by Dan H Kind
Chapter 24
Sorrow, Hatred, Fire, Lamentation
Team Myth touched down on the bank of the Acheron. The long flight had been utterly uneventful, the utterly desolate and utterly boring landscape unworthy of utterance.
Hermes posed in heroic fashion, floating above their heads. “Well, my piz-eoples, I gotta biz-ounce outta this joint. Duty calls, ya dig? Trust me, though, it's been real.”
To Persephone, he said, “Catch you later, my favorite sister.”
He looked at Jack and said, “I'll be seeing you soon, blood-brother. You and me are made of the same soul-fiber, if ya know what I'm sprayin'.”
“Take it light, you crazy kids,” he added, addressing Tom and Becky—and then Hermes was gone, his flapping Air Jordans taking him into the sky and away.
While the others chatted of the upcoming Marsh crossing, Jack strolled over to take a closer look at the Acheron. The crystal-clear water of the River of Sorrow flowed past at a steady rate. Aside from the ashy, flora-less banks, it seemed just like any old Earthly river. But then he heard something coming from underneath the water.
He took a step closer, and the faint sound turned into millions of voices crying out in incoherent sorrow—the voices of devils, angels, lost gods, damned souls, hungry ghosts—all blubbering and blabbering and crying out with indescribable woe. Jack walked to the edge of the Acheron and looked down into the water.
Ghostly ovoids flitted through the River—distorted human faces with blurred visages locked in terrible, tortured expressions. These liquid specters were there for a moment and then gone, swept along by the current, but more unfailingly took their place. It was as if these watery wraiths recognized Jack, for he could make out, above the wailing, voices choked with anguish.
(Wesakaychak . . .) they breathed.
(Whiskey Jack, Jack Whiskey . . .) they gurgled.
(Save us . .) they hissed and bubbled.
(Sadness is our essence. Sorrow is our substance. Come, Trickster, touch the water, and save us from our fate. Reach out your hand. Touch the River. Save us from eternal suffering. Only you can break our bonds of sorrow. Save us, Wesakaychak. Save us, Trickster. Save usssssssssssssssssssss . . .)
Hearing the soul-penetrating sadness permeating the voices, Jack was about to do just that and touch the water (after all, it was a small thing to do to keep somebody from suffering in eternal torment) when he felt a delicate but firm touch on his arm.
“Don't do it, Jack,” said Stephone. “If you touch that water, you won't be saving anybody. You will merely join those shades that have merged with the Acheron, and share their fate: cursed to be the ghost of a memory, trapped forever more within the River of Sorrow.”
Jack froze, and his body trembled under some unseen stress. With considerable effort, he pulled his hand back. When he did so, a male voice with a rather watery sound to it exclaimed, (Godsdamnit! Foiled again!)
The voice died away, and Jack asked, “So does everything around here enchant you and/or try to trick you into joining it in its eternal suffering?”
Stephone laughed. “Yeah, just about. Nothing in the Underworld is what it seems. Hey, but if you move a little ways away from the shore, the weeping and wailing grows fainter.” They did just that, and Stephone added, “That last voice was the god Acheron, cursed to dwell in the Underworld as a hellish River. Acheron sided with the Titans during their battle with Zeus and the new gods for the cosmos—not as a fighter, but as a water-boy. He would bring water to quench the Titans' thirst after battle. Zeus figured it was a suitable punishment for him to be cursed to be a River for the rest of eternity for his so-called war crimes, since he was so fond of water.” She let out a hollow chuckle. “My father is quite the calculating, vindictive guy, huh?”
“Sure sounds like it,” said Jack, not sure how far he should take this line of conversation, considering this was her daddy they were talking about. “So where do we go from here?” he asked to change the subject.
She pointed downriver. “We follow the flow of the Acheron. A little ways down the River turns into foul, brackish Marshland, where the Cocytus and the Phlegethon meet the Styx and the Acheron. The Ferryman of the Dead is the only one who knows the correct route across the dangerous swamp, which is an amalgamation of all the hellish Underworld Rivers.”
Jack stared at the River of Sorrow, which had resumed its weeping and wailing and pleading, though now it cried and moaned with a bit less gusto, as if it had realized there was no hope with this group of travelers. “So are we ready to go? I like this depressing River less and less with each passing moment. It makes me want to cry just looking at it.”
“The Underworld is a very sad place,” said Stephone. “Except for the Elysian Fields, of course.”
“Yeah, you mentioned those before. What are they like?”
“They're like no other place in all the Worlds of Myth. And you will see them.” She grinned at him. “I'll take you there for a little R n' R after all of this is over.”
Jack hoped this would come to pass, and that this whole apocalyptic fiasco would be over soon. Despite being a goddess of death, Stephone pulled strings in his heart that he hadn't even known were there before he met her. He was looking forward to some alone time with her—the sooner, the better.
“All right, let's go,” said Stephone, clapping her hands. “We need to get across the Marsh.”
The companions murmured in agreement and walked on, following the flow of the weeping, wailing Acheron.
The Stygian Marsh bubbled and gurgled and sludged about, as if sentient and pissed off that it was what it was. A gray fog sat over the swamp, caressing the brackish water with the wispy kisses of a dead lover. Dessicated trees peppered the darker reaches of the bog, their leafless branches pointing askance like the dry, cracked fingers of skeletons. A familiar sobbing grated against the mind: the million voices of the Acheron, the River of Sorrow. Other voices howled in anger, cursing in dead, forgotten languages: the Styx, the River of Hatred. Fires burned upon the Marsh, sometimes ignting a tree, which would flare up as though doused in gasoline and burn a sickly green-orange: the Phlegethon, the River of Fire. Bloodless arms reached up from the morass—rotting, decayed, pockmarked—upon which were scores of blinking eyes and gaping mouths that gnashed their teeth and spoke of dark, mournful deeds committed long ago: the Cocytus, the River of Lamentation.
Over the general cacophony, it was impossible to make out any specific yells, wails or sobs.
Up ahead, Jack observed a boat made of gnarled, twisted black wood pulling into a rickety dock that jutted out from the shoreline. The craft was nothing more than a large black canoe with a rippling black sail of intestine-like sinew, unadorned with insignia.
As ferry approached shore, a murmur, like a foul wind of death, ran through the assembled shades.
(Passssssage . . .)
(Passssssssssssage . . .)
(Passssssssssssssssssage . . .)
There seemed to be a billion of the immaterial beings milling about the Marsh's bank, awaiting passage across the water to Judgment.
“Jeez, that's a lot of shades,” said Jack. “I'm surprised so many people still end up here. I kind of figured this old Underworld was a bit out of vogue on the afterlife scene these days.”
“Oh, it is,” said Stephone. “But the King of the Dead has a deal worked out with fundamentalist Christian hell—which is seriously overcrowded with all those Hindus, pagans, Jews, Buddhists, Muslims, atheists, and the like—to take on souls. It's similar to the state of Virginia agreeing to take in criminals from overcrowded Texas prisons for a fee.”
Jack remained silent for a long moment. “Ye gods. Really?”
Stephone smiled. “No, just kidding.”
Jack ginned at her. Stephone's eyes sparkled as she looked ahead. “Now let's get over there to Charon before he departs for the far shore. Of course, he'll know I'm coming when he sees Herby.”
The rat-sized pup had jumped from Steph
one's sleeve and now scampered along the shore, yipping and yapping and dodging shades, her eyes locked on the figure of the boatman and his dark vessel.
“What kind of dog is that, anyways?” asked Jack. “It can't weight more than ten pounds.”
“Six pounds, thirteen ounces, actually,” said Stephone. “She's a Sleeve Pekingese.”
To get to the dock they had to walk through the mass of shades. Jack put up a halfhearted complaint or two, then held Stephone's hand and allowed himself to be led through the writhing, whispering darkness. It was weird, because the shades would drift around them like smoke and reform behind after Team Myth passed. They soon broke through the sea of the departed and walked up to the dock.
“Charon!” said Stephone. “How have you been, old friend? I see you have once again appropriated my little Herby as your own.”
Charon smiled at Stephone from the boat (Jack shuddered). He stroked the dog behind the ears, and Herby's tail wagged as if possessed by demons of blissful happiness. He whispered to Herby, talking in a baby-voice, steadily handing the pup tiny bacon and egg shaped dog-biscuits. “Oo're so cute, Herby, I could just eat oo right on up!”
The Ferryman of the Dead wore a hooded black cassock and clutched a gondolier's stick in his pasty fingers. His skin was tinted bluish-gray. He had the hooked nose of a vulture, long pointy ears, and tusks that jutted from his lower lip to the cheeks of his mottled face. Burning red eyes were buried within bushy black eyebrows, which merged into a tangled mass of beard on his cheeks. A pair of dagger-like horns poked from his forehead, reaching upwards to the featureless Hades sky.
Jack was indeed expecting Charon at any moment to pop Herby into his mouth like a tiny canine hors d'oeuvre, a Pekingese amuse bouche.
The waterlogged wood squished under their feet as Team Myth strolled onto the dock. The shades remained onshore, as if they had to be invited to step onto the rotten wooden planking.
Charon planted his stick in the mud and tied off the boat. From the craft, he bowed to Stephone, arose, and grinned (the bile in Jack's throat rose). “My Queen, it is good to see you. And Herby, of course. Cerby and I miss her—and yourself, as well—greatly.”
“I know, old friend. I'm truly sorry, but you know my situation.”
“I know, I know,” sighed Charon. “It's just that I miss my widdle puppy-wuppy when she's gone!” He cooed at Herby for a while. Then he seemed to remember there were others present and glanced up at Jack, Tom, and Becky with curious eyes (Jack restrained himself from crossing his fingers to ward off evil). “And who are your fine-looking friends?”
Introductions were made. Despite his repulsive appearance, Charon seemed like a real nice guy.
“How can I assist you, my Queen?” inquired the Ferryman. “Do you need to borrow some money? All I've got is loose quarters, but I've got a galactic landfill's worth of 'em stashed away in a hole in Tartarus. You can have as many as you want. They'll give you cash for 'em if you roll 'em up and take 'em to the bank. Me, I just don't have the time for that sort of thing.” He sighed. “No, I must ferry these shades across the Marsh—back and forth, back and forth, forever and ever, until this World fades away into the Void.”
“No, no, Charon, it's nothing like that,” said Stephone, bemused. “We just need to get across the Marsh.”
Charon's face fell, causing his beady black eyes to vanish into the skin-folds on his face. “Oh,” he said in a disappointed voice. “Is that all? I should've known. Nobody ever comes just to visit with me.”
“Maybe next time, old friend. So can you take us across?”
The Ferryman of the Dead shrugged. “Sure.”
A heartfelt smile broke across Stephone's face. “Thank you, Charon. I knew we could count on you. Next time I need a dog-sitter, you know I'm calling you.”
Charon bowed with a flourish, black robes swirling. “Then step aboard my dark vessel, my friends. The shades can wait here for all I care. In the broad scope of things, to them a few more hours is like a single grain of sand that drifts through the endless waters of the Ocean of Myth.”
Team Myth boarded the boat.
“Y'know, Mister Charon, I'm a boatman meself,” said Tom Sawyer, looking around the vessel with approval. “I'd love to come down here sometime and ride the Rivers of the Underworld! Now, d'you think that can be arranged?”
Charon was quiet for a moment, then gladness dawned on his face like a sunrise over hell. “I think that could be arranged.” He peered at Tom with an appraising eye. “I knew from the start you were a river-man. You've got the look—and I've read your books.”
The two river-men began a conversation that soon became incomprehensible to those listening in (except for Becky Thatcher, who knew all about nautical-talk).
Cursed to wait until at least the next departure, the shades hissed mournfully as the dark vessel pulled away from the dock and sailed into the swamp. Although the companions felt no wind upon their faces, the sinewy black sail puffed out as if filled with the ocean breeze.
The dead arms jutting from the murk reached towards those on board the ferry, shrieking curses, attempting to drag them down into the inky water, to come and join them in their torment. All business now, Charon whacked the arms with his gondola, jabbing them in the eyes with expert blows. The mouths let out terrible shrieks when the eyes were poked, but the Boatman was unperturbed by the wailing. The Phlegethon raged in front of them, next to them, all around them. Charon inhaled and breathed out, and a frosty mist exited his mouth and spread out across the swamp. Where the breath encountered the flames, the fire would hiss and transform into stinking, slimy vapor that spread across the morass and coated you from head to toe.
Jack envied the body-less, matter-less, substance-less shades, who did not have to feel the residue of Sorrow, Hatred, Fire, and Lamentation clinging to them. He breathed the swamp-gas into his lungs, and it settled onto his skin and was absorbed into his pores to be sweat out, spat out, breathed out, shat out. The miasma seared into his guts like hot steam, branding his innards with its foul sigil. It amalgamated itself to his organs and began devouring, taking over cells like a cancer, becoming his blood, his guts, his heart, his flesh, his bones, his soul.
Sorrow. Hatred. Fire. Lamentation.
His soul in a nutshell.
Silent amidst a sea of sound, fury, and fire, Team Myth sailed on through the Stygian Marsh, guided by the Ferryman of the Dead.