me, landing on the sheepskin wrapped around me and
bursting into a little flame. I roll away, trying to extinguish it and bang my head against something hard in the process.
Above me somewhere, someone grunts and says, "Whaa?"
I stand up, throwing off the heavy rug and flinging myself on Petr who has just sat up in our bed. He gives an "oof"
and then clutches me to him, kissing my mouth, my nose, my missing eye. He pulls back, his fingers barely brushing
my bandages then traveling over my youthful face and body, both of us bathed in the glow of my immortality.
"Adelpha, what happened?" Concern fills his voice.
"Petr," I caress his cheek and his chin, his stubble scratching me, "don't worry for me. I was a fool. I stood up to
Chrys and I botched it all but something changed. Maybe everything."
"But you're hurt and you're young," he says, anger and confusion mingling in his eyes.
"I know," I sigh, nuzzling his neck, and drawing him off the bed toward the old rug (and the new one) in front of the
hearth. Wonderful man. I'll tell him all of it, here before the fire, of the battle I fought, in my own desperate way, of
what I learned about myself and how I gave a fine gift in the end. And received one. Then Petr, my love, and I will
celebrate the fact my bones no longer ache.
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